by Charles Yu
Third Class Superhero
Charles Yu
* * *
A Harvest Original •
HARCOURT, INC.
Orlando
Austin
New York
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Toronto
London
* * *
Copyright © 2006 by Charles Yu
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and
retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
Requests for permission to make copies of any part of the work
should be submitted online at www.harcourt.com/contact or mailed
to the following address: Permissions Department, Harcourt, Inc.,
6277 Sea Harbor Drive, Orlando, Florida 32887-6777.
www.HarcourtBooks.com
Earlier versions of the following stories appeared in the following
magazines: "32.05864991%," The Malahat Review; 'Autobiographical Raw
Material Unsuitable for the Mining of Fiction," Alaska Quarterly Review;
"Third Class Superhero" appeared as "Class Three Superhero,"
Mid-American Review; "Florence," Eclectica; "My Last Days As Me,"
Sou'wester, reprinted in the Robert Olen Butler Prize Stories 2004; "Problems
for Self-Study," Harvard Review; "Realism," Mississippi Review; "The Man Who
Became Himself," The Gettysburg Review; "Two-Player Infinitely Iterated
Simultaneous Semi-Cooperative Game with Spite and Reputation," Eclectica.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Yu, Charles, 1976–
Third class superhero/Charles Yu.—1st ed.
p. cm.
"A Harvest original."
I. Title.
PS3625.U15T48 2006
813'.6—dc22 2006004786
ISBN-13: 978-0-15-603081-6 ISBN-10: 0-15-603081-0
Text set in Mrs. Eaves Roman
Designed by Scott Piehl
Printed in the United States of America
First edition
A B C D E F G H I J K
* * *
for my parents
* * *
Contents
Story 1 1 Third Class Superhero
Story 2 25 401(k)
Story 3 37 The Man Who Became Himself
Story 4 55 Problems for Self-Study
Story 5 67 My Last Days As Me
Story 6 89 Two-Player Infinitely Iterated Simultaneous Semi-Cooperative Game with Spite and Reputation
Story 7 99 Realism
Story 8 111 Florence
Story 9 131 Man of Quiet Desperation Goes on Short Vacation
Story 10 143 32.05864991%
Story 11 l6l Autobiographical Raw Material Unsuitable for the Mining of Fiction
Acknowledgments 175
Third Class Superhero
Got the letter today and guess what: still not a superhero.
Dear Applicant, not a good sign, the number of qualified candidates this year blah blah far exceeded the number of available blah.
I scan the list of people who did make it. A lot of them graduated with me. It's the usual assortment of the strong and beautiful. About half are fireball shooters. A few are ice makers. Half a dozen telepath/empaths. A couple of brutes, a shape-shifter, a few big brains.
One thing they all have in common is that every single one of them can fly.
I can't fly. I can't do much. On the other hand, it's not like I'm asking for a lot. I don't need to be an all-star. I just want a suit and a cape, steady work, a paycheck that covers groceries. Decent health insurance. But I'll have to wait another year.
At least I have my good-guy card. For now.
***
Every morning, when I open my eyes, I think the same four thoughts:
1) I am not a superhero.
2) I have to go to work.
3) If I didn't have to work, I could be a superhero.
4) If I were a superhero, I wouldn't have to work.
I was temping for a while to keep my afternoons free in case I got calls for tryouts, but those dried up and I needed to get a regular job for dental and vision. Now I'm a records clerk for a big midtown law firm. I like it because I don't have to talk to anyone or explain myself if I'm missing for a few hours. I just say I was lost in the stacks. People at work don't know I'm moonlighting. They think I'm an actor.
***
Part of the problem is my name. Moisture Man. Doesn't exactly strike fear into the hearts of the wicked.
For a few months last year, I tried to get people to call me Atmosphero. A few people did it to be nice, but it didn't stick—I think the problem was too many syllables. Shortening it to Atmos doesn't work either, because there's a physicist up in Seattle named Atomos who solves science crimes with a group that calls itself The Nucleus. The registrar says if I use too similar a name I could be sued for infringement. She suggested the name 'Sphero, but that's just plain wrong. Makes me sound like a force-field guy, and, anyway, -o endings are usually for villains.
So I'm stuck with Moisture Man.
A couple of years ago I listed myself in the phone book, which was a mistake, because you can imagine the crank calls I get.
***
My power, if you can call it that, and I don't think you can, is that I am able to take about two gallons of water from the moisture in the air and shoot it in a stream or a gentle mist. Or a ball. Which is useful for water-balloon fights, but not all that helpful when trying to stop Carnage and Mayhem from robbing a bank.
For years I was on a self-improvement kick. I read all the books and listened to tapes. I ordered everything there was to order by mail. Studied physics, how the big brains can change gravitational constants. I read history, I learned theory, the balance of good and evil, stuff like that. Still doesn't change the fact that I'm minor. Not even minor. A sideshow. A human water fountain.
I did some time in therapy. Turns out, I have a self-destructive impulse and slight megalomania. I didn't need to pay for sixty hours of analysis to find that out. I still go to the gym, but I'm getting old and I can only do so much. I read every word of Heroics for Dummies. $24.99. Written by someone with an MBA. The quick bullet-point tip sheet at the back of the book tells me to "focus on my strengths" and "rely on others when it comes to my weaknesses." That's helpful.
***
Evenings, I get home, open the junk mail, drink a warm beer. My refrigerator is unplugged and will probably stay that way forever. If I get hungry, there's a twenty-four-hour taco stand across the street. Two for a dollar and free jalapeños if you eat there. I usually get four tacos and load up on salsa.
After dinner, around ten or eleven, I go upstairs to sit with Henry. He lives in the one-room efficiency above me. He's got a futon with a thin blanket, which I set up for him years ago. I don't think he's ever changed it from the couch position. He's got one sink and a hot plate and a toilet room the size of a phone booth. Henry usually watches TV while I read the trades.
Henry is eighty-something but looks closer to a hundred and forty. His skin smells like Naugahyde and his hair pops up from his head in clumps of cotton. Up until last year, he was inhaling two packs of Reds a day, but it got too expensive. In his life Henry has poured so much booze down his throat that if he never has another drink again he will be drunk the day he dies. He's been smoked, cured, pickled, and I bet he'll outlive me by twenty years.
The way we met was this: When I moved in nine years ago, I used to hear loud banging and thumping noises from upst
airs about once a week. I ignored it for a while, but one night it went on longer than usual. I went up there and knocked a few times, louder and louder. No one answered. It got quiet. I put on my costume and stood outside Henry's door for a minute.
I heard a whimper. I broke the door down—I could do that kind of thing back then. Turns out it was Henry's son, Harold, making all that noise. He had been beating the crap out of his father every Sunday night for months, an hour or ninety minutes, until he got tired. Henry had been kicked out of the house by Harold's mother thirty-five years earlier for the drinking, but instead of cleaning up his act, Henry just forgot about them and moved into this dump with his fifteen-inch television and ashtray and mini-fridge full of beer. Then Harold's mother got sick and almost died trying not to go to the doctor. Her sister paid the hospital bills and practically raised Harold, and Harold turned out all right, went to college and got married and even had a son of his own, but he was still angry at Henry.
Thing is, I believe Henry when he says he never laid a hand on anyone. I believe him, if only because Henry is the laziest person I've ever met. He only wanted to destroy himself. Did his wife deserve better? Did Harold? Yes. Yes. Henry's not a good guy. He's getting the life he deserves and most days he seems okay with that. I forget that the majority of people don't want special powers, like Henry, who can just barely handle being normal. I don't like the guy, but I guess I have a soft spot for him because he's the only person I've ever actually protected. Even though I didn't really do anything. It was just the costume.
Since then, we've become friends. Sort of. I look in on him a little. Just a little. Not as much as I should. I'll regret it someday soon. It's true. The only kinds of people in this metropolis are failed superheroes and the lonely old men who live upstairs from them.
***
I wasn't always this way. Nine years ago, I was Young and Promising. I lived my life like I was waiting for some big event to happen. Not just a big event, but a Major Life Development. I had a lot of Capitalized Thoughts back then. I did some things I shouldn't have. I lived with about a six-month time horizon. I didn't care about the people around me. I was going places, stepping on stones, burning bridges. I had a day job, but I looked around and said to myself out loud: You people are all lifers but I'm just passing through. On my way to Big Things.
Then that first letter came and I wasn't on the list. A temporary setback. Until the next year, when I wasn't on the list again. Burnham was. Dolan was. So was Feeney. Just a bump in the road, though.
Until the next year.
And then the next.
And then four more years. I got used to it.
This year, though, I thought something was different. This year, I could feel it. I even told a couple of people. I even admitted to myself that I was nervous. This year, things would turn around.
This year hurt.
***
A few years ago, when I was doing better, I got to travel to a parallel universe, where I met a better version of myself. We talked over a beer. We got along. I tried to figure out how he saw the world. Did he have a tendency to withdraw from other people, like I do? How did he make decisions throughout the day? What mistakes had he made? I told him about the one Great Big Mistake I made a long time ago. He knew what I was talking about. Turns out, the difference between us was that one moment. I told him I kind of resented him for getting the life I didn't live. I told him what a mess I was and he just nodded. He said it would probably get worse for me.
***
Golden Boy calls me to pretend like he hasn't heard.
"Let's go celebrate," he says.
"Celebrate what?"
"You mean...? Oh, not again." Of course, he already knew. He tries to be sympathetic, but that's not one of his powers. How can he understand? He's an EM. Destined for greatness. Able to manipulate electromagnetism the way other people chew gum. He graduated two years after me and he's already got his own squad. Made Class Three on his first try, Class Two three years later. As of next January, he'll be Class One and get his own secret hideout. I'll probably never see him again.
"Next year, man." He says he'll see what he can do about getting me some work. I want to hang up but I can't afford to. I need his help.
When Golden Boy gets drunk, he crackles with energy. I've always wondered what it must be like to be him, to walk into a room and have everyone feel it on their skin, in their hair, their brain waves. When the earth's fields shift and warp, he says he can feel it in his limbs, in his breathing, deep inside.
***
A couple of weeks later, I get a gig. I'm at work when I get the call. It's a mission. A real one. Golden Boy throwing me a bone. I don't know if it's out of pity or friendship. I don't know which makes me hate him more. But I'll take it. I go to my supervisor and ask for a few personal days. He says no. I tell him I have to quit on the spot. He says clean out your desk.
The turbo car picks me up in front of the law firm. Golden Boy is driving and Red Fury is sitting shotgun. I probably don't have to explain that I'm in love with her. She looks like a comic-book drawing. Her IQ is 190. On cloudy days she's a force to be reckoned with, but in direct sunlight, she is pretty much invincible. She waves at me.
I get into the backseat. Zero C is back there, reading the battle plan. He's an ice shooter. I don't know him very well, but he seems a little standoffish. Career-minded. "Try not to get in my way," he says, his breath freezing in the air.
Golden Boy tells me we're going to fight the Tricky Trio. I say that is a terrible name for a bad-guy group. He tells me to stay on task.
"We got word they are planning to steal a quantum computer from the university," he says. "It's four on three, our advantage." He said that to make me feel better, but I get the implication. It'll be a walk in the park. It doesn't matter that I'm basically useless.
We pull up and the bad guys have already done the deed. They're loading the computer into their helicopter, which is powered up and ready to take off. I take a deep breath and get ready to fight, but before I know it, Golden Boy and Red Fury are already out there, kicking ass. Zero C looks at me. "Why don't you just stay in the car?"
I wonder that myself.
But I don't. I go to take off my seat belt but it's more complicated than it looks. By the time I get out there, two of the trio are down and Golden Boy has the third trapped in an energy field. Zero C whooshes by me and creates an ice prison to hold all three until the police arrive. "We work fast in the big leagues, chief," Zero C says. "Try to keep up." I try to explain about my seat belt, but no one's listening.
***
On the way home, I don't want them to see where I live, so I tell them to just drop me off at a bar. I go in for a drink. As I sit down, in walks Johnnie Blade. He's a gray guy—talented enough to have passed all the tests, but never bothered signing up for either side. He calls me about once a year, trying to get me to sell my good-guy card for cash. Or something better. He slides up next to me and orders whatever I'm having.
"Is it worth it?" he asks, grabbing a handful of peanuts and tossing them into his mouth. I don't answer.
Johnnie Blade grabs my wrist and locks in on me. "There are alternatives, Nathan. Quit trying to climb that ladder." He hands me his business card and teleports out. I am about to throw it away when I see the local news on the TV. The Polaris Team defeats Tricky Trio. There's Golden Boy and Red Fury and Zero C, making it look easy. Almost fun. And then they somehow got a shot of me sitting in the car, struggling with my seat belt. I put Johnnie's card in my pocket.
When I get home, I go upstairs to check on Henry. He's asleep. I startle him a bit trying to cover him with a blanket.
"How did you do?"
"We won," I say. "I kicked a little ass." Henry looks at how clean my costume is and smiles, embarrassed for me.
"Yeah, I saw you on the news. Next time, buddy. Next time."
***
Another year of not making the cut means another year of trying to
do enough freelance to keep my good-guy card, which means getting a provisional license. I sign up for the exam. The test is on a Saturday at a local high school.
Inside the exam room, sixty of us are crammed together at twenty desks. It is hot and people keep shifting around. The proctor explains the rules: three hours of multiple choice, an hour of true/false, and then ninety minutes of moral quandaries. We fill in bubbles. Name. Alias. E-mail. We describe ourselves:
What abilities do you have? Please check all that apply. _ Can run faster than a cheetah.
_ Can jump more than twenty feet into the air from a standing start.
_ Can swim faster than an adult dolphin.
_ Can tell if a person is lying.
_ Can intensify feelings of others.
_ Can make others doubt themselves.
_ Can manipulate atomic structure.
_ Can be invisible.
_ Can see through objects.
_ Can see the future.
_ Other (please explain):
There's no box to check for my power, so I write it in. Try to pretty it up a little.
Condensation power: Can take water from the air and use it as a distraction, or to cause momentary confusion in the enemy. Also to extinguish small fires and provide refreshment for team members.
I look around at the people in there with me. To my left is Itch-Inducer Boy. To my right is a pebble shooter. Over by the door are Malaise Man, The Fatiguer, and The Nauseator aka Slight Discomforto. Burnouts, all of them. And they are no doubt thinking the same about me. All of us crammed into this sweatbox, each with the same thought bubble over his spandex-costumed head—I'm the diamond in the rough, just wait, world,you've underestimated me—each thinking he's the late bloomer, the one who is going on forty but has enormous untapped potential thus far stymied by a combination of bad luck and small-minded admissions committees.
