Heroine Complex

by Sarah Kuhn

  “No.” His normally carefree smile was tight. “Not in a million years. And for the record, I think you look fine the way you are.”

  I ran a self-conscious hand through my curls and smiled back, an awkward silence descending between us.

  “You are a fool for not hitting that, darling,” Lucy always said whenever Scott joined us for a beer at The Gutter. Once again she was way invested in my non-sex life. “You know I feel the same way about cocks as I do about cauliflower: weird shape, kind of gross. But this one is right in front of you and it can be quite relaxing to—”

  Wait! Relaxing . . .

  I met his clear blue eyes.

  Sex! chirped Soothing Inner Voice. Sex relieves stress!

  Okay, so there was that comfortable sibling vibe to consider, but maybe if I focused hard enough, I could produce a sexy response to Scott’s theoretically sexy abs. We were two sexy twenty-something adults now, and if I could get myself to feel that special, sexy way, maybe we could have a dog-hair-free quickie on this sexy countertop, thereby dissipating my unsexy Anxiety Ball and sending me on my way to this stupid party and—

  Oh my God. What was wrong with me? One unexpected task from Aveda and I was ready to re-create awkward prom night sex, potentially trash a longstanding friendship, and scar my baby sister for life should she hear any of our tepid cries of pleasure.

  Besides, I was getting nothing. No sexy feelings at all, no matter how hard I stared at his abs. Dead-Inside-O-Tron was cranked up to eleven.

  “You could use the glamour to mess with her.” Scott smiled, dissipating the momentary awkwardness between us. “Make yourself look like someone even more famous. Maybe Angelina Jolie could be at this party, steal Aveda Jupiter’s thunder.”

  I let out a laugh that was supposed to sound tossed off but came out strangled.

  “No,” I said, as Anxiety Ball delivered one last kick to my gut. “My game plan is to be as un-thunder-worthy as possible.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “I’M AFRAID MR. SPARKY was unsalvageable.”

  “Darling, that is tragic. Isn’t it tragic, Evie—er, Aveda?”

  “What?” I snapped to attention. “I thought the porcelain unicorn’s name was Mr. Sparkly? With an L?”

  Letta Wilcox turned to me, auburn topknot shifting mournfully back and forth as she shook her head. The combination of her sylph-like limbs, porcelain skin, and sad demeanor always reminded me of Galadriel posing as a goth kid. Mopey Elf.

  “Both Mr. Sparky and Mr. Sparkly lost their lives in today’s battle.” Letta heaved a sigh. “They were brothers. I picked up all the pieces, but gluing them back together is gonna be impossible.”

  Lucy scooted closer to Letta. “Such a shame,” she said. “I want to let you know, that I—er, we are here for you.”

  Lucy, Letta, and I were in the roped-off celebrity VIP section of Whistles, Union Square’s latest terrible tourist trap of a restaurant, waiting for the fan meet-and-greet to start. The big key to the city ceremony would take place after I’d successfully interacted with each and every fan.

  I was hoping for something resembling “successfully,” anyway.

  The fans themselves had already formed a meandering line in the non-VIP section, a seething mass of humanity that threatened to overwhelm the not terribly spacious space. And I’d been wrong about the well-ventilated part. The thick scent of fried mozzarella sticks and sweat hung in the air like a greasy cloud. I’d seen Maisy flitting around earlier and vowed to avoid her at all costs. The last thing I needed was a bungled “exclusive Aveda Jupiter quote” showing up on her blog.

  Letta was there to deliver desserts, but as soon as she tried to leave, Lucy attached herself like a piece of double-stick tape. “I didn’t find one of those stones for you guys,” Letta said. “I thought the demon cupcakes might’ve left it in my best vat of chocolate, but there was just . . . nothing.” She heaved another sigh.

  “Look at you, being so helpful during your time of crisis,” Lucy purred.

  I suppressed a very un-Aveda-like eye-roll and allowed myself to zone out from their conversation so I could focus on the matter at hand.

  Which was breathing.

  Aveda had a specific ensemble in mind for her big night. And said ensemble involved a corset that could charitably be described as “ribcage-pulverizing.”

  I’d argued against the corset’s necessity. Predictably, I’d lost.

  “It’s steampunk,” Aveda trilled as I was being prepped, pinched, and squeezed into my party outfit. Shoehorning Aveda into her ensembles was usually a task that fell to me. But since I was the one being shoehorned, Lucy did the honors, lacing me into the blue satin corset. This outfit centerpiece was offset by a white blouse, knee-high boots with whimsical buttons shaped like clockwork, and a pair of very tight leather pants. Aveda wanted me to strap goggles on top of my head to enhance the overall steampunkiness, but even I had my limits.

  “I let the fans vote on my new costume and Sexy Steampunk trounced Goth Lolita two to one,” Aveda continued. “They will be expecting it.”

  Her gaze swept over me and I could practically see the gears whirring in her brain, cataloging every bit of my body that was rejecting the corset. We could usually wear the same size clothes, but they hung a little differently on me. And the corset didn’t so much hang as crush.

  “So suck it in,” she ordered.

  “I am,” I gasped. “But, you know, the me version of you likes to eat the occasional carb. And the glamour will smooth out any wrinkles.”

  Though Scott’s glamour token couldn’t conjure, say, an entire outfit, it would make the corset ensemble appear to fit me the way it fit Aveda. But it didn’t change the way the clothes felt against my struggling-for-breath body.

  Aveda’s gaze cut through me in a way that made me feel even more out of breath. Despite her opposition to being an invalid, she took to the role reasonably well once she was set up in the downstairs bedroom. She was icing her ankle, which was now bandaged in a compression wrap and elevated on a pillow. With her perfect posture and impeccable black satin pajamas, she projected a heightened version of her trademark air of queenliness. She might be injured, but she was prepared to make up for it by reigning over us with twice the usual amount of gusto.

  “I don’t like this,” Nate interjected, pacing the room like an oversize tiger trapped in a cage. “The half-baked plan you two have hatched is reckless.”

  “Your faith in me is way too encouraging,” I retorted.

  “That is not what I meant,” he snapped. “I was merely suggesting—”

  “And no one asked for your suggestions. This isn’t a science-y thing. This is an operations thing,” I said, resisting the urge to punctuate my sentence with “so, nyah.”

  Aveda and Nate still couldn’t seem to agree on how long she’d be incapacitated. She insisted she’d be ready to go after a good night’s rest. Nate was sticking with his four to six weeks mantra.

  I was tuning both of them out and trying to come up with a plan wherein I sneaked a call to Mercedes and Aveda was somehow okay with it.

  I tried to keep myself focused and breathing as Lucy finished lacing me up, as I used Scott’s glamour token to morph me into Aveda, as I was finally hustled out the door and over to Whistles.

  Despite the restaurant’s name, there didn’t seem to be an actual whistle theme to speak of. No collection dotting the walls, no wacky whistle-themed food items, no “Mr. Whistle” managing the place.

  Instead every available surface of Whistles was covered with pictures of cats. Cats batting at yarn, cats in costumes, cats reenacting key scenes from A Midsummer Night’s Dream. No space was allowed between these artistic masterpieces. They were pasted edge to edge, wallpapering the place in adorableness. The one non-feline decoration was a life-size statue of Aveda situated in the middle of the restaurant, a garish hunk
of plastic—bright red costume, jet-black hair, painted-on grin. I knew she had campaigned extra hard for that statue—the newest in a line of high-end collectibles—to make an appearance at this event.

  I shuddered. I had managed to all but stamp out my claustrophobia over the past three years, but this cave of yowling kitty mouths was testing me, particularly when combined with the buzz of the crowd and the cheese-sweat smell. I tried to think about yoga and other calming things, but all I could see were the walls of cats, ready to close in on me while the corset rearranged my internal organs.

  “At least I got her number,” Lucy said, snapping me out of my thoughts. She nodded at Letta’s retreating back. “But the girl blows hot and cold. Which would be fine if the blowing weren’t so metaphorical.” She winked at me, gunning for a laugh. I was focused on calming my nerves and didn’t have the strength to give it to her.

  “Does that . . . can you use that saying?” I sputtered. “How would it work?”

  “I’m not here to give you Gay Lady 101,” Lucy sniffed. “Anyway. You have to help me choose a crowd-pleaser for my next big karaoke jam at The Gutter. Once Letta witnesses me doing my thing, she’ll be putty in my hands.”

  That was probably true. Lucy was a superstar down at The Gutter. She had an impressive voice and an even more impressive sense of showmanship, sprinkling her performances with seductive nods to the crowd, soulful hands to the heart, and a thing I called “the stare-fuck.” When deploying the stare-fuck, she singled out an attractive lady in the crowd, locked eyes with her, and sang like there was no tomorrow. She usually ended up going home with that person.

  “What should I sing?” she pressed.

  “I don’t know,” I said, tugging at the fluttery cuffs of my blouse. “Why don’t you ask Stu?”

  I jerked my head toward the far left corner of the room, where Stu Singh, the grizzled old piano player from The Gutter, was serenading the crowd with tinkly instrumental versions of show tunes.

  “Try ‘Walkin’ After Midnight,’” a smooth voice piped up. “Patsy Cline always equals classic crowd-pleaser.”

  “Rose!” I smiled, pleased to see a familiar face. Instead of her uniform, she wore a suit that complimented her broad frame and a crisp white dress shirt that contrasted nicely with her dark brown skin. “So great to see you!”

  “Aveda,” she said, regarding me coolly.

  Oh, right. I was Aveda. Who probably wouldn’t be so effusive to the head of a team she often referred to as “redundant.”

  “So,” I said, racking my brain for what Aveda would say. “Are you here for the fan meet-and-greet?”

  “No,” Rose said. “The mayor requested my attendance. To show that we’re all in the supernatural crime-fighting business together.”

  I thought I detected a hint of sarcasm, but with Rose, I couldn’t be sure. Her deadpan was deader than most.

  If it was sarcasm, I couldn’t really blame her. Rose and her cleanup crew worked hard, but never got a fraction of Aveda’s glory and fame. I’d tried to get Aveda to throw them a mention at one of her press conferences, but she liked preserving the illusion that she didn’t need any help when it came to keeping the city safe.

  I suppose it was true that Aveda didn’t need much help, though the U.S. government had initially seen things differently. Back when that first portal opened up, the government had gone a little crazy: a special demon task force was formed and installed in San Francisco, a hefty military presence was brought in, and large sums of money were dumped into developing technology to predict, detect, and contain the portals. There was even talk of evacuating and nuking the entire damn city if another big portal opened up.

  But then? Nothing happened.

  Okay, not nothing. The smaller portals kept on keepin’ on, the non-humanoid demons threatened to eat the city on a regular basis, and demonology scholars continued to study, dissect, and theorize ’til they turned blue in the face. And as for all that expensive tech? Most of it ended up being next to useless. Rose and her team used a few scanner-type gadgets to make sure the portals were closed and staying that way, but no amount of tech could predict where and when the portals were going to occur in the first place. Some weeks were multiple-portal-type deals and some weeks boasted a grand total of zero.

  Still, the threat of invasion seemed to have passed and the smaller portals remained confined to San Francisco, and that was enough for the government to shrug and go, “Welp, guess this is just another thing to add to San Francisco’s already astronomical quirk factor.” The task force still maintained an office in the city and Nate submitted any new findings to them on a monthly basis. And Rose’s cleanup crew was always on hand to back Aveda up.

  Not that she ever acknowledged that.

  “Hey, Rose,” I said impulsively. “Great job at the bakery today.”

  Surprise flickered through her eyes. “Thank you.” She straightened her spine and gave me a stiff chin bob. “I need to go check in with the mayor.” She turned to Lucy. “Try the Patsy Cline.”

  “What? Oh, sure thing,” Lucy murmured. She cocked an eyebrow at me as Rose left us. “Going a bit off script, aren’t you? Aveda Jupiter isn’t in the habit of delivering accolades to others.”

  “One time won’t hurt,” I said. “And maybe don’t tell Aveda I did that.”

  “Dudettes!” Tommy Lemon stomped up behind us. “They’re about to let the fans past our illustrious velvet rope!”

  Being an actual movie star (albeit one who usually starred in lowbrow comedies wherein he donned a foam suit and played an alien, animal, or elderly version of himself), Tommy was the only San Franciscan who could match Aveda in celebrity-ness, and Whistles management had thought he’d make a fine addition to tonight’s event. I knew Aveda thought differently.

  “Time to look alive!” Tommy said, bugging out his already buggy eyes.

  I squelched the unease in my gut. My brief interlude with Rose had been calming, but now the oppressive walls of cats were back on my radar and really getting to me.

  They’re just nice, regular folks, Soothing Inner Voice reminded me as Lucy and Whistles’ lone security guy started letting people past the rope, a few at a time. Just like Aveda said. Nothing to worry about.

  “Ms. Jupiter?”

  An awed-looking twelve-year-old girl popped up in front of me. She opened her mouth to speak again, but couldn’t form any words beyond “uhhhhhgghhh.” She thrust an Aveda Jupiter trading card at me, her eyes the size of dinner plates.

  I smiled and took it from her, trying to look as beatific and serene as Aveda always did at public appearances.

  “Why, thank you . . . ?”

  “Amy!” she squeaked.

  “Amy!” I scrawled my best approximation of Aveda’s signature on the card. “Do you have a question for me?”

  “Only one question per fan!” Lucy barked, hovering behind Amy. “And no touching!”

  “I really want to be a superhero when I grow up.” Amy peered at me gravely. “How do I do that?”

  “Uh . . .”

  The real answer was, of course, “be involved in a freak supernatural accident and let your psycho obsessive nature do the rest.” Instead I took as deep a breath as my corset would allow and said, “Stay in school.”

  She tilted her head to the side, the awe fading.

  “That’s it?”

  “Yup!” I plastered a grin that was more like a grimace across my face. “You can do it!” I handed her the trading card and ended with a double thumbs-up.

  “Okay.” She looked at me skeptically. “Well, thanks.”

  “‘Stay in school’?” Lucy clapped a hand over her mouth as the now severely disillusioned Amy toddled off. “Why not lead with ‘crack is wack’?”

  “Shut up,” I snarked, tugging at my corset. “This thing is cutting off the oxygen flow to my brain.”
<
br />   Of course, Maisy chose that moment to flit her way over to us. “Ooh!” she exclaimed, a delighted gleam dawning in her eyes. Shasta stood behind her, scowly as ever. “Is your new costume not working out, Aveda? ’Cause that’s a scoop if I ever heard one.”

  “Clothing is oppressive to our natural forms.” Tommy leered. I took a minuscule step away from him.

  In an instant, Maisy’s phone was in her hands, her thumbs tapping away at the keyboard. “Punked by Steampunk,” she murmured. “Something like that.”

  “That’s a good one,” Shasta said.

  “Er, no,” I said, with more force than I intended. Aveda wanted press, but not the kind that made her look silly or indecisive. “The new costume is great. I was just making a hilarious Aveda-style quip.”

  “Got it.” Maisy nodded. “I hope we can hang out more so I learn to read you like a true friend. Know when you’re kidding and when you’re not.”

  “You can’t kid a kidder,” Tommy said, guffawing at his own non-joke.

  “Whatever that means,” muttered Shasta.

  “Wait . . .” Lucy swiveled away from me, every muscle in her body tensing. Her gaze zeroed in on a giant dude forcefully pushing his way through the line, eager grin plastered on his face, OVER THE MOON FOR JUPITER! tee pulled tight over his mountainous torso. He shoved a few fans at the front of the crowd aside and stomped up to the velvet rope.

  “Aveda!” he bellowed, his voice a donkey-like honk. He leaned in a little too close, sending bits of spittle flying at my face. “You have to settle a bet for me. My friend didn’t think I’d have the balls to ask this question, but I am so gonna!”