Ok, so I'm back from vacation, and bearing another chapter.

Disclaimer: hgiH ykS nwo ton od I. =)

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All throughout the next day at school Ivy was distracted. All throughout the rest of the week, she was distracted. She didn't say a word during lunch when her friends were discussing which club to go to, and she was silent still during the PE class they all shared. She was grateful that her aunt had made changes to her classes so she could be with friends, but at that moment, friends weren't exactly the most important things on her mind. Finally on the bus ride home that Friday, Zach asked her what was wrong.

"Huh?" She turned to look at her friends, who were staring at her waiting for an answer. "I'm sorry, what'd you say? I spaced out."

"You've been spacing out all day, Ivy. What's up?" Layla repeated Zach's question, without the ghetto.

"I didn't sleep much. Had to finish a bunch of work, then I just couldn't get comfortable."

They all seemed to buy her lies, except Warren. He just glanced at her with a knowing look, then went back to the conversation. The bus came to Warren's stop and he told Ron to pass it. Ivy looked at him curiously. The others had all gotten off at their respective stops, and it was just Zach, Warren and Ivy left on the empty bus.

Zach was dropped off soon after.

"So. What's the matter?" The bus stopped and she took her bag and climbed out with Warren behind her.

"I told you guys, I didn't sleep." Warren raised an eyebrow and shrugged.

"You'll tell us when you're ready." He started to head down the street in the direction of his missed stop. Ivy rolled her eyes, tilted her head back a bit in frustration, practically stomped her foot and called after him.

"Can you keep a secret?"

He turned back around to face her. "Will you trust me to?"

Ivy shifted her weight back and forth a few times before giving a tiny shrug and looking down at the ground. When she looked back up a moment later, Warren was walking back towards her. Silently they walked the few blocks until they got to her apartment building. She let him in, and he followed her into the elevator. They got out on floor seven, the highest one. She led him down the entire hallway until they reached the last door.

Walking into her cozy studio apartment Warren had no idea what to think. He expected, white, black and gray everything, and got colors. Mounds and mounds of colors. Every shade of every color everywhere. The walls themselves were a dark, rich orange in the living room, and the kitchen was a forest green. The ceilings were white, and the rug was a nice deep blue on the brown hard wood floor.

The furniture was very modern and the high ceilings made the place seem much bigger than it actually was. The walls were decorated in scenic photos of every kind; rivers, lakes, streams, forests, cities, deserts, the Taj Mahal. Slowly taking everything in, he realized how dark it was inside the room. He looked around for a lamp, and found none. He looked above his head and saw a small ceiling light. He scanned the walls and finally found the switch near the kitchen, where Ivy had been getting some water and a big bag of Puff Cheeto's. He walked over to the switch and reached out for it when a bright orange and purple chip bag blocked his hands path.

"I like it dark." Was all she said with a look that told him not to try again, so instead he turned around and sat on the couch she had motioned to with the water bottles. He sat down and was handed a bottle. She set hers and the bag on the small, dark coffee table. She walked down a small corridor and returned an instant later with the shoe-box Gennifer had given her. She sat down across from Warren in a black Lazy Boy-Wannabe. She held out the box to him.

He looked at her face, which he noticed was a combination of worried, scared, nervous and paranoid all mixed together. She bit her lip gently, gnawing on the chapped skin, and he took the box from her shaking hands. Setting it on the table in between them, he opened it and took out a long letter. He skimmed over it, then looked through the contents of the box. He shifted through a syringe, spare needles, and thirty-one filled corked test tubes. He picked up the syringe first and raised an eyebrow.

"I'm not into drugs, if that's what you're trying to tell me." He gave a light smile, and it faded quickly when there was no response. He held up the letter. "What's this mean? I don't understand." He shook his head for emphasis.

"There's something wrong with me. Or, OK, not wrong so much as a, stupid stupid stupid power." She let out a breath. "Whenever people touch me skin to skin, I burn them. It's like they're sticking their hand into a flame. The skin blisters and it can even scar." She looked down at the box. "If we stay in contact long enough, where ever I'm touching will burst into flames. White flames." She shook her head and ran a nervous hand through her hair. "My mother didn't have this power. No one in the family did, so when I got it, no one knew what to do. My mom being the crazy telepath she was, found one of the smartest genetic doctors in the world, Tod Karmichael. He took a sample of my blood and DNA and whatever, and he created a serum for me. Basically I inject an entire bottle and ta-da! I'm touchable. Or at least that's how it's supposed to go. There's no guarantee that it'll work, and if it does work, the amount of time it'll work for is unknown. He says it should last forty-eight hours. And there's no way to tell how long it'll take to spring into action, so I'd be a sitting duck waiting for it to work, or not work."

Warren stared at her. After a few minutes, he broke the silence. "Are you afraid it won't work, and you don't want to be disappointed?"

"Yeah, that's part of it. The other part is that this is how I was made. I'm like this for a reason. I don't want to be so quick to give it up, without ever finding out the why that goes along with the what."

"Look, from what both you and this letter said, the serum doesn't take your power away, it just hides it, it lets you live like a normal person. You'll be able to go dance with that creepy guy at the pizza bar. When it wears off, you'll be all spooky and mysterious again. It's not permanent."

After giving his words a moment of thought, she responded with, "No, I guess it isn't, huh? And I definitely don't want to dance with that guy. He was so not my type." Warren gave her a rare smile and handed her the box back. Trembling, she took it from him. Oblivious to the fact that she had taken her gloves off, and his gloves were fingerless, her pinky brushed against the back of his index finger while she took the heavy box from him. She gaped down at the small touch and almost jerked back. Almost, until she realized he wasn't burning. Her eyes widened, and her mouth dropped open.

"How? What-- What are you?" She shook her head in disbelief. "No one has ever--" She closed her mouth and continued to shake her head. The sensation of her skin on his was warm, hot even, but not burning.

"Fire." Warren muttered. He looked up at Ivy who was still in complete shock. He lit his other hand. "Fire." He said more clearly.

"You're a pyrokinetic." She shook her head again. "That's why you aren't affected, because you're immune to fire." She was in complete awe at this new discovery, not quite sure how to react. Warren nodded slowly. Slowly they raised their hands until all her fingertips were pressed against his. She smiled at the touch and the warmth that came with it.

"Fifteen years." A small tear fell from her left eye, and hit the table. It splashed, but into a tiny white flame, not just a tiny puddle of water. Warren looked at her in amazement. She gave a small smile and shrugged.

Waking from her trance, she looked down at the shoe-box they held between them, and took her hand back. His gaze followed hers.

"Are you going to...?" He trailed off, unsure of how to phrase what he was trying to ask.

She hadn't come all the way back to the previous conversation, still being shocked by the ability to touch someone had jolted her thoughts a bit. She shook her head a little as if shaking out the rest of the distractions. She looked down at the syringe.

"Well, I've got nothing to lose. I might as well see what happens, right?" She looked at him nervously, seeking comforting words and support. She was lucky Warren wasn't as dense as he was mean.

"And if it works, all the better. Whatever happens you'll be fine." He brought out the syringe, needle and one tube. He assembled it the way he had seen in movies, and handed it to her. "The letter says that you should inject it straight into your blood stream, and the effects should be immediate. I'm assuming you'll feel like, a wave or rush of something go over your skin. I dunno, makes sense." He shrugged.

She nodded her comprehension, and pumped her left forearm full of blood. She took the syringe, and injected the clear serum. Within moments what felt like a ripple passed over her skin. She closed her eyes and let it engulf her completely. She opened her eyes and saw Warren staring back at her. She reached out, and lay a sweaty hand on his forearm. The heat was gone, and it was simply skin on skin. He must have felt it, too, because he looked at her and smiled.

"Guess it worked after all." He looked at her and saw something brighten in her eyes that hadn't been there before. A smile of pure joy crept across her lips as they curled at the corners, and a deep, throaty laugh escaped her lips.

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