2 Deja Blue by Julie Cassar

yeah!” Brennan nodded enthusiastically. “Actually, once I heard the entire situation from Celestine, and discover e d t hat it was that greedy punk Grobel behind the schemes to get you out of the picture, I figured I’d have an easy way for you to re pay the life-debt to her.”
    I waved my hands impatiently, urging him to continue, “ Aaaanndd ???”
    “Well, it involves bribery, of course.” Brennan answered.
    “That’s it? You’re going to bribe the Mermaid ?” Jeremy asked.
    Brennan gave a look of disdain, shaking his head, “Of course not. You can’t bribe Mermaid s.” (No, no, of course you can’t…How the hell would we know? Ugh. I kept my mouth shut, but was getting more and more irritated at Brennan’s lack of detail . It’s not like they’d given me a Fairy-World Handbook with all of the rules. G eesh .) Brennan darted his eyes over to me, giving me a warning look. My eyes widened as I said, “ Wh aa at ? I didn’t say anything!” I guiltily replied , using my best I’m-innocent expression.
    “Oh. You said it alright,” Brennan answered smugly.
    My mouth hung open. “No. I didn’t.”
    “Yeah. Ya did,” he replied.
    “No. I’m pretty sure I didn’t say a word.”
    “That’s right, you didn’t say a word.” Brennan retorted. 
    That was it. I exploded. “I wasn’t trying to use some weird Fairy telepathy! How the hell do I know what I’m doing?! You guys never tell me anything!” I can’t even have private thoughts anymore without some Fairy eavesdropping. And , I still d on’t know how I am supposed to repay the debt to the Mermaid . This was the most frustrating situation I’d ever been in, and I was going to get even nastier if Brennan didn’t start giving me some better answers.
    Anya spoke up, “Ruby, your Fairy telepathy is new. You’ll get the hang of it, I promise. But , right now, when you’re very emotional… happy, sad, angry… whatever, you tend to… ahhh … broadcast your thoughts.”
    That did it. I was pissed. “It’s not my freakin ’ fault that you guys are listenin ’ in on my head. Stay out of it! I don’t know what the hell I’m doing, so cut me some slack!” I gave Brennan the evil eye and focused on my Fairy -talk, directing it right into his pea-sized, little brain. “ Okay Mister Nosey-pants Eavedropper . How ‘bout listening in on this , y ou obnoxious, cocky , smug … stupid… m other fu … ” Before I finished the thought, Brennan jumped up from the table shouting at me in some foreign language. I think it was Fairy …or…something. It sounded kind of Irish. Maybe Celtic?   But whatever it was, it sounded like something from another time. And , it sounded harsh. He was definitely using worse words than I was. I didn’t know what he was saying, but I knew it wasn’t nice. He was so mad that I thought his eyes were going to pop out of his head.
    Jeremy interrupted, holding up his hands, like he was the cop appr oaching some scary, whacked-out-on- crack nut job, “ Okayokayokayokayyyyyy .. .why don’t we all just calm down. Let’s just dial it down a notch, shall we? Chill. Your . Grill. ” I got the sinking feeling that I was the whacked- out nut job. I slumped down over the table, burying my head in my arms and let out a big sigh. I was on the verge of tears and felt overwhelmed with everything that had happened in the past two days. So much for that calming spell Anya placed on me. She’d better give me a double dose of another one, and quick. 
    Anya spoke up again, reaching across the table to rub my arm. I looked up at her with my teary eyes. “ It’s okay, Ruby, really. It’s not like we hear everything you’re thinking. It’s only happened once or twice before. Please, please, please don’t even worry about it.” She shot Brennan a look and he spoke up, quickly calming his demeanor. “Yeah, yeah. Forget it. Do you wanna hear my stellar idea about how you’re gonna pay back the Mermaid ?”
    I let out a