Dull Boy

by Sarah Cross

  “I’m glad that wasn’t me,” he says. “You know you can say no to Darla, right? She’ll try to make you believe you can’t, but it’s not true.”

  Darla socks him in the arm. “Lies! Don’t tell him that!”

  Sophie and Darla are in the middle of telling me how they met in an ice-skating class and bonded as the class freaks (Sophie would stay in the locker room half the time, because her power was out of whack and she couldn’t change out of her street clothes because they were stuck to her—or the opposite would happen, and she’d be tromping into the parking lot in full figure-skater regalia, ruining her skate blades on the concrete because she couldn’t unstick long enough to get them off. Darla, meanwhile, was taking the class because her dad forced her to get out and do something non-gadget-oriented, but she was afraid she’d get hurt, so she skated in a snowsuit, like a puffy snow-angel marshmallow . . . ) when the doorbell rings.

  Sophie bounds over to the door. “That’s him!”

  Darla prides herself on being a master of disguise, but she’s pretty easy to read: she is not happy. Her eyebrows are scrunched in an angry V. Nicholas jabs her with his foot. “Lower the obvious quotient a little.”

  “I know, I know, but I’m so mad. Jacques is as close to the enemy as it gets. What is she doing bringing him here? When Avery’s here? Is she nuts?”

  “Mind filling me in?” I ask. My foot’s tapping, my nerves have gone from pumped to screaming like fingernails down a chalkboard, like don’t-go-into-the-basement-alone, the-killer-is-calling-from-inside-the-house! Primordial warnings you don’t ignore.

  Or, you know, I could be overreacting, responding to Darla’s tendency to exaggerate.

  Nicholas starts: “Jacques is . . .”

  Before he can finish, Sophie leads her guest into the room and we all clam up. He’s lagging a step or two behind her, platinum-blond hair in his face, diamond stud earrings in his ears.

  It takes me all of two seconds to recognize him.

  Jacques is the guy with the Jaguar. Casanova with a driver’s license. And . . . superpowers?

  I feel about as tense as Darla looks. Sophie’s friend or not, I don’t want him here. I don’t want to see her hug him hello, or laugh at anything he says that I’m sure won’t be funny . . . and I definitely don’t need a demo of his badass force-field-invisibility-bulletproof-better-than-mine powers.

  His eyes travel the room until they land on me—and lock. Sizing me up, like we’re having some kind of stare-down.

  Sophie’s hugging his arm, her face brighter and cheerier than it was after my feat of strength, or silly charades. “Everyone, this is Jacques. Jacques, these are my friends Darla, Nicholas, and Avery.”

  We all hello him in return.

  “Pleased to meet you,” Jacques says coolly.

  I remember his accent from when I first heard him outside Roast, remember thinking it was an unfair advantage—because don’t girls always fall for exotic accents? But as it has time to sink into my consciousness, the odd rise and fall of his speech hits me like a steel pipe.

  He sounds like Cherchette.

  13

  MY MIND’S POUNDING along with my nervous-tapping fingers: Cherchette, Cherchette, how old is Cherchette? She looks . . . not so much young as ageless: like she’s lived, but the scars have stayed on the inside. She’s like a perfect portrait, trapped in time. A white marble statue.

  Is it possible she has a teenage son?

  I watch Jacques while Sophie babbles on, getting him up to speed on things I’d rather he didn’t know about—if there are even any secrets anymore. If he’s Cherchette’s son, does he know what she knows? He definitely looks like her: same pale skin, piercing blue eyes, bloodless lips. I don’t worry about being caught staring, because Jacques’s eyes haven’t left me since he got here. His gaze digs into me, eager to unearth something ugly, or weak. I don’t know—I’ve never had anyone look at me that way before.

  The shiver running down my spine cranks itself higher. Feverlike chills assault my body in waves, getting stronger the longer Jacques stares at me—and there’s no break. I grab a blanket off the back of the couch and wrap it around my shoulders like a cape. Try to think: summer, barbeque, heat wave, like he’s not getting to me at all.

  No one else is reacting to Jacques like this. Darla’s oblivious, wound up in a tight ball of frustration, a twitchy fake smile on her face. Nicholas is politely listening to Sophie and nodding at all the right times, but at one point our eyes meet and I feel like he recognizes that something isn’t quite right here.

  “You know what would be an awesome team-building exercise?” Sophie says abruptly.

  “Team-building exercises usually involve a team,” Darla says before she can finish. “I don’t recall Benedict Arnold being on our team, so the point is moot.”

  The two girls glare at each other. Nicholas squirms in his seat. I sense a girl fight on the horizon. Time to get him out of this.

  I get up, dragging my blanket cape behind me like it’s a fashion statement, not a necessity. “Sophie, do you have any macaroni and cheese we could make?”

  “Macaroni and—umm, didn’t you just eat like a whole pizza?” She tilts her head, waves of hair tumbling onto her shoulder, totally confused. Jacques snorts, like I’m this disgusting glutton and now he has a legitimate reason to despise me.

  “Yeah, I promised Nicholas I’d show him my secret recipe.”

  Sophie shrugs. “Check the cabinets.”

  “Cool. Onward, Nicholas.” I gesture dramatically with my cape, and thankfully he has the sense to follow. I figure Darla can hold her own out there—Jacques is the one who should be afraid.

  We raid the cabinets and I bang a bunch of pots and pans around, doing my best to create an inconspicuous wall of noise. “What the hell?” I say. “Who is that guy and why does he look like he wants to kill me?”

  “Jacques Morozov,” Nicholas says. “Sophie met him a few weeks ago. I guess he’s like us, but his pedigree has Darla freaking out. She thinks his mom is evil incarnate.”

  “Evil incarnate?” Uh . . . that’s a bit harsh.

  He sighs, tears open the macaroni-and-cheese box. “Has a woman named Cherchette contacted you?”

  What do I say? Should I lie? Is that the best way to start a new friendship?

  “Once,” I say, hoping a half-truth is better than no truth. “You?”

  Nicholas nods. “I don’t know if she said the same stuff to you, but she basically offered me a place with her, like she has this powered-kid sanctuary or something, and she claimed she could help me get my power under control so I wouldn’t hurt anyone.”

  “And Darla thinks that makes her evil?”

  Nicholas digs the powdered-cheese packet out of the box, sets it neatly beside the stove, and opens the fridge to find whatever else we’ll need. “It’s a combination of things with Darla. Natural caution, competitiveness, paranoia. But I’m sure she’ll tell you all about that, whether you want to hear it or not.”

  Actually, I do want to hear it. I’ll take any input I can get, even if it’s a little biased. “And what do you think about Cherchette?”

  “It’s hard to say. It’s not like anyone else has shown up and offered to help, you know? So I’m inclined to think her intentions are good, since, I mean, she must know how hard it is, having powers and not knowing what the hell’s going on. What did Cherchette say when you met her?”

  “Same stuff.” I don’t mention breaking the thug’s hand and smashing up the antique shop. I concentrate on filling a pot with water, focus on the stream. “So . . . what did you think of her offer? Is hurting people something you worry about?”

  I want to say what I’ve never said, except in a screwed-up rush of emotion to my parents after my last wrestling match—and they misinterpreted it, they thought I was being too hard on myself: I hurt someone. I messed up and I hurt someone. And it could have been worse. One day, it could be so much worse.

  “How could I n
ot worry about it?” He takes a deep breath. “I fight so much with my dad. He doesn’t get who I am at all, and I’m afraid that one day he’ll get in my face and I won’t be able to get away from him in time. My vortex will activate and I won’t be able to stop it.”

  “Wow,” I say, before I can think better of it. “That sucks.”

  Nicholas laughs. “I know, right? Darla keeps telling me that great minds can triumph over anything—the great mind is Darla, if she hasn’t made that abundantly clear yet—but it’s not that simple. She thinks I can train my power and learn to control it, but the only way to train it is to purposely use it . . . and there’s too much room for error. It’s like testing a nuclear bomb to find out what it does. Yeah, you’d end up with answers, but maybe you’re better off not knowing. At least this way it’s still speculation, that I destroy things because some part of me wants to. If I ever really tap into that, and find out that deep down I’m a monster . . .”

  He repositions the flaps of his trench coat, folds his arms over his chest. “Would you want to know that about yourself?”

  “I feel like I’m still figuring that out.” My voice comes out weak and I clear my throat. “I’ve done some things that make me wonder that, too. It was never because I wanted to hurt anyone—I just couldn’t control it. It’s like I have to relearn everything. And when I’m worked up—scared, or even feeling competitive or whatever—I don’t think. Stuff just happens and then you’re left with a bunch of broken pieces, and there are no rules to tell you how to handle it.”

  “Exactly,” Nicholas says. “That’s the thing Darla doesn’t get. There are no rules. She wants to help us make them. But I feel like I might be opening Pandora’s box if I try to tame my power. I’d rather just suffocate it.”

  We’re quiet awhile, watching the water boil, dumping in the dried macaroni, and stirring it around. I wonder what he means by “suffocate it.” How do you stop your power without stopping yourself?

  I hear music coming from the other room—not sun-shiny, girly pop but hard, raucous metal. The lead singer’s voice sounds like it’s being filtered through a lawn mower. Not quite Sophie’s style.

  “Sounds like they migrated,” Nicholas says. “Darla’s probably blowing off steam. Come on—before she head-bangs herself to death.”

  I turn off the burner and we head out to the living room, where Darla is standing on the couch, hands poised for air guitar, thrashing like mad.

  “Careful.” Nicholas grabs her shoulders to steady her. She already looks woozy. “You could hurt someone with that giant brain of yours.”

  “Good,” she mutters, sinking down into the couch cushions. “I hope it gives Jacques a concussion. I would’ve zapped him but I knew Sophie would never talk to me again if I did.”

  Nicholas pats Darla’s head, casually petting her hard-rocking hair into place and soothing her at the same time. She’s fidgety, but I think she’s calming down. Well, as much as is possible for Darla.

  “Where’d they go?” I ask.

  “Basement,” Darla says. “Sophie has a sewing room down there. She wanted to show Jacques the costume she made for him.”

  “He . . . uh, he wears a costume?”

  “I don’t know if he’ll actually wear it,” Nicholas says. “Sophie made one for all of us. I think she did some sketches for yours. She wanted to get your okay first.”

  “I don’t trust him!” Darla sputters, springing away from Nicholas’s hand. She folds her arms behind her back and starts pacing. “His mom is an evil megalomaniac pod person with no soul who thinks she knows everything—”

  Nicholas raises his eyebrows at me mid-rant. “Sound familiar?”

  “FYI, Nicholas, I am not an evil pod person with no soul.”

  “Um, about this evil thing . . . does anyone want to explain that to me? Or is this just part of crazy-exaggeration happy hour?”

  “He knows about Cherchette,” Nicholas tells Darla.

  “She offered you the same deal?” Darla asks, shocked for a sec before I nod and she shouts, “I knew it! Didn’t I predict this? I knew, I freaking knew she would come for you! And you have to ask me why she’s evil??”

  “Uh, apparently,” I say, running through a whole list of dastardly villains in my head. “Unless she eats babies and wears a skeleton mask and I just haven’t figured it out yet.”

  Darla takes a deep breath and sits down, all stern like she’s prepared to school me. “Avery, seriously—what kind of person shows up out of nowhere and tries to lure kids away from their parents? Murderers, pedophiles, and psychopaths. Normal people do not do that. Just because she didn’t offer you candy and tell you your mom was in the hospital, then ask you to get in her car so she could drive you there, doesn’t mean she has good intentions.”

  “Yeah, but she has powers,” I say. “She’s proven that. And she’s a little weird, but so are we. I doubt she wants to carve us up in her basement. She’s probably just trying to help, like she says.”

  “If she really wanted to help, she’d arrange to be a liaison with your parents, and give them the info they need to help you. Not take matters into her own hands and make you, like, lie to your mom and dad and disappear from their lives forever. That is evil. It’s exerting waaay too much control over you guys, when what you really need is practice—not some creepy, ice-sculpted villainess running your lives for you.”

  “That does sound kind of evil,” I admit. “But I still think you’re totally wrong.”

  Nicholas presses his palm to Darla’s head to calm her before her eyes can pop out. I’m getting the impression that wrong is like the dirtiest word you can use when it comes to Darla.

  “What kind of liaison is she supposed to be? Look at the X-Men and Professor Xavier. He invites superpowered people to live with him at his school because he’s trying to help them learn about their powers. He can’t exactly pop into the X-Jet and make house calls whenever a new crisis erupts, so he brings them to where he is.”

  “Yeah, but in that case, the parents still know where their kids are,” Darla points out. “Everything about Cherchette is shrouded in secrecy.”

  “My freaking power is a secret!” I say. “Are you saying I should tell my parents about it?”

  “No! That would be a horrible idea! You’re missing the whole point! Do you know what I’ve been able to find out about Cherchette, other than what I’ve learned from Nicholas? Next to nothing! Her life is so tightly guarded that it’s like she doesn’t exist. Meanwhile, she seems to know everything about you guys. Doesn’t that scare you?”

  “Darla also hates that Cherchette even knows about us in the first place,” Nicholas says. “She doesn’t like anyone having the same secret intel she has.”

  “Speaking of that,” I say. “Darla, how do you have all this information? I mean, Sophie and Nicholas I get, but as for me, and, um . . .”

  “Catherine?” Darla fills in. “Catherine was easy. Once I knew that people with powers existed, all it took was a combination of my excellent observation skills, and an awareness of the trouble she was getting into. I used to hang out at Roast way before I started ‘stalking’ her.” She adds finger quotes that I’m sure are for my benefit. “It’s a good place to study. And Catherine plus a freshly mopped floor is an amazing sight. Her balance is unreal. Plus, have you ever noticed that she punctures stuff with her nails, without meaning to? Like, cuts her skin or scratches the tables with just a casual touch? I could go on, but I think you’ve seen the rest for yourself.”

  I nod, remembering the carnage when Catherine tangled with Big Dawg. “I mean, but do you think it’s obvious? Because I know she doesn’t want to be found out. None of us do. But if you could figure it out . . .”

  “No way.” Darla shuts that down, sure as sure can be. “I had to know what to look for. And once I knew that powers existed, any and all ‘amazing feats of adrenaline’ had to get a second look. Like a guy your age lifting a car? Nice Today show interview, by the way. Very hero
ic. I’m surprised you didn’t get a girlfriend after that.”

  “Uh, thanks,” I say, wondering how I’m supposed to take that, and whether I should be creeped out that she probably has files on my love life.

  “The point is, I have a reason for knowing about you guys. And I’m not methodically hunting kids down.”

  “Or enrolling in their schools and adopting different personas to try to befriend them,” Nicholas says. “That would be insane.”

  Darla throws a pillow at him. “Remind me why I haven’t replaced you with a robot?”

  “No clue.” Nicholas grins. “Because you’re lazy?”

  Darla howls and stomps on the couch, hurls the last remaining pillow at Nicholas. I wonder if she’s flirting with him or if she’s just being overly dramatic. Maybe both.

  “Is she about to turn into the Hulk?” I ask.

  “Yep.” Nicholas grabs Darla and flips her over his shoulder so he can carry her down the stairs. “Let’s check on the dynamic duo. Sophie has an Xbox and a pool table in the basement, so we should be able to find something to do without killing each other. Right, Darla? Can you behave or do you need to live in upside-down world a little longer?”

  “The blood is rushing to my brain,” Darla says. “You’re only making me stronger!”

  “Looks like dizzier,” I point out.

  We troop down the stairs and enter a subterranean playground. While the rest of the house is decorated in this deliberately stuffy style (lots of breakables and expensive furniture, paintings of landscapes and flowers), the basement is a bastion of cartoon violence—with some girly, glittery stuff thrown in. Posters of Captain America and Supergirl share wall space with fashionista manga girls. A Ping-Pong table has been reborn as a plastic battleground: toy-size Master Chief leads an army of cutesy Japanese trading figures, Disney princess dolls showing off their right to bear arms (um, since when does the Little Mermaid wield a submachine gun?), and G.I. Joes against a legion of alien grunts—with Godzilla bringing up the rear.