Human

20.

I stared at him completely dumbfounded.

Garrett's expression was like the one you see on a five year old's face as they come down the stairs on Christmas morning. He was grinning from ear to ear. His cheeks were flushed and his eyes danced in delight. I got so caught up in his adorableness I almost forgot that he had just said something insane. I shook my head to get my mind working properly again. Garrett had a way of messing with my head. "What are you talking about?" I asked impatiently.

Garrett pulled me back over to the campfire and sat me down on the log again. "Cade, I am serious. I really think you're parents aren't you parents." He gave me that look again like I was being totally dense for not following what he was trying to say. "Cade, you haven't ever been sick. Potentes aren't affected by illnesses. We don't get colds, or diseases. For some weird reason, Carrianne wasn't able to burn you or affect you in any way. Trust me, she tried hard. Then there was that crazy thing that happened at the store. I don't think that was an earthquake. I think it was you."

"What are you trying to say, Garrett? You think I caused an earthquake?"

Garrett rolled his eyes exaggeratedly at me and grabbed my head, one hand on either side of it and shook it slightly in a playful manor. "How can someone who makes all A's be so slow?" He laughed. "See, that's another thing Cade! You are really smart. Do you even have to try to be good at school or is it just kind of natural to you?"

"I mean, I guess I have just always been good. I study and stuff, but it isn't hard to me. Why?" I asked him again. Then the wheels in my head began to turn. He can't possibly be thinking what I think he is.

"You're getting it." He commented on my change of feeling. Now I was feeling like he had lost his mind.

"You can't be serious." I said skeptically.

"Cade!" He said excitedly. "I really think you are..."

"No." I cut him off before he spewed his ridiculous theory. "I know where you are trying to go with this, and you're wrong. I have pictures of my brother and I as babies with my parents. There isn't any way that they aren't really my parents. And aside from that, I don't have any abilities like you guys. I've never done anything. Whatever happened today was just a random thing. I would know if I was some kind of...whatever. You're wrong."

Garrett chewed on his thumb nail. "You are so stubborn." He groaned. "You've heard of adoption right?" He laughed. "I am telling you, I really believe you are a Potente. Just because you haven't ever displayed any power before today doesn't mean that you don't have it. Do you think we are born just knowing how to do this stuff?" He asked as he stared at a leaf on the ground until it began to float up from the ground and land in my lap. "We are taught. Our parents begin working with us on discovering and strengthening our power from the time we are walking, and on. That's like I said earlier, when a human and a Potente mate, their child's ability may go unnoticed if there isn't someone trying to help teach them. A normal person wouldn't just up and try to move something with their mind, or set a fire, for the fun of it. You only do that if you believe it is something you can do."

"Ok, I see now that you are an insane person."

"Cade, my god, just try." He pressed. "I'm telling you, I can feel it, you have to be. There is no other explanation."

I stood up from my spot. "I can give you thousands of explanations that would make more sense than me being a secret superhuman." I actually laughed at myself. "Watch this." I told him and I exaggeratedly stared at a leaf. "Shocker." I said when nothing happened.

Garrett came to stand behind me. "It won't work with you being skeptical." He said annoyed. "You have to learn how to access it. Back in the store, you were angry, right? Then earlier today with Carrianne, I would assume you were afraid, or I guess angry again. You need to focus. Reign in your emotions and breathe." He pressed his body directly behind me. I was suddenly hypersensitive of my own body. Garrett brought his hands up to my face and covered my eyes. "Close your eyes." He whispered right into my ear. I obeyed even though his hands were over my eyes anyway. "Slow your breathing." He whispered and I realized I had been breathing fast and heavy. "Keep them closed, keep concentrating on breathing normally. Do you feel the trail my hands leave on your skin? Focus on my skin connecting to yours. Feel the path they take." He slid his hands away from my eyes and down the sides of my face and down my neck. He moved them down my shoulders, pulling my jacket away from them as he went. I began to breathe erratically again. "Cade, focus on deep slow breaths." His hands slid down my arms until they got to my hands and he laced his fingers with mine. I felt like I could feel the hot trail his hands had left on me. My whole body was tingling and I was having to try hard to keep my focus and not think of how close his body was to mine. "Now I want you to keep your eyes shut, but picture a leaf in your mind. Memorize every part of it. The color, the feel, the shape. Picture it vividly in your head." I followed his direction. "In your head imagine that leaf lifting from the ground and up into the air. Do it slowly, don't rush it." Again I pictured my leaf lifting and floating up to my eye level. "Now when I count to three, I want you to open your eyes and the first leaf you see, will it to rise, just like you did the one in your head." My heart hammered against my chest, and my fingers twitched around his. I felt Garrett lean in close to my ear, his lips brushing the top of it gently. "One...Two...Three."

I snapped my eyes open, locked in on my target, and willed it up.

"Oh my god!" Garrett half shouted.

I looked around us, and my eyes couldn't believe what they were seeing. Not only had I somehow managed to lift one leaf...I had lifted hundreds. I turned around looking all around us. We were surrounded by leaves all frozen suspended in the air. I couldn't hold back my gasp, then they all fluttered back down to the ground.

I looked at Garrett who was standing with his hands folded behind his head and his jaw pretty much on the ground. "Did you do that? Did you help me?" I demanded.

He shook his head slowly. "That was all you." He muttered in amazement. "Cadence, even I can't do that many at once."

My head was full of mush. "This isn't happening."

Garrett pulled me into him and he wrapped his arms around me. "Oh, it is happening." He laughed.

I wound my arms around his waist and laid my head against his chest. "How can this be real? I just...I just did that." I mumbled.

Garrett chuckled at my obvious shock. "I'm going to take you to see someone tomorrow. He may be able to help us figure out what else you can do. I haven't ever tried to teach someone before."

"Yeah, well you sure did a good job." I whispered. I closed my eyes remembering how amazing it felt to have him so close. I leaned my head away from him and looked up into his beautiful face. He looked down to me and smiled. "Garrett..." I whispered his name. The heat between us was unignorably intense and he tightened his grip on my waist. I inched up on my tiptoes slightly, and he leaned his face closer to mine.

I could hear the ragged breaths coming from him. He lifted a hand to the side of my face and I leaned into it, closing my eyes. I felt him come closer. "Cadence." He said my name painfully, and rested his forehead against mine. I wanted him to kiss me so badly. I haven't ever wanted a kiss so bad in all of my life. With all the lead up, and suspense attached to it, I knew it would be the best kiss of my whole life. I opened my eyes and his bore into mine echoing the same thoughts. He slowly kissed both of my cheeks. Then my forehead. Then the tip of my nose. "I want to kiss you." He whispered. "So badly, I do."

"Then do it." I breathed back.

"When I kiss you, Cadence, it won't be in secret. Our first kiss won't be while I am still technically in a relationship with someone else. When I kiss you...When I kiss your perfect lips, I swear I will give you all of me. I want to do this right. I feel things for you Cade. Things I haven't ever felt before. They're scary they are so intense. I need to be around you. When I'm not, all I think of is how much I want to be near you. I've felt it since the day I first saw you. You make the pain I feel everyday go away. I can breathe when I'm with you. When you said we couldn't be friends it killed me. I need to be your friend. I need to be...I need to be more than your friend Cade. You're in my head. All day, and all night. I want to kiss you. I want to be with you. No one else. Just you."

I reached my arms up and around his neck, pressing the side of my face to his. If I looked into his eyes any longer I would ruin everything. I can't be as strong as him. I would kiss him. I could feel tears in my eyes. Nobody had talked to me that way before. "I feel things too, Garrett." I relished the feel of his face next to mine. I was burning to kiss him, but I fought it. I released him and backed away. "You don't know how much."

He smiled wickedly. "Actually, I do."

I rolled my eyes.

Despite the fact that I had just found out I am possibly adopted and a freaking superhuman Potente, all my mind could focus on was this guy. This beautiful, perfect guy.

I might be a Potente... But, I am 100% falling in love with Garrett McDuffie.