Jeremy and Jana settled down on his couch and began to watch the episode on Psychi’s family.

———————

…

About five minutes into the episode, an image of Jeremy and Psychi’s old house appeared.

“Psychi herself offered to give us a tour of her house, and, of course, we took up the offer.”

-

“Huh, your house used to be bigger,” Jana commented.

“Yeah,” Jeremy said. “But that was mostly just because mom liked it that way. We don’t need the space with just Psi and me.”

“Small houses for big people…”

-

A young girl with light brown hair hovered over her home’s doorway. The sound of cars could be heard from the camera’s speaker, signaling that it was on a city block. Her home was large, and three stories tall. She smiled at the camera, bouncing up and down hurriedly. “Okay, can I start?” she asked with a bright smile.

-

Jana thought Psychi was adorable as a kid, but refused to complement her in any way.

-

“Sure, go ahead,” the cameraman said.

“Awesome! So…this is my home,” she said, motioning to it as the camera panned around, showing how expensive it was. “Umm…we have a backyard-we grow berries back there-and I also wanted a hedge maze in the front, but mom said that was too big…” she said with disappointment. The door then opened behind her.

And, behind it was a woman in her late thirties with a confused expression. She had the same hair color as Psychi, and was fairly tall. She was wearing pajamas. “Umm…O-oh jeez!” she said, closing the door a little to hide her bedwear. “Psi! You said they were coming on Thursday!”

“Isn’t today Thursday?” Psychi asked.

“No, it’s Tuesday!” the other woman said.

“But it’s the third day of the week…” she complained.

“Psi…that’s Tuesday.”

“O-oh. I messed that up…”

There was the sound of the older woman’s slippered footsteps moving across wooden boards.

“Well,” Psychi said, pushing the door open again. “anyway, that’s my mom. My dad isn’t here right now, cause’ he’s busy with a client.”

-

“So that was your mom, huh?” Jana said.

“Yeah. She kept Psychi and me in check as kids. Our dad didn’t need to work, but he wanted to use our wealth for good and all that.”

“You make it sound like a bad idea.” She chuckled.

“It ended up being one.” Jeremy said stoically.

“What do you m…” Jana trailed off, realizing vaguely what was being implied.

-

She led the cameraman indoors, where she began showing off her different rooms.

“This is the foyer, and those are our stairs. We have three stories.” There was a small cut.

“Then this is the dining room,” she said, motioning to a room with a tiled floor and large table. “Sometimes the rest of the family comes over and we eat. Mom says they’re all money-hungry, though, so they haven’t come over in a while.”

It jumped to another room with sofas and chairs, as well as a carpeted floor. A young boy leaned against a couch, sitting on the floor as he played a game on the TV, which hung over a fireplace. He looked up at the two after a second. Strangely, while his hair was naturally darker than Psychi’s, it also had black highlights. Once he saw the camera, his face spontaneously turned into a wide, unnerving smile. “What’s up?” he said with a high pitch and tilted head.

“That’s my creepy brother,” Psychi said, before floating down to his level then massaging his cheeks. “Stooop smiiling so creepy, JerJer!”

“Ooookwwaay??” he said through his squished face. When the older girl flew back, his face was neutral. There was a hint of edge to the expression, though it was difficult to put a finger on how.

-

“Yep, that’s a creepy smile,” Jana commented.

“Yeesh, I knew I was bad back then, but I can’t defend myself,” he admitted. “That looked baad.”

-

Psychi looked back to the camera. “He plays games all the time in here.” She then flew to the kitchen, connected to the TV room.

While she did, the camera flitted between Jeremy and the TV as the cameraman asked, “What’re you playing?” curiously.

“I like Halo: Psi-Rings,” he said, his pitch low and somewhat monotonous. “Mom lets me play it when dad isn’t home.” The game on-screen showed his character standing idly over the bodies of a few aliens, a pistol in his hand. It was a hit game, at the time, but it definitely wasn’t for seven-year-olds. Jeremy continued playing it, paying the cameraman no heed. The scene lingered a little while Psychi entered the edge of the frame, looking between the camera and game with a curious expression. She didn’t seem particularly impatient, though.

Jeremy actually showed impressive skills as he played, the video jumping to different points where he made quick decisions in difficult situations, eventually clearing the level by the skin of his teeth. A caption played at the top stating, {He was playing on legendary difficulty, a difficulty that even skilled adults struggle with.}

-

“I guess that’s meant to be impressive?” Jana said questioningly.

Jeremy shrugged. “I was good at games back then, yeah.”

“But not now?”

“I’m decent,” he said with a shrug. “I guess I lost my edge.

-

The camera jumped forward to Psychi showing off their kitchen, where she offered the cameraman and Jeremy an already heated hot pocket. They both accepted, so they were flung into their hands straight from the microwave. It was too hot for the latter, and he accidentally dropped it.

When Jeremy picked it up after it fell down, cupping his hands over the paper surrounding it, Psychi said, “Eww! We can just make another…”

“I don’t like wasting food,” he said simply, his expression still neutral as he nibbled onto the very slightly dirtied food. “Rich girl…” he muttered.

-

Jana restrained a chuckle. “Aren’t you rich too? What’s that weird jab at your sister about?”

“Hmm…honestly, I have no clue.”

-

From there, Jeremy followed them as they walked outside. There were three lines of berry bushes in their backyard.

“And these are our berry bushes!” Psychi said, orbiting the yard excitedly. “We started growing them three years ago, so they are three years old! Did you know that Loganberries are actually blackberry rasberries?”

Jeremy sighed, though his rolling eyes were faced away from the camera.

“No, I didn’t,” the cameraman said.

“Well they are! Oh, and also, bushes are perennial plants, so they don’t die after spring?”

“Nope, not at all. I haven’t heard of that before.”

“And also, we do all our harvesting during spring, so we get tons of berries, and we make jam! Oooh, we still have jam! Do you wanna try a Jam sandwich?”

“Nah, I’m full for now. How about after your tour?”

“Okay!”

-

“Oooh, a jam sandwich doesn’t sound too bad, eh?” Jana said, elbowing Jeremy gently.

“Were my noodles not good enough for you?”

“Nope~I want mooooore!”

-

The video jump cut a few times as the cameraman got some good shots of the plants, then he walked up the stairs with Psychi, where her mother was dressed up, and met the cameraman as Psychi showed him a small closet filled with tabletop games.

“H-hello, I’m Marci, I’m Psychi’s mother,” she said. “Nice to meet you.”

She shook hands with the cameraman, and it cut to a scene of her standing in the backyard.

“Once we learned that Psi was a super-psychic, her father and I decided I’d be a stay at home mom,” she said. It subtly cut. “I take care of her and Jeremy. Both of them can be real handfuls, but Psi really needs attention, you know?”

Then it cut back.

“And this is our storage room,” Psychi said, showing off a room of shelves filled with boxes. Everything was neatly stacked. In fact, most of the house was really clean.

It cut again to a guest room, then to a large bathroom, where Psychi showed off their jacuzzi.

“What?” Marci said, shrugging as it cut back to the interview of her outside. “Who gets rich then doesn’t buy a jacuzzi?” After another subtle cut, she began to say, “Well, I wasn’t always rich. Psi is the only reason we are, and a few years ago, we got enough to buy this house.” There was another small cut. “You know, if your kid is strong enough to redirect a nuclear missile, you get rich pretty quick. The government pampers you, too.” Cut again. “I’m just glad they didn’t take her away from us, like some other governments do.”

The narrator’s deep voice butted in as a slideshow of infant super psychics flashed by. “Some governments take super psychics away from their families. Most infamously is the Chinese government, who institutionalized the practice in a government-created program known as the ‘Greater Care Program’ after their large population birthed three such psychics, citing the children as ‘assets of the state’. This makes them a superpower on par with the United States, which houses two super psychics, one of whom works for the state. Canada, Psychi’s birthplace, also houses a psychic that was born only a month after her, Jana Pontoon, who is well known as the child to Marcus Pontoon, the CEO of the rising sports and psychic guild giant, Psychic League. It is speculated that Canada could become a superpower on par with Russia if either of the children were enlisted to their psychic forces later in their lives, although the government hasn’t shown any public interest in coercing them to do so.”

-

“HA! That never happened,” Jana said. She clasped her hands together. “Also, rest in peace my Russian brethren.”

“Russian bretheren?”

“The super psychic in Russia. He got, uhh…” She glanced to the side, regretful. “Cut in two.”

“Ouch.”

-

The small info-slideshow faded back into Psychi floating up the stairs, the cameraman behind.

It then quickly cut to her opening a door with sparkly, pink, glittery decorations, which looked like confetti plastered on it. “This is my room,” she said, revealing a room with a bulletin board on the other end, decorated just like the door, but with photos of nice-looking landscapes and flowers posted into it.

She first walked to the board. “This is where I put pictures of the cool things I find when I fly around,” she explained, before gesturing to a nice, small camera with a satchel strap on it. “Mom got me a camera for Christmas so I could show her the photos.” She then moved to the dresser and patted the top of an orchid, which grew on it. “And this is Marry, my orchid. Mom said I could only have one plant in my room, which is stupid, cause’ I’d never break a living thing on accident.” Then, Psychi pointed to her bed, which looked mostly unused. “Apparently its weird, but I don’t use my bed. Mom says I have to float over it when I sleep, though.”

“Float?” the cameraman said confusedly.

“Yeah, I fly in my sleep. I also sleepsoar sometimes. Once, I flew to a ice cream shop in America while I slept.”

“Whacky. Is that really safe?”

“Yeah. But sometimes I cause…my dad calls it ‘collateral damage’.”

It cut back to her mom in the garden. “Psychi has always been difficult to handle. You know, there’s a lot of books on how to handle children, but none of them talk about how to handle kids who can pretty easily tear down the house if they get a bit too angry. I’m just happy she was always relatively autonomous. She’s a really smart kid. But even then, I always need to keep an eye on her. You can never really be sure what she’s thinking.”

It cut to Psychi pointing to a poster of a famous music artist on her wall. “Oh, and that’s Justin Beaver. He’s super hot.”

There was an awkward pause as the cameraman silently moved the camera between the ten-year-old and the poster.

“You think I’m weird, don’t you!” she said annoyedly. “All the other girls love him!”

It cut back to her mother. “She also started reading minds recently, and I have no idea what to do about that. Like, how do you handle a kid who knows what you’re thinking? She keeps asking me weird questions, too! How am I supposed to answer her when she asks what **** is?! Who the hell was even thinking about that?!”

“Well, that explains some things,” the cameraman noted. “Also, I totally feel your pain.”

“Thanks…” she said tiredly.

-

Jana nodded. “Relatable cameraman.”

-

It cut to the front of Jeremy’s door, which had a blackboard hung from it that said in a very pleasant font, “No girls allowed.” He stood in front of it and said, “Umm, so this is my room,” as he opened the door. Psychi tried to casually go inside, but he placed his hands on her face and pushed her away. “No, no girls allowed!” he said. “They ruin everything.”

Psychi crossed her arms, pouting. “I just want to see your room…” she muttered.

He let the cameraman in, who panned about it. The room was painted black, with a bed with black sheets, a black desk, dresser, and more. “Dad didn’t like me paining the wall black, but Psi painted it for me, so he couldn’t do anything about it,” he explained.

“Wow, you really like black,” the camerman said.

“Uh-huh. Oh, I also have a pet,” he said, pointing to a small terrarium on his desk. The camera zoomed toward the sandy inside, where a tarantula was eating one cricket of a few scattered about it, its body half-buried in the sand. “That’s A…Free is his name. I like spiders. He’s very nice.”

-

“You named your spider Free?”

Jeremy frowned. “Yeah…I did. He’s still in my room, you know.”

“Oh, seriously? I missed that.”

“Uh-huh.” He quickly paused the video, then dashed to his room, walking out a moment later with the same tarantula in his palm. He then sat back down, holding it toward Jana. “See?”

“Aww,” Jana said, holding out her hand. It walked forward onto it. “It’s so cute!”

“See! Nobody else gets it.”

Jana began petting the spider with a dumb smile as the video resumed.

-

As the camera zoomed out, Jeremy opened the top, then scooped up the spider rather casually before presenting it to the cameraman.

“Do you want to hold him?” he asked.

“Uhh…will he bite me?” The cameraman sounded nervous.

“No. I trust him. Besides, a tarantula wouldn’t really hurt.”

“Sure, but…” he began to argue before just setting down the camera on the bed. His face was just out of view as Jeremy passed the tarantula over to the other hand, the spider walking forward without much prompting.

Jeremy began gently petting the spider with affection. It didn’t seem to mind. “Do you want to pet him?”

“I-I think I’m good, you can take him back.”

He took it back, then plopped it in his cage, but not before saying, “It’s important you see who is a threat and who won’t hurt you. A tarantula may be scary, but he won’t hurt you. So is my sister, but she wouldn’t either. Once you know who to trust, life becomes a lot easier.”

“Uhh, thanks for the life advice?”

The scene cut to his mother. “Jeremy’s a weird kid. Psi is one thing, she’s a great girl, but she’s also a pretty normal girl. She likes the same things other girls like, like fashion and celebrities and stuff. I…well, I know I’m contradicting myself, but I can tell what Psychi is thinking…not so much Jeremy.”

-

Jana paused. “I have to ask, how come Psychi doesn’t go by Psi anymore?”

He clicked his tongue without much care. “Because dad is dead. He named her.”

“O-oh…” Jana said, though she seemed more confused than sorry at bringing it up. She knew Jeremy’s parents wasn’t that much of a sore spot for him, but he addressed it casually. She was similar in the way she usually referred to her father, but…even by those standards he seemed unperturbed.

“He was a silly guy. Once his baby started floating, he said the dumbest name imaginable, and it kinda just sticked, not like I was there to see it. So…her name is a memento, you know?”

“Hmm…” Jana remained silent, wondering how Psychi and Jeremy could even be related, what with their wholly different outlooks on life and mental fortitudes.

-

As the show unpaused, it cut back. “Did you know that black is the absence of color?” Jeremy said after his little life lesson.

“Yeah, I did,” the cameraman said, raising up the camera again.

“But that’s not really true,” he suddenly said. “Black is never black. Nothing is really black except black holes and…other things like that.”

“Uh-huh…”

“Also, even if there were black things, they would still reflect the light we can’t see. And even then, anything with heat sometimes lets out particles of light. So really, you would need something entirely black at absolute zero to make it really black.”

“Cool.”

He looked down, somber. “Do you think a soul can be black?”

“Erm…what do you mean?” the cameraman said, his voice cautious as the childish enthusiasm took a nosedive into an uncanny question.

“If we call bad people’s souls black…are they really…” he paused. “Can they really be black?”

“I-I don’t know, kid,” the cameraman said. “Probably not.”

“Hmm. I don’t know either.”

It cut back to his mom. “He asks a lot of things. He’s really curious, and he’s really smart, but he always says the weirdest things. He also has weird tastes. Once, I bought dates at the supermarket, and ever since then he’s asked me to buy them whenever Psi takes me out. We have him in an IEP program, for kids with special needs, because he has trouble expressing himself. He doesn’t have trouble with anything else, though.” She paused. “Umm…he also used to be a violent to the other kids when he was really young. I’d rather not talk about that, though.”

-

“Bro,” Jana said, pausing. “You’re creepy as fuck as a kid.”

He nodded slowly with a smug twist of his face. “You think?”

“Like, the heck are you talking about?”

“I wish I knew, girl. I was a bit of an edgelord.”

“Bro, that’s not edgelord, that’s legit creepy. What kid goes around asking if souls can be black?”

“Me.”

“I think that response misses the point…” She shook her head. “Whatever. Anyway, are you seriously not gonna cry or somethin’?”

“I said I’d be fine,” he said. “Do you want me to cry?”

“Nah, but…” she glanced to the side. “I cry when I watch my dad’s old interviews.”

“So you’re…salty that I don’t?”

She didn’t comment on that.

“Sounds like a L plus ratio plus single child plus fatherless behavior problem to me,” he said with a shrug…

before Jana wrapped around an arm around his shoulder, dragged him into the side of her chest, then knuckled his crown.