Free Glimmer by Stacey Wallace Benefiel, Valerie Wallace

coffee and pie on the table.  As she approached Zellie’s table, the group ceased talking about anything important.  After they’d all divvied up who’d had what and settled the bill, he heard Zellie and Ben set up a meeting with each other for late the next morning - the late request being Ben’s of course. Christopher couldn’t argue that the boy’s beauty sleep did serve him well.  Wes may be able to prevent him from dating, but he couldn’t do anything about who he looked at.
    He finished his coffee and laid a few bucks on the table, waiting for Zellie’s group to leave.
    “Hey, Pastor Morris,” Melody Wells said to him. “Did you play hooky and go to the mountain today?”
    Christopher cleared his throat.  How long had she known it was him sitting in this booth eavesdropping? “Hi, Mel,” he said, flashing his most charming smile, “I’m actually headed up the mountain for a little nighttime snowboarding.”
    “Cool,” she replied, her mouth smiling but her eyes sending a different signal. Was that a warning that she was onto him? “You should have come and sat with us, met my new friend Ben and his dad Frank.” She flipped her long blonde hair back off her shoulders. “Anyways, have fun.  See ya in church on Sunday.”
    “See you Sunday.”
    With the group gone, Wes appeared beside him.  “Great, nearly two years working side by side with their dad, gaining the trust of their family and now the little Lookout suspects something.” He motioned as if brushing the hair back from Christopher’s face.
    Absently, Christopher reached up and pushed the hair back himself. “I suppose that’s the end of casual surveillance,” he muttered into his coat collar.
    “I don’t know why you care about hearing all of their stupid gossip first hand anyways.  Boo-freakin’-hoo, Zellie and Avery can’t be together.  Boo hoo, Ben the super hottie misses his dead mommy.  Life’s not all cuddling and trips to Hawaii.  You glimpsed this shit two days ago--”
    “The glimpses aren’t always one hundred percent, you know that.”
    Wes gave him a sly smile. “Sweetie, when was the last time you were wrong?”
    The corners of Christopher’s mouth lifted slightly in a grin, hoping he wasn’t giving his uneasiness at the question away.  Two days ago . What he’d glimpsed two days ago was not what had happened today.  According to what he saw, instead of sitting at the table making plans with Ben, Zellie was supposed to be in the restroom crying her eyes out over Avery.
     
     

Chapter Eight
     
    I laid in bed with my eyes closed listening to Melody snore. I could hear her nose whistling with every exhalation. She was getting a cold.  Not that her snotty sounds were keeping me up.  Replaying the day’s events was.  I hadn’t had a day as crazy as this one since the accident last spring that revealed the full extent of my abilities -  when I spazzed out and rewound for the first time.  And even with all of that excitement and turmoil and craziness, it couldn’t even be compared to today.
    A painful shared vision, rewinding a fist fight, almost losing my virginity...seriously God, thanks for the deluge.  I tried replaying my steamy truck escapades with Avery in my mind, but it was ruined for me now.  The parental “plan” was even going to rob me of my best fantasies?  Ugh.
    I rolled onto my side, opening my eyes, staring blankly at the wall.  I wondered if it was ruined for Avery?  God, if I could just...communicate with him somehow.  What was the use in having supernatural gifts if they all totally frickin’ blew? I could see what he was dreaming, it wasn’t like I could talk to him while I was there in his head, but it was a way to be close to him.  Usually, it felt like an invasion of privacy, but I didn’t have anything else.
    Closing my eyes, I concentrated on him asleep in his room, picturing the moonlight coming through his bedroom window, glowing in his silvery-brown hair.