“Afraid of what, Recall?” said another voice from the radio, a man’s voice. “Afraid of me?” He laughed. “The big bad Norman scares the little mutants?”
“You, and all the Normans. You write the paychecks, you buy the products, you give out the jobs, you enforce the laws. There are mutants out there, famous mutants, politicians, movie stars, novelists, maybe even super heroes afraid to show themselves, afraid to lose the public’s trust. No matter how powerful they may seem, they’re weak against all of you out there listening. Maybe collectively they could change your minds, but each of them is alone, and nobody is brave enough to go first.”
From a chair in the corner of the room, the Razorback cowl glared at Buford with accusatory glass eyes. All he’d ever wanted to do was help people, to defend the weak and to make a difference. But beyond that, he had to admit he had a personal agenda: to be liked. After years of fighting the good fight in obscurity, he’d finally achieved that.
Tomorrow he’d be in Washington, attending a reception at the White House. Taryn was flying in from Arkansas, where she’d been visiting her family, to meet him. The spotlight would be on him one more time, but he could feel it fading already. The national press was becoming bored, and in time he would probably just slide back into obscurity, a local curiosity and not much more.
In six months, nobody would care if he was a mutant, even if he shouted it from the barn top. In six months, the truth could do him no harm. In six months, the truth could do nobody any good.
From the radio, the announcer was giving the toll-free numbers and asking the listeners to call in. Buford considered the phone on the nightstand the way a hiker might consider a rattlesnake on the trail in front of him. He couldn’t ignore it, and he couldn’t go around. Either way, it was going to be a long night.
Generation X - Crossroads Page 24
