"Okay. So. What am I thinking right now?"

He's sitting on his knees now, propped up like a little kid, and excited like one, too. I had known this question was coming. I'd been expecting it, in fact. But now that it's here, I forget how I'd mentally practiced answering it.

"I don't know," I say, guilt prickling like needles at the edges of my stomach.

"Oh, right," he says as if he's realized his mistake. "What emotion am I feeling?" he asks, correcting himself.

I don't know how to tell him this. "I don't know," I repeat.

His features now convey deeper confusion than they had when he'd originally become aware of my curse. "But you said—"

"I know what I said," I cut him off.

"Then why can't you—"

"I don't know."

He huffs like a child, his lips forcing the air from his cheeks. "I don't understand."

"I don't either. It doesn't work on—" I cut myself off this time, backtracking. I don't want him to think there's something wrong with him. I start over. "I've been able to read every single person I've ever met." Pause briefly for dramatic effect. And... "Except you."

Eli gapes, mouth open, brows furrowed. And then, just like that, his expression does a complete three-sixty. He laughs! He actually laughs!

"Wuhú+! This is thaqúbewáthe!" He claps his hands together in front of him and I am reminded of a sea lion.

I had been prepared for an initial reaction of shock, sure. Doubt — I was banking on it. Anger — I would've taken that, too. But this? This I could not have expected. I try to distinguish what this kind of reaction might mean. Maybe he's laughing because he thinks this whole thing was one big prank and I really got him for a second there? Maybe he's laughing at himself for actually letting himself believe something so far-fetched and paranormal — because if I can't tell what he's thinking, I obviously must have been lying about my ability? Not being able to feel his aura makes it difficult to decide between these two possibilities. I suppose the only way to get my answer is to ask.

"Why are you laughing?"

"Because it's like, I finally meet someone with superpowers, and of course I'd be immune to them. Like... of course!"

He speaks of "super powers" as if he believes there's a larger population of people in this world that can do things similar to what I can do, and what Gray can do and what Matthew can do, but also like we're aliens and no one believes in us, and Eli has been waiting his entire life to be graced with one's presence.

"I don't get why that's funny."

His eyes get huge again, huger than before, as he answers me. "It's not! It's not even funny!" And then he's laughing again, doubling over himself in round two.

His joy is contagious; I find myself chuckling along with him. I should've known by now to expect the unexpected when it came to Eli. I really should have known.

He takes a deep breath, coming down from his high. "So, it's just nothing? When you try to read me!?" he asks, finally meeting me back down on earth.

"No, it's white!" I tell him, finally meeting his excitement.

He makes the cutest reflection face, his eyes looking towards the wooden ceiling over our heads, remembering back to before. "I didn't ask you about white."

"That's because white isn't a color," I tell him with a grin. "It is the absence of all color."

He looks back to me, his smile taking over his face. "Oh, yeah?" he asks.

"White is nothing. Vast, empty, blank nothing."

"That's so weird," he says with a sigh, the gravity of his defective brain finally hitting him, but at least he's taking it lightly.

"When I first met you... I thought I was broken. But then I could still feel everyone else's auras. It was just you." I start the thought off nodding and end up finishing it with a shake of my head.

He smirks. "So that's why you wouldn't stop hanging around me!" he says both smugly and in obvious realization. "Because I was a mystery!"

I jokingly agree with a roll of my eyes. "Yeah, that's exactly how it happened. I just had to get in closer. To observe the subject more in depth." As if he's the one that needs scientific observation. As if he's the one with the super power.

He re-sorts himself into an Indian-style seating position and leans back on his palms. His look is still smug as he speaks. "So, tell me, Detective Bumblebee, was your research conclusive?"

He's basically asking me to tell him, and he doesn't even know it. The guilt pricks at my insides again, only this time the needles have moved up to my chest. I feel a shoving feeling, as if they are trying to crack the bone to relieve some pressure. The logical part of me deems the feeling due to my lungs needing more oxygen, and suddenly it seems very cramped and stuffy in here. I fidget in my seat, trying to get comfortable before I tell him the thing I always meant to tell him when I asked him to meet me up here earlier this afternoon.

This afternoon seems days and days away. I was a different person this afternoon. I was a little more innocent, a little more ignorant. A little less scared.

I think back to this afternoon, try to remember why I'd called this meeting in the first place. Something about me wanting to share all of my secrets with Eli before I leave. As a gift to him. But could it be that maybe I just wanted to relieve my own burdens before I leave? Ease my own guilt? Create my own peace of mind?

Having a peace of mind, even the smallest sliver, seems as appealing to me as freedom right now.

"There's something else."

Eli sits up, slowly, no doubt feeling the importance in my words and the hesitance in my tone. "Don't tell me you can move objects with your mind. You know how they say you can never have too much of a good thing? That's because you can't. It's not fair to everyone else."

I don't bother to correct him in his misunderstanding of the phrase. That is of the least possible significance right now.

"No," I reply, and it comes out shaky. I clear my throat before starting again. "When I implied that I'd never felt your aura before. That wasn't entirely correct."

His gaze bores through my head. "You mean you have felt it?"

I swallow the lump in my throat. I nod.

He smiles wide and claps his hands again, bouncing a bit in his seat, again like both a child and a sea lion. "That's fantastic!" His next thought comes out rushed, several sentences mushed into one idea. "How do I make it work?—What do I do?—Tell me what to do, and I'll do it.—I want you to feel it again!"

I bite the inside of my lip, looking at him intently, trying to decide on my next course of action. I know what I'd need to do in order to feel it, but I don't know if I should...

Here goes nothing.

Again.

I crawl the short space to Eli — not seductively, just out of necessity as one can't really stand up and walk in here — his eyes growing wider and wider as I get closer and closer, as if it is seductive. I stop when I reach his lap and lift my torso up until it is parallel to his. I close my eyes before they can fall upon his face; I don't want to see his last innocent gaze before I rip his heart out of his chest. With closed eyes comes more alert hearing. I hear Eli's breath catch, and that is the last thing I hear before I close any remaining space between us.

Initially, I feel lime green. I'd expected he'd be startled, and I assume no other girl has ever admitted to him that she can read minds and then kiss him in his treehouse without warning. The lime begins to subside and is starting to be replaced with some purple, which was also to be expected. My initial plan was to kiss him quickly, get a color, and then pull back and announce to him my findings before that color also becomes my color.

But Eli changes my plans.

As I make a move to pull away, his hand hastily grips my hip, holding me in place. I put my palms on his chest, ready to push him away, but then I feel his heartbeat. It is pounding. As if it's trying to jump out and touch me. I feel the tip of his tongue glide across my bottom lip, and his purple leaks from his chest and taints my fingers, and from my fingers it infects my arms, and then my chest, and then the rest of me. I feel myself slipping into Eli's aura, giving into it, letting it become mine. I feel myself slipping, and I don't dare try to stop it.

I am selfish. Eli may not ever want to kiss me again after tonight. I might as well kiss him back.

So I do.

My hands crawl up the back of his neck and rest in his long hair. It is so silky and smooth; I find that I love the way my fingers can tangle themselves in it so easily. Eli's hands move from my hips to the small of my back, sliding slowly up to my shoulder blades and then back down. When they reach my backside, Eli surprises me by lifting me up and into his lap. I am careful not to break the kiss as he repositions me, because I know that once I do I will have to tell him the truth. Also because he's feeling pretty good right now, and, as a result, so am I. I'm feeling pretty good.

After a few moments of enjoying me in his lap, his hands taking their own turn in my hair, he becomes dissatisfied with this position as well, apparently deciding that he could possibly reach maximum enjoyment status elsewhere. He grabs my waist this time, carefully lifting me up and, to my surprise — again! — he begins to slowly lay me down. And, also to my surprise, I do not protest.

My back meets the tablecloth covered planks of wood slowly, his hand cradling the back of my head so that it never makes contact with the hard floor. He lays sideways atop the floor and halfway atop me. His purple aura keeps its hold on me, despite the absence of his mouth on mine, taking much longer than usual to fade. It must get stronger the longer we remain attached. Hadn't I mentally likened Eli to a leech once before?

He kisses me again, and he emits tiny noises from the back of his throat as I kiss him back which make my cheeks feel ten times warmer and my stomach do cartwheels. He can't seem to get enough of me, and it is a very addictive feeling. I want him to kiss me like this always.

Wait. I do?

He puts a hand down on each side of me, pulling himself up and over so that his body is once again parallel to mine but it hovers above me. He pulls back slightly, his breathing heavy and ragged, and his hair falls and tickles my face. I remember that day at the reservation; it seems so long ago now. If this afternoon was days and days ago, then my graduation party was years and years. He smiles down at me, laughing a bit, and the sight of it leaves me more breathless than I already am.

Yeah, I think I do.

"Purple," I breathe out.

So why do I say that?

He pulls back more, lifting himself up higher by straightening out his elbows. His smile fades but does not diminish entirely. "You felt that?"

I swallow and give a small nod. My chest rises and falls dramatically beneath him. My heartbeat echoes in my ears. I am terrified. Please don't hate me.

He sits up entirely, one knee bent upright and the other bent on the floor and angled outward, his foot on its side beneath the first knee. He rests his elbow on his raised knee and rakes the hand attached to it through his hair. I sit up slowly and wait in agonizing silence for his reply. Please don't hate me.

"You can only feel my aura when we're kissing?"

He is no longer looking at me, so I am forced to actually form coherent words instead of merely nodding. "Something like that," I say, because it sounds better than just saying "yes".

He looks at me slowly, dauntlessly. "Has that ever happened with anybody else?"

"I wouldn't know," I answer. He should know I've never kissed anyone else. And he should know why.

"Wow." He rakes his hand through his hair again, and I realize this is the first time I've ever seen him upset. The hair thing must be a tell. I look away from him, guilty. That could've become of use in the future if I were to stay here in York. But things seldom work out the way we want them to.

"That's so cool."

And then, sometimes, they do.

I snap my head back up. He's not mad...? "What?"

He's smiling again. "You can't read my mind unless we're, like, connected. That makes me kinda special, right?"

He's not mad. I give him a half smile. I can hardly believe it. I won't fully commit to the yellow that tugs at me until I can fully believe it.

He wags his eyebrows at me. "Maybe I'm, like, your soul mate, or something."

He's really not mad! I laugh aloud, relieved. Either he doesn't think I've used him for my own experimentation or he doesn't realize it. Either way, I'm floating on a cloud.

"Can we try it again?" he asks, but he's already scooting closer, and by the time I've opened my mouth to say yes it's being occupied. I immediately feel yellow, and I pull back before it can change to purple so I can give him a different answer this time.

"Yellow," I say, my smile conveying the yellow I also feel within me.

"Happiness," he echoes.

I begin to nod, but he's cupping my face in his hands and kissing me again. This time, I feel blue.

"Royal blue," I say. "Confidence."

He kisses me a third time, and I feel orange. When I voice this, he grins proudly.

"I was thinking about how it's possible that you can read minds. I was trying to make you feel curiosity, and it worked!" He thinks for a beat. "Let me try something else."

This time when he kisses me, I feel dark blue. Worried, I pull back almost immediately.

"What was that?!" I ask at the same time that he says, "What did you feel?!"

"Dark blue," I answer. "Sadness."

He frowns slightly, as if he doesn't intentionally want to but he can't quite help it. "I was thinking about you leaving."

I kiss him again, this time not for a color, but in an attempt to comfort him. I lift a hand to his cheek and he lays his hand atop mine. It works; his aura fades into a light blue. When we part, I tell him this.

"Calm," he says.

"Calm," I repeat.

His eyes flutter shut and he rests his forehead on mine. We stay still for a few moments, breathing the same air. Calm.

"Don't leave," he pleads quietly.

"I have to," I answer even quieter.

He kisses me, and it is soft, sweet, slow, gentle — everything a girl could ever ask for in a kiss. I feel it all the way to my toes. Calm. If he thought me only feeling his auras when we're kissing was cool, he's going think this is even cooler.

"I still haven't told you everything," I say into his lips.

He pulls away slowly, tucking a stray strand of hair behind my ear. I've always thought it was cheesy when guys do that in the movies, but it fits perfectly into this moment.

"You mean, you can move objects with your mind?"

"Not quite," I say, laughing softly. Calm and happy. The two best emotions, if you ask me. The two rarest for me. And this boy makes me feel both at once.

"When we kiss, and I feel your aura, it's more than that," I admit, looking him square in the eye. For the first time tonight, I am confident in what I am telling Eli. Everything so far has gone far better than I'd ever expected, so why not?

He gives me a confused look. "What more could there be?"

I feel myself start to grin a little. "I don't just feel your auras; I feel your auras." Before he can ask what I mean, I continue. "Like, I'm not only reading them, but I'm feeling them myself, too."

He chews on this for a moment before asking "What?" with a slight shake of his head.

"Like just now, for instance," I explain. "Your aura was calm when you kissed me, and then it was like it was not only yours, but also mine. I felt calm."

He just stares at me, his nose crinkled, and I, of course, have no idea what he's thinking. He doesn't smile or clap or laugh like he had every other time before. He just... stares.

"Isn't that cool?" I offer up. I'm starting to get a little nervous. Has he finally gone into a state of shock, as any other average human would have done the very first time I claimed I could read minds? Back in the hospital — days away?

Now he's not even looking at me. He looks away, past me, still staring, but at something else. Some other memory, perhaps. Some other thought, some other idea.

Now I'm really getting nervous. The needles are forming again in my gut. "Eli? Isn't that even more kind of soul mate-y?"

"No," he answers me, finally. And this time, when he looks at me, his eyes are sad, drained of all former sunshine. "I can't believe this."

I practically scoff. "Everything I've told you tonight, and this is the part you don't believe?"

"Wahú! It isn't fair!" he cries, and I start.

"What's not fair?!"

"You!" he all but yells this time, and I flinch. I close my eyes for a moment, try to feel for the gray aura. I'm almost certain this is another vision, another mirage. Eli has never yelled at me before. I honestly doubt Eli has ever yelled at anyone before.

But I feel no gray. Only white.

I open my eyes, and my friend is scowling down at the floor like he has recently suffered a great wrongdoing by its hand. I wait, breath held, for him to speak.

"You've never actually said that you don't have feelings for me," he says to the floor. "But, more than once, you've reminded me that our romantic relationship is one-sided. But I never believed you." He looks up at me, and the hurt in his expression is almost palpable. I can nearly feel the black aura I'm sure he's vibing right now. "Do you wanna know why?" he asks, and I'm both scared to know why and scared to reject him. So, instead, I don't give him an answer at all.

He doesn't need one, apparently, because he goes on, his tone even angrier than it was before. But this time it's a soft angry, a calm angry, and everyone knows that is far scarier than a loud, violent angry.

"Because you kissed me. When I kissed you, you kissed me back. Sometimes you even kiss me first. And I always felt like maybe you..." He stops here, shaking his head at the floor again and laughing, but it is dry and humorless and horrifying. "God, I'm so stupid."

Did he just swear? He never swears...

"I always thought that you did like me in that way, for sure, because when we kiss, I always felt like that was maybe reciprocated. That your actions spoke differently than your words. That you were afraid to have deeper feelings for me because of your situation, or maybe you just didn't want to tell me you liked me because you were leaving soon and didn't want to hurt me. But you kissed me back, Aspen! You kissed me back!" He spits this last line, and I involuntarily scoot backwards atop the quilt.

"And even that wasn't real!" he exclaims. "It wasn't real!" He rakes a hand through his hair. Maybe I had been right about the tell.

"It wasn't real," he says again, but this time it is soft and bitter, almost as if he's telling it to himself instead of to me. "You were only into it because I was into it. You didn't have a choice but to be physically into me in those moments, because I was physically into you."

He brings his gaze back up to me, and I shiver even though it isn't cold. We just glare at each other for a moment before he speaks another accusation at me. "Well? You're not even gonna try to tell me I'm wrong?"

I just look at him. My face is hot, especially behind my eyes. The needles have made their new home inside my skull, I think. I blink, and Eli blurs before me. But it's not a vision clearing into reality. It's just water.

"Well. I guess that's it then."

My brain cries out to me to say something, anything: Come on, Aspen, say something!

I say nothing.

Eli turns, opens the door hatch, and begins to descend the ladder. I sit in stunned silence and stare at the empty space his body left behind. The slamming shut of the wooden panel startles me, and some sick, twisted part of me decides that I should feel proud because I finally got the reaction I was originally expecting.

I scramble to the hatch, pulling it open and climbing out as fast as I can. I'm two rungs from the bottom when my eyes adjust to the dark without the help from the artificial light of the lantern. Eli is walking across the grass towards his house. He's halfway to the door.

"Eli! Wait! Where are you going?" I ask, even though it's pretty obvious.

He stops and turns to me, sighing. I hop to the ground, but I don't walk to him. Something tells me I shouldn't.

"It's after nine. I'm going to bed."

I take one hesitant baby step. "Shouldn't we, like, talk about this?"

He shrugs, raising his arms at his sides and slapping them on the legs of his jeans. "What's there to talk about?" His voice sounds tired, passive.

"I don't know, like..." I struggle for an answer, any answer. What I really want to ask is if he's breaking up with me, but I can't bring myself to. Because I think I already know that that's what's happening. And I don't have an ending for my sentence.

"I'll see you tomorrow, Alyssa." Then he turns and continues walking.

I stand, still and broken, a pile of needles by the ladder, and watch him walk into his house without so much as glancing back at me. And I'm not sure what to feel more of — relief that he said he'll see me tomorrow or heartbreak over the fact that he called me by my fake name.

__________

So this is my favorite chapter. For... reasons. And here is the long-awaited color wheel that I promised! If it's too small for you to read, mosey on over to aspenbrooksquinn.tumblr.com to see the full version. (If you've been paying attention, I realize that some of those labels aren't consistent with what I've previously written. But I've had a change of mind and am going to go back to previous chapters and amend the ones I've updated.)

Moment of truth, guys. Before I posted chapter one on WattPad some odd months ago, I had been writing, planning, and rewriting Chameleon for about a year or so. Ish. And I had amassed a grand total of... twelve chapters. I was able to dense (is this the opposite of condense? ...No? Okay.) these twelve little episodes and squeeze out nineteen! In my database (a notepad app downloaded for free from the app store), this chapter, chapter nineteen, is chapter twelve. Meaning... I have officially caught up with myself. From here on out, every chapter will be a brand new something that I have brandly newly writ. This big long explanation is to warn you that I may or may not be able to continue to update weekly. Thursdays is still the plan, but realize that I'm not merely editing and "densing". I'm blindly creating. Which is the most fun, but takes the most time. So this is me apologizing in advance if #ThAURAsdays become #WheneverTheChapterIsCompletedDays. I love you all for sticking with me so far, and I value your opinions and comments like little nuggets of gold, perhaps worn as a heart-shaped, diamond encrusted, inoperable locket around my neck.

Glossary:
wuhú+ -- masculine exclamation of surprise
thaqúbewáthe -- to praise; to speak of as wonderful
wahú -- expresses anger, surprise, disappointment