Blue Violet (6 page)

Ellie shot her
brother a mental image of sticking out her tongue.

“You sure
you didn’t see anything?”
he asked. Even in her mind Ellie could hear his
worry.

“I’m sure.”

“Better to
be absolutely sure. I’ll go check it out just in case.”

“I’m
absolutely sure. But you do what you think is necessary. I’m going in to school
now.”

“Alright.
I’ll let you know if I find anything.”

The morning
was a cold one, so she grabbed her backpack, huddled down into her parka, and
made a dash for the building. As soon as she walked in the main doors, she saw
Lila.

“Hey, Ellie!”
Lila waved her over. “Delia, Nate, and I hang out in the cafeteria before
school. Wanna come sit with us?”

Ellie smiled,
hitching her bag into a more comfortable position on her shoulder. “Sure!”

When they got
to the cafeteria, Ellie slumped into one of the chairs at the table. “Hi,
guys,” she greeted Adelaide and Nate. They both gave her a generic but friendly
greeting in return. The three of them concentrated on their homework
.

Talk stayed
fairly minimal until the starting bell. This high school revolved through a
block schedule, five classes each day, but a different five classes every other
day. Today, Ellie’s first class was P.E. Ellie liked most sports, so she
usually enjoyed it, except for having to dress out in the mandatory ridiculous
gym uniform.

Jill, the girl
she’d sat behind in English the previous day, was getting dressed in the locker
room. She’d seemed very nice, so Ellie decided to approach her.

“Hi,” Ellie said
as she sat down and started pulling off her shoes. “Jill, right?”

The other girl
gave her a big grin. “Yeah!”

Ellie didn’t
need Griffin’s mind reading to know that Jill was pleased that she’d noticed
her.

“You’re from
Texas, right?” Jill asked, as she pulled her gym shirt on over her head.

Ellie’s
eyebrows shot up. “How’d you know?”

“Small
school.  We don’t get new kids often.” Jill grinned. “Why’d you move to Estes?”

Ellie shrugged
nonchalantly. “The usual reasons… family commitments,” she answered.  “Have you
lived here all your life?”

“Yeah. Born
and raised. It’s too bad you moved here in the winter.”

“Why? It’s
gorgeous!”

“But in the
summer the tourists fill the place up.”

Ellie was
confused. “And that’s a good thing because…?”

“Uh, hello!
Boys!” Jill laughed.

Ellie laughed
along with her as they finished dressing and headed to the gym, Jill chattering
all the way. Today was basketball, so they didn’t have much time to talk any
more while they practiced passing, dribbling, and shooting. After P.E. finished
and they’d showered and dressed, Jill walked with Ellie to economics still
talking a mile a minute. By the time they reached the classroom, Ellie had the
low-down on practically the entire school.

At the door
Jill paused and waved. “Hey, Brian!”

A good looking,
red-headed boy returned her wave with a nod. “Hey, Jill.” He casually strolled
over to the girls. “Who’s your new friend?”

“I’m Ellie.”
Ellie held out her hand with a friendly smile.

Shaking her
hand, Brian said, “The new girl in school, huh?”

“Yeah.” Ellie
returned the smile as she surreptitiously sized him up.
Cute, definitely
cute
…In that captain-of-the-football-team kinda way.

“How’s it
going so far? You liking Estes Park High?” he asked.

“Can’t
complain. Everyone I’ve met has been really nice,” she answered.

“Well, you let
me know if anyone gives you trouble and I’ll set ‘em straight.” Brian winked
and Ellie hid her amusement.
Definitely
the captain of the football team
type. Probably popular.

Although Brian
was in Ellie’s class, he didn’t sit near her. So Ellie was surprised when he
waited while she gathered her books and then started walking with her to the
lunch room.

“Would you
like to sit with us?” he asked in a friendly, yet casual tone as he pointed to
a group seated in the far corner.

As she
approached the table, Ellie tapped into Griffin’s mind reading and quickly
picked through the minds of those already seated. She grimaced inwardly. She’d
somehow been befriended by some of the most popular people at the school, and while
this wasn’t a bad thing by itself, it could be tricky given her situation. It
would put her in a more public spotlight, which made it harder for her to just
blend in. Most normal people—people
without
abilities—never suspected
her or Griffin of being anything other than ordinary. But she’d learned through
experience that they were less likely to suspect anything if she just remained
in the background, unnoticed.

As she
listened, a very subtle strain caught her attention.

“…Lila
better be right, that this girl is nice
,” from one girl.

“…Man, Nate
was right.  She’s hot
,” a boy was thinking.

“…As long
as she doesn’t hit on Brian, she’s cool
,” another girl mentally decided. 
In fact several of the girls at the table had feelings along that line.

“…I wonder
why Adelaide’s acting so weird. She’s too shy to approach someone she doesn’t
know
,” was a final train of thought Ellie picked up on.

Adelaide,
Lila, and Nate clearly belonged in this high school clique. In fact, based on a
few passing thoughts of the people at the table, it seemed as though Adelaide
had orchestrated Ellie’s invitation to join them for lunch. Ellie silently gave
Adelaide top marks for skills of subtle manipulation and decided to play along.

Ellie turned
to Brian and grinned. “Sure, I’d love to join you. Thanks!”

After grabbing
their food, she and Brian sat down at the table.

“Hey, guys,
this is Ellie,” Brian introduced her.

Ellie sat down
next to a beaming Adelaide, pulling out her homemade lunch. School lunches
somehow still managed to be atrocious. “Hi, Ellie, welcome to the table.”

Ellie spent
the lunch hour being good-naturedly grilled about anything and everything. She
didn’t need Griffin’s mind reading skills to know that several of the girls in
the group weren’t thrilled with her joining them. They already saw her as
competition rather than as a potential friend. Ellie confined herself to a
mental eye roll. This was nothing unusual for girls. The boys—other than Nate,
who only had eyes for Adelaide—all vied for her attention. Some overtly, some
more subtly. Ellie avoided talking about herself as much as she could,
preferring to turn the conversation to other topics. She knew the cardinal rule
when trying to get into any clique –Always make friends with the girls first.
And the best way to do that was to not appear too interesting to the boys, or
too interested in them.

“So what do
you do around here for fun?” she asked as she popped the top on her Coke can.

“Oh, there’s a
ton to do,” a boisterous girl named Kayla answered. “Especially in the summer.”

“If you can
manage to avoid all the tourists,” a boy named Mark grumbled with a smirk.

“Hey, Mark,
don’t knock ‘em.” Brian grinned. “Didn’t you date a tourist girl last summer?”

Mark gave him
a dark look in return.

Lila
continued. “In the summer there’s all the outdoorsy stuff. You know… hiking,
biking, camping, white water rafting. There’s lots of shops downtown… if you
can afford them.”  Everyone groaned at this. The shops had great stuff, but
weren’t exactly priced for the average teenager.

“What about in
the winter?” Ellie glanced out the window. Snow covered everything outside.
Today was particularly cold and windy, the air snapping crisply. Ellie actually
enjoyed this weather after many years in the heat of Texas. Snow was a rare
thing in Austin.

“There’s not
too much skiing close by,” Nate explained around a large bite of his sandwich.
“But there’s still other outdoor stuff, snowshoeing, that kind of thing. Mostly
we hang out indoors during the winter.”

“Ellie, you
should come with us to the movies this Friday,” Brian suggested. He named a
recently released movie with one of Ellie’s favorite actors, and she decided
that she actually liked the thoughtful boy. Using Griffin’s power, she could
tell that the invitation was friendly and genuine.

“Sure!” she
accepted happily. “Sounds like fun.”

After her last
class of the day, Ellie suppressed a flash of disappointment when she saw that
Alex wasn’t in the parking lot like he’d been the day before. It was ridiculous
to feel this way…she’d barely spoken two words to him. But still, the
tightening of her chest was hard to ignore.

She faked a
smile and waved bye to Adelaide. Although the temptation to ask Adelaide about
her brother poked at Ellie, she forced herself to remain quiet. She headed to
her car, jumped in, and drove quickly down the road. She didn’t head straight
home, taking some time first to get some errands done.

When Ellie got
home and tromped up the stairs from the garage in the basement, she found
Griffin in the kitchen making dinner. She dropped her backpack on the floor by
the stools. “Hey, Griff, what’re we having?”

“Pork chops,”
he replied.

“Mmmm… with
your cherry sauce?  My favorite! You trying to butter me up for something?”

Griffin gave
her one of his rare grins. “Nope, just had all the ingredients on hand.”

Ellie went to
stick her finger in the sauce for a taste, but got her hand playfully slapped
as punishment.

“Were you
listening in today?” she asked him, sneaking a taste anyway.

“A little,” he
grunted. “Adelaide sure gets props for being able to get people to do exactly
what she wants without their knowing.”

Ellie laughed.
“Seriously…  I am now officially part of her circle of friends without having
to lift a finger or read a single mind.”

“I don’t think
you have to worry that they suspect anything,” Griffin said. He turned back to
the pork chops in the frying pan.

“Well, that’s
something. Did you listen to any of the rest of their family today?”

Griffin shook
his head. “No. I spent most of the day moving in and listening to you at
school.”

Ellie hid her
impatience. She wanted to know more about the others. Especially Alex.
What
was he like?  What could he do?  What had he thought about their encounter that
morning?
…Although she’d rather find that last bit out for herself.

Ellie started
to set the table when her cell phone beeped, signaling a text message. With a
small frown, she picked it up, and then almost dropped the phone. A text
message from Alex blinked at her.

“Hi,”
the message said.

“Hi, yourself. Chickening out on our
run?”
she messaged back.

“Lol. No. Still on for that.”

“Okay… what’s up?”

There was a
pause long enough for Ellie to get nervous.

“Just wondering how your day was,”
he eventually answered.

Ellie blinked.
And a small ray of hope lit up inside her chest.

“Typical day in the life of a high
school student. You? “

“Typical day in the life of a law
office intern.”
Another pause and then
,
“
I’ll see you tomorrow at the crack of dawn.”

Ellie sent
back a smiley face.
“See you
tomorrow.”

Dinner was
fairly quiet, with both Ellie and Griffin preoccupied with their own private
thoughts. When she was done eating, Ellie gathered up the dishes and took them to
the kitchen.

“Hey,” she
called to Griffin, who merely grunted. “I’ve got to get out of the house. I’m
going to go fly for a bit. Okay?”

Her favorite
and strongest morph was that of a Peregrine Falcon, inherited through her grandfather.
It wasn’t unusual for Ellie to spend some time each night in this form, she so
loved the feeling of freedom and the power of soaring through the open sky.

Usually when
she went flying, Griffin couldn’t care less. This time, however, he looked up
at her with slightly narrowed eyes.

“You’re not
going to go watch them, are you?” he demanded, moving around the bar and into
the kitchen.

“As a matter
of fact, I’m not.” Tempting as it was, she had no intention of going anywhere
near the Jenners and Pierces tonight.

“…Because we
agreed that I would do most of the watching right now since they don’t know
anything about me, remember?” Griffin continued.

“I remember
what we agreed to,” Ellie put her hands on her hips, her voice ringing with irritation.
It drove her nuts when Griffin got on his superior soap box—like he was so much
older than her, when really he was younger by ten whole minutes.

 “Okay,” he
finally relented. “Just so you keep to the plan.”

Ellie didn’t
bother to reply. She headed out of the back of the house and trudged up the
snow-covered hill and into the woods. As soon as she was camouflaged by the
thick trees, she transitioned into her falcon form.

To any
onlooker she would’ve appeared to blur before their eyes, shimmering like a
mirage in a desert. There was no sound to accompany her transformation, and in
mere moments a falcon appeared where Ellie had just been. In all of her morphs,
Ellie’s exotic coloring showed through as a midnight black body and violet-blue
eyes. As a falcon, this was quite striking up close, but from a distance, no
one would notice anything unusual about her appearance. She spread her long
wings, and with a mighty
whoosh
, she took flight.

Ellie quickly
gained altitude. She worked off her frustration and impatience with the
situation in a series of incredible dives. She would flap her strong wings to
get high up in the air…spread out her feathers hovering a moment, enjoying the
view, and then rocket back toward the earth. Sometimes she would level out well
above the ground, other times she waited until the very last second before
pulling out of the stoop. Her maneuvering left her both exhilarated and in a
much-improved mood.