Nobody by Jennifer Lynn Barnes Page B

wrong
.
    It explained everything. No matter how hard she tried, or how sweet she was, or how often she went to the same places and did the same things, hoping that someone would eventually notice, no one ever did. And if what Nix was telling her was true, then no one ever would. She was constitutionally incapable of mattering,all because of some invisible birth defect she couldn’t control.
    It really is just me, and nothing I do will ever change it
.
    The death of a dream was an eclipsing thing, and the hope that someday things would be better had been Claire’s mainstay for as long as she could remember. She wanted to fight to hold on to that sliver of
maybe
, but she couldn’t bring herself to doubt what she was hearing, because it explained so much.
    “You’re not a Nobody, Claire.” Nix was adamant, and his words managed to pierce the thoughts gumming up her head. “I’d know if you were.”
    “A Nobody?” Claire repeated dully. “Is that what we’re called?”
    It’s what he’d told her over and over again when she asked him who he was
—Nobody
. He’d said it like it was a name, an identity, and a curse, all rolled into one.
    “
Nobody
is the word for someone who can’t give their energy to anyone else, yes. It’s what I am. It’s why I make the perfect assassin. People don’t notice me. They look straight through me. They forget me.”
    “I didn’t.” In the days since she’d first seen him, staring down the barrel of his gun, Nix’s face had never been far from her mind. She’d thought it was because there was something wrong with her, something that drew her—perversely—to her killer.
    In a way, Claire supposed that she’d been right.
    “You’re special, Claire. No one else has ever been able to really see me, and no matter what I do, I can’t shake you. Even when I fade, you find me.”
    “Fade? Is that what you’re doing when you close your eyes?” Claire asked, her mind working through the logic of his words like a calculator crunching numbers.
    “Fading is something Nobodies can do. Even if I wanted to be noticed, most people would look straight past me, but if I concentrate, if I push all of the thoughts out of my mind and stop trying to be worth something, then I fade. People can’t see me at all. And because objects have energy, too, when I fade, as far as the world is concerned, I don’t exist. The laws of physics don’t apply to me. I can walk through walls. I can shake off gravity. I can disappear.”
    Claire wrapped her arms around her chest. What Nix was describing—it was beautiful. She wanted to disappear. She wanted to walk on water.
    She wanted to fly.
    But more than anything, Claire wanted the courage to take one step forward. One step closer to Nix, who didn’t believe she was a Nobody for the same reason she hadn’t been able to imagine anyone capable of walking past him without wanting to fall into the blue of his eyes.
    “I see you,” she told him softly, afraid that she would lose the words if she didn’t let them loose. “Faded or not, Nobody or not, I see you. I see you when I close my eyes. I see you when you’re not even there.”
    Nix took a step back, like she’d hit him. “That’s why you’re special, Claire. That’s why The Society wants you dead. Normals aren’t supposed to notice Nobodies. You must be some kind of outlier.”
    “I’m not special, Nix. I’m wrong.”
    “No. You’re not. You’re—”
    “I’m just like you. Don’t you get it? The reason I can see you is because we’re the same.”
    “It doesn’t work that way.”
    “How do you know?” Claire pressed. “Have you ever met another Nobody?”
    Nix paused.
    “You haven’t, have you?”
    Nix refused to shake his head, but Claire saw the answer in the set of his jaw.
    “Think about it, Nix. You talked about energy, right? And everybody has it? And people exchange it, but for whatever reason, Nobodies can’t give their energy to anyone else. Maybe it’s