Dad grinned at me. “Can’t. I’m saving money to buy a new son who won’t sass me. I’m sure He understands.”
“Mom, are you going to let him talk to your beloved only son that way?”
She said, “I sure am. If I try to stop him, he’s liable to replace me too.”
“No woman could ever replace you,” Dad said. He hesitated. “Two or three women might be able to do it, though.” Dad ducked, letting the half-rotten peach Mom had thrown sail over his head.
I went to get an empty bushel basket, stacks of which were nearby. I left the full basket right where it was. Later some of Dad’s men would drive down the rows of widely spaced trees in trucks and pick up and load all of the peaches we had picked.
As I started picking again, I thought of how much I had missed Mom and Dad and their playful banter with each other.
That thought brought me up short again. Why would I have missed them? I had seen them almost every single day since the day I was born.
A person who chases fantasies has no sense. Dad’s Biblically cribbed words started to run over and over again in my mind. The nagging feeling that had been bothering me for weeks got stronger as I chewed on those words. A person who chases fantasies has no sense. Something about this whole situation wasn’t right. Sometimes it felt like I wasn’t in the real world and that I was instead in a play where everyone was acting except for me.
The grayness at the edge of my vision got darker and more pronounced. I could almost—but not quite—bring it into focus. For some reason I found myself thinking of a story from the Odyssey. In it, Odysseus’ men, while sailing from the Trojan War back to their home in Ithaca, were blown off course. They landed on an island where the people offered Odysseus’ men the fruit of the lotus plant as food. It turned out the fruit contained a narcotic, making Odysseus’ men stop caring about going home. They only cared about getting more of the lotus fruit.
Someone shook my shoulder, jarring my thoughts away from the Odyssey and breaking my increasing concentration on the gray fog.
“Hey Theo,” Dad said. His hand was on my shoulder. I now stood in the middle of a row of peach trees. Though I didn’t remember doing so, I had apparently walked away from the tree I had been picking. “Didn’t I ask you to get back to work?”
I shook my head in confusion and frustration.
“S-s-something’s wrong,” I said, stammering to put what I was feeling into words. “There’s something I’m supposed to be doing. There’s something I’m supposed to be seeing. Something about a lotus.”
As I spoke, the grayness at the edge of my vision coalesced more, becoming more distinct. Now that I could see it more clearly, it was a large swirling pinwheel of gray gas that was a bit taller than I was.
“There!” I said, spinning to try to point at the swirling gray mass. But, it moved as I did, always staying at the edge of my vision. It was like chasing a rainbow. The straw hat I had on to protect me from the sun flew off my head. Sweat dripped into my eyes, partially blinding me. I tried to blink it away and see clearly. “Can’t you see it?”
“There’s nothing to see, Theo,” Dad said firmly. His fingers dug into my shoulder. “Now I’m not going to tell you again—get back to work.”
“But can’t you see it? It’s right there!” I spun again, trying to bring the elusive gray mass into full view.
“Theo, you’re talking like a crazy person,” Mom said. She was now alongside Dad as I spun like a whirling dervish. “You’re scaring me.”
The thought of me being like a whirling dervish triggered a new thought in my mind. Hadn’t I recently dealt with someone named Dervish? Then again, what kind of weirdo name was Dervish? What sadistic parents would saddle their kid with a name like that? It sounded like a name you would find in a comic book. I was thinking about the Odyssey and seeing things and thinking about people I knew couldn’t possibly exist. Mom said I sounded like a crazy person. Was she right? Was I going crazy?
“Theo, that’s quite enough,” Dad said. He grabbed me firmly by the arms, stopping me from continuing to chase the grayness that danced right outside my view like a will-o’-the-wisp. Dad had been a farmer all his life, and his grip was viselike. A bunch of the peach pickers around us had stopped working, staring at me and the scene I was causing. “Now get back to work.”
“Not until I figure out what the hell is going on,” I said. Almost as if it was happening in slow motion, I saw Dad’s right hand lift to slap me. I wasn’t sure if it was to punish me for cursing—something Dad couldn’t stand—or to slap some sense into me.
I twisted out of the grasp of the hand that still held me. I lifted my left forearm, blocking Dad’s slap. I jabbed with my right, hitting Dad hard in the solar plexus. Dad grunted loudly. I took a couple of steps back, out of his reach. Dad sank to his knees, grabbing his stomach as he fell.
Mom ran to Dad’s side, bending over to see if he was okay. Though he gasped for breath, he seemed otherwise unhurt. Mom then looked up at me with shock her face. Some of the other peach pickers were around us now, encircling my family like spectators at a prize fight. Most of them had known me for years and had not seen me swat so much as a fly. They also looked at me with shock, not knowing how to react.
I felt as shocked as Mom and the others looked. For one thing, Dad hadn’t tried to lay a hand on me since I had taken a friend’s watch in the first grade. He had given me a well-deserved spanking then, but hadn’t touched me since. Him raising his hand to me now was completely out of character. It was like seeing a dove attack a hawk.
For another thing, I had defended myself like I was a trained fighter. Dad was bigger and stronger than I. And yet, I had defended myself with ease, automatically, without thinking about it. I had done it on muscle memory, as if I had blocked shots and thrown punches hundreds of times before. I felt like if the guys around us suddenly attacked me, I would know how to handle myself. I found myself thinking that, if I needed to take them down, I would disable José first. José had been a semi-professional boxer in Mexico when he had been younger. As far as I knew, he was the only trained fighter in the group around us. He favored his left leg a little, so I would target him there. Then I would take out my friend Glenn, who played college football and posed a threat simply because of his size and strength.
How the whole thing would go down played out in my mind’s eye like I was watching a martial arts movie.
The plan of attack that unspooled in my mind surprised me. I had never taken so much as a Taekwondo class. Who did I think I was, Batman?
Batshit crazy was more like it.
I smiled at the thought. That sounded like something Myth would say.
Wait, who the hell is Myth? I don’t know anybody named Myth.
And yet, I did. I latched onto his name like a drowning man clutching a life preserver. Focusing on Myth’s name got me thinking about the Odyssey again. Why did that story about the lotus-eaters resonate with me so much?
Then it hit me. Lotus. The Trials. Isaac, also known as Myth. Neha, also known as Smoke. Mom’s brain cancer. Iceburn. Dad dying in the fire Iceburn had set.
The dream I had weeks before hadn’t been a dream. That was reality. This was the dream. It was all some kind of sick test.
“You’re dead,” I said to my parents. “You’re both dead.” My voice cracked. My vision blurred, obscured by tears. “None of this is real.”
Dad got back to his feet. Mom stood up straight. She stepped forward and took my hand.
“Don’t I look real? Don’t I feel real? Don’t I sound real?” Her voice was pleading. “Stay here with us. We love you. Me, your Dad, Amber, your friends—we all love you. We’re as real as you need us to be.”
Dad said, “Yes, please stay with us son. We love you. Don’t leave us.”
The gray fog was no longer an elusive chimera in the corner of my eye. It took shape as a swirling gray mass to my right. It was now as plain as the peach trees around us. I somehow knew it was the way b
ack to the world I knew.
I also somehow knew that my Mom was telling the truth. I could stay here with her and Dad and Amber and my friends and my perfect life forever. If it was real to me, did it matter that it wasn’t real in reality? The only reason why I had gone through superhero training was to earn the right to legally track down the people behind Dad’s murder. If Dad was alive here, what did I need a Hero’s license for? If I stayed here, I could be with both my parents. I could be surrounded by friends. I could marry Amber. I could be happy. For the first time in my life, I could be happy.
Would it really be so terrible to continue to eat the lotus?
I shook my head no. I pulled my hands out of Mom’s. She started to cry. It nearly broke my heart.
“I can’t stay,” I said. “I want to, but I can’t. You have to deal with the world the way it is, not the way you want it to be. You both taught me that. There are people in the real world who have been out to get me. They killed a lot of people trying to get to me. Dad. The people caught in the Oregon wildfire Iceburn set. They almost hurt a lot of people in the Guild complex with the bomb they planted. I have to find and stop them. If I don’t, who will? Besides, what is it you’re always saying, Dad? ‘To whom much is given, much is required.’ I’m an Omega-level Metahuman. They tell me I have the potential to be one of the most powerful Metas in the world. To be honest, I often wonder if there’s been a big screw-up somewhere. I feel like a confused, scared kid more than I feel like an Omega-level Hero. But if what they say about me is true, then I have the potential to be one of the most powerful forces for good in the world. I can’t waste that potential. I won’t.”
I shook my head ruefully. “I didn’t ask to be given superpowers. There was a time I would have happily given them back if I could. But now that I’ve got them, I need to do some good with them. There are a lot of people I can help, people who often can’t help themselves because they’re up against forces that are too big for them to cope with. Half the time I feel like they’re too big for me to cope with too. But I have to try. I can’t let myself get swallowed up in a dream world.”
I thought about my recent realization that I was in love with Neha. “Plus, there are people in the real world I care about. Maybe they don’t all care about me the way I care about them, but maybe I can change that. The only way I’ll know for sure is if I go back.”
I turned and walked towards the swirling gray mass. I wanted to look back at my parents one last time and say goodbye. I wanted to ask them to tell Amber I loved her.
I didn’t look back, though. Goodbyes didn’t matter. Sending my love didn’t matter. None of these people were real anyway.
But, to be totally honest, that wasn’t the real reason I didn’t pause to look back and say goodbye.
The real reason was I knew if I stayed any longer, I’d never leave.
My body merged into the gray mass. My beautiful dream world dissolved.
CHAPTER 23
I woke up.
I was back in the Guild testing room with Lotus. He was looking down at me with the same faraway look he always had.
Though there was no confusion now about what was real and what was not, I remembered all of what had happened in the dream world Lotus had put me in. I remembered how that dream world had been so much better in so many ways than my real world. I remembered how happy my childhood had been in that dream world. I had lots of friends and I had never been bullied. I remembered how my family had never been poor and how we never had to struggle from day to day to make ends meet.
I remembered Amber. I remembered the love in her big blue eyes when she looked at me. I remembered how it had felt to touch, kiss, and be inside of her. Being with her had made me realize why some people had written flowery poems about the people they loved. I had thought it was all exaggerated nonsense before.
And, I remembered my parents being alive. I especially remembered them. I remembered Dad’s hands from when I had shaken them. Calloused, rough, strong, and determined. I remembered Mom. How she smelled. How hugging her felt like home.
But, as I lay there in the chair, all of it was beginning to slip away. The edges of the memories were becoming fainter, like a shaken Etch-A-Sketch.
“Well done, young man. You passed the test,” Lotus said.
I stirred, trying to sit up. My body was stiff from disuse.
“How long have I been here?”
“Two days.”
“Two days?” I repeated, flabbergasted. “How’s that possible? It seemed like weeks.”
“Things are not always as they seem.”
Lotus started to turn away. I had managed to get to my feet by now. I was equal parts angry and upset. I started to tear up again. All this pain was because of a stupid test. A test of what though? My resolve? My resistance to temptation? My capacity to see through artifice? My ability to resist the urge to go shoot myself in the head due to heartbreak and loss?
No, it was not merely a test. It was a lie. A beautiful dream of a lie I never wanted to wake from.
“Hey wait a minute, Lotus. I want to say something.”
He turned back around. “Yes?”
I punched him hard in the jaw. Despite my arm being stiff, it was a textbook perfect right cross. Lotus staggered backwards, then landed heavily on his behind.
I knew I shouldn’t have done it. I knew it before I did it, and I knew it after I did it.
Felt good, though.
***
I sat on the edge of my bed. After punching Lotus, Pitbull had confined me to my quarters until he met with the other proctors to decide what they would do with me.
Isaac stood on one side of me; Neha on the other.
“Dude, you sucker-punched a Hero?” Isaac said. His eyes were wide with disbelief. “I don’t know whether to high five you or slap you upside the head.”
“I didn’t sucker-punch him,” I said defensively. “I told him to turn around first.”
“Hey Lotus, Mr. Licensed Hero and Trials Proctor Sir, yeah I knocked you on your ass and yeah I loosened your teeth, but in my defense, I had you turn around first.” Isaac rolled his eyes. “You know that sounds lame, right?”
“I was mad.”
“Oh the ‘I was mad’ defense. Well that changes everything.” Isaac’s voice dripped with sarcasm. “Did you go to law school when we weren’t paying attention? If so, you should demand your tuition back. The fact you were mad means nothing.”
“How about you ease up on him,” Neha said. “Can’t you see he’s upset? The proctors might throw him out of the Trials over this.”
As she spoke, I came to the sudden realization that Isaac had been right when he had blown up at me and Neha before the Trials had started: she did tend to defend me. I feared she did it the way you’d intervene on behalf of a defenseless puppy rather than the way you’d defend someone you loved. Though my memories of Amber were already faded like a picture exposed to the bright sun for too long, I still remembered the way she had looked at me. It was not the way Neha looked at me.
Isaac said, “You’re right. I shouldn’t berate him. The proctors will likely be doing that and more to him soon enough.”
“Not helpful,” Neha said.
Isaac shook his head in wonder. “I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating in light of this incident: White people are crazy.”
“That’s racist,” Neha said.
“It’s not racist. It’s fact-ist. There’s nobody here but us chickens. Screw being PC. We can be frank with one another. White people are cray-cray. Who are almost always serial killers? White people. Necrophiliacs? White people. Skydivers? White people. National Enquirer readers? White people. Guys who punch their test proctor in the mouth?” Isaac pointed at me. “White people.”
I fought off a grin. Isaac was now doing what he often did, making jokes to make me feel better. He really was a good friend.
“I’ve been to jail,” I said. “If white people are so crazy, you’d think one hundr
ed percent of the inmates would be white. They’re not. There’s plenty of you people there.”
“You people?” Isaac raised an eyebrow at my word choice. I had chosen those words deliberately, to get a rise out of him. “Now that’s racist. Besides your 1950s diction proving you can take the boy out of South Carolina but not the South Carolina out of the boy, you’re proving my point by reminded us you’re a jailbird. There are two people of color in this room and one paleface. Only one of us has been to jail. And who would that be?” Isaac pointed at me again. “The crazy white one. Now that I think about it, it’s kinda shocking you didn’t flip your lid before now.”
Before a race war could break out, the door to my room dilated open. Pitbull stepped in. The room was so small that there wasn’t much room left over with just me in it. With four people in it, it was like being in a clown car.
My apprehension about what the Guild would do with me had eased a little thanks to my bantering with Isaac. Now with Pitbull here, my fears came back with a vengeance. It was a hard to read Pitbull’s expression. It was tough to believe he had stopped by to pat me on the back though.
Pitbull trained his eyes on Isaac and Neha. He said, “Don’t you two have somewhere else to be?”
“No,” Neha said. There was a note of defiance in her tone. I knew she wanted to hang around to stick up for me.
“Well, find somewhere else to be,” Pitbull said flatly. “Now.”
Neha looked like she was about to argue with him. Isaac saved her from stepping into as much hot water as I was in by grabbing her arm.
“Come on, let’s go,” Isaac said to her. “Maybe there’s a documentary about skydiving serial killers we can watch through Overlord.” He pushed her towards the door. Fortunately Neha chose to go willingly. I doubted he could have made her leave if she had decided to stay.
Isaac shot me a look that said Don’t do anything stupid before the door dilated behind them, leaving me alone with Pitbull.
I still sat on the bed. Pitbull leaned against the wall, his arm folded. He looked down at me. His black eyes were expressionless.
Trials: The Omega Superhero Book Two (Omega Superhero Series 2) Page 21
