Read Online Gifted Touch by Melinda Metz - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Melinda Metz
Tags: General, Family, Juvenile Fiction, Social Issues, Mysteries & Detective Stories, Teenage girls, Telepathy, 9780060092382 9780064472654 0064472655, HarperTeen, Extrasensory Perception
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admitted that sometimes the thoughts really seemed to come from other people, especially thoughts about her.
That’s part of what paranoiac delusions are, Rae.
You’re imagining that people must be thinking these things of you, and so you’re projecting the thoughts onto them — in your own head.
Rae leaned back and rubbed her forehead. Maybe some sort of exorcism would be useful, she thought.
“Would you like to stop for a Slurpee on the way?” her father asked.
“No, thanks. Not unless you want one,” Rae said.
She turned her head toward the window so he couldn’t see the film of tears coating her eyes. Would he ever stop offering her stuff in that hopeful, eager voice?
“I’m not really a Slurpee person. Although I like the word. Slurpee. Slurrrpeee. It’s onomatopoetic, don’t you think?” her dad asked. “The word slurp sounds like the sound that you make when you slurp.” 78
Oh God. He’s slipped into educational mode, Rae thought. She gave a couple of blinks, and her eyes cleared up.
They were still about fifteen minutes away from Oakvale. She was not going to be able to take this.
“Dad, what was Mom like when you went to visit her in the hospital?”
Oh my God, she thought. She had so not been intending to ask that. All she’d wanted to do was change the subject, and the Mom question had come spewing out. Rae shot a glance at her dad. He didn’t seem upset. He looked like he was giving her question careful consideration.
“She was very much herself,” he finally answered.
“Although sometimes the medication they had her on made her a little . . . dulled. Your mother, usually she sparkled.” He reached out and briefly touched Rae’s face. “You sparkle, too, sometimes.” How to sparkle. Step one—go insane, Rae thought.
Not an article soon to appear in Self magazine.
“We had some wonderful conversations when I would visit,” her father continued, his voice the slightest bit thick. “We talked about you a lot, of course. She wanted to know every single detail. Every burp. Every smile. But we’d talk about philosophical questions, too, the way we had when we were dating.” He loved her so much, Rae thought. That was clear 79
every time he talked about her. Every time Rae let him talk about her. She knew he’d talk about her more if Rae didn’t go into shark-attack mode when he did, reminding him what this goddess had done.
“Did you ever have any sense that something was wrong? Before what happened, I mean,” Rae asked.
She usually hated talking about her mom. But this was info she needed now.
“No,” he answered immediately. “Not really,” he added, his words coming slowly. “Except that near the . . . the time, she seemed agitated. She was ecstatic because you had just been born. But I knew she was worried about something. She wouldn’t tell me what.
She never did, not even afterward, when she was in the hospital.”
He shot a glance at Rae, his blue eyes unusually intense. “I think she was protecting me from something. She was like that, always putting other people first.”
Rae focused all her attention on adjusting the air-conditioner vent in front of her. If it helped Dad to be delusional, maybe she shouldn’t burst his pretty bub-ble.
“I didn’t want to push her. Not when she was in the hospital. I thought there would be plenty of time for her to tell me what was bothering her. But then, a few months after she was institutionalized, she got 80
sick. Her body began to deteriorate. It happened so rapidly that her doctors weren’t able to diagnose her before she died,” he continued. “And I never got to . .
. We never got to really talk again.” Her father grabbed his sunglasses off the dashboard and put them on, but not before Rae saw the tears in his eyes.
“They wanted to do an autopsy,” he continued. “But I wouldn’t give them permission. I just . . . I couldn’t.” Her father wiped his face with the sleeve of his white
That’s part of what paranoiac delusions are, Rae.
You’re imagining that people must be thinking these things of you, and so you’re projecting the thoughts onto them — in your own head.
Rae leaned back and rubbed her forehead. Maybe some sort of exorcism would be useful, she thought.
“Would you like to stop for a Slurpee on the way?” her father asked.
“No, thanks. Not unless you want one,” Rae said.
She turned her head toward the window so he couldn’t see the film of tears coating her eyes. Would he ever stop offering her stuff in that hopeful, eager voice?
“I’m not really a Slurpee person. Although I like the word. Slurpee. Slurrrpeee. It’s onomatopoetic, don’t you think?” her dad asked. “The word slurp sounds like the sound that you make when you slurp.” 78
Oh God. He’s slipped into educational mode, Rae thought. She gave a couple of blinks, and her eyes cleared up.
They were still about fifteen minutes away from Oakvale. She was not going to be able to take this.
“Dad, what was Mom like when you went to visit her in the hospital?”
Oh my God, she thought. She had so not been intending to ask that. All she’d wanted to do was change the subject, and the Mom question had come spewing out. Rae shot a glance at her dad. He didn’t seem upset. He looked like he was giving her question careful consideration.
“She was very much herself,” he finally answered.
“Although sometimes the medication they had her on made her a little . . . dulled. Your mother, usually she sparkled.” He reached out and briefly touched Rae’s face. “You sparkle, too, sometimes.” How to sparkle. Step one—go insane, Rae thought.
Not an article soon to appear in Self magazine.
“We had some wonderful conversations when I would visit,” her father continued, his voice the slightest bit thick. “We talked about you a lot, of course. She wanted to know every single detail. Every burp. Every smile. But we’d talk about philosophical questions, too, the way we had when we were dating.” He loved her so much, Rae thought. That was clear 79
every time he talked about her. Every time Rae let him talk about her. She knew he’d talk about her more if Rae didn’t go into shark-attack mode when he did, reminding him what this goddess had done.
“Did you ever have any sense that something was wrong? Before what happened, I mean,” Rae asked.
She usually hated talking about her mom. But this was info she needed now.
“No,” he answered immediately. “Not really,” he added, his words coming slowly. “Except that near the . . . the time, she seemed agitated. She was ecstatic because you had just been born. But I knew she was worried about something. She wouldn’t tell me what.
She never did, not even afterward, when she was in the hospital.”
He shot a glance at Rae, his blue eyes unusually intense. “I think she was protecting me from something. She was like that, always putting other people first.”
Rae focused all her attention on adjusting the air-conditioner vent in front of her. If it helped Dad to be delusional, maybe she shouldn’t burst his pretty bub-ble.
“I didn’t want to push her. Not when she was in the hospital. I thought there would be plenty of time for her to tell me what was bothering her. But then, a few months after she was institutionalized, she got 80
sick. Her body began to deteriorate. It happened so rapidly that her doctors weren’t able to diagnose her before she died,” he continued. “And I never got to . .
. We never got to really talk again.” Her father grabbed his sunglasses off the dashboard and put them on, but not before Rae saw the tears in his eyes.
“They wanted to do an autopsy,” he continued. “But I wouldn’t give them permission. I just . . . I couldn’t.” Her father wiped his face with the sleeve of his white
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