I’ve never really been anything special, the only time I’ve ever been really good at something was dance, and that’s when I was eight. I ended up quitting though, and seven years later, I’m still as boring as I was when I quit dance. I have the usual schedule of a seventeen-year-old, school, home, and occasionally my best friend Kelly will come over and we’ll watch a movie or something. She always seems to enjoy watching movies more then I do. Reason being is I’m deaf. Reading subtitles isn't really the most fun ever.

Don’t feel bad or anything, I don’t really know what it’s like not to be. I suppose my mother is to blame, she’s the one who went and brought me to some gypsy when I was still a baby. She was odd like that when I was young, thinking a gypsy could help me life a very long life or something. I know my mother wanted the best for me, but it didn’t really work out. The gypsy took my hearing and gave me a new sense. My mother doesn’t want to accept it (thinks I’m crazy, or she’s going crazy, one of the two), but I can hear people’s thoughts.

It kind of makes a little sense when you think about it. You know how people who are blind (or deaf) have a fantastic sense of smell or taste or whatever? Well the gypsy took my hearing and with her extraordinary powers gave me an ability to hear people’s thoughts, as opposed to people’s voices. My mother tried to get my hearing back, bringing me to all sorts of doctors, but we’ve found nothing can help.

Hearing other’s thoughts isn’t always fun. I try not to dwell too much on a bad thought, or a mean person, but sometimes it does hurt. I lose a lot of friends when I find out what they really think of me. Which is ok, because I’ve got Kelly. Kelly is the only person I’ve meet that hasn’t once had a horrible thought. Really the nicest girl ever, I’m very lucky to have met her. Kelly knows sign language because of her deaf little brother, so that helped us become closer friends. Don’t even have to break out the old pen and paper like I do my other friends, the few I do have.

Kelly is also the only other person besides my mother and myself that knows about my ability. I was nervous when I told her about a year ago. She of course was shocked and couldn't believe it, as most people would react. I proved it with a few simple games of 'what color am I thinking of' and after that she was surprisingly excited. She thought it was super cool I could hear thoughts. It took a few months to get over the fact that yes, I knew what the check out guy was thinking and what the old women standing behind us in line was thinking. Kelly hasn't told a soul either, just as I asked her. Mostly because I don't want to be seen as a freak.

But I’m pretty normal and boring besides all that, trust me. I’m about as plain as you can get. Mud brown eyes and hair, normal height of about 5’5’’ and relatively pale skin, though I can get a wicked tan in the summer. I recently got a new haircut, it's kind of cute I suppose, with bangs hanging over my forehead and a bob like cut that is about a half a inch about my shoulder. I’m not good at anything (excluding dance) and I’m not tremendously smart. Just average.

All of this I pondered while washing my hands. I stopped concentrating on my image in the bathroom mirror long enough to hear Kelly think, ‘Jessica is taking a while in the bathroom, is she OK?’ What did I tell you? Most innocent thoughts ever.

I stepped out of the bathroom, and signed to her to start the movie. We were watching some chick flick again, Kelly’s favorite. I let my thoughts wonder again.

School is starting again tomorrow, my summer break is over. My senior year, which is pretty exciting I guess, after this year I’m outta here. I’m going to some place hot, like Florida or even California. Anything is better then chilly Wisconsin. Getting though this year will be a breeze. Maybe for once the first day of school wont be so bad.

I woke up the next morning feeling the dread pour in. School. I couldn’t believe I felt like it would be a good day when it’s the first day back. Of course it’s going to be horrible, everyone thinking crazy thoughts all at once, it gets hard to block it all out sometimes (even with ear plugs).

I finished getting ready anyways and took a walk to the kitchen down the hall. My mother was sitting with coffee and watching the news. I knocked on the kitchen door-frame to let her know I was there. She waved hello without turning around. I grabbed my self a breakfast bar and knocked on the way out too, she waved goodbye, still watching the news.

‘Those poor kids…’ she was thinking, meaning another disaster on the news. My mother was addicted to it, I’ve never understood why.

Kelly usually picked my up in the morning because I wasn’t allowed to drive. My mother didn’t think it was safe, in reality being able to hear driver’s thoughts was the safest way to drive I believed, but whatever. Kelly came roaring around the corner, and pulled into the driveway. She had the base on really loud, so much so I could feel it from the front door. I got in and said good morning to Kelly. She gave me a smile before she threw the car into reverse and we were off to school.

My school was really quite small. I begged my mom to let me go to one; big schools gave me headaches with all the students everywhere. 300 students was still a lot to handle while they dance inside my head, but I can deal. Kelly and I walked in together and even before reaching the doors I could hear a buzz of excitement among the female population. More then the usual ‘Brett got a super hot hair cut’ or ‘I just saw Jason without a shirt’. I could feel the males in our school radiate jealousy at their girls swooning over some guy. Some guy named Wes. That's about all I could hear before Kelly dragged me into homeroom.

Kelly and I exchanged schedules; we had four out of seven classes together, including lunch. We grinned at each other before sitting down in out seats. Kelly began to sign/talk about Jeff, her latest crush. Jeff was our friend I would say, he sits with a lunch at least, and we saw him a few times this summer. Kelly just recently noticed that he was cute. They would be good together I had decided long ago. Both had identical thoughts on a lot of things. It was always great when I could hear them think in unison.

Kelly stopped talking and I noticed the boring thoughts of a teacher walk into the room.

‘These kids are too loud, they need to learn some manners, when I was a teenager I would never…’ Mr. Taay had some very boring thoughts, I tell you.

The girls sitting behind me were much more interesting. I concentrated on listening to them.

‘I hear this Wes guy is really hot’ a blonde girl named Brittany thought.

‘I heard Wes has been in Jail’ Brittany’s friend Sara pondered.

This was all very interesting but it seemed not one of them had actually seen this Wes guy. I kept looking for a mental picture but they’re all different. Wes had green hair, no red, he was black, he was very pale, he looked like Orlando Bloom, no, Johnny Depp. These girls couldn’t make up their minds.

This went on for four periods, I tried talking to Kelly about this new kid, but she knew even less then I did about him. No one really seemed to know who this kid was, or what he looked like. Not for certain at least. Most seemed just as happy to think of him as their own personal Romeo.

It wasn’t until lunch I saw him. I sat down with Jeff and Kelly as they talked about some new movie coming out as far as I could tell. I chewed on my carrots and let thoughts flow into my head. It could be alarming sometimes but I wanted to know more about this Wes kid. I’m curious, always curious.

My head was starting to hurt, and I was about to give up before I heard a very excited thought cross my mind.

‘Oh my god!’ a girl mentally shrieked ‘That’s him isn’t it? It has to be him, I haven’t seen him around before, he’s so hot!’

I looked around and found the direction the thought was pouring from. A little freshman was staring at the lunch line.

There he was, Wes, standing in line to get French fries and a coke. Personally, I thought he was cute, but not really anything special. He had black hair that was cut in a nice short haircut, he was tall, and really kind of resembled a model for some store in the mall. One thing interesting was he had a small scar going over the right side of his lips. Just a line, above his lips on the right and stopped a little after passing his bottom lip.

That was kind of cute, I had to admit, and the kind of thing that made me want to know what it was from. I watched him for a bit longer, content for the moment knowing the face that was stirring half the schools population.

I had just turned back to my lunch before I heard something that made my heart jump, a cold rush flew though me, and I stopped breathing. There was a sound, much clearer then any other I had ever heard. A thought didn’t sound anything like it; I have been hearing those all my life. I had just heard a deep, distinctly male voice, say:

“What?”