My Boss Thinks Too Loud

I was sixteen the first time I heard a stranger's mind.

I'd just woken up in a hospital on the Saw Mill Parkway side of the river. The ICU smelled like antiseptic and lily air-freshener. My parents were dead and the room was wall-to-wall family I barely recognized.

Aunt Lorraine was holding my hand. She was sobbing — real, snotty, public sobbing.

"Megan, sweetheart, thank God. Thank God you're here, you scared us half to death."

Her thumb stroked the back of my hand.