Override (Glitch)

watched him eye it critically.
    “It’s very…” he paused, “accurate.”
    “Is that good?” I asked in a small voice.
    The Professor laughed. “Zoe, art isn’t about good or bad.” He handed the paper back to me. “It’s about letting yourself feel things, and then trying to communicate those feelings. Here, let me show you something.” He led me over to the canvas in the corner where Cole had been working. The canvas had been pointed at the wall, so it wasn’t until we walked around that I could see it.
    Tears immediately pricked my eyes. “It’s beautiful.”
    There wasn’t any clear image or figures in the picture. Instead, it was a wash of color, vibrant red spreading into shocking blue, with dabs of white and yellow throughout.
    It looked like delight. Or maybe that’s just what looking at it made me feel.
    “But he’s an ex-Reg,” I turned to the Professor.
    “It’s harder for them than it was for the rest of you glitchers,” the Professor said, “but Cole’s living proof that no matter how much metal you put in a person, you can’t take away their humanity. Cole just has to fight harder for it.”
    I immediately thought of how I always felt a rush of relief right before I clicked into the Link each night. It felt like a free pass. For a while I didn’t have to try to sort out the emotions, I could just let them dull to gray. But here Cole was, fighting to keep them.
    “But why?” I whispered. “Why does he try so hard?”
    “Oh, Zoe,” the Professor said with a smile, “look at the canvas. Can’t you see why?”
    *   *   *
    I couldn’t stop thinking about the canvas as I walked out of the class and down the empty hallway. I wanted to be like Cole and paint in color. I wanted to feel things, I was just tired of feeling bad things. I’d had enough of bad things. But I’d also felt the emotions Cole had captured in the painting before—beauty, color, delight. I’d felt them with Adrien.
    My wrist com buzzed with a message:
I’m waiting for you at your dorm.
    It was as if Adrien had read my thoughts. I felt a flush of warmth and smiled. I hurried down the hallway to my dorm. He was waiting outside the door for me, his face dark and intense.
    “I’m sorry,” he said as soon as I got close. He pulled me into a tight embrace. His words were a whisper against my neck. “I’ve been an idiot. I let this project I was working on distract me from what’s really important. So tonight,” he pulled back and brought my hands to his lips. He kissed my fingertips. “We are going on a date.”
    “What’s that?” I asked, my heart fluttering erratically at his touch.
    “It’s what they used to call them in the Old World,” he grinned. “Just two people going out to dinner. And not at the Caf.”
    I scrunched up my face, confused. “Why not? We’ve repaired most of the fire damage. Everyone’s been eating there all week.”
    “Because,” he laughed, then leaned in to kiss my nose. “The whole point is that it’s just the two of us together. Alone.” His voice dropped on the last word in a way that sent a quick shiver up my spine.
    He’d been so distant the past few weeks, but here he was, grinning genuinely like there wasn’t a thing to worry about.
    I shook away the confusion and smiled back at him. A night of forgetting about everything and simply being together sounded perfect.
    “A date,” I said. “Will I eat my gruel out of a fancy cup?”
    “Don’t ruin the surprise,” he smiled. “I already know you’re going to love it.”
    I started. “Wait, you’ve had a vision of our date? No fair!”
    He winked at me. “Let’s just say I have a good feeling about it. I’ll come back by your dorm room at seven so I can escort you to dinner.”
    *   *   *
    “This is so romantic,” Ginni squealed, and for once, Xona didn’t even bother to roll her eyes.
    Ginni had pulled me in front of the mirror for the last half hour and was curling and pinning my hair up in intricate ways.
    “I wish I had a boy who would ask me on dates. We’d talk about the books I love and he wouldn’t mind that I talk so much. In fact, that’s what he’d like about me most. We’d talk for hours and…” She paused. I looked at her in the mirror and her face held a puzzled frown.
    “What?”
    “Oh,” she giggled, shaking her head. “I just had the weirdest sense that I had met someone. But that’s impossible.”
    “All those romantic books are giving you