Awakening Book One of the Trust Series(99)

Garrett was staring at a blank space on the wall. She was sure that he would rather stare at nothing than look at her at the moment. “I did not choose to be Nathaniel Livingston’s son. In case you forgot, I left him to come back here.”

“You only left when his views became even too extreme for you. Look at me.” When Garrett did not budge, she grabbed him by his shoulder and spun him around. “I said look at me!”

“Oh, so the amazing Caitlyn Young wants to talk and wants me to look at her. Your ego is really getting to be too much. Do you just expect me to cater to your every whim like everyone else does?”

“I don’t see what the problem is. You did not have any problem doing it for your father.”

Garrett’s eyes narrowed. “You are walking a very thin line.”

Caitlyn paused. She needed to get a grip on herself. Even though there was a lot between the both of them at the moment, if she did not reign herself in, she was going to lose him. Caitlyn was not ready for Garrett to walk out of her life. She sat back down and her voice took on a normal tone. “Garrett, if I had stayed just a plain old human and you had met me; would you have even given me a second glance? Would you have viewed me as an inferior being?”

He paused. “Caitlyn, you are not a regular human being, so this argument is irrelevant.”

She shook her head. “It is relevant. Just answer the question. Please.”

“No, I would not have dated you. I probably would not have even become friends with you.”

She rubbed her eyes with her hands. She was praying he would not answer that way. “Normal humans are not inferior, Garrett. My friends at home are not substandard.”

His left eyebrow arched highly. “Aren’t they? Because I think, no, I know that since you have been with the Trust, you have contacted your friends only a handful of times, if that. Even if you won’t admit it to yourself, your actions show the superiority you feel over them. I mean, you did not even let them know that your sister died. Your supposed best friends who should be there in your time of need. You know you are greater than them.”

She felt guilt when she hadn’t contacted them for comfort in her grief. “I could barely function. I did not even want you there at first. It does not mean that I think that I am better than them.”

He paused, and his hands grabbed hers, his voice quiet but severe. “It is evolution Caitlyn. Pure and simple. The current human species are the Neanderthals to our Cro-Magnon. They will wither out and die by natural selection.”

The truth in which he made that comment made Caitlyn look at him with whole new eyes. “I refuse to believe that.”

Garrett sighed. “Caitlyn, I’m not saying that I want to eradicate the human race. That is my father’s crazy notion. I am just saying that we are different, we are special. What is so wrong with being special?”

“Oh, there is nothing wrong with being special, as long as one realizes that special does not make you better.”

“In this case it does. As to dating a human or being friends, they could never understand what I am going through. It would never be an even friendship.”

Caitlyn was tired of arguing. “Where is the man that I care about, Garrett? Where are you?”

He looked at her and thought back, “I am still here; you just need to accept the other half of me. Now that the truth is out there, get to know me. Get to know the real me. I promise you will still want me.”

She wanted to believe him more than anything. But one truth remained. “It turns out that we are very, very different.”

“Please don’t take this harshly, but cut the holier than thou attitude, Caitlyn. Question things. Think about what an Actual really makes you. Think about what you want out of this, not what you can be for the Trust. Hell, even think if you want to be in the Trust. There are other options, even besides the Cine Tofa. Think about what you and I can be together. I never wanted to hide anything from you; I never wanted to keep that part of my life from you. I promised the Trust I would mentor you the best way I knew how and I would train you with the Trust methodologies. I may have kept things from you, but I never intentionally lied.”

Tears sprang to her eyes. “You are right about one thing. I need to think. I need to think about a lot of things. I need time.”

Garrett looked hurt. Even as mad as she was at him, she did not want that for him. But she knew she needed to say more to him.

“I need time away from you, from all of this. I don’t know what to think about everything.”