“During your sister’s accident, you know how you saw the whole thing through her eyes? How you felt like it had been happening to you?”
The blood drained from my face. I did not want to talk about this.
Jinx continued on. “And you know how when you go near your mother, you suddenly get depressed, even if a few minutes earlier you were just fine?”
I barely nodded. How could she know this stuff? There had to be another explanation.
“And at school, you feel a jumble of emotions...more than the usual teenage girl mood swings.”
She was right. The things I’d been feeling in the past few weeks hadn’t been normal. Maybe some of it could have been explained by Lony’s death, but when I added it all together, something wasn’t right.
“What’s happening to me?” I whispered.
Jinx set the dog aside and knelt in front of me, folding my hands in both of hers. “You’ve heard that twins have psychic connections, right?”
“Yeah. Lony and I used to dream the same dreams sometimes when we were little…”
“And you have probably heard about auras before too, right? The psychic energy field that surrounds us? Some people can see them. I can’t, but some can.”
I nodded.
“Well, when your sister died, your auras connected…they reached out to each other. I’ve heard of it happening before. That’s how you could feel what your sister experienced in those last moments.”
I let that explanation sink in. The doctors at the hospital wondered how I was able to experience physical shock when I should have only felt an emotional one.
Jinx continued, “After the accident, your aura was stretched. It didn’t go back to its normal shape around you.”
“My aura is broken? What does that mean?”
“It means that whenever people enter your aura range, you can feel their emotions.”
I considered all of the strange emotions I’d had that week. My mother made me depressed. Being around Bryan calmed me down. Being in a classroom filled with hormonal teenagers sent me in circles.
“So…so I’m psychic?”
“No, honey. You’re an empath.”
Nine by Night: A Multi-Author Urban Fantasy Bundle of Kickass Heroines, Adventure, Magic
Chapter 18
“Empath…” I whispered, feeling the word on my tongue.
Jinx hopped up and retrieved a book from her stuffed shelf. “Let me show you.”
As she flipped to the table of contents and located the section she was searching for, I checked out the title of the book. The Guide to Modern Psychic Phenomena by C. C. Knight, PhD.
“Here we go,” she said as she moved to the couch next to me, so I could follow along as she read aloud. “‘An empath is someone who is sensitive to the psychic energy and vibrations of others. Because emotions are charged with life energy, the empath experiences the emotions as their own. When the emotions are positive, this can be beneficial to the receiver; however, when the emotions are negative, the receiver is in danger of depression, bouts of rage and exhaustion. Empaths have been known to turn to drugs or alcohol as coping mechanisms. Many admit to having thoughts of suicide.’”
“What!” I interrupted. “I’m going to want to kill myself over this?”
Jinx shushed me and continued reading.
“‘The best way for an empath to combat these negative symptoms is by first, recognizing the difference between genuine emotions and those that are imposed on them, and secondly, by surrounding themselves with positive people. Some empaths claim to be able to block the emotional energy of others, and even convert negative energy into positive and channel it back to the sender, thus improving the emotional health of the sender…’”
Jinx closed the book and gave me a pat on the knee. “Cady, I know a woman, Sophia Blackwell, who is also an empath. When I began noticing the symptoms in your thoughts, I called her for advice. She has learned how to develop and control her gift, and has given me some suggestions on how I might be able to help you do the same. Sophia would love to help you herself, but she is getting up there in age and lives out in Sedona, Arizona. Traveling here is not really an option for her now.”
I didn’t say anything for a long moment while I let it all sink in. It wasn’t that I doubted the existence of psychic energy, in theory. What I had trouble with was the idea that I had any psychic ability. While I basically had a healthy self-image, I never really thought there was anything special about me. I had no other real talents: I was cute, but not beautiful; smart, but not a genius; well liked, but not popular. I was as middle of the road as a teen girl can be. Why would God or fate or the cosmos or whatever decide to give this ability to me?