Chapter 12

                                    

                                          
Michael and Sloane cleared out as if Locke had started a wildfire just by walking into the room. I don't know about you, but I do believe that my fellow Naturals don't fancy Lacey Locke as much as I thought they did. 
                          
Dean won't look me in the eyes, once again, and I wonder if I've done something wrong, but really, he's acting as if nothing happened at all last night. As if he barely knows me. Which I guess is the truth, but it doesn't feel that way. 
                          
We go over a few ideas for my first training day, and if Dean looked unhappy before, the emotion was even stronger now that the Agent decided on a field trip. 
                          
"You're driving," Locke says as she throws Dean the keys. 
                          
He walks out of the kitchen with an expression I've come to know as brooding, and without another word we all get into Lockes SUV. Me in the backseat and her in the passenger. 
                          
"Where to?" Dean grumbles. 
                          
She gives him an address and he murmurs something inaudible, although I do catch a slight southern accent in his tone. 
                          
Again, we fall into an awkward silence. 
                          
Dean doesn't seem shy. So if anything, I'd assume he saves his voice for when he feels it's really necessary. 
                          
Profiling. Is that what I'm doing right now? I wonder if he's doing the same to me...
                          
He's a very careful driver, and his shoulders tense when he gets cut off. And when we got to the mall —which is apparently where we were heading— he gets out, shuts his door, and holds the keys out for Locke. All without even so much as glancing at me. 
                          
Obviously since I've never had any friends, I'm used to blending in, but Dean not even bothering to look at me feels like an insult. Like a dagger in my heart. Might as well call me Julius Caesar.
                          
"Welcome to Westside Mall," Agent Locke says, snapping me out of my internal sorrows. "I'm sure this wasn't your idea of how your first day would go, Violet, but I wanted to get a chance to see what you can do with normal people before we dive into the abnormal end of the spectrum." 
                          
Deans eyes flick sideways. 
                          
"Something you'd like to add Dean?"
                          
Dean shoves his hands into his pockets. "Nothing. It's just been a long time since someone told me to think about normal..."
                          
A few minutes later, we find ourselves sitting at a table in the food court. 
                          
"The woman in the purple fleece, what can you tell me about her Violet?" Locke asks. 
                          
I sit and follow her gaze to the person in question. She wears running shoes and jeans. Sporty, and threw on the jeans last minute before coming to the mall, or isn't athletic at all and wants people to think she is. I say this out loud. 
                          
"What else?"
                          
What else? They want to figure out why you can know things so easily and they can't. They want you to pick it apart. That's what Michael told me. 
                          
Locke wants the bigger picture. 
                          
Behaviour. Personality. Environment. 
                          
I look closer at the girl in fleece. 
                          
She chose to sit near the edge of the food court, even though there were plenty of tables closer to the restaurant she'd ordered from. And rather than looking at her surroundings, she keeps her eyes glued to her food.