Chapter 5

Chapter 5

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I wave goodbye to Kierra, Tanya, and Remi as they walk inside the school and I stay out, waiting patiently for Nate. Kierra gives me a look right before her face gets hidden by the school walls, but I am unable to determine what the look is supposed to mean. I brush it off as a "be careful" look. I sit down on a bench closest to the school to wait on Nate. I pull out some everlasting gum and a book to read.

I find myself checking my watch every minute or so, expecting Nate to show up anytime. Unlike back at the library on the first day, where I thought he had ditched me, I start to worry that he got in trouble or something has come up to where I couldn't come. Normally I would be totally fine with me not being able to come but I've been looking forward to seeing his dorm all day. I mean, he has one all to himself on the top floor, that's gotta be the best dorm you could ever have.

I check my watch one last time, after fifteen minutes of waiting, and ponder texting him. I don't want to be annoying, I mean it has only been fifteen minutes, but then again I am curious and don't want to sit out here for another fifteen minutes just to find out that it was wasted. My brain swims with overreacting thoughts on whether or not I should text him until after a minute or two I see his dark figure walking towards me, almost as if he's a shadow with all his black clothing, the only thing standing out is his brilliantly green eyes that seem to pierce through me. I wonder if that's what it's like for others when I look at them?

I give him a smile and a wave before sticking my book back in my bag and walking to meet him halfway. "I thought you had ditched me." I joke.

"Oh, sorry about that. I was cleaning up my dorm, it was a mess." He sighs, causing me to laugh.

"You didn't have to do that for me."

"Oh but you didn't see the catastrophe."

I am hit with warm air and a wave of aroma coming from the dinning room, causing my mouth to water, but my stomach says no since I ate dinner in Eden.

"I already ate, but I'll come in with you if you want me to--" Nate starts.

"I ate in town. Let's go to your dorm." I say in hasty excitement that I worry sounded a bit strange, but he just laughs slightly and leads the way.

We make it to the lift, which is the part I dread. It shoots upwards, but instead of slowing down almost as soon as it starts it just gains speed, racing farther and farther up. I clench onto Nathaniel's arm to keep from falling, because he is just standing as still as a statue. After what seems forever the lift comes to a slow, shaky stop.  I step off, my legs feeling even more like jello than usual. I end up tripping over my own foot, preparing my face to meet the ground, but it doesn't come. Instead I feel arms around me, and I unclench my eyes to find Nathaniel has grabbed me, the leather glove feeling strange against my skin.

"Nice save." I laugh out loud, thankful to still have my face salvaged. He smiles and seems like he is going to answer, but quickly his eyes look down at his arm, where there is a tiny bit of skin showing where his sleeve came off his glove. Suddenly I am shoved to the ground so fast that I don't have time to realize what's happening until my hands scratch against the rock floor. I seethe through my teeth, my elbows aching as well now.

Now that Nathaniel has fixed his sleeve I can see the terror in his eyes. He reaches a hand out to help me, making sure absolutely no skin is showing. "I'm so so sorry, Elina!" he exclaims as I pull myself up using his hand, which he drops as soon as it's use has run out. "I just-- I panicked and--"

"It's fine, Nate. Really. Don't worry about it okay?" I reassure him as I absentmindedly brush off my pants, despite the fact the have no dirt on them. I can see his face visibly relax as he realizes I'm not angry, but I can tell he still feels bad. "Come on, let's go shall we?" I smile to reassure him once again that it's okay. He nods and we take a right down the strangely dark hallway. I use my charm to create a sort of, well I don't know what you would call it, a white energy candle?  Nate looks over in slight awe.

It isn't long before we make it to a door and we stop. Nate reaches in his back pocket to pull out his key. He rattles it in the lock for a second and a half before I hear the lock click and the door swings open. At first I can't see anything, but then he flips on the light switch. It actually looks a lot like my dorm, but the color scheme is different and it's slightly bigger. It has a black carpet, and a worn red couch. Besides that, it looks almost identical to mine. The only thing is that it's completely bare, no posters, no extra lights, nothing. The only thing I see is a lot of plants, all around the room, especially in front of the window, which has a great view of the Raina Forest. I look over and see that a PlayStation and a GameCube is connected to his TV and is surrounded in games. I smile at the scene before me.

"Sorry it isn't much." He mumbles, hands buried deep in his pockets.

"I love it." I respond honestly. I hear him breathe out a laugh and take down his hood beside me before nervously moving to the couch.

"So, what do you want to do?"

I smirk. "Got any good games?"

"Oh! In your face, sucka!" He exclaims jumping off the couch, hands in the air, very unlike his usual self, and this expression sounding very strange with his accent.

"I would've won if I wouldn't have hit that banana peel!" I snap back. He just smirks at me.

"I won." He starts to move towards the kitchen, leaving me laughing. We played a lot of first person shooter games on the PlayStation for a while, but eventually we started playing mario cart, which we have been playing for three hours. I've got to see a side of Nathaniel that I haven't been seeing this week. He is more carefree, not as held back, not as careful, happy. He does act happy when I'm around him, but a lot of time it's fake, and even if it's real it's barely there, darkness still looming behind his smile. But not tonight.

"Want a coke?" He asks over his shoulder, pulling open the fridge door. I tell him yes and he comes back to sit down on the couch, handing me my cold can. I open it, take a sip and sit it back on the table, wiping my wet hands on my pants.

"Your hands are so tiny." He chuckles.

"Tiny, but amazing at video games." I counter.

He stares at them for a second, strangely perplexed. "I wish I could touch them." he sighs, it seems like that sentence would sound weird, but the way he said it makes my heart break. There was a few times while we were playing that I would go for a highfive, and he would just look at me with a sad expression.

It's silent for a few moments, before I speak up.

"Hey, can I try something?" He looks over at me with a confused expression.

"I guess."

"Okay," My heartbeat quickens. "take off your glove."

"What?" His voice becomes less soft.

"Just do it okay."

"What are you--"

"Trust me okay." I say sincerely. He looks uneasy, but he slowly pulls off his glove by each finger, revealing his hands. It occurs to me that this is the first time I've ever seen his hands. I lift up my own hand and concentrate hard on the energy around me, that feels warm and comforting. Soon my hand is covered in a glowing light white with a hint of orange around the edges.

"You're not going to touch me are you?"

"Just-- trust me." I say, even though I'm a little scared. I slowly reach out and touch my finger tips to his, flinching a little at the contact.

"Oh my God..." He says softly, staring at our touching finger tips. "I'm touching you!"

I smile widely, a smile as bright as my eyes. But after a moment I'm hit with a strange feeling, almost like my mind is being invaded. Emotions flood in, happiness, excitement, awe, confused terror, and affection but it's not mine. It doesn't feel like mine, it feels... different. I take my hand away from Nate, very much to his dismay, and the feelings go away. I touch him again, and they come back. Am I feeling his emotions?

"This... This is amazing." He smiles at me, looking so happy that it looks like he could burst into tears. His words tear me away from my mind, where I was concentrating on the strange invasion of emotions. Suddenly, I get an idea, it hits me so fast it physically knocks me back. I jerk my hand away and jump off the couch.

"Wait, what if I could use this!" I start, but as I see his confused expression I continue. "What if I could use my power --charm-- to our advantage!"

"Our advantage?" He repeats questionably.

I sit back down beside him and begin explaining. "What if, I could train with you, get you to where you can control your power, so your touch only kills when you want it to. Teach you to channel at will sort of. My charm might be able to help."

"But... The teachers have been working with me for years and--"

"Yeah, but do they actually work with you?" I argue. "Most of them seem too afraid of you to help you with anything, I don't see how Charm Control can be helping you at all."

"Yeah, you're right..." He thinks for a minute. "You know, I did read in a book from Charms Basics that some Energy charms can transfer energy to others, to help them with their charm or to make them more energetic or strong or fast or anything like that you know?"

"I could see if I could help you by giving you some of my energy maybe? I would have to read up about it and stuff but..." My mouth widens into a grin. "This could work Nathaniel! You might be able to touch people again!"

"That would be so amazing." He replies longingly. "We should hit the library tomorrow."

"Definitely." I nod. "I can't wait! You'll be back to touching people in no time."

"We should really stop saying that, people are going to get scared." He says, seriously at first but then we both burst into a fit of giggles.

"That, is very true."

"Found the book you were talking about and one more on the same thing." I say, dropping two heavy books onto the table at lunch, making a loud thump. At Charms Basics I asked Mr. Bryson for books on it and then went to the library during the beginning of lunch.

"Okay, cool. We could go to my dorm after your one on one Charm Control to research and practice." He suggests. I nod, using energy to steal a few of his fries from his plate since I won't have time to eat.

"Using your charm to steal french fries?" He smirks. "I'm glad you're the one who got the most powerful charm of all time."

"It's for the greater good. The greater good of my stomach." I reply with a sly smile. "Now, come on. We are going to be late for History."

History, which is usually very exciting, is boring as I sit through the class, just letting the time pass by as I think about fixing Nathaniel's problem. How wonderful his life could be I helped him fix it, how we could high five after playing video games, how people wouldn't be scared of him and maybe...

"Ms. Faith?" I jerk my head up at the sound of Mr. H calling my name. "Can you tell us when the C.S. sent it's first Charms to help in the war?"

I rack my brain for an answer, my heart beat quickening. "Uh-- um--"

"1623" I hear Nathaniel whisper quietly beside me.

"1623" I repeat louder. Mr. H seems taken aback, surprised I got it right.

"Um, yes correct. Okay, let's continue."

The rest of History and Charm Control go by agonizingly slow. I try to pay attention, but my mind wanders elsewhere. As Charm Control comes to an end the rest of the class, the waterbending Charms dripping wet, start to file out of the room. I promise Nate that I'll meet him afterwards in his dorm and take out the energy exchanging book to flick through as I'm waiting for Mr. Allore, eating chocolate to replenish my strength.

"Good afternoon, Ms. Faith." I hear after a few minutes. Mr. Allore walks in, looking the same as always. 

"Good afternoon." I respond, sticking my book back into my back after folding the corner of the page.

"Have you been practicing picking up utensils like we talked about on Friday?" 

I think for a second and realize I didn't do it as much as I was supposed to, but I did it none the less. "Yep. Only had three pencils break."

"Good. Well, let's get started."

We practice a while on controlling my emotions which is mostly what we've done this past week, I thought that maybe today would be different but I guess not. We've been working a lot on using my happy feelings and memories to my  advantage, he said that we won't be working on using my negative emotions for a while, only pushing them away for now. I've had to work really hard not to bust the lights or shatter the windows. 

"I was wanting to ask you something," I start as our class comes toward an end. He gestures for me to continue. "well, I was reading in this book, and it was saying something about energy exchange. How I could, theoretically, lend my energy to another person so they could have more strength or whatever." I fiddle with my fingers. "I was wondering exactly how hard that is? If I could do it? I thought I would ask you because you seem to know more about it than anybody else." 

"Well, I don't think it's too hard, with some practice it would be possible. May I ask, why you are wanting to know about this?"

I think for a moment, should I tell him? Will he stop me? Or will he help me? "You know Nathaniel Greenfield?" He nods, and he actually doesn't flinch in fear like the others, but does not seem phased by his name. "Well, Saturday night we were hanging out in his dorm, playing video games, and I had an idea. I kinda used my energy to touch him, but it wasn't skin to skin contact, like I had a glove of energy on my hand. Also I wanted to ask you something else about that, when I touched him, it was like I could feel his emotions." This is what seems to phase him. He looks at me with curiosity. 

"How do you know it was his?"

"Well, it felt like I had two sets of emotions. Mine felt familiar you know, but his felt strange and alien in my mind. Cold almost." I explain.

"Hmm, that is strange. I'll try to look into that. But, continue, why did you want to know about energy exchange?" He responds.

"Well, I thought, what if I could work with him. Maybe if I could help him, lend him energy at times, I could help him gain control of his power. He could touch people again." I find myself speaking so quietly, almost in a whisper, in a voice full of such sympathy. "None of the teachers really want to help him, they are so afraid of him there's no way it's helping. I could help him."

"That's a lovely idea, Elina." He responds, but sighs. "But think of the danger, giving your energy to someone could be very dangerous. You very well might be a natural at it considering your charm, but still the dangers..."

"I'll be careful I promise. I want-- no, I need to help him Mr. Allore." I look at him with pleading eyes. "He needs to be able to live a close to normal life, but I need your help."

He sighs heavily and looks at his watch. "Well we do have a little more time, I'll go ahead and teach you the basics. You can practice on me." I smile widely.

"Oh, thank you!"

"First of all, you need to be either touching the person, touching something sentimental of the persons, or some DNA. Touching them or touching their DNA works a lot better. Here, grab my hand." He reaches out his hand and I grab it. "Now, you need to concentrate. Concentrate really hard. Concentrate on me, clear all things out of your mind, and concentrate on me."

I do as he says, I concentrate hard on my teacher. On what he looks like, the silver in his eyes, his family, his hand. I remove all other thoughts from my mind, with difficulty. I close my eyes and take deep breathes.  

"You need to concentrate on giving me some of your energy. First, picture it in your mind, make it the only thing you're thinking of. That's when you slowly start to move your energy towards me." I do what he says, thinking so hard it almost hurts. Other thoughts try their way into my mind, but I push them away. Suddenly, I feel like the energy is being drained from me, taken from me as you will. I don't have to concentrate on it anymore. I open my eyes and realize that there is a glow of the lightest blue engulfing Mr. Allore and I. Covering us like a blanket. He grins at me widely. "You're doing it, Noelle!" 

I smile back, a little weakly, not even able to acknowledge him calling me by my middle name. I feel my eyes begin to droop and the urge to lay down and sleep. "I'm going to let go of you now. Don't be alarmed." And suddenly, he takes his hand away from me and I almost feel the connection physically snap, causing me to fall back onto my pillow, breathing heavily.

"Elina, are you okay?" He looms over me with a worried expression. I blink several times before sitting up, holding my head.

"Yes, I'm okay." He hands me a chocolate bar and a cup of orange juice. "Did I do it?"

"Yes! You did fantastic!" He exclaims happily, bubbling with excitement. "You seem to be a natural." I gulp down my orange juice, smiling from ear to ear. But it disappears and turns into confusion.

"Why did you call me Noelle?" I c**k my head sideways. For the first time he looks genuinely nervous.

"Did I?"

"Yes, while we were exchanging energy."

"Oh, yes right. Sorry about that, I always forget whether your first name is Elina or Noelle." He covers. I squint at him, but decide to let it go. I need to get to Nathaniel.

"Thank you so much for helping me Mr. Allore." I tell him, gathering my things. 

"Pleasure's mine." He responds as he does after every session. "Be careful, Ms. Faith."

"I will. I'm going to go get started on helping Nate now. He will be able to touch people again." I say with confidence before exiting the room and heading for the lift. I send a quick text to Nate, telling him to be ready in his dorm with chocolate and orange juice.



I knock on the door to Nate's room and wait impatiently, bouncing up and down. As soon as the door opens I stride inside without a word. Nate looks at me with happy confusion etched onto his face. Hopefully, one day, it will keep that happiness wherever he goes.

"So, let's get started!" I tell him, rocking on the balls of my feet. He chuckles warmly.

"Okay, okay. I set up a practice room in the spare bedroom. It's pretty roomy. There wasn't a bed in there so I put a few pillows and a table and a few chairs. Come on." He gestures for me to follow him into the spare bedroom, which my dorm doesn't have. It really is pretty roomy, big enough to practice in. The floor is scattered with pillows and there's a small round table in the corner complete with chocolate, orange juice and a box.

"Where did you get the chocolate and orange juice?" I ask.

"The lunch ladies are very kind." He smirks. "And by that I mean they are afraid of me and just by asking they'll give me what I want."

I laugh at him and set my bags on the ground, pulling out my two books on energy exchange. "I talked to Mr. Allore about what we are doing and he said it was a very good idea. He even helped me exchange energy with him, so I sorta know how to do it. I accidentally gave too much I think but with practice I'll be good at it."

"Really? That's awesome!" He replies. 

"Yeah. But it was weird, he called me Noelle. He's done that a couple times." I look at Nate with a confused expression which he shares.

"That's weird. I mean it is your middle name so..."

"Yeah, it's probably nothing." I wave it off and turn to my now open book. After scanning it for a minute or two I speak up again. "Okay, so in here it doesn't really say much more than Mr. Allore told me. It really just repeats that it's very dangerous if you take too much of my energy, but all I have to do to disconnect it is stop touching you or whatever I'm touching that's linked to you. Do you have a pair of scissors?"

"Why?"

"I need a lock of your hair for DNA because I can't touch you. Not with skin to skin contact anyways." He doesn't question me further and goes to find a pair of scissors. A few minutes later he comes back with a lock of jet black hair in his hand, he's tied it together with a bit of string. I take it from him carefully.

"Thanks. Now, I've got to concentrate on you really hard, and then I'll start giving you some of my energy. I'm not really that great at it yet, but practice makes perfect. Ready?" He nods silently and we sit on the pillows in the floor.

"Be careful."

I do as I did with Mr. Allore, but strangely I find it easier to connect with Nathaniel. I even start to feel his emotions again. Then suddenly, way stronger than when I was with Mr. Allore, I feel the energy being sucked out of me. Now draining or trickling slowly, but being taken quickly. I feel my body weakening and my eyes beginning to close in only thirty seconds. I faintly hear Nate's voice, but can't make out what he's saying. I drop the lock of hair and fall backwards onto the floor.

"Elina? Elina!" Is the last thing I hear before unconsciousness consumes me.


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Author's Note

Every review helps. Thanks for reading!