American Quest by Sienna Skyy

right?”
    Jamie’s expression softened and she reached out for him. She held him close for a few seconds—and then she pushed him onto the couch. “Sit and listen,” she said as he looked at her, mouth agape.
    She marched into the kitchen and filled the kettle with water. “You
know how you always joked that the reason we’ve been best friends all our lives is because we hit it off so well in the nursery?”
    “What’s this got to do with—?”
    “Bruce! You know I’m not going to jerk you around, so humor me!”
    There was a simple explanation for Jamie’s brusque tone: alien abduction. Though he was feeling more nervous by the second, Bruce placated his best friend. “Yes, that’s always been the joke.”
    She set the kettle on the stove and joined him on the couch. “Well, you were almost right about that. Here’s the thing: it’s no accident that I was born one day after you. I was born because of you. From the moment you were conceived, you were marked as someone unusually passionate. I mean crazy passionate. Off the charts passionate. Don’t ask me how that works at conception; I’ve been wondering that for years.”
    “Jamie . . .”
    She put a hand up. “This means you’re likely to accomplish great things—could be, I don’t know, incredible works of art or leading a revolution. Writing works—plays, for instance—that change the way people think. That’s major stuff. But as it turns out, not the most major stuff. The thing about people like you—and trust me, I’m no expert on any of this, as much as I’ve tried to be—is that we knew you’d seek a life partner who was equally passionate.”
    “We?”
    Jamie tipped her head downward. “You’re interrupting. I asked you not to interrupt, didn’t I?” She sighed. “Yes, we . I was put here to watch you. To guard you.”
    Bruce’s ears rang, striving to process the nonsense that poured from Jamie. “Wait a minute. Hold on. Who’s ‘we?’ And if I’m so special, why would you have to guard me? Where the hell is all of this coming from?”
    Jamie waited a beat, but didn’t scold him again for interrupting. “‘We’ is me and . . . oh God. I’ve been visited by—hang on, one thing at a time.” She tugged at a curl that spiked down over her ear. “The reason I am guarding you is because your potential increases exponentially if you fall in love with someone like you. Amazingly, you managed to date a bunch of lightweights for a long time. Then Gloria showed up.”

    Bruce snorted. He’d never heard her talk so crazy before, and if it were anyone other than Jamie, he’d be whistling for the paddy wagon by now. But he took it all in, thinking he’d sort out the truth from the insanity later—if only she’d get to the part where she told him where Gloria was.
    Jamie continued. “Both of you, you’re unusually committed and passionate people. And you found each other and fell in love. That’s an amazingly rare thing. It shoots the potential the two of you have up into the stratosphere. But it’s also a dangerous thing. It draws attention from a kind of darkness that would love to pervert your power. And when it does—no, if it does; we have to make sure it doesn’t—it would destroy you. And not only you.”
    Jamie didn’t have to worry about his interrupting any longer. Bruce was officially speechless.
    She took a breath. “With that kind of power in the wrong hands, it could destroy the world. When you met Gloria, I knew there was a serious risk. I’ve been waiting for this phone call ever since.”
    The teakettle began to whistle. Jamie rose to attend to it.
    Bruce stared into an empty space. Dark powers watching them? Where did that put Gloria now? His stomach rolled. Too much, just too much. He shook his head. He was barely aware when Jamie set a teacup before him.
    Jamie punched a number into her cell phone and listened, then shook her head, ending the call. “No Candace. I got a voice mail from her, but