“He’s a teenager, Dad, he isn’t worth anything.”
“His family has money. His father owns a construction business in town...”
“Dad, no.”
“He’s had years — years to rein that boy in and he hasn’t done a damn thing. He’s just as responsible for —”
“Stop,” I say. “Just stop. You’re not suing anyone.”
“Matt —”
“No.” I brace my hands on the armrest of the couch and push myself to my feet. It takes me a few seconds to find my balance. My voice is strong but soft because speaking makes my entire head hurt. “Dad. Angus has already been kicked off the football team. He’s probably going to get expelled, and he’s facing a felony assault conviction that’ll follow him around for the rest of his life.”
I think I had another point to make. Yeah, right, I was going to say suing the Parr family wouldn’t punish Angus. Something like that. Doesn’t matter. Dad knows where I was going. I sink back to the couch, exhausted.
Dad sits next to me. “That’s very big of you,” he says, “and better than that thug deserves. If you change your mind —”
“I won’t. It’s done. Let it go.”
Dad gives me a funny look. I can’t tell what he’s thinking.
Or maybe I can.
This isn’t the right time. I can’t think straight. All my filters are completely down.
Like that’s ever stopped me before.
“Dad? Why’d you do it?” I say. “Why’d you cheat on Mom?”
The question causes Dad to lock up, deer in the headlights style. “Matt, I told you —”
“No, you didn’t. You never told me why.”
Dad looks at the floor. He sits there for I don’t know how long.
“We’ve been together for a long time, your mother and I,” he says, “and when two people are together for so long, they can become...too comfortable for their own good, I guess you could say. They fall into ruts without realizing it. Everything starts to feel the same. Not bad, just routine. When she — my receptionist — started showing interest in me, it was exciting because it was different. I let myself get carried away by those feelings, one thing led to another, and...well.”
Yeah. Well.
“I cheated because I was weak and selfish and thoughtless. I never stopped to consider how much it would hurt Barbara.” He looks up at me. “Or you. I’m sorry I let you down, Matt. And I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to say that.”
“I don’t know what to say,” I say. “I mean, like, literally. These drugs are hardcore.”
Dad laughs. It’s been forever since I’ve made him laugh.
“Why don’t you go to bed, buddy?” he says. “You’ve had a rough day.”
“Yeah.” I stand. “My bedroom’s upstairs, right?”
“Right.”
“Crap.”
“Need a hand?”
“...Yeah. Thanks.”
Mom and Dad order me to stay home from school and work for a couple of days, and I’m not inclined to argue — which I think speaks volumes about my condition.
I get the first good look at myself when I snap a selfie to send to Edison along with a note reading, “Calling in. Face broken,” and it’s no wonder Mom started crying when she saw me at breakfast. My nose is swollen to twice its size, and a vivid bruise radiates from the center of my face to create a reddish-purple mask around my eyes. Jeez, I look like I went the distance with Apollo Creed.
On the upside, once I wake up, I stay awake all day, which I spend marathoning Wachowski movies: Bound, The Matrix, Cloud Atlas and, against my better judgment, Speed Racer and Jupiter Ascending — which, I discover, are both greatly improved by the addition of powerful pain medication.
On Wednesday, I make the executive decision to stop taking my meds. I don’t like how they make me feel, but more importantly, I need to test my reflexes and mental acuity in the traditional manner: Bioshock Infinite. Not counting lunch and bathroom breaks, I finish the game in just under eleven hours and only die five times. Not my personal best, but it’s in the top five. I take that as a promising sign I’m not suffering from any serious long-term effects from the concussion.
Despite Mom and Dad’s protests, I insist on going to work on Thursday. It’s a test-run, I argue. Seven hours of school might be too much, but a couple of hours at work shouldn’t be too taxing. Mom’s reluctant, but Dad gives me the green light.
I brace for the barrage of questions about my face, which has deflated back to its normal size while the bruising has darkened to a blackish-purple with yellowing edges. It actually looks worse than before. Two security guards and a receptionist comment on the injury and ask if I’m okay, but no one hits me up for details.
...Until I get off the elevator and almost walk right into Zina. Her first surprised “Oh!” is a soft gasp prompted by our near-collision. The second is yelp of mild horror. Her hand jumps to her lips then reaches out to touch my face. I rear back on instinct.
“Oh my God, Matt,” she says, “what happened?”
“Remember the meathead who tried to start a fight with me after the dance?” I say. Zina nods. “He sucker-punched me at school Monday morning. Broken nose, concussion...”
“Are you okay?”
“Um...broken nose. Concussion. I think I covered that part. I have to get to work,” I say, moving to step around her. Zina counters, blocking me.
“Matt, wait. I’ve been thinking a lot about what happened Saturday, and I want to apologize for ditching you.”
“Zina, no...”
She pushes on. “I overreacted. The look on your face when you had that guy on the ground...it scared me. You looked like you wanted to kill him. But I know now that was just the heat of the moment. You told him you didn’t want to fight and he backed you into a corner. All you did was defend yourself.”
Hearing Zina admit I scared her, that’s like a knife of solid ice straight to the heart. Listening to her make excuses for me twists the blade.
“I know you never would have hurt him.” Zina laughs, but it’s a nervous, uncertain sound. “You wouldn’t really have ripped off his arm.”
“No, I wouldn’t have ripped his arm off,” I say, and because I never know when to shut my mouth, I add, “I would have dislocated his elbow so badly he’d never have full use of his arm again. And if I’d seen this coming?” I say, gesturing at the mess of my face, “Angus would have been the one waking up in the nurse’s office with a broken nose and a concussion.”
Why stop there when I can dig the hole deeper? That’s the Matt Steiger way.
“And I wouldn’t have felt bad about it.”
“I see,” Zina says. She considers me for a moment then asks, “Would you have been proud of yourself?”
Would I? Angus Parr is a crap excuse for a human being. He spent his entire school career hurting and scaring people for fun, and he wasn’t above harassing girls and disabled kids if they were the only available targets. If anyone deserved a hefty dose of comeuppance, it was him.
But putting him in the hospital wouldn’t have been comeuppance. That would have been straight-up revenge.
“No,” I say.
She nods. “I’m going to take my break at four. Why don’t you meet me in the cafeteria? We’ll get some coffee and talk some more.”
We don’t talk; I talk. The conversation is more like a confessional, and I let Zina know exactly what she’s in for if she’s going to be involved with me in any capacity. She deserves to know who I am: a smart-assed, judgmental, self-centered, grudge-holding jerk who’s a little too quick to push back when someone pushes him.
I don’t think I’m a bad person. But I’m not the best person I could be, either.
“How old are you?” Zina asks. “Sixteen?”
“Yeah.”
A tiny smile appears on her lips. “That would explain it.”
She asks me to meet her for dinner after work. It’s not a date, she stresses, just a chanc
e to talk some more.
I don’t know where this is heading. Maybe she wants to keep seeing me; maybe she’ll decide she only wants to be friends; or maybe she wants to confirm to herself she wants nothing to do with me. I don’t know. Guess I’ll find out.
My shift ends, and I trudge up to Edison’s office for a final check-in. I’d say my first foray back into the real world was a success; I’m a little more tired than I thought I’d be, but I haven’t experienced any headaches or dizziness and I haven’t spaced out at all. I’m calling it a win.
“Before you go,” Edison says. He picks up from his desk a black case made of solid, heavy plastic, and with an air of ceremony, opens it to reveal —
“Is that...?” I say.
“It is. Finished it up yesterday. Behold! The first field test prototype for the thunder gun.” Edison winces. “We might be stuck with the name.”
“If I can learn to live with ‘the Hero Squad’...”
I take it out of the case, feeling its heft. It has some weight to it, but it’s a good weight; it doesn’t feel awkward in my hand. The matte black casing is sleek and has a retro vibe to it, like it was modeled after a prop laser gun from an old sci-fi movie. I approve. My thumb rests on a safety switch, and the power output control is located on the side of the trigger assembly, easily accessible by my index finger. A tiny panel on the butt of the gun, maybe the size of a postage stamp, indicates the power level: green for low, shifting up the spectrum to red for high.
“What do we do now?” I say.
“You use it,” Edison says. “Field testing is the next step. We need to see how it performs in practical use. That means you’ll need to file detailed reports after each use...”
“Seriously? You’re giving this to me?”
“It’s technically Bose Industries property, but you’ll be responsible for it.” He smiles. “I trust you to take good care of it.”
A year ago, Edison wouldn’t have trusted me with an expensive piece of tech like this. He wouldn’t have trusted me with his true identity. Hell, he wouldn’t have trusted me to break a dollar without short-changing him. We’ve come a long way since then.
I’ve come a long way.
Dad once told me life isn’t about the destination; it’s about the journey. I disagree. The past year has been hard, painful, and not a lot of fun, but this year’s Matt Steiger is a vast improvement over the previous model. I still have a lot of growing up to do, but overall, I like where I’ve ended up.
Here’s hoping the next leg of the journey is a little kinder.
I lock the thunder gun back up in its case and head out to meet Zina.
NINE – KUNOICHI AND DR. ENIGMA
ROCK AND ROLL DAMNATION
1.
Everything goes dark. People scream and shriek for a few seconds, and then the noise fades out. My adrenaline levels go crazy.
“Are you ready?”
“Uh-huh,” I say, but I’m lying. My brain tries to wander places I don’t want it going. Not now, brain. I have to get this right or I’ll screw everything up royally.
A hand lands on my shoulder and squeezes. “Breathe. You’ve got this.”
I take a breath. I think of Dad. I exhale. All my anxiety pours out of me. I’m calm, I’m focused, and I’m ready to kick some ass.
A spotlight at the back of the auditorium comes on and follows me as I emerge from the wings in my Angus Young costume. The audience goes nuts again. Dressing up is a tradition for the high school stage band’s Halloween concert. Once Bo decided I had to dress up as Angus Young — because I’m short, energetic, and own a Gibson SG, like Angus — it was a given we’d open the show with some AC/DC. I smile, tip my cap, take my mark at center stage, and rip into the opening riff of “Thunderstruck.” The crowd goes bonkers.
We actually wanted to open the show with “Shoot to Thrill,” but that’s one of the songs on the school’s no-play list. “Shoot to Thrill” is banned because it mentions shooting, which “isn’t appropriate for a public school environment.” “Shot Down in Flames” is on the list for the same reason. “You Shook Me All Night Long” is on the list because it’s about sex. “Highway to Hell,” “Hell’s Bells,” and “Hell Ain’t a Bad Place to be” are on there because they mention Hell a lot and “might be offensive to our more devout audience members.” Basically we can’t do, like, half of AC/DC’s catalog because it might offend the grown-ups in the audience, which is stupid because the main reason we do a lot of older songs is because they’ll appeal to the adults who grew up listening to that stuff. I don’t get it.
Whatever. Doesn’t matter. “Thunderstruck” is a good opener. The audience starts singing along right away, chanting “THUN-DER!” when Caz Hitch hits the first booming drumbeat. The other instruments join in gradually: Tylyn on bass, Joey Millar on rhythm guitar — I beat him out for lead guitarist — Grace Davis on keyboard, and finally Bo, who’s dressed as Brian Johnson.
For the next hour and a half, we own the audience. We jump from one song to the next without any breaks except for the few seconds here and there when Bo banters with the audience. He’s a natural front man, all charming and witty. Most of our playlist is hard, driving rock, and it’s all material we picked ourselves: the Foo Fighters, Aerosmith, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Fall Out Boy, Pearl Jam, the Smashing Pumpkins, Alice in Chains, Godsmack, Stone Sour, Bush, the Clash, the Dropkick Murphys, the Killers, Nirvana, the Ramones, Imagine Dragons, Mumford and Sons, Guns N’ Roses...by the time we end the show with Walk the Moon’s “Shut Up and Dance,” everyone is dripping with sweat. My voice is a little raw from singing, my fingers are stiff, and my legs hurt from jumping around, but I feel like I could keep going all night. The audience is on their feet and dancing in the aisles and singing along with us and the energy is AWESOME.
After our final bow, we head backstage to clean up before the reception. Mr. Dreyfuss, the band’s faculty adviser, greets us with a big, proud smile.
“Amazing show, guys,” he says. “Go dry yourselves off. You want to be presentable when you meet your adoring public.”
“I have extra deodorant for anyone who forgot theirs,” Bo announces as he leads us back to the dressing room.
“Told you you had it,” Mr. Dreyfuss says to me as I pass.
We head back to the dressing room, and the first thing Bo does after stripping out of his soaking wet tank top is throw it in my face.
“Gross!” I say.
“Sweat baptism for the new guys!” Bo says. Ty and Caz take off their shirts and chuck them at Grace and Joey. Caz’s shirt hits Joey in the face with a loud splat. Jeez, I got off easy.
“All kidding aside, guys, you did great,” Ty says. “Now get changed. We have some serious glory to go bask in.”
After plays and concerts, the school sets up a dessert buffet in the cafeteria for the guests. It’s nothing major, mostly platters of cookies from the supermarket and Hi-C served in a big punch bowl to fool people into thinking it’s something fancy, but it gives people something to do before we come out.
“And, as usual, there’s nothing left for us,” Caz says, gesturing at an empty plastic tray covered in cookie crumbs.
“You know the drill, Caz,” Bo says. “We schmooze for a half hour then go grab dinner.”
“Yes. Dinner. Food,” I say. “Lots of food.”
“Hang tough, Muppet,” Ty says, “we’ll get you fed.”
It’s so weird hearing someone outside of the team call me by my nickname. Every time someone in the band calls me Muppet, I almost tell them no, you can’t call me that, only my friends get to call me that — and then I remember that Bo and Tylyn and Caz and Grace and Joey are my friends now.
I mean, they’re my friends too. I still have my old friends. Most of them, anyway, though it’s not like I’ve seen them much lately, what with Carrie and Matt working, and Matt is kinda-sorta seeing someone, and Stuart’s volunteering with the youth club. Plus I’ve been rehearsing for this show, like, five day
s a week for the last month. If I’m not staying after school to practice, I’m getting together with the band at Bo’s house on the weekends.
I start to wonder if any of the team even showed up, and then I hear Stuart calling my name from somewhere in the cafeteria. The place is packed, and it takes me a second to spot Stuart’s hand waving at me from deep within the crowd. I shove my way through.
“You were freakin’ awesome!” Stuart says, lifting me off my feet in a big hug. I can’t stop myself from squealing as he plants me on his shoulder and shouts, “Missy Hamill, the new queen of rock!”
My friends respond with cheers and applause. My friends are here. Of course all my friends are here. I don’t know why I was worried. Carrie came; and Matt; and Matt’s maybe-girlfriend, which is cool; and Natalie and Astrid, which I didn’t expect...
I didn’t expect to see Sara here, either.
Awkward...
Mom and Dad distract me for a little while and gush about my performance. When Dad and I had our big heart-to-heart after the Buzzkill Joy mess, I finally told him about my secret hobby. Dad always wanted me to take up an instrument but he wanted me to play something classy and dignified like the violin or the piano. He was a little surprised and, I think, disappointed that I’d taken up the electric guitar, but he got over it fast and encouraged me to stick with it. If I loved it, then it was important and I shouldn’t give it up. That meant a lot to me. I never practiced when he was home out of habit, so until tonight, he’d never heard me play before.
After that, my friends all take a turn hugging me, telling me how great I was. It’s pretty awesome.
And then I reach Sara.
“Hey,” I say.
“Hey,” she says, and suddenly I feel like everyone is watching us to see what happens next, maybe expecting some kind of blowout, but it’s just my imagination. I glance around and the only person paying any attention to us is Stuart, and he’s glaring at Sara like he’s trying to set her on fire with his brain.
Action Figures - Issue Five: Team-Ups Page 22
