Timing Is Everything In Telepathy

"A friend is someone who knows all about you and still loves you." ― Elbert Hubbard

"Don't walk in front of me… I may not follow. Don't walk behind me… I may not lead. Walk beside me… just be my friend."
― Albert Camus

"Anyone who is observant, who discovers the person they have always dreamed of, knows that sexual energy comes into play before sex even takes place. The greatest pleasure isn't sex, but the passion with which it is practiced. When the passion is intense, then sex joins in to complete the dance, but it is never the principal aim." ― Paulo Coelho

"There is nothing better than a friend, unless it is a friend with chocolate."
― Linda Grayson

"When someone loves you, the way they talk about you is different. You feel safe and comfortable."
― Jess C. Scott

"Well, it seems to me that the best relationships - the ones that last - are frequently the ones that are rooted in friendship. You know, one day you look at the person and you see something more than you did the night before. Like a switch has been flicked somewhere. And the person who was just a friend is... suddenly the only person you can ever imagine yourself with." ― Gillian Anderson

"Promise me you'll always remember: You're braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think." ― A.A. Milne

She spent too long choosing the shirt. Teal or turquoise? Aqua or cyan? Royal blue or navy?

"Oh, are you serious?" When the knock came on her door she just smirked and hastily grabbed the teal tee shirt, the one made of the softest kitten-like cotton against her skin. She opened her door and Freya had her hands on her hips, staring down like judgment had a face.

"I dunno," Gaia murmured. "Maybe a mix of teal and lime green?"

"Gaia! You're not even dating him! Wait – are you?"

"No! We're friends. I could… I mean, aside from you and Rhea, I could call him my best friend but, you know."

"Oh, sweetie." Her sister's wife stroked her head, then lightly tweaked her pointed furred ear, just to hear that funny purring giggle. "Now come on. You're late for the makeup chair."

As they made their way to Freya's studio, Gaia said, "So, is it just me, or have you girls wondered why only my limbs have fur? It's like I'm wearing socks and gloves with retractable claws."

"I thought all the samples you gave to Rhea showed something?"

"They showed a lot of somethings."

"Buuut?"

Gaia made a vocal shrug.

"More reasons to test out that new concealer, then."

"Also, turquoise eyeliner and silver shadow!"

"Whatever makes you happy, darling. Hair up or down?"

"Down. Mikey said he wants to practice braiding."

"That's awesome. Boar brush, copper brush, bamboo wood brush, ox horn comb?"

"…yes?"

…"okay, I'll rotate."

One hour later, the sun was setting, and as if by clockwork, there was a quiet tap on the biggest living room window. Rhea, her hair held up with chopsticks and a smirk on her face, sashayed to the window, grinned her supermodel grin at the large mutant turtle, and slid open the window, offering her hand.

"What a gentleperson," Michelangelo said loftily, squeezing her hand in greeting, silently hopping down. "So, where's my brain twin?"

"The wife insisted on making her colorful," Rhea smiled. "Spin?" And as the Beethoven sonata in the background rose, Mikey gracefully raised his arm and she twirled, dipping all the way back into his plastron, which made them burst into giggles.

"Cough," Freya announced.

Mikey almost pushed Rhea aside in his excitement. "Oooh, tell her to bring a bag of hair stuff!"

"This is why I have a purse, baldie!" came Gaia's voice, and she stepped out from behind Freya, her gentle eye makeup done cat eye style, her lips lined and colored the shade of cranberries. Pale purple jeans, cowboy style boots with sneaker style soles, hair tucked behind her ears. She looked like a small elf.

Mikey made a "turn around" gesture. Gaia's low-rise jeans now had a clever V slit to allow her tail, which was swishing. "Neat!" he said. "Donnie and I looked up all kinds of braids. You should've seen Master Splinter's beard."

The three women laughed.

"Wait," Rhea said, going to the umbrella stand. "Are you taking a cane?"

"Probably not," Gaia said. "I have ninjas to hold on to."

Mikey just shrugged.

Freya looked at Rhea. "Um, are we giving them a curfew?"

"You didn't the first six times," Gaia said. Also, I'm nineteen."

"Just keep your phone on?" Rhea suggested.

"Duh, always. And yes, I have a portable charger."

Rhea muttered something in Japanese, then repeated it in Greek and Norwegian.

Gaia and Michelangelo stared.

"Did she just-"

"Sis, did you just-"

Rhea shrugged while Freya bent over howling.

Mikey and Gaia stared at each other, blushing.

"But we're not even…"

"But we won't even…"

"But we haven't even..."

Freya was almost screaming with laughter.

Rhea was laughing now, too. "Just go, just go. Stay safe. You have your travel medication, yes?"

"Yes, Rhea."

"Pajamas?"

"Yes, Rhea.

"Deodorant and moisturizers?"

"Yes, Rhea. In fact, that balm is good for turtle skin."

"Okay, okay, go, then!"

Gaia sighed and shot back "Silly family" in both Japanese and Greek. Then she hopped onto Michelangelo's carapace, locked her arms and legs around him, and waved goodbye as the sun vanished below the horizon.

When they arrived in the lair, pizza was already on the table, April was in the bean bag chair getting a shoulder massage from Leo, Raph and Casey were splayed on the couch watching a hockey game, Don was at the table with his laptop, and Splinter was in his armchair – his furry beard still braided. Gaia just grinned.

After the chorus of "Hi, Gaia!" she limped to the table and picked up a slice of mushroom and green pepper pizza. Before she found a chair, though, something gently tickled her mind and she felt her left leg turn inward at the knee, her feet slowly pronating. She sighed. "Oh, dear Mike-Mike, you cannot keep that up. That's my neurophysiology, not yours."

"But…but…twinsies?"

"Bum leg from stabbings doesn't actually count. That's acquired, not congenital."

"But helping?"

"Only temporarily."

At the pout on his face, she put her slice down and wrapped her arms around his neck, rubbing her feline nose against his terrapin beak. "I'm grateful. I am. But you can't fix the Born This Way stuff and you know it. Just call it amelioration."

"I like that word."

"I use it a lot. I don't even want kids and I wanna name a kid Amelia. Maybe I'll write a book with such a character, make her psionic and disabled."

"Can I draw the cover?"

"My only choice."

"Yays!"

They forced Raphael and Casey to scooch over. Mikey picked up one controller and switched to the gaming console. Raph grabbed the other controller. They let Gaia choose the game, since she couldn't play physically but loved watching. She picked "Borderlands 2".

"You know," Donnie called over, "I could try making a controller just for you, if you want."

"Sweet," Gaia said. "I don't care if I lose every time, even."

"Leo's the only one who'd go easy on ya anyway," Raph grunted.

"Hey!" Leo barked.

It was hours later, as everyone prepared for bed. As April and Casey left the lair, they kept nudging each other and staring at Gaia and Michelangelo. Gaia did her best to roll her eyes in exaggeration each time, but it didn't stop the fluttering in her belly. Mikey and Gaia went to his room, where she sat on his bed and dumped her duffel bag on the floor in the same spot she usually did. Mike unzipped it and quickly found a brush and hair ties.

His ministrations toward her scalp hair, ears, shoulders, and back had her melting with a soft, high purr. After her hair was successfully pulled into a French braid, Mikey rested his hand between her shoulders and asked, "So where does your purring come from, anyway?"

Turning around, she tapped the lower part of her throat, tilting her head all the way back. He pressed a finger there and squeaked at the vibration. He brought his head down and pressed his ear slit to her neck, a gesture that widened her eyes and made her heart pound. Her purr changed in vibrancy. "That. Is. So. Cool." Mike was whispering, as though not to disturb her throat. "Can you talk?"

She lowered her chin to the top of his head. "I can totally talk. Totally." And the purr accented her low vocals, and the telepathy between them made her realize that her turtle was blushing. Wait. What?

Mike had the same thought, because as her head snapped up, he pulled back quickly, and he stared at her. She drowned in those baby blue azure eyes. Oh gods, she could drown forever.

They had been hanging out for three whole months. She confided in him and Ice Cream Kitty. Leonardo had tried to show her basic katas. They read comics together. She watched him play all his video games and listened without interruptions when he babbled about random things. She watched Donnie work in his lab, watched Splinter prepare different tea blends. She spent hours in Mikey's room, applauding his magic tricks, demonstrating her own mutation, crawling along his walls, writing poetry and short stories to go along with his art. They created a comic together. They made his action figures and her plush toys dance in the air. He soothed her seizures and she soothed his. They thought at each other inside and out, it was like being born knowing each other.

This was the first time this had happened.

Her purr took on a very low, very deep resonance. Suddenly, from deep in his throat, he churred.

She didn't think. She leaned forward, closed her eyes, and kissed him.

His mouth was astonishingly soft, and melted into hers.

It lasted maybe five seconds, and they pulled apart, gasping.

What was that? in unison.

Is…is it okay?

Are…are you okay?

Are you?

Is this good?

What happens now?

Should anything happen now?

He closed his hands around her upper arms, gently gently slowly softly. Anything?

She reached up and cupped his face in her hands. Everything?

As the kiss danced and lengthened, he fell back on the bed and she shifted against him, and something else shifted and then they didn't talk anymore, but they thought at each other, they thought everything at each other, whispering like secrets in shadows, and energy built and crackled, and a door shut and locked on its own, and everything was silent save for the rustling of clothing and bedsheets and the breaths of small whimpers and purrs. Soon, senses overwhelmed, and she let out a mewling sound, and reflexively his hand pressed into the slender dipping feline curve of her lower back, and when she unintentionally unsheathed her claws, he welcomed it with a breathless giggle. When she adjusted her hips just so, the gasp from his throat sent a chill along her spine. The way he growled made her growl back, and his strength was beautiful, the gentle way he held her as though she would never fall in her life again. And then it was all a single rocking, rhythmic wave, almost a pure dance.

When she slowly woke and opened her eyes, she could sense early morning, somehow. She stretched, and purred, and then sore muscles struck and she mumbled "Ow" because it always happened.

The body curved around her flinched and twitched, and as she turned her head she was momentarily lost in a pair of shining blue topaz eyes, and then he smiled, and it was That Smile, and she found herself grinning.

"You hurting?" he asked gently.

"I always hurt," she responded. "How's your leg?"

"Sore and stiff," he admitted.

"I could massage it," she offered.

"I'd like that."

As Gaia went to work on his quadriceps, hamstrings, knee, and hip, she cleared her throat. "So. G-good?"

She was a little surprised when he laughed throatily. "Awww, Kitten. Awesome. Though I may have to explain the claw marks."

"We were…wrestling? Again?"

"They'll be able to smell it as much as you can."

"Oh, right." And her nostrils flared, taking in the sweet, tangy, almost bittersweet chocolate afterglow. She wanted to bury her nose in his leg, but she concentrated on physical therapy; as she lifted and stretched his left leg, she tried not to think about his tail or cloaca or how oddly similar his plastron scutes felt to her own fingernails, keratin brushing against keratin, shudders between them, chemistry between them swirling like electricity.

Michelangelo cleared his throat. She suddenly got a very clear image of her own thighs and the way the muscles held taut as hands pushed her legs into a butterfly pose and then—

Her face and throat burned. "Fair enough."

She finished the massage. He stretched, smiling. "Now it's your turn," he smirked.

They switched, and he held her left leg like a precious thing, and she felt how he held back all that physical power just to make sure he didn't hurt her, and for the first time since she was ten years old, physical therapy didn't hurt.

They got up and grinned at each other, bursting into gigles. But they didn't look at each other's eyes while wiping themselves down and getting dressed, because their dual smiles were too big and too cheeky, and another "wrestling match" was a floating thought.

Interestingly, they were the first at the kitchen table. Gaia watched Mikey make scrambled eggs, toast, bacon, blueberry muffins, and coconut water with pineapple juice while she made coffee with cocoa and cinnamon and milk. As the others gathered around, Mikey finished up Splinter's tea and toast, and Gaia sweetened Donatello's coffee just in time to telekinetically deliver it to his outstretched hand.

Splinter inhaled. "The tea smells lovely, Michelangelo." And he paused and caught both their eyes very deliberately. Gaia bit her lip a lot. "And Gaia," Splinter added slowly, "Donatello's coffee smells quite tasty."

Donnie nodded, oblivious to the innuendos. "Cinnamon, very nice! Gaia, you make strong coffee. Mikey, make yourself a cup, please, then I need to gather the data for our ADHD project."

No one else said a word as they ate, but Gaia caught Raph flaring his nostrils and narrowing his eyes every now and then. He would look at her with a look she knew very well from having older siblings. She smiled at him, eyes hooded.

Mikey was sitting next to her, drinking his own coffee prepared the same way and looking extremely satisfied. And they still did not look at each other's shining eyes, because they knew too much now. But the smiles on their faces and the workings in their psionic minds made the kitchen feel just a little brighter.