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  Published by The Hartwood Publishing Group, LLC,

  Hartwood Publishing, Phoenix, Arizona

  www.hartwoodpublishing.com

  Don’t Touch

  Copyright © 2013 by Barb Taub

  Digital Release: December 2013

  ISBN: 978-1-62916-015-3

  All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination, or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  Don’t Touch by Barb Taub

  Hope flares each morning in the tiny flash of a second before Lette touches that first thing. And destroys it.

  Her online journal spans a decade, beginning with the day a thirteen-year-old inherits an extreme form of the family “gift.” Every day whatever she touches converts into something new: bunnies, bubbles, bombs, and everything in between.

  Lette’s search for a cure leads her to Stefan, whose fairy-tale looks hide a monstrous legacy, and to Rag, an arrogant, crabby ex-angel with boundary issues. The three face an army led by a monster who feeds on children’s fear. But it’s their own inner demons they must defeat first.

  Dedication

  Dedicated to my husband, my own prince of a guy.

  Excerpt From Lette Simoneau’s LiveJournal Blog

  Can’t Sleep

  LiveJournal, October 26, 2012 by LetteS

  —Lette’s Birth Date Calculator: 22 years, 9.2 months

  I have a secret wish, buried so deep it only escapes in dreams, where I touch someone and nothing happens. Next morning, hope flares in the tiny flash of a second before I touch that first thing. And destroy it.

  Chapter One

  WORST. Day-After-Birthday. EVER.

  LiveJournal, January 20, 2003 by LetteS

  Yesterday was my birthday (13!) so Mom said I could start this LiveJournal blog if I keep it private. But I never thought I would start my first post by saying that this morning at 6:15AM I found out I am a freak.

  After all the birthday presents and cake, last night when I got into my (brand new!) loft bed I was a normal, neurotic (isn’t that a great word?) angst-filled (I had to look that one up too) new teenager. Then my alarm went off this morning. I woke up, and I could feel colors. Through my fingertips.

  Yeah, I know: so freak. My fingers were touching my new quilt, and even though my eyes were still closed, I could feel vermillion, titian, and bittersweet. Who knew those were even words, let alone colors? I walked around my room with my eyes closed and fingers out. Dresser? Sienna brown. Mom’s evil cat George? Atrous black and niveous white. Walls? Glaucus blue (which sounded a lot better as “tropical lagoon” on the paint chip card).

  Lamest. Superpower. Ever.

  At breakfast, I tried to show my parents that the dishes were Chartres blue and the napkins Viennese ivory. But Mom was all, “Lette, we’re running late so maybe you can show us your little trick again at dinner. Right now you better scoot for the bus or Dad will have to drop you off.” (Which must never happen because the high school where he teaches math is connected to my middle school, and someone might see us together.)

  Because I’m such a giant, most people don’t realize I’m actually almost a year ahead in school. After some tests they gave us in third grade, I ended up skipping a year. Well, really only half a year because my birthday is in January. But it doesn’t take any particular brains to know the most important commandment of middle school is Thou shalt not be noticed. Not by the kids who sit at the big table at the end of the lunch room, the ones who know exactly what to say and wear. Not by the bullies or the teachers or the universe. At five feet, twelve inches (I know, but it sounds better than six feet), I’m about the tallest kid in the school, so it’s already hard enough to escape notice. No way was I going to tell my friends, or anyone else, how I could feel colors I never even knew names for—puce, chartreuse, amaranthine.

  I stayed after school for play practice. I’m Third Orphan in Annie, and I don’t have lines, but our director says, “There are no small parts, only small actors.” (Which is lucky, because I’m like the tallest one there.) So by the time the activity bus dropped me off, it was almost dinnertime.

  The message light was blinking on our (Wedgewood blue) answering machine. Maybe she’s making up for Dad, who never speaks whole sentences, but Mom’s messages have no pauses for sentence structure. Luckily, they almost always get cut off by the message timer. “Oh, hi, Lette, it’s Mom, and we’re going to the Homeowners Association meeting because the Smeltzers—you know, the Smeltzers with the nasty little dog who chases George—well, they put on the agenda again to get permission to park their friggin-ginormous motorhome in their driveway, even though the thing is big enough to require its own zip code, so I’ve explained to Dad that we’ll fight to the death to make sure that’s never allowed in this neighborhood, but since it’s going to be such a long meeting, I left you a plate in the microwave for your dinner, and there is some birthday cake left in the fridge, but if you want one of us to look over your homework leave it on the table because it’s going to be a late one if the Smeltzers think they’re going to—” Beep…

  While I waited for dinner to heat in the (French bisque) microwave, I had a long talk with Mom’s evil cat George. In fairy tales, I told him, the daughter’s problems are usually the mother’s fault. Either she insults some fairy, or she dies, leaving her daughter to be raised by a cruel stepmother. Sometimes even before the kid is born, the mom gets in trouble with a remark about spinning straw into gold or just popping over to borrow a bit of salad from the witch’s garden next door.

  At the very least, I told George, Mom could have been an evil ogress. That would certainly have explained…well, something anyway. George spat at me and stalked off.

  Fact is, although Mom can be scary about RV parking, she just doesn’t fit the fairy tale profile. She’s assistant to the director of human resources for a law firm, she wears dark suits, is super polite—even to the Smeltzers—never uses swear words, and she didn’t die and leave Dad to marry an evil stepmother. She spends way too much time researching the healthiest foods for me, and never misses a PTA meeting. Dad teaches high school calculus and builds model train layouts in the basement. I have no idea how he actually instructs his students, because I’ve never heard him say a full sentence. Usually Mom says what they think, asks him if he agrees, and he says, “Mmmmm.”

  So that’s it for my first journal post. Yesterday the Birthday Girl; today the Freak.

   •●• 

  Birthday +2 Not A Freak!

  LiveJournal, January 21, 2003 by LetteS

  —Lette’s Birth Date Calculator: 13 years, 2 days

  I’m okay! I woke up this morning, and I couldn’t feel colors anymore. I’m still skinny and have a weird face. But my fingers work fine.

  The Blog Tips pop-up says I should write an About Me section, so this is what I was planning to say before I found out I was a freak: My name is Lette Simoneau. I officially became a teenager two days ago. I’m too tall, too skinny,
and I have too much red hair that goes in every direction except the one I want it to go. My Nana says I’ll grow into my eyes (too big) and my mouth (too wide) and my chin (too pointy) and my body (way too tall) but I’m not sure. Of course, now none of that will matter if the freakiness comes back.

  Last summer, I took a College for Kids class in computer programming at the high school because the course description said we would write a date calculator. I would like to go on dates but I didn’t know you could calculate them. Also, I thought there might be boys in that class who were taller than me. I hate it when I’m that wrong. Not only was I the only girl there, but the boys were all at least six inches shorter. Including the teacher. And the date calculator turned out to be a program to figure how many years since a certain day (I used my birthday). The programming was pretty fun though.

   •●• 

  This is NOT Good.

  LiveJournal, June 20, 2003 by LetteS

  —Lette’s Birth Date Calculator: 13 years, 5 months

  Sorry I haven’t posted in almost five months, but I was trying to avoid thinking about the color-touch thing. School went on like usual, and I even got nine speaking lines in Annie when Belinda Aronsen had to get her tonsils out.

  We only have one more week of school, and yesterday morning I was thinking about my new CIT (Counselor-in-Training) job at Melody Acres Day Camp. I was brushing my teeth, wondering if any of the other CITs would be (tall) high school guys, when I noticed something glowing in the mirror. The electric toothbrush that Mom insisted on when I got my braces was still buzzing against my teeth as I turned in a slow circle. Everything I had touched in the bathroom was glowing. Doorknob, towels, toilet, toothbrush—all gave off this kind of shimmery golden light. I spit out a (glowing) stream of toothpaste, rinsed, and screamed. “Mo-o-om!”

  Mom made me stay home, with strict instructions to wear gloves and not touch anything in the house.

  Luckily, when I woke up this morning, the glow-touch was gone. But Mom says maybe we better skip the CIT job just in case.

  It’s going to be a long summer.

   •●• 

  High School!

  LiveJournal, September 10, 2003 by LetteS

  —Lette’s Birth Date Calculator: 13 years, 7.7 months

  Summer sucked. One day in July, I could read books by just touching the cover. And there was a day in August when I could turn on the TV by just putting my hand on top of the set. Each touch-thing only lasted one day and each was really lame. But the books stayed readable, and the TV stayed watchable.

  Mom says maybe it’s a phase I’m going through, like pimples or braces. Dad, of course, doesn’t say anything.

  Starting high school was scary. But with the braces off, my mouth is looking almost normal. There’s a nice guy, almost as tall as me, in my history class. His name is Sean, and he asked if he could sit next to me at lunch. Then he asked for my phone number, and tonight he called to see if I was going to the dance on Friday.

  I wonder if he would still like me if he finds out I’m a freak.

   •●• 

  Getting Worse

  LiveJournal, April 18, 2004 by LetteS

  —Lette’s Birth Date Calculator: 14 years, 2.9 months

  The touch is happening more often. Regular gloves don’t help, but luckily, out of the blue, Dad’s great-aunt Roulette (I’m sorry to say that I’m named after her) sent a box of surgical latex gloves and a pair of fancy Goth fingerless gloves. They seem to keep the touch from changing things, so now I wear them all the time, even to bed. How did my great-aunt know?

  I used to think, when I turned fourteen, I’d worry about whether a guy would ask me out, not whether I would accidentally touch him and make him a squirrel. Or worse. I tell all my friends that I have allergies but Sean thinks I’m weird and now he’s going out with my friend Megan. I’m probably too much of a freak for anyone to date, and I’ll end up one of those old ladies like great-aunt Roulette, living alone except for a cat. Hopefully, not George.

   •●• 

  My Life Sucks

  LiveJournal, September 22, 2004 by LetteS

  —Lette’s Birth Date Calculator: 14 years, 8.1 months

  One thing that’s weird is the touch doesn’t work on me. I tried standing in front of the mirror and touching my own face (carefully!). But the same too-tall, too-thin, too-serious girl always looks back at me through too-long copper colored bangs. I guess that’s lucky, considering what happens to things I touch on some days. Also, touching things with my lips or anything other than my hands seems to have no effect.

  I’m surprised at how well my parents have adjusted. Mom did research online, but couldn’t find anything to explain the touch. Once, Dad looked up from his Model Rails of the World magazine, muttered vaguely about great-aunt Roulette, and then disappeared into the basement.

  Most of the time the touch is as lame as that first day, but occasionally it gets pretty exciting. Okay, the guest room floor did have to be reinforced from below after I turned the furniture on gold-touch day, and it caved in the floor onto Dad’s Tyrolean funicular railway layout in the basement. But at least, as Mom pointed out when she was trying to comfort him, they won’t have to worry about saving for retirement or paying for my college. He’s rebuilding the railway, and she’s looking into a furnace to melt down the solid gold hide-a-bed and bureau.

   •●• 

  Really Bad Days

  LiveJournal, December 20, 2006 by LetteS

  —Lette’s Birth Date Calculator: 16 years, 11 months

  They don’t happen that often, but there are days when I wake up and I just know if I touch anything it will be bad. Those are the days the little pieces of gravel I keep in a heatproof dish on my bedside table burst into flame, bubble, dissolve in acid, or flat-out disappear. I’ve had to miss a lot of school because of those days. Mom tells people that it’s because of my medical condition.

  I have a great computer, and I spend a lot of time online. Most of my friends now are online people I’ve never seen who don’t know I’m a freak.

   •●• 

  Date: March 15, 2007

  To: [email protected], [email protected]

  From: [email protected]

  Subject: I’m so, so sorry!

  Goodbye Mom and Dad. It’s safer for everyone if I stay at the mountain cabin. I’ll text you.

  Love, Lette

  PS I really am sorry about George.

   •●• 

  That’s That

  LiveJournal, March 16, 2007 by LetteS

  —Lette’s Birth Date Calculator: 17 years, 1.9 months

  Yesterday, Mom’s evil cat, George, jumped onto my stomach before I woke up. Without thinking, I reached over to shove him off the bed. That’s when I realized two things.

  Thing one: there was a rip across my right-hand glove.

  And thing two: George shut up in mid-hiss.

  Even before I rose up on one elbow, I knew this was not going to be good. On the bed next to me was a back-arched, tail-splayed, mouth-pulled-back-in-frozen hiss cat shape sculpted entirely from… I leaned closer and sniffed. S’mores?

  “Mo-o-om!”

  Even as I heard Mom racing toward my room, I was leaping to lock my (now giant s’mores) door. “Don’t touch the door!” I yelled. “And I’m sorry about George.”

  “Lette?” Pause. “What about George?”

  “Really sorry.”

  “Lette?”

  Pulling on new gloves, I hauled out my camping backpack and threw in jeans, shirts, underwear, and a giant discount box of disposable surgical gloves. It was weird, but I think in some corner of my mind I must have been planning this for a while. Maybe even since that first color-touch day back when I was thirteen. Anyway, now that I’m seventeen and have been driving for over a year, I knew I could take the keys to the little Honda and head for our cabin a few hours north of Seattle.

  As Mom yel
led from outside the door, I typed in a quick goodbye email to her and Dad, and put the laptop and charger into my pack. Then I pulled on the backpack and went out my bedroom window. That turned out to be a lot harder wearing a full camping backpack, and my glove ripped again. So I broke off the bottom of the s’mores windowsill in case I got hungry later.

  Chapter Two

  Text Message from Mom’s Phone 2:17PM, Oct 20, 2012

  “L? R U there? Dad @ modL bkyd layout conf so jstme 2day. cn I cum ^ 2 c u? XcitN news!”

  Text Message from Lette’s Phone 2:18PM, Oct 20, 2012

  “Use your words, Mom. You’re just embarrassing yourself. I’ll put out the ladder.”

   •●• 

  Not So Bad, Really

  LiveJournal, October 20, 2012 by LetteS

  —Lette’s Birth Date Calculator: 22 years, 9 months

  I haven’t written in a while, but after Mom’s visit today, I thought it might be time for an update.

  As I unrolled the chain ladder fastened to my porch, I wondered what Mom’s news might be. But I didn’t see how it could change things for me. I hate it when I’m that wrong.

  Some days I can’t believe I’m almost twenty-three, or that I’ve spent the past five years living in my parents’ little mountain cabin. Luckily, it’s close enough that my parents visit most weekends. And money is never a problem because Mom’s friend Eric, who runs a pawn shop off of Pioneer Square in Seattle, is always able to take the melted down gold or other valuables I’ve touched and change them to cash with no questions asked.

  Sure, there were bad days, but lots of good ones too. I discovered I love working in my garden. But even with heavy gloves over my surgical gloves, gardening is hell on latex. Still, most of the craters from that landmine-touch day are now filled with dirt, and it looks like a really good year for my tomatoes. That is, if I can just get them to stay tomatoes and not turn them into small pink bunnies or straw hats or whatever that day’s touch is. And that really big crater behind the cabin must have tapped an underground spring because it makes a great swimming pool. Of course, the front door is now over two stories above the ground after the cabin rose up twenty feet in the air from the levitate-touch day. But with the mountain at my back you can’t really tell. Much. Dad put some long poles under the four corners so what looks like stilts holding up the cabin are actually anchors holding it down.