“I don’t want any help.” Amstrad whispers to Charmorag as Kiki is waiting in the alleyway behind the apartment.
   Why not?
   “I want to do this on my own! And again, you can’t give away our power. They’d freak out.”
   Fine.
   “Really?”
   Yes.
   “Alright.”
   He exits through that heavy back door and they get started. The first half hour is the basics, both of them practicing levitation on empty cans and, like lifting particularly heavy weights, shallow trash bags. Eventually, Kiki stops him and speaks up.
   “It doesn’t seem like you’re very good at lifts. That’s okay, most of us aren’t. But if you think you can fly, then you might be a little different than most psychics. Like me.”
   “What do you mean? Can you fly?”
   “No. I think you have something called a Talent. A psychic ability totally unique to you, and I suppose it’s flight. Usually those who have talents aren’t very good at lifts, the most basic of psychic functions.”
   “What’s your Talent?”
   Kiki shakes her head. “I don’t really feel like saying. Not yet at least. It's not useful here.”
   Amstrad nods.
   “But anyways, have you flown before? Or gotten any sensation like flight?” she asks.
   Amstrad thinks back. “There was one time, right outside of Time Prison, when I felt like I could sort of walk on air. Push off of it like ground. That felt a bit like flying.”
   “Hmm.” Kiki pushes some empty boxes and plastic crates together in a stair-like pattern. “Walk up these. And close your eyes.”
   “Uh. Okay.”Amstrad closes his eyes and is about to walk up when Kiki stops him.“Wait, I’m gonna shuffle some things around. Don’t peek. Trust me.”
   Amstrad hears the boxes move slightly. The trick seems obvious. ‘Oh would you look at that, he walked an extra step’. It won’t work. He’s thinking too hard about it.
   He walks up the three boxes he knows are there, and then tries for an imaginary fourth. He feels Kiki’s hand on his chest.
   “Wait.” she says. “Open your eyes.”
   He looks down. She’d moved every box out of the way. He’s standing on air.
   Amstrad freaks out, falls down, slips, and is caught by Kiki before he would’ve hit his head on the asphalt.
   “Well, you’ve got something.” she says.
   “Shit. Why’d I fall?” he asks.
   “I dunno. Maybe you don’t believe you can fly yet. At least, not without someone else’s help.”
   Amstrad gets back to his feet and brushes off his jacket. “So… what now?”
   “How to improve? Good question.” Kiki starts walking around, looking up at the high brick walls. Cold wind blows in from the Hudson as trucks and cabs speed past. “In my experience, it helps a lot to have something physical, tangible, ritualistic to base your practice on. Like how it helps with lifting to gesture your hand at the item.” She pats the rough brick facade and nods. “How about you try walking all the way up this wall?”
   “What? But that’s not, like, stairs.”
   “I said you could fly. Not walk upwards. Who says you can only walk along one axis that isn’t the ground?”
   “I don’t know.”
   “Don’t know. Just-” she waves her hands vaguely, “-be it. Put the idea in your head that it’s possible. That’s the biggest shit they have against us, you know. The things we accept are impossible.”
   “The jawbreakers?”
   “Everyone, Amstrad. Every fucker who puts you down. Try it.”
   Amstrad walks up to the brick and lays a hand on it. He backs up and kicks at it, then keeps his leg there. Putting his whole weight on it, he longes upwards to put his other foot on the wall. But as soon as they’ve both left the ground, he gets the strongest feeling that he’s falling. He immediately flails and puts his feet back down to catch himself.
   He huffs. “I don’t know, Kiki, I-”
   “You can do it. I saw it.”
   “What do you mean?”
   Kiki points to his leg. “Your foot was planted. The bottom of your pant leg wasn’t weighed downwards, but towards the wall.”
   “It was?”
   She nods.
   “Shit.”
   Kiki levitates a box over to sit on. She leans back and breathes deep, then motions to Amstrad. “Again. Higher this time.”
   And so he does.