Fairy Tale

PEOPLE CALL ME spooky. Maybe because by eleven o'clock on that day, I'd already told Ariana Miles she'd starve to death in Hollywood, Erica Fuentes she'd bomb history, and Wendell Marks that he would never, ever be a part of the A-list, no matter how hard he tried.

Now, sitting in the bleachers after school, half watching a meaningless Hawks football exhibition Came and waiting for some nameless freshman to bring me my French fries (psychics cannot work on an empty stomach), I've just about reduced my fourth client of the day to tears (well, Wendell didn't cry; he just pretended to yawn, covered his mouth, and let out a pathetic snurgle). But hey, sometimes the future is scary.

Sierra Martin won't look at me. Instead, she's taken an unnatural interest in the Heath bar wrapper wedged between the metal planks her sequin-studded flip-11 ops are resting on. A tear slips past her fake-tanned knees and lands perfectly on her porno-red big-toe nail.

"Sorry," I say, offering her a pat on the back and a couple of orange Tic Tacs for consolation. "Really."

Sometimes this gift does suck. Some days, I have the pleasure of doling out good news-BMWs as graduation presents, aced finals, that sort of thing. Today, it's been nothing but total crap. And yes, it obviously must have come as a shock that I'd envisioned Sierra, whose parents had bred her for Harvard, walking to Physics 101 on the Middlesex Community College campus, but it's not my fault. I just deliver the mail; I don't write it.

"Are you... su-ur e?" she asks me, sniffling and wiping her nose with the back of her hand.

I sigh. This is the inevitable question, and I always answer the same thing: "I'm sorry, but I've never been wrong."

I know that probably makes me sound like a total snob, but it's simple fact. Since freshman year, I've correctly predicted the futures of dozens of students at Stevens. It all started way before that though, in junior high, when I correctly guessed who would win the million-dollar prize on every reality-TV show out there. At times I would have to think, really think, to know the answer, but sometimes I would just wake up and, clear as day, the face of the winner would pop into my mind. Soon, I started testing my abilities out on my friends, and my friends' friends, and before long, every other person at school wanted my services. Seriously, being a psychic will do more for your reputation than a driver's license or a head-to-toe Marc Jacobs wardrobe.

Sierra tosses her frizzed-out, corn-husk-blond spirals over her shoulder and straightens. "Well, maybe you saw someone else. Someone who looked like me. Isn't that possible?"

Actually, it isn't possible at all. Sierra has a totally warped sense of style, like Andy Warhol on crack. Every day things lying around the house do not always make attractive accessories. I shrug, though, since I don't feel like explaining that hell would have a ski resort before two people on the face of this earth would think it was okay to tie their ponytail up in a Twizzler, and crane my neck toward the refreshment stand. I'm starving. Where are my French fries?

"I mean, I did get a twenty-three hundred on my SATs," she says, which is something she's told me, and the rest of the student body, about a billion times. She might as well have broadcast it on CNN. However, she hasn't taken into account the fact that there are thousands of other students across the country who also got those scores, and took college-level physics or calculus instead of Dramatic Expression as their senior extracurricular activity. Everyone knows that Sierra Martin screwed herself by deciding to coast through her classes this year.

See, I'm not
that
spooky; truth is, most people don't use enough of their brains to see the obvious. Part of it is just being keenly aware of human nature, like one of those British detectives on PBS. It's elementary, my dear Watson. Colonel Mustard in the Billiard Room with the candlestick, and Sierra is
so
not Harvard material.

"We need to do the wave," Eden says, grabbing my arm. She doesn't bother to look at me; her attention is focused totally on the Came, as usual. "They need us."

I squint at her. "It's an exhibition Came."

She pulls a half-sucked Blow Pop from her mouth with a smack and says, "So?

"Okay, you go, girl," I say, though I wish she wouldn't.

She turns around to face the dozen or so students in the bleachers, cups her hands around her lips, and screams, "Okay, let's do the wave!" Auburn hair trailing like a comet's tail, she runs as fast as her skinny, freckled legs can carry her to the right edge of the seats, then flails her arms and says to the handful of people there, "You guys first. Ready? One, and two, and three,
and go!"

I don't bother to turn around. I know nobody is doing it. It's human nature-doing a wave during an exhibition Came is totally lame. Actually, doing a wave at all is totally lame. And nobody is going to listen to poor Miss Didn't-Make-the-Cheerleading- Squad.

She scowls and screams, "Morgan!" as she rushes past me, so I feel compelled to half stand. I raise my hands a little and let out a "woo!" Sierra doesn't notice Eden's fit of school spirit, since she's still babbling on about her three years as editor of the yearbook, as if giving me her entire life story will somehow get her closer to the Ivy League.

Eden returns a few seconds later, defeated, and slumps beside me. The spray of freckles on her face has completely disappeared into the deep crevasse on the bridge of her nose. "This school has no spirit."

It's true-and ironic, really-that, though my best friend, Eden McCarthy, probably has more school spirit in her pinky than the entire student body put together, she didn't make cheer leading. Being a cheerleader, though, isn't just about having spirit. Eden could make a cow look graceful. I say, "Well, good try; A for effort, and pat her back.

"But,
Morgan, "
she whines, "it's Cameron out there. He's about to score another touchdown."

For the first time in a half hour, I look toward the field...And, wouldn't you know it, the Hawks are on the ten-yard line. I watch as the ball is hiked into the hands of my boyfriend, Cameron Browne. He backs up on the toes of his Nike cleats and throws the ball perfectly to the wide receiver, who is tackled at the one. "Oh. Good."

"You could try being a little more supportive," Eden says with a sigh.

"But you have enough school spirit for the both of us," I say, giving her a hug, even though I'm kind of irked by the insinuation. Of course I support Cam. Otherwise I wouldn't have spent every Saturday night in October last year with my butt frozen to the bleachers, sipping watery hot cocoa and watching my manicure turn all shades of purple. "And it's just an exhibition Came."

Anyway, if you know Cam, which I do, since we've been attached at the hip since kindergarten, you know that he does not need a cheering audience in order to kick ass. He's incredible, which is why he's the only sophomore on the varsity football team. In fact, the Sunday
Star-Ledger
once said, and I quote, "It appears that Cam Browne can do anything."

And, ahem, he's all mine.

"That's my boy!" I shout out, mainly to appease Eden, and give him a wolf whistle. Few girls can wolf-whistle like I can, but that's because I've had so much practice. Because Cam Browne "can do anything." And everything he does seems to deserve one. He turns, grins, then holds up three fingers, brings them to his mouth, and points them at me. One, two, three. That's our secret way of saying "I love you." Since we were together when other kids from our class were still in the "Ew! Cooties!" stage, we learned to keep everything corny and romantic a secret. Back then, our lives depended on it. Now, it's habit.

"First and ten. Do it again!" Eden shouts another one of the Hawkettes' most popular cheers. She knows them all by heart. Luckily, she doesn't do the arm movements, or else I don't think I could be seen with her.

Sierra must have realized I'm not listening to her. She clears her throat "I know you don't care, but this is
important"

That's the worst part about being psychic to high-schoolers: they're so insecure. You can't just be the all-knowing prophet who spits out wise fortune-cookie sayings all day-you have to be part "Dear Abby," too. "I do care. Si. I feel really bad for you, honest. But you have to move on. Rise above it."

"Easy for you to say. You probably already saw yourself at Yale," she says bitterly.

I shake my head. "I'm not very good at seeing my own future."

It's kind of like being a genie; I have this amazing power, and yet I can't use it on myself. But I'm okay with that. I'm only a sophomore, so, though my college choice is pretty much up in the air, it's probably the only thing that is. I know that my future is with Cam. I know he and I will go to the same school, or at least schools close to one another. After all, we're next-door neighbors, and we've known each other almost since we could walk. We'll both be turning sixteen on October 15. We're so in tune with one another that I can detect when he's having a bad day from a football field's length away.

But Cam rarely has bad days. Today, as usual, he's in top form.

"Be...Aggressive. Be. More...Aggressive. B-E A-G-G-R-E-S-S-l-V-E!"
Eden shouts as Sara Phillips, an actual cheerleader, walks past and rolls her eyes.

Eden doesn't seem to notice. She is clueless in so many ways, which makes her my polar opposite. For example, she has had a crush on Mike Kensington forever and can't seem to get it through her head that he's obviously gay. His sense of style, the fact that he spends way too much time on his hair... none of this has thrown her off, and I refuse to disrupt her plans to one day bear his children. She clutches my arm and screws her eyes shut as Cam shouts, "Hike!"

"Oh, this is so nerve-racking! I can't look!"

I've loved Eden almost as long as I have Cam, but not only is she clumsy and clue challenged, she's also so neurotic that I'm surprised I haven't envisioned her having a heart attack at eighteen. Her grip is enough to cause nerve damage, so I pry her fingers up one by one and say, very calmly, "It's. Just. An. Exhi-"

And that's when it happens.

Cam has the ball in his hands, and he's searching for a receiver, but they're all blocked. A defenseman breaks free from his left, and rushes in for the sack. Just as he's about to throw his hands on Cam's shoulders, my boyfriend takes three quick steps forward, and before he can step on the head of a fallen teammate, he's airborne.

He sails, like a feather on the wind, over the massive pile of bodies in his way, right into the end zone.

Instantly, the bleachers erupt into thunderous applause, which is weird, considering the effect of Eden's recent Wave Effort. Even Sierra jumps to her feet, her bleak future forgotten for the moment.

Eden opens her eyes and shrieks like a banshee. "Oh! He is so amazing!"

I can't move, can't even bring my hands together for applause. I think even my breathing stops, for the moment. Am I the only one who noticed something strange about that last play?

Am I nuts, or did my boyfriend just
fly?

MAYBE OUR NEWSPAPER IS RIGHT. Cam Browne really
can
do anything.

The Hawks win the Came, which sends Eden into a state of euphoria I thought could only be achieved by doing meth. Even if it's just an exhibition Came. And, hello? The win was no surprise.

Her best friend is a psychic, after all.

Following every win, we go to the Parsonage Diner and the boys eat. A lot. I get a celebratory chocolate milk shake. I'd never thoufht there was such a thing as too much chocolate, but last year, I had so many milk shakes that now I can't look at one without getting a little queasy.

This year, the J. P. Stevens Hawks will probably be New Jersey's finest again, though I haven't actually envisioned that. My gift can be a little tricky to control sometimes, because I never know exactly to
where
in the future it's going to take me. Plus, Cam doesn't want to know. He's one of those "let the chips fall where they may" types.

After twirling my hair into a ponytail in the lav, I spot Cam at a booth, and immediately I catch my breath. When he's scrubbed up like that, his broad chest pressed solid against his T-shirt, shoots of black hair falling carelessly into his cavernous brown eyes, he can still make my heart flutter. I'd like to say that, looks-wise, I'm just as show-stopping, but aside from my psychic abilities, there isn't anything remarkable about me. So, though we've been together this long, the phase "Is he really mine?" always seems to repeat in my mind like a broken record. He's using some foreign football language with Scab and the other maniacs on the team that mostly includes a series of grunts and growls, so I part the sea of testosterone by sliding in next to him and giving him a kiss. "Just as I predicted," I tease.