Chapter 10: Mandy and Candy

Julie was still sitting on the bed with me when we heard the commotion in the hall. Then the door to my room banged open and in tumbled a giggling mass of blond-haired beauties.

“Holy Shit! This whole family is blond!” I thought.

Four beautiful blond goddesses!

Since I knew Nicky and Jennifer, and the other three appeared to be very similar in appearance, allowing for the slight age differences, I assumed these others were also my cousins. It turns out, I was right. The two youngest ones were the fourteen year old twin daughters of Sarah’s twin sister, Debbie. And the third was Jennifer and Julie’s older sister.

“I wonder what color my hair is?”

“It’s dark blond. Kinda sandy really. You used to be blonder when you were little,” Julie said.

“Say WHAT!” I was so surprised she had heard my thoughts, it took a minute for her words to register. But before I could say a word, there was a scream

“JU-LEE-E-E ... No-o-o-o! Don’t you dare! How COULD you?”

Everyone froze as Jennifer, standing in the doorway, began to cry.

Forgetting that she had just overheard my thoughts, I slid Julie off me, swung my legs to the floor, and taking two steps, hugged Jenny to me.

“Jenny,” I said softly. “Listen to me sweetheart.” But she wouldn’t stop crying.

I turned and grabbed Julie’s hand and pulled her to Jennifer. I looked at Julie and asked, “Ready?”

She looked confused, then seeing where I was headed, she smiled real big as she nodded.

Holding on to both of them, I began to slowly share with Jenny and Julie, my ‘memory’ of waking up from the coma. Then I moved to yesterday’s lunch with Jenny, then to this morning’s breakfast with Nancy Lee. I followed with my ‘sermon’ to Catherine, and then lunch with Julie, right up to the girls all coming through the door a few moments ago. I had moved slowly and carefully, amazed that if I took my time and focused, I could control exactly which parts to share.

But, I discovered, while it takes very little energy to read someone, it takes LOTS of energy to share myself with someone. As I finished, I began to stagger, and reached back for the bed. I leaned against it for a second, as I glanced around the room.

The other four girls were staring at us with their eyes wide.

“Oh-oh! Is that the green-eyed monster rearing its head?” I thought, looking at Nicky.

“I can’t believe you showed him your tits!” Jenny squealed.

“Me either. I was trying to get him to react like before,” Julie explained, blushing a little.

“Did he?” Jenny asked.

“Naw,” Julie told her twin sister. “He showed you what happened. He just pigged out on chocolate ice cream.”

“Well, at least now I understand why Nancy Lee was trying so hard to call her mom,” Jenny said.

“O-o-o-o! Can you believe that mom is pregnant?” asked Julie.

“WITH TWINS!” they both screamed together!

This broke the other girls’ spell. Soon they were all talking at once.

I turned and climbed in the bed and settled back with a sigh.

“It’s moments like this,” I smiled to myself, “that I love being me!”

The next hour or so was spent with six teenage girls talking to each other simultaneously, and remarkably, understanding everything each of the others was saying.

“Talk about remarkable talents!” I thought. “That’s really more impressive than what I can do.”

It didn’t take long until they broke their huddle and surrounded my bed. Then one of the ones I hadn’t met yet said, “Michael, would you please tell us how you did that?”

Now, if you put an audience of six people in front of any extrovert, they can’t help but perform. Make it an audience of six very pretty teenage girls in front of a sixteen year old, hormone-laden male, and a performance is inevitable.

I touched the spokesperson. It was Randi. Randi was Jennifer and Julie’s big sister and it appeared, my only non-twin cousin.

“Hello, Randi,” I told her. “I’m Michael. I’m introducing myself because, to my memory, we have never met before. However, I see that you have met the old Michael, and I am sorry he, or I, as the case may be, was a total jerk. The incident with the firecracker was inexcusable.”

“So! You do remember!” she accused.

“No. YOU remember,” I shot back. “I simply read your memory. By the way, who is Keith Williamson? And does he really have a Partridge Family poster in his bedroom?”

“KEITH WILLIAMSON!” You were in Keith Williamson’s bedroom?” squealed both sets of twins.

“Does his mom know you were in his bedroom?” asked Jennifer.

“His mom? Does OUR mom know you were in his bedroom?” asked Julie.

Randi was blushing by now. I touched one of the others.

“Hello Candace. May I call you Candy?” I asked. “Or should I call you ‘Sugar-lips’ like Wesley Cowan did? At least before he tried to get you to put them somewhere you didn’t want him to!”

While she hung her head and the others made various comments designed to further her embarrassment, I quickly touched the remaining twin.

“By process of elimination, you have to be Amanda. May I call you Mandy?”

I looked her in the eye, and waited for her response. What I was really doing was buying time, trying to decide. The others grew quiet, waiting to see how I would tease Mandy.

“Mandy, does anyone in this room know?” I asked

She hung her head. I could feel the guilt eating her alive. Donald Kirkland, whoever he was, was gonna get the shit beat out of him when I got out of the hospital. I let her feel my rage.

“How did you do that?” Randi asked again.

“What about Nicky?” asked Candy with a mischievous grin.

“I’ll explain that in a minute, as for Nicky, she can share her experience if she wants to,” I said.

I turned to Julie and asked, “Would you see if Beth or Peter could locate Grandmother?”

She got an apprehensive look on her face like ‘Oh. No. Here we go again!’ and looked to Mandy. I touched Julie and she immediately headed to the door. I thought I heard voices talking, and then she returned a moment later.

“Beth said to stay here. She sent Peter,” Julie told me.

“Okay,” I said. “I need to ask you and Jenny a question. Would you mind if I showed your sister and cousins what I showed both of you earlier? I’m not doing it to embarrass you. This is important, especially for Mandy.”

They looked at Mandy as Julie and Jenny both nodded.

“All right. Randi, Mandy, Candy...”

“What about me?” Nicky asked.

“And Nicky,” I amended. “When I woke up Monday morning, there was a strange feeling in my head. But since I couldn’t remember anything, I didn’t think anything about it. Over time, I began to notice that I could sense the emotions of certain people whenever they touched me. The more it happened, the more I could sense. Then, I began also sensing their thoughts connected to those feelings.”

I could sense their skepticism.

“This morning, by accident, I discovered I could also share my emotions with others. I do not understand what is happening, nor do I know why it happened. I can only assume it has something to do with the accident, because Grandmother Catherine says I couldn’t do this before.”

Catherine and Sarah entered and stood quietly behind the girls. Thank goodness, they hadn’t left the hospital yet.

“What I am about to do is share some of my memories with you. Jennifer and Julie have already experienced this,” I said. Then I turned and smiled at Jenny and Julie. “And they have graciously allowed me to share them with you. I am doing it because in horsing around with you all a moment ago, I discovered something that unfortunately is not a joke. This is serious, which is why I asked for Grandmother and Sarah to join us.”

Catherine stepped forward and laid her hand on me. I dumped the last half hour for her. I hoped she got it.

“It would help me to show you better, if you each touched me. Remember, we are all family here. And what I share with you, I do so because you are my family, and maybe it can help. But whatever happens, please try to keep this in the family,” I told them.

They were all touching me now, including Sarah. Nobody said a word. I closed my eyes and focused as I replayed what I had played for Jennifer and Julie earlier.

There were gasps as I added the part about Donald Kirkland. They were all reaching out to Mandy as I lay there, now totally wiped out. As the conversations buzzed all around me, I realized that the replay had taken most of my still reviving energy level.

I dozed off.

The room was dark.

“Oh, shit! I slept through dinner again,” was my first thought. “That sucks! Because I’m starved!”

“Bea sent you something. Do you feel like eating?” came her voice.

“Hell, yes!” I replied.

She stepped into the light. She wasn’t wearing her uniform tonight, either. Instead, she had on a cream-colored lace blouse with buttons down the front and a dark wine-colored skirt that came to her knees, with a small slit in front. The blouse was unbuttoned far enough to allow a generous view of the tops of her breasts. She wore a wide ribbon in her hair, the same color as her skirt. The confusion of her being out of uniform must have shown on my face.

“Bea and I are off tonight. But when Sarah called and said they needed someone to watch you, I told her I’d love to. She wanted me to clock in, but I told her I wanted to do this as a friend, not an employee,” Sydney said. “I am your friend, aren’t I, Michael?”

I reached for her hand.

“Always and forever,” I told her truthfully. I let my feelings for her pour out as I held her hand. Sydney just sighed.

“Here you go,” Sydney said as she set the aluminum foil covered plate on my tray. “Let’s see what Bea sent. She’s such a wonderful cook.”

She talked as she fed me, telling me about her day, and her plans for the next couple of days since she was off. She told me how Little Kenny did at the market earlier, and their plans to go to the zoo in Knoxville tomorrow. When she called Bea about watching Little Kenny for the evening so she could come stay with me, Bea had fixed me a plate for her to bring along, just in case.