Superpowerless

by Chris Priestley

‘Yes.’

  ‘Where the hell were you? Were you at that festival with this girlfriend of yours? Sneaking around behind my back – so you could screw some girl from school?’

  ‘I didn’t go to the festival.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I didn’t go to the festival.’

  ‘You told me about the bands you watched. You went into such detail.’

  ‘I know,’ he says, suddenly filled with the shame of it all. ‘I wanted you to believe me. I’m sorry.’

  ‘Then where did you go? That was so important to lie about? Clearly somewhere I wouldn’t have given you permission for. Let’s hear it. The truth, please.’

  David has been given ample time to prepare for this inevitable question, but all the lies he has come up with seem to sound ridiculous. As annoying as it is, the truth, on this occasion, seems the best option.

  ‘I went to a house on the coast. With friends.’

  ‘Friends?’

  David is stung by how implausible she assumes this to be.

  ‘Yes – friends. Kind of.’

  ‘What the hell is that supposed to mean?’

  ‘I don’t know. They aren’t my friends now.’

  ‘Why all the secrecy?’ says his mother. ‘Why lie?’

  ‘Because I didn’t think you’d let me go.’

  ‘Is it drugs?’

  ‘Is what drugs?’

  She slaps her hands down on the table.

  ‘Is that why you’re like this?’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Is it drugs?’ she shouts. ‘Are you on drugs? Tell me!’

  ‘I’m not on drugs!’ yells David.

  They are both wide-eyed now. David can see his mother’s hand trembling. He feels nauseous. Everything feels like it’s unravelling.

  ‘Then what?’ says his mother after a long pause.

  David closes his eyes tightly shut and leans back.

  ‘It was Ellen,’ he says to the ceiling. ‘The girl I told you about. I wanted to be with Ellen. She invited me.’

  ‘Oh – she exists then? You’re sure?’

  He lowers his head and opens his eyes.

  ‘Yes – of course she exists.’

  ‘There’s no of course about it. You seem to have become a very efficient liar. I know nothing about her. You suddenly announce it at dinner.’

  ‘I thought I’d told you about her,’ says David.

  ‘No, you don’t. Do you think I’d forget you telling me about a girl? Do you seriously imagine I don’t spend my whole time worrying about you – wanting you to have friends and be happy. If you’d told me you had a girlfriend, I’d remember, OK?’

  ‘All right then,’ he says. ‘What do you want to know? Her name’s Ellen Emerson. From school. We met at the shops a while back and we got talking. It was her who invited me to that party.’

  His mother looks at him for a while, saying nothing for a long moment.

  ‘So it was about … sex. The lying?’

  David’s stomach lurches.

  ‘Mum – do we have to talk about this?’

  ‘Yes!’ she says. ‘You forego the right to be coy when you lie to me.’

  David stares into his bowl of cereal.

  ‘Yes – all right. Jesus! I wanted to have sex with her.’

  She looks as though she is about to burst into tears but she doesn’t.

  ‘You tried to get your best friend – your only friend – to cover for you; to lie for you. Good for Joe for refusing to have anything to do with it.’

  ‘Is that what he said?’

  ‘He didn’t need to.’

  ‘Because Joe’s perfect, I know.’

  ‘Oh, stop being so childish! Something could have happened and I wouldn’t have known where you were.’

  ‘But nothing did happen,’ says David. ‘Nothing.’

  David’s mother holds her head in her hands. She says nothing for a long time and David wonders whether he is meant to leave and leave her to it, but he can’t make himself get up from the chair.

  ‘What’s going on, David?’ she says eventually, so quietly he only picks it up with his super-hearing.

  ‘What?’

  ‘To you. To us,’ she says, taking her hands away and staring at him pleadingly. ‘To me … and you.’

  David can’t look at her. He doesn’t know what to say.

  ‘We were so close before your dad died,’ she continues. ‘You don’t seem to even remember …’

  David’s eyes start to sting.

  ‘It feels like when he died that died too,’ she continues. ‘The fun we used to have together. I tell myself that it’s just because you’re growing up and so you don’t need your mum like you used to, but it’s more than that. You’ve shut me out. You’ve used his death to shut me out.’

  ‘I haven’t.’

  Has he?

  ‘Well, it feels that way,’ she says.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mum – honestly.’

  She throws her head back so she is looking up at the ceiling and David can only see the underside of her chin. It feels a very long time before she looks at him again.

  ‘I don’t know what to say, David,’ she says. ‘Whatever I say to you seems to have the opposite effect. I’m lucky if I get so much as a grunt in reply. You seem to talk to Holly more than you talk to me.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s true.’

  It is. He talks more to her than to anyone. More than Joe even. That has never seemed strange until now.

  ‘I hear you talking up there,’ she says.

  ‘You do?’ he says, startled.

  ‘I can’t hear what you’re saying obviously,’ she says. ‘Which judging by your expression is clearly a good thing.’

  ‘No – it’s just – you know …’

  ‘No, I don’t know,’ she says. ‘I don’t know anything. There could be something going on between you and Holly, for all I know.’

  ‘Mum – there’s nothing going on –’

  ‘I know, I know!’ she says, frowning. ‘That’s ridiculous, obviously. All I mean is that I don’t know anything about what’s going on in your head any more. You’re a mystery.’

  She shakes her head, lost in her own thoughts. He is filled with a sudden desire to tell her about his superhero alter-ego, but though he opens his mouth he cannot form the words.

  ‘Sorry,’ says David eventually.

  ‘I’ve got to get on,’ she says, scraping back her chair and leaving the kitchen without another word.

  Chapter 38

  Everyone Wants to Believe They’re Special

  The room is airless, but David refuses to get up and open a window. It feels right. It is appropriate to his state of mind – his brain feels as if it is being crushed in a vice.

  He lies on his back and gazes at the imperfections in the ceiling – imperfections that become more and more exaggerated as he studies them, until he feels as though he is hovering over a vast ice field, chilled despite the warmth of the room.

  He has been idly flicking through the Red Sonja Conan comic, looking at the bizarre range of jobs advertised therein:

  BOYS, 12 OR OVER, SELL GRIT FOR CASH PROFITS AND PRIZES

  THE KEY TO YOUR FUTURE: BE A LOCKSMITH

  TRAIN AT HOME FOR A BIG INCOME CAREER IN

  ACCOUNTING

  HOW TO WRITE, SELL AND PUBLISH YOUR OWN SONGS

  SELL ENGRAVED METAL SOCIAL SECURITY PLATES

  David doesn’t even know what social security plates are or why anyone might want them engraved. He is waiting for Holly to arrive, lying in a state of near self-hypnosis, until he hears her footsteps on the stairs, the clunk and slither of the hoover against the wall. But when she finally enters his room he does not acknowledge her at all.

  Holly does not respond to this lack of response. She knows what it’s about, and if David wants to signal his annoyance without discussing it, then that suits her just fine.

  But David can’t keep it up.

  ‘You told Mar
k I spied on you!’

  Holly rolls her eyes and turns to him, hands on hips.

  ‘Look – what was I supposed to do? It’s your own fault. He told me what you were like when they were round here. What the hell was that about?’

  David scowls.

  ‘He was getting on my nerves.’

  ‘He was getting on your nerves?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Holly shakes her head.

  ‘You’re messing with people’s lives,’ she says.

  ‘No! You’re messing with people’s lives. It’s not my fault if you’re screwing Mark.’

  She glares angrily at him.

  ‘Keep your voice down!’

  David slumps down, muttering to himself. After a moment, Holly comes and sits on the bed beside him.

  ‘Look, I’m sorry I told Mark about you spying on me. It seemed the best thing to say.’

  ‘For you, maybe.’

  She nods.

  ‘For me, yes.’

  David wants to stay mad at her, but he knows in the same situation he’d have done the same.

  ‘He thought I’d told you,’ says Holly. ‘He was really angry. I couldn’t have him thinking I’d just been randomly blabbing. Sorry.’

  David lies back down on his bed. Holly stands up and goes to the window, silhouetted against the slats.

  ‘Look,’ says Holly, ‘he can’t exactly tell anyone about it, can he? So one more person knows about your little secret. Now we’re in the same boat.’

  It doesn’t feel like that to David. He wants to say that he doesn’t think that spying on people doing something is the same as actually doing the thing that the people are doing, but he thinks better of it.

  ‘Come on,’ she says, bending over and grabbing the ball. ‘Ask me something. Anything.’

  David shakes his head. He isn’t in the mood. He was sick of the whole sorry mess – a mess that just seems to get more and more tangled and complicated at every turn.

  ‘All right then …’

  She throws the ball at him and he only just manages to stop it hitting his face. She laughs at his look of surprise, and after a moment he joins her, holding the ball with both hands.

  ‘So …’ she says, looking around the room for some focus for a question.

  She glances towards the drawing of Lightforce.

  ‘Tell me a secret,’ she says. ‘Something no one knows.’

  ‘That’s not a question,’ he says.

  ‘All right then,’ she says. ‘What is your biggest secret?’

  ‘It won’t be a secret if I tell you.’

  ‘Well, maybe that’ll be a good thing,’ she says.

  ‘How do you work that out?’ he says. ‘I don’t see you telling everyone about you and Mark.’

  ‘Yes – but you know about it,’ she say. ‘So it’s not a total secret.’

  ‘And that feels better, does it?’

  She smiles.

  ‘No. But I thought maybe, as you know such a big secret of mine, there might be something you could tell me. If you tell me a secret, I’ll tell you one. How would that be?’

  David frowns dubiously.

  ‘You already know that I spy on you.’

  ‘True,’ she says. ‘But speaking as a person with secrets, I think you have other secrets. I can see it in your face. I can see the effort of keeping them all hidden.’

  She reaches out and lays her hand on his face. He closes his eyes. He is so very tired. The weight of it all. It’s exhausting. Enough. Enough. Give in.

  ‘I think – I thought – I had superpowers,’ says David.

  As soon as he has said the words he wants to reel them back in – to unsay them.

  ‘Really?’ says Holly.

  After a moment David nods. He feels like he’s falling out of the sky, plummeting to earth.

  ‘Go on,’ she says. ‘Tell me about this dream of yours.’

  ‘It isn’t a dream. I mean, I’m not asleep. It feels real. It feels more real than what everyone else is trying to tell me is real.’

  He shrugs. There seems no way to explain it that won’t make him seem ridiculous. He has never wanted to talk about it because on some level he knew to do so would destroy his powers. The truth is kryptonite.

  ‘Go on,’ says Holly.

  David feels as if the words are slipping back into the darkness and he has to wrench them free before they disappear. Why isn’t she laughing?

  ‘Oh!’ she says, pointing to the drawings on the wall. ‘You’re Lightforce!’

  David shakes his head.

  ‘The other one.’

  Holly frowns and nods as though that makes sudden sense to her.

  ‘And you, what, rescue people from burning buildings – save the world … that kind of thing?’

  ‘No – I only have one thing to do. One thing. And I can’t even do that.’

  ‘What is it? What do you have to do?’

  David takes a deep breath. Why is this so hard to say?

  ‘I have to save my dad.’

  Finally. He gasps with the effort. It’s like having a massive splinter wrenched from his flesh.

  ‘Oh, David,’ says Holly.

  She leans forward and puts her hand on his shoulder. David fights to hold back tears. Now nothing in the world can stop him from continuing.

  ‘Every time it’s the same,’ he says. ‘I see the car going into the water or I see the car sinking and I fly there and I use my super-strength to pull it out. Or that’s how it was for a while. I’d rescue him. I’d stop him from dying.’

  ‘And then what happened? What changed?’

  ‘Right at the point where I’d be about to save him, something always stopped me.’

  ‘You changed your mind?’

  David winces as the very thought of Lightforce hits him with a blinding burst as though his enemy is there with him at the river’s edge.

  ‘No – there was something else there. Someone else – with superpowers. Someone stronger than me.’

  ‘A supervillain?’

  ‘I guess.’

  Holly peers at him, cocking her head to one side.

  ‘What did it look like, this supervillain?’

  David feels his muscles clench. The light bursts again behind his eyes, like a migraine.

  ‘I can’t see. It’s just like a human-shaped blinding light. Too bright to look at. It’s too powerful for me. More powerful than anything.’

  Holly sits back, pondering all this.

  ‘Wait! You mean him,’ she says, pointing to his drawing on the wall. ‘It’s Lightforce!’

  David nods.

  ‘So Lightforce stops you from saving your dad.’

  David nods again, pushing his fingers through his long hair.

  ‘But why?’ she asks.

  David has asked himself this many times of course.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  Holly sits back, staring at him.

  ‘I know, I know,’ he says. ‘Feel free to laugh.’

  ‘I’m not going to laugh.’

  ‘Why not?’ says David. ‘It’s pretty hilarious.’

  ‘No, it’s not,’ says Holly.

  David chokes back a sob and can’t speak for a while.

  ‘So now you know,’ he says at last. ‘I’m even crazier than you thought.’

  ‘Not crazy.’

  ‘No?’

  ‘Everyone wants to believe they’re special,’ says Holly.

  ‘Even if they’re not,’ says David.

  ‘Hey,’ says Holly. ‘That’s not what I meant.’

  ‘Please,’ he says. ‘I’m not special. And you don’t have to try and pretend I am. I’m not a kid.’

  ‘You are a kid,’ says Holly. ‘No shame in that. So am I most days. Everyone thinks there’s this big moment where you suddenly become an adult, but there isn’t. It’s a process.’

  ‘I love you,’ says David.

  ‘No, you don’t,’ says Holly, kindly but with a sigh.

&n
bsp; ‘I do,’ says David. ‘Don’t tell me what I feel. Why does everyone think they know better than me how I feel?’

  Holly takes a deep breath and exhales slowly.

  ‘OK. If you do love me, it’s because I’m the only girl you’ve taken the time to get to know,’ she says. ‘A girl you’ve talked to, properly. A girl you’ve been brave enough to be weak in front of.’

  ‘You don’t know that.’

  ‘Don’t I?’

  ‘I don’t care!’ shouts David.

  ‘It’s powerful stuff,’ she says, ‘getting inside someone’s head. Much more powerful than getting inside their pants, believe me. But you have to get inside someone’s heart for love.’

  ‘And I haven’t got inside yours, is that it?’

  Holly smiles a gentle smile and David feels it like a hot needle in his heart.

  ‘I’m very fond of you, David,’ she says, ‘but I don’t love you. I’m sorry. Not in that way.’

  ‘Because … you love Mark?’ says David.

  ‘Mark? I’ve already told you – I’m not in love with Mark.’

  ‘What then? Is he in love with you?’

  ‘No – he’s in love with Marie.’

  David frowns, confused.

  ‘How? I don’t get it.’

  Holly smiles.

  ‘He’s a little bit obsessed with me,’ she says. ‘But it’s not love. He still loves Marie. He just can’t stop himself.’

  ‘Why would you –’

  ‘Why would I allow myself to be the object of an obsession?’ she says with a sad smile.

  David tries to make sense of what she is saying. Is she talking about him? Is she saying he is obsessed with her too? Maybe he is. Holly looks away and shakes her head.

  ‘Anyway, a deal’s a deal,’ she says. ‘I promised you a secret, didn’t I?’

  Chapter 39

  Like an Animal

  Holly seems to lose her nerve and covers her face with both hands.

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ says David. ‘You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to.’

  ‘No – I do. I do want to.’

  David looks at her. It doesn’t look much like she wants to. It looks like it is causing her the same pain it caused David to reveal his secret.

  ‘You know that I dropped out of university, but you don’t know why,’ says Holly.

  ‘You told me. You had a breakdown,’ says David. ‘You were stressed out about that boyfriend – Duncan – who went off with someone else.’