The She-Hulk Diaries

by Acosta, Marta

  There was a moment of silence, and then the crowd started clapping and hooting, and I turned and pushed my way out of the club, shoving people aside as I said, “Sorry, sorry, sorry!”

  I broke through the cluster crowding the door and I was out on the sidewalk. I rushed forward, trying to breathe, but it felt as if my throat had closed up and my lungs had collapsed. I blinked to stop the tears and told myself, Don’t cry, don’t cry! Because I never ever cried in public. I never ever showed my pain or loneliness, but now tears blinded me.

  I swiped at them and bumped into someone, who said, “Watch it, ma’am!”

  I began running. I ran until my muscles burned and a heel broke off on cracked pavement. I ran thinking of how Ellis had once gazed into my eyes and told me he loved me and how I’d told him, “I love you, Ellis Tesla, and I always will,” and then he’d kissed me all over and I’d tried to show him with my body how much I cared for him, how he was everything to me.

  But he’d never answered my message.

  I stood at the edge of the curb and slammed my good heel against it until it broke off, and then I turned toward home. My entire body prickled with Shulky inside, her soul raging and furious like a caged animal, but this time I wouldn’t let her out. This time I would endure my misery until I overcame it… and overcame misplaced, undeserved feelings for an Ellis Tesla who had only existed in my imagination.

  Because the real Ellis only used me as fodder for his songs.

  Because Ellis Tesla is as false as his name.

  11:50 P.M.

  In bed with the blanket over my head. I am cried out, having gone through a box of tissues, and now at least able to breathe regularly again. It’s just a song. It doesn’t mean anything. I don’t care, don’t care, won’t care anymore for Ellis Tesla. There is only Ellis Quintal IV, and he’s a cold-blooded bastard.

  I’d rather face down Dr. Doom, because VvD is always honest about his desire to exploit others.

  MITIGATING CIRCUMSTANCES

  APRIL 26

  VALENTINE’S DAY RESOLUTIONS

  STATUS

  On track to accomplish every goal. All it took was proper planning to dramatically improve the quality of my life.

  I have successfully not fixated on Ellis. In fact, I go for extended periods of time without looking for Fractious Faraday videos, reading their fan page, or checking on my eBay bid for Fringe Theory’s LP.

  I’m glad I saw him on the same day that I found out about my new living space because now I can move on both physically and metaphorically. I’m sure Rene will be impressed when I tell him. I wish I had time for a session because we’ve got so much to talk about.

  I’ve moved enough to know that it always takes longer than you think, requires more cardboard boxes than you have, needs more trips than you first calculated, and no matter how careful you are, you’ll lose and forget possessions. However, after the last calamity at the Mansion, I hadn’t acquired much besides my clothes and Shulky’s more extensive wardrobe. Ruth sent over a van to collect my boxes at 7:30 a.m.

  At 8:00 a.m., I met Ruth on Fifth, a block away from the Mansion, with my last duffel bag of gear.

  She was wearing pink pleated khakis and a sherbet-yellow polo and looking a little more nervous than usual as she led me to a plain steel door between two buildings.

  “I thought I knew all the secret doors in the city,” I said.

  “No one knows all of them—well, except Tony, but he’s a genius!” When Ruth opened the door, I saw a room with trash bins and other debris. She closed the door, flicked a switch, and the entire room began descending.

  “You will love this place, Jen! It’s super special.”

  “I’m glad to be able to move before my next case goes to court, because it takes up every second,” I said. “Is everything okay?”

  “Sure, absolutely! Here we are!” She opened the door and we stepped onto a brick walkway that ran alongside two sets of rails.

  Antique gas lanterns were fitted up with modern lights, so I could see the roughness of the stone-block walls. I knew about the ancient tunnels, which ran beneath the modern subway, but I hadn’t been in them before. I took a sniff. “The air smells fresh.”

  “The ventilation is modern. It’s this way.”

  I followed her, and the tunnel opened up to an old station platform where a compact, shiny single-car train was parked. Ruth explained that the train ran on perpetual energy and hovered just above the rails. “You can use the Solomobile in any tunnel because it’s synched into the system to prevent collisions. Once it’s running, the invisibility shield engages.”

  I looked around and saw that the station platform was walled off with opaque glass that shimmered as a thin sheet of water fell down over it.

  “Oh, I should have mentioned the waterfall wall!” Ruth said. “Isn’t it pretty?”

  “It’s lovely—but where’s the apartment?”

  “Right behind it. The wall isn’t really glass. You could drive a tank through it, but it’s better if Shulky doesn’t try, okay?” She went to a post set into the platform and entered a code on its panel. Then she placed her hand against a bio reader on the wall. “You know what a security nut Hawkeye is. He’s very protective of this space.”

  The waterfall parted, and a section of the wall slid open to reveal an open concept space that looked like the presidential suite of a fancy hotel.

  Ruth told me the code and said, “Your handprint and Shulky’s will unlock the door. Oh, you’ll be so close to the Mansion! We can see each other all the time.”

  I dropped the duffle bag on a fifteen-foot-long sofa. All the furniture was elegant but sturdy looking, and there weren’t any easy breakables, like glass knickknacks, or any easy ruinables, like white carpets. It was the sort of place where I wouldn’t have to worry about accidentally trashing anything. “Ruth, you’re amazing. This place is terrific!”

  “I know you’ll never want to leave,” she bubbled.

  “It’s the most perfect apartment ever for me!” I said, as I sank into a leather armchair that was deep enough to be comfortable for my long legs.

  6:30 P.M.

  Dahlia helped me give the GLKH loft a final going over, and she was excited about my new place, which she insisted on calling “your underground lair” in a deep voice. She was wearing bright pink contact lenses, and I kept staring at them and looking away because they made her look a little inhuman.

  I told her, “I’ll have you over to my fab new bachelorette pad soon. I can take you down in a private elevator, and I’m going to cook an international gourmet dinner, which isn’t one of my resolutions, but I’m going to add cooking to my goals since I’m accomplishing so much already. I’m also going to learn how to sew so that I can upcycle clothes that Shulky rips. I’m trying to be more green. I mean, you know what I mean.”

  “Please, poodle, don’t worry about becoming a Holly Homemaker for me. Experiment on another victim first. Where were you last night? Adam and I wanted to meet up with you.”

  “Well, um.”

  “Shut up! Did you do the sideways Viennese waltz with Dr. Stunning?”

  I looked at her. “D, that’s the first time you’ve ever made sex sound less dirty than it is.”

  She looked as confused as I felt. “That’s weird, isn’t it? Well, you’re not giving me any repressed urges to riff on. Or maybe I don’t have any repressed urges to riff on.”

  “Maybe you’re not repressed because Adam has released your repression—and please don’t tell me anything explicit or graphic.”

  “Oh, Jen, he’s the sweetest, smartest, most wonderful man I’ve ever met! I don’t even care if he self-cuts his hair, that’s how much I like him. Rodney loves him, too. He’s becoming part of Adam’s pack.”

  “I’m so happy for you, D,” I said and ruffled her hair, which was fuchsia to match her freaky eyes. “But be careful. Humans who hang around superhumans often get caught in the crossfire or used as hostages in criminal enterpri
ses.”

  “I’ve been around you since frosh year and nothing bad has ever happened to me.”

  “Not yet, and I hope it won’t. Just be careful, hon.”

  Although I’d liked living in this executive loft, I’d held back from settling in because it wasn’t really mine. We went from room to room, opening every cupboard and drawer to make sure I hadn’t missed anything. I found an old piece of dry fruitcake on a high shelf in She-Hulk’s closet, with a man’s banana hammock thong. D and I both said, “Eww, gross!” and I threw them away and washed my hands with lots of soap and hot water.

  D said, “How did Claude, your former potential future love of your life, take the news that you’re leaving?”

  “He said I’m his nicest tenant and that he’ll miss me and my statuesque green girlfriend. And I thought I was being so sly. He said he won’t forget me.”

  “Speaking of forgetting, you didn’t tell me where you went last night.”

  “Erm, I was packing.”

  She caught me in her mesmerizing pink gaze, and against my will, I told her about going to the bar and discovering Ellis and his new band. She emitted a lot of OMGs and shut-ups, and she wanted me to call him and demand to know what it all meant, and I told her it meant that he hated me and his songs were full of shit, and that I’d wasted years fantasizing about someone who was a jackass. A really, really, smoldering hot jackass.

  Maybe I associate jackassedness with hotness, e.g., Tony, which is why I’m not burning with desire for Dr. Stunning—who’s a gentleman and a scholar.

  I really need to see Rene and talk about this stuff.

  Bruce called to congratulate me on my new place.

  B: It’s got a great gym.

  ME: Does everyone know about Hawkeye’s secret pad except for me?

  B: Don’t make this all about you, Jen. I give you six months max before She-Hulk destroys it.

  ME: Ha-ha. It’s indestructible.

  B: Don’t underestimate her, because I don’t. Make it four months.

  ME: You ought to get together with Holden Holliway. He likes to make bets about how long it will take me to go back to superhuman law at GLKH. Guess what? I located one of the new superhumans! He’s a really nice guy, but he can’t remember who he is or what happened to him. He already helped Shulky out, though, with that moonbeam raygun.

  B: Watch out. He might get his memory back and discover he’s a murderous maniac.

  ME: I really hate when that happens, but I got a very sweet vibe from him.

  B: You and your vibes, California girl. What kind of vibe do you get from your new boyfriend, Dr. Douchebag?

  ME: Oh, I wanted to mention that I’m going to learn how to sew. You can give me all your wrecked clothes and I’ll make quilts out of them or something.

  MAY 1

  I can’t believe how quickly time has flown by. This morning our QUIRC team—Amber, Genoa, Quinty, and I—marched up the steps to the courthouse. Sven and his security guards arrived by separate car.

  Reporters were waiting for us and shouting at me, “Jennifer! Jennifer! Will She-Hulk come to cheer you on or give you legal advice?”

  “No, she reserves her appearances for cases of superhuman law.”

  “Jennifer! Do you have any clues about the identity of the superhuman who built the moonbeam raygun, shot the water spheres cannon, or created the fatshions?”

  “The NYPD and investigators at the Mansion are still looking into the incidents, and you can address your questions to them.”

  “Do you think Dr. Doom is involved?”

  The hammerhead had paused on the steps, and now she glared at me as if I was responsible for getting all the attention. I said, “While these do resemble Doom scenarios, Victor von Doom’s work has a mad genius’s skillfulness and catastrophic results. It’s never this amateurish.”

  Amber moved to step in front of me, flipping her blond hair in my face. “Now, if there are no more questions about the ReplaceMax case…” she said, and her honeyed tone soothed the frenzied reporters.

  I followed her into the courthouse and resisted the urge to wrap her hair in my hand, lift her up, and wring her out like a wet towel in a locker room. Because I am a mature professional.

  We selected a jury, which is both tedious and terribly important because we needed people who could grasp the basics of cloning and bioengineering. I excused anyone who was interested in celebrity. Max Kirsch’s lead attorney, Melissa Christoph, and I were both looking for jurors who were sympathetic to organ transplants—that was the easy part because most people knew of someone who needed or might need an organ.

  I ran into Melissa in the ladies’ room during a break, and we caught up on news about friends and family.

  “It’s going to get ugly. I’m going to go after you like a junkyard dog after a T-bone,” Melissa said. “I’ve told my tween not to watch the news, so she doesn’t hate me more than she already does.”

  “Give me what you got, because I’m gonna make you roast like a drunk arsonist with a can of gasoline and a lumberyard,” I said. “I’m glad I don’t have to deal with angry kids, Missy, but I have acquaintances who aren’t happy I took the case.”

  “It could be worse. We could be going against She-Hulk in court. I’m too old and slow to duck flying furniture.”

  We both laughed until we got to the door, and then we put on somber, serious attorney faces.

  9:00 P.M.

  I avoided my phone by working out on the punching bag in my awesome new gym. It’s not the same as Azzan scolding me, but Fritz has become his new favorite student, so at least Azzan isn’t lonely. I groaned when my phone buzzed again, but then I saw that the call was from Holden.

  “Holden, hi!”

  “Hi, Jen. Congratulations on getting Hawkeye’s place. I’ve been to a lot of great poker games there.”

  “Am I the only one who didn’t…” I began, but it was obvious everyone else knew about the underground lair. “I’ll have a housewarming when this case is over.”

  “How’s Missy?”

  “Her son is going to be Scrooge in his school’s A Christmas Carol, so she’s got a personal incentive to wrap up things by December.”

  “Tell her hi for me. Are you tired of human law yet?”

  “No.”

  “Just thought I’d check!”

  Spent the rest of the night practicing my opening statement in the mirror, until I knew it by heart.

  Resisted looking up the Fractious Faraday schedule. Songs are make-believe and I have to deal with real life.

  MAY 2

  The first actual day of trial was exhausting. I felt energy buzzing through me as I gave my opening statement. It’s different than the energy I get transforming, but it’s still a sweet high, marred only by the fact that Ellis Quintal was sitting in the courtroom glowering at me.

  He was so tall that the bailiff asked him to move to the back row. He’d grown his hair longer and had a beard, which made him look even more like his piratical lumberjacky self and threw me off my game just enough to miss a few beats.

  “The jury will be shown how Matthew, I mean, Maxwell Kirsch brazenly rejected Dr. Sven Morigi’s warnings that the organs were detected. Defective. The organs were defective.” I took a breath to calm myself. I kept my gaze away from Ellis and hit my stride, letting my statements build upon one another until the entire courtroom was transfixed by me.

  As I sat down at the plaintiff’s table, Amber met my eyes for a second and turned away, but Sven gave me an encouraging smile.

  When I looked around, I saw that Ellis was gone.

  The emotional high faded once I left the courtroom. I took a long walk before heading down to my subterranean lair. It was really fun to watch the waterfall part and the door slide open to my awesome new pad. After I’d flopped onto the couch, I checked my phone.

  Jordy had texted me. “I need yr help. Not important cept 2 me. Bring burgers fries shakes.”

  I was happy that Jordy wante
d burgers, because that meant he was feeling well, and I was complimented that he’d ask me, Jennifer Walters, for help when I knew he idolized Shulky. Maybe he’d decided to go into suspended animation and wanted me to draw up the paperwork. Or maybe he needed advice about transferring his brain into an android body.

  I changed into running pants, a sports bra, and a hoodie, and I called in a to-go order for burgers. I used my aPhone’s locator to guide me through the old tunnels and climbed a ladder to go to the surface. I picked up our food and was soon in Jordy’s room.

  So was Ellis. He was leaning against the wall of windows strumming a ukulele, and when he saw me, he said, “What are you—”

  Jordy sat up in bed. “Hi, Jenny. Thanks for coming. Big E, I asked her here because you can’t help me.”

  “I can help you with whatever you want, Jordy,” Ellis grumbled. “You haven’t asked me to help you with anything.”

  “Okay, teach me how to dance,” Jordy asked Ellis. “We’ve got a dance here on Saturday, and one of the candy stripers asked me. Tanya.” Jordy looked at me and said, “I need to know how to old-people dance.” He saw the bag in my hand. “Big E hasn’t eaten yet.”

  I handed the bag to Ellis, who held it as if it contained poisonous snakes. “Go ahead. They’re the most delicious burgers in the city according to my best friend.”

  “Yeah, go ahead, Big E,” Jordy said. “We had mac and cheese tonight and I had seconds, but I’ll take a shake, chocolate if you got it.”

  I handed him a drink.

  Ellis opened the bag and unwrapped a burger as if it was his final meal. We ate in silence, until Jordy said, “So, Jenny, can you teach me? I have a slow jam mix.” He held up a player and a portable speaker.

  “Let me finish my burger and I’ll teach you to two-step. It’s really easy.”

  “I already got an okay from my doc,” Jordy said, and buzzed for the nurse. “Jenny, I’ve been investigating that strange pretty dude you’re representing, Slime Mold Rug Guy.”