by Chara, Mina
When I returned to the table Grey London’s syringe was gone: I’d lost both of them. I rushed back onto the Hero High bus with Jake. Grey London had been kidnapped, and I had to tell someone. Jake kept patting my back, as though he was worried I’d vomit. I jumped out of the bus the moment it stopped, making for the real heroes building, Jake hot on my heels. I skidded to a halt at the sight of Grey London walking through the doors, threw off my heels, and ran towards her. “W-what happened?” I asked, panting.
Her hand on the door, she shook her head,
“Are you okay? Did he hurt you?” I asked, looking her up and down.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she replied, frowning.
“Dr. Dangerous, he took you, he, he-” She started blankly at me, refusing to admit what had happened. Jake peered at me from behind. “What about Dr. Dangerous? ‘Day? Did you see Dr. Dangerous?”
Grey London narrowed her eyes at me, and I sighed. “No, no. It was nothing.” Grey London nodded and left. “I think maybe I’m just tired,” I said. “Walk me to my room?”
Jake nodded, and wrapped an arm around my shoulders. I wasn’t going back to my room, I was going to see Lisa. I wasn’t sure who I could trust, but she was my best bet.
✰✰✰
Half an hour later my rusted old bike had delivered me safely to Lisa’s home. I left the bike in the drive, rapped on the door and sighed with relief when Lisa ushered me in.
“Is everything okay, Friday?” she asked. Barney sat on the sofa, the ghost of a smile on his face. They’d been laughing. Together.
“I didn’t mean to interrupt, I can go if-”
Lisa’s cleared her throat, and shook her head.
“Non sense. Get it?” she said with a smile.
Barney snorted. “I should go anyway, Lisa. It’s getting late.” Lisa nodded and fetched Barney’s jacket while I stepped aside, inspecting the pictures that hung on her wall and trying to pretend I hadn’t noticed; Lisa was smiling at Barney, Barney was smiling at Lisa, he was at her house late at night, and her kids were in bed. They mumbled to each other, Lisa trying to hide her smile, while Barney let it run wild. One last adjustment of his jacket and Lisa held the door open while he gave her one last smile before leaving.
“So, what’s wrong, kid?” she inquired, “is everything okay? You look worried.”
“Do you know anything about a golden syringe?” I asked as we sat down together on the sofa.
“Where’d you hear about that?” she asked, leaning forwards.
“I found one, two actually.”
“You found one?” she repeated, struggling to keep her voice low.
I nodded. “But then I lost them.”
“Friday, what exactly have you been doing?”
“Please, I have to know!”
“It’s not your job to look into this kind of stuff,” she told me.
“Lisa, please! I can’t sit still and do nothing. What do you know?”
“Not a lot. It was a couple of months ago,” she said, leaning forward once again. “Someone approached me to ask about my powers, whether they were OK, or whether I wanted some sort of upgrade. He showed me a gold syringe.”
“What did you say?” I asked.
“No! Obviously.” Lisa growled.
“Right. Of course.”
“Now tell me, what have you been doing? What do you know about the syringe?” Lisa asked.
“Grey London, she was kidnapped.” I could feel something rising in my throat, I swallowed hard. “Then she appeared outside the Super Structure and she told me I’d-” My eyes burned as I looked down at shaking hands. I was scared, so scared. Lisa said nothing, pulled me into a hug, the way my mother used to, and let my head rest on her chest.
“You need to stay safe Friday,” she told me, as I fought back tears.
“I can’t, I have to work.”
She pulled back, looking down at me, holding my shoulders. “Not everything is up to you, kid,” she said, smoothing my hair, “you don’t have to grow up so fast.”
My mind skipped back to the syringe, The Figure, Dr. Dangerous, Grey London, the fact that the same people had approached Lisa, and even she didn’t know what was happening. She wasn’t asking me to ignore it, she was asking me to be safe, to take my time, but I couldn’t, not when frustration and the drive to do, shook me to my very core. I’d lock it up, like I had at home. I would try, I would try to be patient. I nodded and she wrapped her arms around me again, telling me to start from the very beginning.
✰✰✰
After I told Lisa what I knew, she helped me search my room for the syringe, just in case I’d missed it. I told her I’d been kidnapped by the Dr. but left out the kissing part. She said she’d keep an eye out for any other heroes using syringes, and then I knew I should have told her earlier. Why hadn’t I? Was I just so used to doing things by myself? Maybe I just wanted to prove that I, alone, had done something.
On Saturday the gold team and I had to be ready for a yearly meeting called the Hero Channel’s Upfronts. Aya slaved over all the clothes in my designer closet, trying to choose between two skirts. I’d almost fallen asleep watching her pick. She sighed, and threw me the tea length one with a shirt.
“You’re sure?” I asked, jolting awake.
“The flap pocket it too casual. I just really like it.”
I changed quickly as Aya rushed out to finish her hair. David and Ashley were waiting by the door, playing rock paper scissors. I almost giggled when I realized David had matched the color of his jacket to Aya’s dress. Ashley wore the same suit I’d seen him in last time, it still sent flutters of nerves through my stomach. Did I like him? I wasn’t really sure.
I slipped my phone into my pocket just as Aya rushed out and David took her arm. As soon as the bus pulled up outside the tower, Veronica slid the door open and looked us up and down as though checking we were dressed well enough. She paused when she got to me, but didn’t say anything. As soon as I sat down and the bus started up, I leaned forwards.
“What exactly is it we’re doing?” I asked her.
“Going to a restaurant. I would have told you earlier, but I didn’t know the shareholders wanted the gold team, most of you are freshman, usually they leave them out of the Upfronts.” She said this all while texting on her phone. I was genuinely impressed. “All you kids have to do is make simple chit chat and enjoy the meal while the cameras make the rounds, and some people make some announcements.” The others seemed to nod as though that sounded pretty simple, but I couldn’t make simple chit chat. I resolved very quickly to hide behind one of my team mates. No one would want to talk to me, I had the least media coverage of anyone in the gold team. Aya already had a deal with a clothing line, David had been on two magazine covers, and Ashley had an endorsement deal with Strawberry Tarts, a product title I had mis-read as ‘Strawberry Farts’ on multiple occasions.
The bus pulled up to a tall restaurant painted emerald all over and just for once there were no paparazzi outside, nor any reporters in sight. A large gold sign atop the entrance said ‘Émeraude’. Two men opened the front doors in tandem, their hands splayed on the horizontal gold bars that made up the handles. Aya stood on my right, whispering in my ear about how she’d never been here, and Ashley on the other side sighed. As the doors opened, I held back a whistle.
The restaurant was ginormous! Symmetrical steps on either side led up to a balcony dining room across from the large glittering chandelier that hung in the center of the restaurant.
We moved through crowds of servers and customers to the hostess. I recognized almost all the faces as several camera crews weaved through the tables picking up conversation. A small stage and podium sat atop a balcony for addressing the whole restaurant. The walls were the same shade of green as the outside, but so were the chairs, and the tables. Veronica waved her hand at the hostess, urging her to go faster and soon we were on the balcony, seated at a long table that sat at the same level as
the shower of diamonds that hung in the room. It seemed as though million dollar dresses and designer tuxedos were the regular dress code.
“Ah Veronica, darling!” Veronica embraced a portly old man with rosy cheeks and kissed him twice on each side.
“And this must be the freshman team. Come, come, sit down, children.” Four seats lay spare, so we each took one. I ended up on the very end next to Ashley as everyone resumed their conversations. Veronica took a seat next to the portly man and started discussing us with her neighbors. Captain Fantastic nodded at me from the other head of the table. I forgot to hold the kind of smile I reserved only for him, goofy and childish. Ashley’s knee tapped mine, so I jolted back, and glared at him. “What was that for?” I growled.
He leaned over to whisper, “try not to swoon at the sight of him.”
“I wasn’t swooning,” I insisted.
“Looked like you were.”
I huffed as Ashley took a swig of his drink. The cameras focused on a man standing behind the podium talking about the next wave of hero high toys.
“Eh, Veronica, I know it’s unusual for me to ask for the freshman team, but I felt it was necessary this year.”
“I understand, Sir.”
“But uh, why are there four of them? I thought it was a three man team?”
“Ms. Fitzsimmons over there joined recently at the invitation of the other members.” Veronica’s voice was soft, she sounded much more timid around this man and I wasn’t sure if it was because she was cautious, or because she was hiding just how ruthless she could be.
“Ms. Fitzsimmons is it?”
I jumped and hiccuped. My team laughed. “Yes, Sir.”
“Your first name?”
“Friday, Sir.”
“Good strong name. My grandmother was called Friday. And what have you done, girl?”
“I was featured on an episode of Real Heroes with Sense and Barney, and then-”
“I remember you, the tiny little thing Dr. Dangerous went after. Well isn’t that interesting.” His gaze returned to Veronica, and he continued to speak as though my team and I weren’t there. “It’s a shame really, with four of them we’ll have to re think the love triangle.”
Veronica nodded knowingly and took a sip from her glass. I looked past Ashley to see Aya and David holding back groans. Love triangle? With Ashley? Aya saw my knitted brow and leaned over Ashley to whisper.
“They like to pair us up, though if you’re wondering if they wanted Ashley and me to be a thing, the answer is no. They never even considered it.”
She sat back and accepted a menu from the waitress as Ashley continued the explanation. “They wanted another girl in the team for the love triangle, they were about to hold auditions, but Aya decided she liked you, so we made the decision before they could.”
“So then, I’m not part of this, right?” I said.
Ashley sighed, and set his cutlery down. For once it didn’t feel like he was sighing because of me, it felt like he was sighing because he had to explain to me what was essentially multiple seasons worth of a soap opera. “It looks like even though they have another girl on the team, now they’re not going to go through with the new team member being the last piece of the triangle.”
“Okay? Then what were you supposed to be?”
He chewed the inside of his cheek. “David’s boring best friend.”
I looked up from my menu in time to catch his smile. He did not think of himself as anyone’s boring best friend. I couldn’t help but laugh a little as I turned my head away.
“Don’t laugh, I’m not boring,” he whispered.
“I’m sorry,” I said and giggled once again. I looked around the table and saw Matt from Hero High. He was on Real Heroes now, he’d graduated this year. Cassandra and Donnie sat next to each other; they were an important couple the show was trying to push. It looked as though Lisa hadn’t been invited, but Barney was. He sat to the right of the captain wearing something a bit more modern than the rest of the men. He was already gulping down the wine.
Eventually we all ordered, and I didn’t have to worry about filling my mouth with words when instead I could fill it with chicken. I had a hard time convincing myself I wanted to eat. The food wasn’t bad by any means, but I’d ruined my pallet on too many chicken nuggets and was forced to face the truth: I was no longer refined enough to appreciate food that wasn’t deep fried or coated in breadcrumbs.
Trudging on through the night, I tried to finish as much of the food as I could. The portly man stopped speaking to his producer friends every now and again, and looked over at one of the students. At one point in the dinner a young man with dark hair walked over to the portly man and shook his hand. I looked at the badge on his jacket, and realized he was the Mayor, Thomas February, the third member of the February family to be elected as mayor. The Mayor smiled as the cameras caught him, and then waved as he left. The portly man started to talk about this year’s teams, and what they were doing on the show.
The Plum team had three members, they’d stayed the same since their first day, they were all sophomores. The man was worried about their appeal since the team was all female. He suggested a more mature concept for them, which everyone knew meant he wanted them scantily clad. Veronica rolled her eyes, and then nodded.
The Olive team were two boys, one sophomore, one senior. They’d been a two man team for a while, so no one dared add a new member to the team this year for fear of fan outrage, though the producers and the portly man did discuss adding a girl to the group so they could start a romance arc in their last year.
As the dessert arrived they moved onto the fuchsia team which had five members, all seniors. Five was enough. No-one even considered adding new team mates this year. All eyes were going to be on them this season, the most pressure was always on the seniors. All they seemed to say was that their merch wasn’t selling as well as it could and no one could work out why. They’d doubled up on couples this season, and prepared merchandise for it, what they didn’t seem to know was they’d forced a couple pairing that no one liked. Everyone could tell Maya liked Lucas, and Lucas liked Maya, but they insisted on Lucas liking Riley, when we all knew she was completely in love with Farkle.
Cassandra and Donnie sat without the rest of their team. The Mint team was one of the larger teams on the show, but the cameras usually focused on the core group which meant Cassandra and Donnie, a couple on show, but a couple with no chemistry. It was all a complete mess with old, out of touch men trying to relate to the younger generation and failing to figure out what they were doing wrong. Sitting at the table was like a show of its own.
“Well we have time to figure out what to do with the new girl.” My head shot up from my chocolate cake to find the man and the other producers looking me up and down. I felt like covering myself with a black bag. My team mates faces twisted uncomfortably as they tried to stay quiet. “She’s not very-” one of the suited men searched for his next word carefully.
“Womanly?” finished another.
“Exactly.”
I was completely taken a back, and of course I put down my fork and forgot I’d been told to cut the gas. “I’m seventeen!” I said. Their eyes widened, and the cutlery dropped. “Of course I’m not very womanly, I’m not a woman, I’m a girl!” Their mouths hung open and the portly man glared at me like I’d killed his dog. Stupidly, I continued, I thought I might as well. Go big or go home, right? “Oh I’m sorry, was that a private conversation? Should have had it somewhere private then.”
“I think you should leave young lady,” said the portly man.
“Fine by me.” I pushed back my chair, panic written on the faces of my team mates. Ashley reached for my hand, but I shook him off, too angry to care. For the first time in the dinner the captain looked up from his plate with a somber expression that I couldn’t read. I picked up my plate and fork, I wasn’t about to leave the cake behind. The cameras down below swerved round to me and moved in, still trying t
o keep their distance as though they could hide that they were hoping I’d freak out. The staff stared daggers at me as I left. I walked straight out into the street, eating as I went, giving them what I hoped was nothing to film.
What a bunch of old farts. I stomped down the side walk and into a city park, placed my cake beside me on a bench and picked up my phone to call Lisa.
“Hey kid, what’s up?” There was a scuffle from behind the phone, Lisa shouted to her kids to keep it down.
“I got stuck walking home, can you give me a ride back? I don’t know who else to call, is that okay?”
“Of course kiddo, that’s what I’m here for, where are you?”
“Hilary Park.”
“Give me ten.”
I closed my phone again and finished the last of my cake. I gazed at the empty plate and sighed, I’d stolen a plate from an expensive restaurant. That wasn’t very superhero like of me. With a roll of my neck I got up again, I would have to give it back.
I waddled onto the sidewalk again hoping no one would see me, and nodded to the nice men who held the door of the restaurant open. I walked up to the podium only just tall enough to look over it, and set the plate down. “Sorry I took this by accident, oh, and here’s the fork. Sorry.”
The hostess frowned, and waved me away. I checked the balcony to make sure no one had seen me come back with my tail between my legs. The captain looked down with a gentle, but proud smile on his face as he noticed me. I shrugged and held my hand up to him as though to say, ‘what? I didn’t do anything’, then I hurried back down the road into the park. Once there I sent a text to Aya apologizing, telling her I was fine, and that I had also returned the stolen property.
Lisa dropped me off back at the tower, and walked me to my door. I nearly told her she was going the wrong way until I remembered I lived somewhere else now. Lisa gave me a hug.
“You gonna be okay kid?”
