Superpowerless

by Chris Priestley

  David nods.

  ‘Happy then. They’d give it all up to be happy. You can’t be happy and be a superhero.’

  ‘Can’t you?’

  David shakes his head. A bitter passion comes into his voice.

  ‘How could you be? However powerful you were, you could never fix everything, protect everyone. There will always be more supervillains out there. You’re always going to feel like … like you’ve failed.’

  Holly frowns, taken aback by the intensity of this little speech.

  ‘That’s a pretty gloomy way to look at it.’

  He shrugs. He smiles, trying to lighten the mood he has created.

  ‘It just seems like how it is.’

  ‘I’d take having superpowers over being superpowerless any day of the week.’

  David nods.

  ‘About last time,’ says David, ‘you know – the kissing thing –’

  Holly laughs.

  ‘I know!’ she says. ‘Your mum coming in like that. Ha! What would she have thought?’

  ‘It’s just that the party is coming up this weekend, so …’

  ‘So what?’ says Holly.

  ‘I thought we could – you know …’

  She stares at him.

  ‘I think we covered everything we could,’ she says. ‘You’re on your own.’

  ‘But –’

  ‘Seriously, David – you’ll be fine. I’ve got to get on.’

  He opens his mouth but the hoover has already roared into life and Holly is in work mode, earbuds in. David settles back on the bed and picks up a comic.

  It’s Daredevil and the Black Widow #106. Daredevil, aka lawyer Matt Murdoch, is another superhero whose gift masks a curse. Blinded by radioactive material that heightens all his other senses. He is weakened and strengthened by it. Made less and made more.

  David thinks about this for a while but soon he finds himself looking from the curvaceous Black Widow to Holly and back again as she works her way round the room. He wishes he had a sexy superhero sidekick.

  Chapter 20

  Sociable and Yet Not

  David has worried that his mother might not be OK with him going to a party across the other side of town but she seems delighted – although she tries hard to hide it.

  She is so transparently pleased, in fact, that David has the strongest urge to cancel.

  ‘Just text me when you’re leaving and try not to be too late. You know I won’t sleep properly until I hear you come in.’

  And that is pretty much it.

  David gets a text from Ellen saying she hopes he’s still coming and he texts back to say that he is. They’re texting. Just like normal people. David has never really texted anyone in his life apart from his mother and Joe. She ends hers with a smiley face and a heart.

  David did used to text his dad. His name sits there on the list on his phone, a constant reminder that there will never be another text from him. Not ever.

  The party is at Ben’s house. His parents are away on holiday. This made David nervous for a start – worried that he was going to be involved in one of those news items where teenagers trash the house while parents are out of town. But Ellen has explained to him that Ben’s parents know all about it and are completely cool with it. And of course Ben would have parents like that. Of course he would. Tosser.

  But the thing that has really swung it for David is the fact that Ellen says that Matt has said he’s not going if Ellen goes because it would be too embarrassing, and as she is going and has told him she is, then Matt won’t be there.

  Ben’s is a big house – much bigger than David’s, and David’s is pretty big. It’s a tall Edwardian villa, detached and at the end of a dead-end road backing on to the park. David has been there before, years ago when he and Ben mixed in the same circles – or when no one really had any circles. He’d gone to Ben’s tenth birthday party. So had Joe. And Ellen. Matt too. Although Matt was a dick even then.

  David could hear the whump, whump of the music when he turned the corner from the main street. He has arranged to meet Ellen on that very corner, but there is no sign of her and no reply to his text so he sets off towards the house wondering if she’ll be hanging around outside or might even have arrived early, popped in and lost track of time. Just then his phone pings.

  It’s Ellen. A text. Something has come up, she says. She will be there, but she’ll be late. She apologises profusely and says she’ll see him there. Smiley face. Smiley face. Smiley face. Heart. Heart. Kissy lips.

  David’s face is not smiley. He seriously considers turning round and going home there and then. He is only going to the stupid party because of Ellen and now she isn’t even there – and who knows if she’ll ever actually turn up. Maybe she is having second thoughts about being seen in public with someone like David. Who could blame her? The fantasy is starting to curdle.

  If anyone had asked, David would have said he hated parties, but in truth he can’t really remember the last one he’d been to and suspects that it may even have been that tenth birthday party of Ben’s at the same location.

  Apart from parties his parents had had, that is. Or rather his mother. His father had disliked parties as much as David. But it’s not like he doesn’t know what a party is. Or that’s what he tells himself anyway, as he walks more and more slowly towards Ben’s house.

  But Mark is right about that at any rate – David has spent too much time on his own in his room. Hard as it is, dull as it may turn out to be, maybe he does need to start talking to people again. All the same, he realises that he has absolutely no idea what to say.

  He had hoped for a group of people to arrive at the same time as him, so that he wouldn’t be noticed, but after standing outside for a few minutes he feels like he is sticking out more by loitering and so, with a deep breath and a cold sensation in his guts, he pushes at the open door and walks in.

  He needn’t have worried about the reaction. There isn’t one. He isn’t noticed at all. At. All. The music is loud but almost drowned out by the sound of people shouting over the top of it to be heard.

  He uses his super-hearing to double-check that there is no whispering about him, but he detects nothing at all. Maybe they’ve forgotten who he is. That seems preferable somehow to that they simply don’t care.

  There are some kind of flashing coloured lights coming from one room, pulsing to the beat, and he heads in what he assumes is the direction of the kitchen to drop off the bottles of beer he’s bought. Or that his mum bought, on the last trip to the supermarket.

  ‘Excellent!’ says an older boy he’s never seen before, who takes the bottles from him and puts them in the fridge – which looks entirely packed with other bottles.

  ‘I’m Blake!’ he says.

  ‘Oh – David.’

  ‘You’re at school with Ben?’

  ‘Yeah,’ says David. ‘Er … How do you know him?’

  ‘I don’t,’ he says. ‘I just like parties. Don’t tell anyone.’

  David nods. Blake laughs uproariously.

  ‘I’m his brother. It was a joke.’

  ‘Yeah – of course. Right. Ha!’

  Blake looks at David for a while, but neither of them can think of any reason or way to prolong this encounter so Blake moves off, beer in hand.

  David opens the fridge and takes out a cold beer, finds a bottle opener and opens it. He takes a swig and squeezes through the crowd into the corridor.

  He has been there barely ten minutes and he is already baffled by what he is supposed to be doing. How did you get to know what to do at parties? Grown-up parties – where there was booze and dancing and groping in the corners.

  Where did they all learn? Everyone around him seems to be borderline hysterical, cackling and whooping and leaping about. He can’t understand why.

  He stands in the doorway of the room set aside for dancing. It looks like it had been the lounge but it has been cleared of furniture for the duration of the party. Blake is with a girl ca
lled Willow from David’s English class. He is enthusiastically grinding his hips into hers to the beat of the music. She looks decidedly less enthusiastic, but he grinds on oblivious.

  David finds that his bottle is already empty and returns to the kitchen for another – at least it gives him something to do for the next few minutes. He drinks that even more quickly and is most of the way through the next beer when he becomes aware of someone standing beside him.

  ‘Look at you – drinking beer and hanging out at a party just like regular people.’

  It’s Joe.

  ‘Oh,’ says David. ‘What? Hi.’

  Joe smiles and leans back a little unsteadily against the wall, beer bottle in hand.

  ‘I’ve been watching you,’ he says.

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Yeah. I always thought you were putting it on, but you really are a bit weird, aren’t you?’

  ‘Cheers.’

  ‘You’re welcome … So you must be interested in Ellen if she managed to get you to a party,’ says Joe. ‘Not really your thing, surely?’

  ‘Don’t underestimate the power of alcohol to enhance an experience,’ says David, waving his beer bottle.

  ‘Who said that?’

  ‘Me – I just said it.’

  Joe nods and smiles. He clinks his empty beer bottle against David’s. But there is a coolness there. Would Joe rather not be seen with him? Is it because David has come for Ellen when he wouldn’t come for Joe?

  ‘Listen,’ says Joe. ‘I’m going to get another one. You?’

  David shakes his head.

  Joe moves off, merging with the crowd, and David stands alone. He takes another swig of beer. He feels more relaxed. Maybe it suits him, this party life. Sociable and yet not. Surrounded by people and alone.

  There is just one thing wrong. There is an absence of Ellen and it is this Ellenlessness that David notices most of all, despite his attempts to manufacture an air of what he hopes will look like moody disregard. He wanders from room to room in the hope that he will bump into her. He doesn’t. He checks his phone and walks straight into someone.

  ‘What the fuck is going on with the hair, David?’ says Matt McKenzie, grabbing a couple of locks and holding them out.

  David pulls away. Not too quickly. Not fast enough for it to be perceived as aggressive. He doesn’t want to start anything. Superheroes don’t fight civilians like Matt. It wouldn’t be fair and it would mean his cover would be blown. Restraint. That was the key.

  ‘Yeah – what kind of a look are you going for?’ says his sidekick, Rory. ‘Sad schoolgirl?’

  Matt laughs.

  ‘Anyway,’ says David, starting to walk away.

  ‘Whoa,’ says Matt, blocking his path. ‘Where you going?’

  ‘I just –’

  ‘Well, that’s not friendly, is it?’ says Matt, turning with a look of mock hurt on his face.

  ‘It really isn’t,’ says Rory.

  ‘Look, I don’t want –’

  Matt suddenly grabs David by the jaw, squeezing his cheeks together, shoving him back against the wall. A small group has gathered now.

  ‘Let him go.’

  David sees Joe shove through to the front.

  ‘Stay the fuck out of it, Jardine,’ says Matt without turning to look at him.

  He is staring into David’s face, his eyes bulging. He knows. He knows that Ellen has invited him. She’s told him. David clenches his fists but what can he do? He has the power to break every bone in Matt’s body with one punch, but he has to control himself. He has to rise above such pettiness. With great power comes –

  ‘Say, “I’m a pretty girl”,’ says Matt.

  ‘I’m a pretty girl,’ says David in a monotone.

  Rory laughs. His breath stinks of tobacco.

  ‘That was good,’ says Matt. ‘But now say it like you mean it.’

  ‘I’m a pretty girl,’ says David in exactly the same voice as before.

  Rory laughs even louder.

  ‘For fuck’s sake, David,’ says Joe. ‘Come on – leave him alone, Matt.’

  ‘And I said, keep out of it, you bla—’

  Joe steps closer.

  ‘What was that?’ he says. ‘Where was that going? Black, was it? Black what? Huh?’

  The crowd mutters and Matt loosens his grip on David’s face and licks his lips, looking uncomfortably from face to face. David wriggles free and rubs his jaw. Someone turns the music off.

  ‘David!’ says Ellen, pushing her way through. ‘What the hell are you doing, Matt? Don’t be such a jerk.’

  ‘Really?’ says Matt. ‘You’re really going to go out with this prick?’

  ‘It’s all about pricks with you, huh, Matt?’

  ‘I didn’t hear you complaining.’

  Ben shoves his way through.

  ‘No fighting,’ he says. ‘I mean it. Matt – stop being an idiot.’

  Matt bites his lip and stares at Ellen, who is hugging David. Grudgingly he taps Rory on the arm and they head towards the door. As he passes Joe he jabs out an elbow and catches him in the nose, knocking him backwards.

  ‘Hey!’ yells David, and rushes forward, spinning Matt round and throwing him up against the wall. He pulls his arm back, ready to punch him. Time seems to slow down to a crawl and he sees a look of genuine panic on Matt’s face. David crunches his hand into a fist and hurls it forward, but before it hits home Ben grabs his arm.

  Ben’s brother Blake lurches in and yanks Matt sideways by the scruff of the neck and frogmarches him to the front door. There is a hush following the slamming of the door and then a muffled shower of abuse from the street outside. Joe stands nursing his nose. David is facing the wall where Matt had been, thinking about the punch that never landed.

  ‘Arsehole,’ says Blake as he came back. ‘Why do you hang out with people like that?’

  Ben ignores him. He is staring at David.

  ‘Leave it a few minutes and then you can go too,’ he says.

  ‘What?’ says Ellen. ‘Why has he got to go? It was Matt who was causing trouble.’

  ‘It’s fine. I’ll go.’

  ‘You see?’ says Ben, still looking at David. ‘He’s happy to go. Which is cool, as I didn’t invite him!’

  Ellen blushes.

  ‘What? So? And I suppose you invited everyone personally, did you?’

  ‘It’s fine,’ says David. ‘Really.’

  So they leave – he and Ellen. David is painfully aware of everyone watching.

  ‘You OK, Joe?’ asks David as he goes.

  Joe nods, holding a tissue to his nose. Then the music is turned back on and the house returns to party mode.

  Chapter 21

  Full of Surprises

  Ellen hooks her arm through David’s and cuddles into his side as they walk. When they get to a small park they stop and sit on a low wall under a buzzing street light.

  ‘Why did you tell me you’d checked with Ben?’

  ‘I meant to. I was worried he’d say no, if I asked before. He wouldn’t have been bothered if it hadn’t been for the trouble. I might have known Matt would do something stupid. He’s honestly quite sweet when you get to know him. But he does have a macho thing going on.’

  ‘Not like me, huh?’ says David.

  Ellen smiles.

  ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ she says. ‘You looked like you were going to knock his head off.’

  ‘I don’t normally … I mean, I’m not really …’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’m just not like Matt, I suppose.’

  ‘Don’t compare yourself to him,’ she says. ‘Don’t compare yourself to anyone. There’s just you. And then there’s other people. I never compare myself to anyone. We’re all just random.’

  ‘Trouble is, most people don’t think like that,’ says David.

  ‘Screw most people,’ says Ellen.

  David smiles. This is the moment. If it was a movie, then this would be the moment the music star
ted up and everything in the background would fade to a blur.

  He puts his hand to her hair and then her face and strokes it and she leans into his hand and closes her eyes. He tries to remember what Holly said.

  David moves his hand to the nape of Ellen’s neck and then round behind her head and she is already leaning forward by the time he pulls her gently towards him, her eyes half open now as their lips meet.

  He tries to heed Holly’s advice about being in the moment, but thinking about Holly’s advice is taking him out of the moment and back to his bedroom and he finds himself wondering again about whether or not he and Holly would have kissed had his mother not walked in.

  Not that this kiss with Ellen – this kiss that is taking place right now – in this particular moment – is not fine … better than fine. It is. It is. It so is. But David is aware that he is kissing both Ellen and Holly at the same time, one in the flesh and one, possibly even more amorously, more passionately, in his imagination.

  Ellen seems happily oblivious to David’s divided attentions, and when they finally come up for air, she pulls back with a smile on her face and an appreciative twinkle in her eye. If there has been a test, David seems to have passed it.

  He had expected that he would feel giddy with excitement but his main emotion, apart from a strange floating sensation, seems to be more a kind of breathless relief verging on exhaustion.

  ‘You’re full of surprises, aren’t you?’ says Ellen, a mischievous curl to her smile.

  Am I? thought David. Am I? But he knows what she means. He has surprised himself. Why would a person like him have any kind of finesse when it came to kissing? That was a man’s kiss and he is very much a boy. He feels a fraud all of a sudden. It feels wrong.

  ‘Look,’ says Ellen, ‘I know this sounds crazy, but some of us are going to stay in a cottage on the coast in August – after results. To celebrate, hopefully. It’s owned by Tilly’s dad. I was going to go with Matt but … well … I wondered if you’d like to go.’

  ‘Yeah,’ says David, without pausing to think. ‘Of course. Would the others be OK with me going? I don’t want a repeat of what just happened.’

  ‘Absolutely,’ she says. ‘They didn’t like Matt – so they’ll be overjoyed that I’m coming with anyone that isn’t him.’