by
Trisky
All morning long that’s all I’ve heard, coffee cups hitting saucers, forks banging plates, knives dropping on top of spoons, glasses butting the edges of the grooves on the good plates. It’s enough to push me over the edge. Maybe it’s a lack of sleep getting to me, or the way I never really noticed how pushy and demanding the day crowd is at the diner since I was never around much during weekdays, too busy with school. My shifts were always early morning or late afternoon. They think because it’s slower during the day, they deserve some special service. I don’t even recognize most of the customers. I’m as much of an outsider to them as they are to me. They don’t belong here.
I don’t belong here.
He definitely doesn’t belong here.
He belongs behind a desk, bossing people around, selling time share advertisements for some community built on top of an active volcano who are looking to improve their image. I’m sure he could make molten lava a selling point. Make up some mysterious anti-aging benefits or something. He most definitely does not belong in the Liberty Diner reading two week old copies of Pittsburgh Out while simultaneously rolling his eyes at the cheap black and white ads and raising them in interest at the color shots of various large muscles highlighted in various stages of leather undress. I guess he has no other place he needs to be, or wants to go. Except here. I’m not sure what there is for him here, but I guess it’s better than sitting home alone.
I stare outside, gathering the plates in no hurry, ten minutes away from freedom. To do what, I’m not sure. It’s a beautiful sun-soaked afternoon. I guess it was worth the fight to see everyone milling around, living their lives the way they see fit, not the way everyone else wants them to. Still, I don’t feel all that victorious. I feel terrified. That this will be all I’ll ever see and these plates will be all that I’ll ever hear. I have nightmares of thousands of loud plates rattling together like tambourines in my brain. It’s no wonder I can’t sleep.
“It’s so beautiful outside. It feels like summer is right around the corner.” Voices fill the doorway, as I watch two strangers greet the blinding rays of sun with hands shading their eyes. They soak the freedom in. The freedom I worked my ass off to retain. I drop another plate in my bucket. Clang!
Snap. I hear fingers snapping behind me, trying to draw my attention.
“More coffee. And a side order of Prozac.”
“I don’t need Prozac, Brian.” Shrill.
“It’s not for you Mikey,” he pats his hand, condescendingly. “It’s for me.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t mean to drag you down even more.” Michael stirs the bottomless pit of his coffee, the spoon churning mindlessly against the walls of the cup. I feel a twitch in my neck. “I just feel so helpless.”
I could probably make a wiseass remark, or several hundred, but I don’t. One raised eyebrow from an increasingly impatient, caffeine-less, nearly derelict man shot in my direction shrieks louder than a dishwasher full of dirty dishes. “I’m sure it’ll be fine, Michael.” I pat him on the back verbally. Much to the dismay of the table waiting in back, I bang my rubber bucket full of filth down on the table. They can wait for the next shift.
“I need to find a real newspaper. I’ll be back.” I watch the loops of Brian’s shoelace on his right foot come undone as he walks towards the door. He doesn’t take the time to notice and I don’t find the time to point it out. He’s already outside, beyond the door, beyond the window, long before I can. I just hope he doesn’t trip.
“I didn’t mean to chase him off like that.” The sound of Michael’s voice reorients me and I slide into the booth across from him.
“You didn’t. He just has stuff he has to take care of. I think he might want to put a classified ad in the newspaper to sell the car.” That’s gonna hurt. “So how is Hunter adjusting to life at your mother’s place?”
“I haven’t been able to see him since we came back. The social worker thinks it’s better to let the dust settle first.” Michael’s face speaks volumes. I never imagined him as a father. It’s kind of endearing.
“Hey, at least he’s in good hands. And at least his mom agreed to let him stay there until you get it all worked out and not in some strange foster home.” I’m not sure Michael cares to hear what I’m saying. His head is too clouded with his own disappointment. Not that I would know what I was talking about or anything.
“She didn’t really have much of a choice once he told them his story. The social worker was pretty firm with his mother about not making it more difficult for him.” He crosses his arms, elbows touching the table and looks at me over the bucket of disaster in front of us.
“At least it sounds like the social worker is on your side.”
“She doesn’t think it’s a good idea to push for him to live with me and Ben. She wants my mom to become a certified foster parent so Hunter can at least stay nearby.” I distinctly recall a side order of Prozac being ordered. The wait service sucks around here.
“That’s better than nothing. Or him getting totally sucked back into the system.”
“Yeah.”
I’m not very good at this Brian substitution stuff. Not because I don’t care, I do. I feel bad for all of them. It’s a tough position to be in. Not that I would know from experience or anything and not that anyone would ask me... I just don’t feel like I’m the one he needs to talk to about this even though he obviously needs to vent to someone. I think Michael would implode if he didn’t vent. It’s the only time he expresses himself clearly. I look around at the customers slurping soup, carving bites to eat, staring at menus in silence, blessed silence. “I’m sure he appreciates what you’re trying to do,” I offer, halfheartedly.
“I promised him we’d be a family and that I’d take care of him.” That’s a pretty steep promise. From the look on his face, it’s one he takes seriously. I push the dirty dishes further away and lean my own elbows on the table.
“You still are, you just don’t live together. I was a stranger living in your old room once upon a time, remember?” And look how that worked out.
“It’s different though, it’s not like we were trying to make you part of the family on purpose. You just wanted to be part of Brian,” he smirks slightly. “Besides, you have a family you can go back to, Hunter doesn’t. You didn’t really need us the way he does.”
Forever and always, outside.
“Yeah, I remember you doing more to try and make me disappear than to keep me around.”
“Didn’t work too well.” He leans his cheek into a balled up fist, smiling and playing drums with his spoon against the saucer. Tip tap. Tip tap.
“Well you’re the superhero. Use your amazing Zephyr abilities to get the exact opposite of what you want by wishing he would go away. The more you wish something would happen, the more the opposite does.” Zap! I look at the blank faces around me for any warning signs in the form of moving eyebrows, absolutely convinced I’ll see Rage shapeshift and morph into one of them if I keep speaking.
“We should probably get the next issue started. I could use the money to give to my mother until she gets certified.”
“And I could just use the money.” Not for any selfless reason. Not that anyone would ask or anything. I suddenly feel very small.
“So I was thinking,” he gets more animated, dumping his coffee cup, spoon, and saucer, all at once, and very loudly into my bucket, “you know how Rage has just been through all of this trauma? Icetina froze him, Razorback almost leveled him. Well what if we introduce a new character, to help him back on his feet, sort of re-spark the fight in him since Zephyr is busy with Juice Pig and trying to save the Hologram kids. We could call him Fusion.”
The seat of the booth rubs against my pants, as I shift uncomfortably, creating a loud, obnoxious noise. “Uh... well... what exactly would this character be doing?” My limbs feel stiff, from rolling around on the floor for hours, no doubt.
“He’d give Rage a new purpose, nurture him, challenge him to get back what he lost. Maybe be an example of what Rage wants to get back to when he has all his powers back, strong and resilient. And of course he’d be hot as hell.” He rubs his palms together, in that way he does when he gets excited.
“So Zephyr has Juice Pig, and Rage...”
“Is on the verge of getting back everything he lost and having everything he ever wanted and Fusion embodies that.” He interrupts me, leaning forward across the table, banging his elbow against my bucket sending a loud reminder right up my spine.
“What about JT? Does he exist in this issue?” Not that anyone would notice or anything.
“He’s there, but he’s tired from doing all that work trying to bring Rage back to life. JT needs more experience before he can be at Zephyr and Rage’s level.” He says it without the slightest hint of irony.
“JT’s spent enough time on the backburner, don’t you think?” I wait for that one moment of recognition to set in. For the skies to open up and beam sunlight on his face. For him to shade his eyes from the glare.
“I feel like he should have his own spinoff sometimes.” He laughs and that’s pretty much it. No really, he just laughs. They say laughter is the best medicine. It’s a damn shame most medicine tastes so bitter, especially the sound of this particular laugh, at this particular moment. “He’s so hard to integrate because he doesn’t really have superpowers yet, you know? He was just some kid that they found. He has to develop his own powers and I don’t know what they are yet.”
Forever and always, outside.
I stand up, lifting my very loud, very dirty set of dishes as I go, supporting the bucket with my hip. “I don’t blame you. It must be hard to balance that with characters that have fully developed superpowers.” After all he’s the writer, it’s up to him to take Rage where he feels he needs to go. I just draw the pictures when he’s done, fill the ink in, shape the outline, make him vivid and real.
“Exactly! He’s more like an Alfred than a Robin.”
“You forgot the one huge secret weapon he has that the rest of these characters don’t.”
“What? A really huge cock?” he snorts.
No, just the power to yield one in particular, at will.
Rage cometh before a fall...
“Something like that.”
I watch Brian walk through the door, lost in some headline about what Deekins intends to do, now that he’s been voted into office. He carries the sun on his back and the warm air with him. I could get lost in that sight for a good long while. He must have stopped to tie his shoe somewhere along the way. Not that I noticed or anything.
I put my bucket down on the counter and block his path back to the table. Somehow when I’m talking to him, I don’t hear much else. “What do you say, you and I take one last drive in the Batmobile? My shift is over.”
I untie my apron, lifting it over my head, not even waiting to hear a response. It’s not like either of us has any place we need to be. I find myself creeping further towards the door. Further away from all this noise and further towards freedom.
I watch him shrug his shoulders helplessly in Michael’s direction. “Why not, it’s beautiful outside.”
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Screencap courtesy of Princess of Babylon