True Heroes

by Gann, Myles

  “Why would I be happy?”

  “Because you have made yourself happy.”

  She swirled her body away and looked down at the pavement. Her mumbles came out at blurring speeds; her small hands flexing and fingers writhing between each syllable. “You haven’t given me a reason to blush,” she whispered as she whirled back, her cheeks flaring red.

  “That probably has something to do with your second reason to be gracious.”

  “I should be blushing because you didn’t kill me?”

  Caleb took a half step closer, his chin barely away from her forehead as it bent towards his chest to angle his eyes into hers. “You’re blushing now because you don’t know what to feel, but you’re glad you’re here to feel it.”

  She gazed upward. “What about you?”

  ‘There’s a constant buzz in your head.’

  ‘That’s her answer then.’ “I think I’m glad you’re here right now.”

  She smiled slightly with her chest heaved and her hands clutching at the bottom of her shirt. Nothing mumbled from her lips as they curved, flattened, and curved again from one horizon to the other. “Can we sit and talk now?”

  Caleb backed down. “I’m sorry but not tonight. Tonight I’ll be going through this thing.”

  She took a baby step closer. “We do have to talk.”

  He laughed. “I know.”

  “But this is more important?”

  “This can’t wait. Can’t this?”

  She inched closer as Caleb’s back hit the container door. “Depends. We ruled out the killing choice. Which of the other two did you pick?”

  “If I was going to leave, I wouldn’t bother making you blush.”

  “But you did bother.”

  Caleb stood up straight, expecting her to recoil, but she didn’t. Her ear ended up against his chest where she listened: ‘Thump-thump, thump-thump, thump-thump. It’s fast for us.’

  She took her head from his chest, smiling up at him as she lazily listed backwards. “Tomorrow?”

  “At group, tomorrow.”

  “We don’t have group on weekends. Still tomorrow?”

  “We have no way of contacting each other.”

  “You know where I live, and I know where you put your stuff. Still Tomorrow?”

  Caleb laughed a little. “Yes. Tomorrow.”

  She turned and ran off with the flash of another smile. He turned to instantly see his power throw open the door and appear before him. “You’re very proud of yourself aren’t you?”

  Caleb turned open the box again. “I like her, and that’s an honor in itself with such a sweet girl.”

  “Oh, please! Your feeble rationalizations don’t cover your avarice.”

  “It’s the truth.”

  “It’s a fragment of truth that you’re content with. You think a shiny pebble will pass as a diamond with me?”

  “Fine. Dive deeper.”

  “You’re happy she likes you, but she has nothing to like. You just see a pretty face, feel a warm feeling, and ta-da you have a crush.”

  “There’s something else there and you know that.”

  “There’s a possibility of there being more under all that skin and blood, but the probability still lies with the fact that she’s a clueless moron like the others. Even if that possibility exists, there is an increasingly smaller probability at each level. You hold hands, then kiss, then roll the dice hoping for such a specific outcome that the sheer magnitude of the odds against you casts hope from the light. As an even sadder sentiment, you don’t even see how much of a failure your biological father was, so you’re trying to emulate his ideals. He had twice the determination and had half the road bumps you’ve had, and failed like a miserable drunk. Your pride is what buffs up your chest and says I’ll be the one to conquer fate.”

  A paper, crinkled and sliced, was in Caleb’s hand. “What it will take: leaving them behind, forgetting about it, letting us go, a willingness to lose everything, and the truth.”

  “Which one of those do you think you have?”

  He sat back using his stacks of old study guides as a chair and closed his eyes. “I have none of these.”

  Chapter 12

  The boxes flipped open from a force that worked beyond Caleb’s hands. Light blue peered into the open flaps. ‘Clothes, comics. Why did you ever collect this crap? Legos.’

  ‘This is half of the crap I used to have. Fink must’ve only packed the stuff he thought was important.’

  ‘What, exactly, is the importance of a turtle-neck sweater when you have me?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Insightful.’

  Behind him, the light was high in the edge of early morning and afternoon. Boxes littered the small patch of land while the sun baked passing onlookers. ‘Woman approaching from behind.’

  Caleb looked up. ‘Do we know her?’

  ‘No. She looks curious. Easy to kill.’

  ‘Shut up.’

  He turned around and walked out. Clammy skin felt cool again when the breeze countered the closeness of the walls. She leaned against the open side of the container and smiled from behind large sun glasses. “You moving?”

  ‘Japanese-American, twenty-four if I had to guess. What do her clothes tell you?’

  ‘Nothing. Leave it to me.’

  “Yeah, something like that.”

  “Oh, that’s cool. You look like you could use a break.”

  Caleb wiped at his face with his sleeve. “I haven’t been sleeping much lately.”

  “Aw, poor baby. Maybe I could keep you company for a little? Keep you up for a little longer?”

  He stayed inside the container frame. “Nah, I think I’m pretty set here. Thanks anyways.”

  “There’s nothing more frustrating than having a clogged brain, I bet.”

  He laughed. “Am I that transparent?”

  She smiled and walked forward. “Only two things keep a man up at night. You obviously don’t have a girl or she’d be here helping. One thing left, then.”

  “What’s that?”

  “A loud brain.”

  “He’s pretty loud.”

  ‘I always thought my voice was soothing.’

  ‘Yeah, like a glass vase in a blender.’

  ‘At least I make sweet music. Your voice is a deepened whine.’

  ‘She likes it.’

  ‘She’s a prostitute. She likes anything and lies about what’s left over.’

  ‘What’s wrong with lies?’

  His power recoiled. ‘Coming from the man who sings about the truth.’

  ‘The truth hasn’t helped me so far. Maybe lies will.’

  ‘You don’t believe that. Not even halfway.’

  Caleb hung his head for a second. ‘I’ve got to try something.’

  “Well, there are ways to quiet it.” She reached forward and played with the pocket on his chest. “I could try for you.”

  Caleb didn’t advance. He stayed back while keeping an embarrassed smile stretched across his face. “I’m not into the whole sex-for-hire thing. I appreciate the offer, but I don’t think I could do it.”

  He gently pushed her hand away and smiled wider for a second. She nodded hesitantly before they both turned. Caleb gently kicked a box-flap open and lifted up the top comic book. ‘This is the last Superman comic my mom ever bought me.’

  ‘She’s not leaving.’

  “Hey, um.” Caleb turned around. “Do you need any help?”

  “No, I’m just looking around right now.”

  “Want anyone to talk to? You said you had a lot on your mind.” She walked forward with her hands outstretched.

  “Listen, this angle isn’t going to work.”

  “No, no angle. I’ve…been going through a lot and I guess I just wanted some company. Of any kind. What about you?”

  ‘You’re thinking about her as entertainment.’

  ‘I need to try something. This funk can only lead to one thing.’

&
nbsp; ‘Oh I promise you it can lead more than one way, but all ways lead to a dead end for you.’

  “I could go for some company.” He closed the box at his feet and stepped out. The shutter gently closed and locked while the woman stood away. He glanced back at her flat shoes and bell-bottom jeans dyed with acid along the seams. His eyes darted up to the white shirt that revealed skin only along the arms. ‘She didn’t wake up this morning looking for a trick.’

  “You mind if we walk?”

  He stood up and smiled. “Not at all. Let’s go this way.”

  They walked down the street, chattering inconsistently about trivial matters that obviously danced around the deeper thoughts in their heads. Power stood on guard in Caleb’s head as he instinctively brought their walk to his apartment. They stopped in front of his building in the empty parking lot while she finished her laugh from a quip. “Your place?”

  “Yeah, it’s the only place I know where to get to.”

  “Oh, you’re new around here?”

  “A few months old, but I haven’t done much around the area.”

  “Caught up in work?”

  “You could say that, yeah.”

  She smiled again. “Well, show me your place. Since we’re here.”

  He laughed. “All right.” They walked slowly up the stairs, laughing boisterously and flashing smiles. His door unlocked before he reached. ‘You’re being helpful?’

  ‘A splinter of dead-ends.’

  ‘That’s a no.’

  She closed the door behind them before scanning the room. “This is yours? It looks like nobody lives here.”

  “Kind of a minimalist.”

  She walked around the living area and peeked into the bedroom. “No bed?”

  “Like I said, I don’t sleep much.”

  “And like I said, you don’t have alotta fun.”

  Caleb’s guard fell to the floor. “You don’t need a bed for that type of fun.”

  She hopped up on the counter and sighed. “I haven’t had that type of fun in a long time.”

  “I thought that was your job?”

  “Honestly, you’re the first one I’ve tried it on. I work at the firm down the street.”

  Caleb leaned against the wall opposite the counter. “What do you do there?”

  “Lawyer. On my way to a partnership soon.”

  “Why did you come to me today then?”

  “I don’t know. I guess I wanted to see if I could pick up a hot guy that way. I’m a lawyer—not a lot of time for me to get a guy the legitimate way.”

  Caleb felt the air stiffen. “Do you want a drink?”

  “What kind do you have?”

  He smiled. “Look around. The minimalist has milk and water that’s about it.”

  She laughed sweetly. “Do you even have glasses?”

  “One or two I think.” He moved behind the counter and opened the only occupied cabinet. “So, milk or water? Or both?”

  From behind, Caleb felt a warm presence, and then two hands on his waist turning him around. His lips were suddenly occupied; his mouth suddenly feeling a foreign presence while his body adapted to a new type of touch. The flesh-colored scenery didn’t change during the fall to a soft floor. His shirt was off and his bare back felt against the polyester; he stared lazily into the blanked ceiling as his chest and neck felt a summer’s night in small circles. Low moans flowed from her mouth between and during breaths, but fell on deaf ears. ‘How could this give her pleasure? It doesn’t. It’s a lie.’ His stomach flipped and churned as she passed over it. A hand appeared under her chin and gently lifted her head away from his flesh. “Please.”

  Caleb got to his feet quickly and walked to the open window, catching the tail of an unpleasant breeze. She sat up on her knees with her shirt off and looked up pleadingly. “There’s nothing wrong with this nobody will think less of you.”

  “It’s a lie.” He looked back to her. “Including your reason for this. Why are you doing this?”

  She looked down, away, and back a few times. “It’s how I lived for a long time. I used to walk up to desperate men, but I always one-uped myself. Not on looks, but on how lonely they looked. My first night, I made it with a businessman that lost his job. It kept progressing until I was doing two or three guys a night. The money was great. That’s all that mattered. My daughter and husband live comfortably on my bill alone. Neither of them knows a thing, but we all live happily. I’ve got bills to pay, mouths to feed.”

  “Since you’ve started this way, you can’t stop. Would you if you could?”

  “I can’t think about that.”

  “Because?”

  “Because it hurts too much to think that I could’ve done something else with my life.”

  “You live a lie.”

  She put her shirt back on. “I live happily.”

  He looked down to her. “No you don’t. You live with money and lies.”

  “Nothing in this world is free, and we all live lies.”

  “Not everything is paid for in money, and we all have the choice to live however we want to live.”

  “You don’t lie?”

  “I can’t”

  She laughed. “You’re full of it.”

  He picked up his shirt. “If you say so.”

  She watched him intently as he let the shirt fall onto his body and messed his hair. “You really think you live honestly don’t you?”

  “I know I try to.”

  “You can’t do that. You’d never be happy.”

  He smiled tiredly. “Do I look happy?”

  She watched him from her knees still. “That’d be why I came to you. I’ve never seen a guy look so lonely.” Caleb walked over to his pack in the corner and rummaged. “Maybe you do live like that, but you can’t forever. I’m sorry, but sooner or later you’ll realize how good it feels to be happy.”

  ‘Match point, Caleb.’ He grabbed towards the bottom of the pack. “How much do you charge a session?”

  She laughed. “You’re going to pay me without doing anything? You don’t have the cash, sweetie.”

  He grabbed three wads of hundred dollar bills and tossed them into her lap. “That should be good for two months. Find a legitimate job.”

  She didn’t even look at the money. “Are you trying to recruit me to the good side?”

  “I’m trying to show you that you have a choice.”

  “I won’t tell them the truth.”

  He kneeled in the corner. “Baby steps. First you get yourself to a good place, then you tell them, and you realize that they still love you because you had their interests in mind. I’m giving you the first step.”

  She gently placed her hands on the money and pulled a small slip of paper from under the money wrap. “Your name’s Caleb? That’s the name on here.”

  “Yeah. How about you?”

  “Shyne.”

  Caleb smiled. “Shyne. I’m taking a nap. You’re welcome to stay and do the same. You look tired too.”

  She sat back on her butt. “I feel like I can slow down now. Maybe I will take a nap.”

  Caleb didn’t wait to see what she did next.

  - - -

  Caleb was drowning in the sea of speckled black. His back arced as his body floated, his head not bobbing with the tide. The extremes of his flesh felt the sting of bitter cold that reached and wretched from endless bowels. Blue specks flew from searching iris, leaping from league to league without the anchor of land or tree.

  His neck lifted as his arms tingled with the comatose life of slowing blood. Fingers curled slowly as his body righted against the persistent current, and the Earth was in his sight. The spotty veil of clouds did little to sojourn Caleb’s gawk; the green, brown, blue and white plains leapt against the sun at its back, all the turning bleating the churning of life that Caleb simply couldn’t see.

  All pluming clouds disappeared. The turning stopped. A maelstrom formed large enough to bite at Caleb’s black pool, snapping and snarl
ing against the green lows and into the brown and white highs until the planet was split. The meridian: a cruel slice through the tangled knot. The core: an unwoven heap being pushed apart by a tiny blue figure—

  The sun felt too hot as Caleb woke on the floor. ‘Door open. Why? That…. Where’s Shyne?’

  ‘She’s hanging in the air.’

  ‘What…. Damn you! That smell again!’

  ‘I had to get rid of the evidence. There are sirens a ways off.’

  ‘Go freaking figure! You’re murdering innocents you can’t do that.”

  Caleb stood and gathered a pack together quickly. ‘You should’ve seen the way she looked at you. I opened your eyes, stood, she stared up, mumbled about what she’d always wanted to do. It was so pleasant to see her die in my hands after she blanketed me with the praise. She said “thank you, thank you for ending my life.”’

  He zipped the pack. ‘I’m sure that’s a direct quote.’

  ‘Perhaps not, but it was in the subtext. She wasn’t as entertaining as the last. She wanted things slow. We weren’t very compatible.’

  ‘Goddamn shame.’ He flung it over his shoulder and was out the window, sirens now resounding from only a few blocks away. His feet skittered across the roof quickly before he was into the alley and mixed into the walking crowd. He was seething. ‘You have to do it. You can’t control yourself can you? All you are is a—’

  ‘I am power. You are the vessel that enables me. At least you got a refund.’

  The corner quickly came and Caleb ran to the metal container as quietly as possible. His hand hoisted the sliding door, nearly throwing it off the rails, and slammed it shut behind him. Caleb found the area too small to pace; he felt confined in the heated dark with shackles clanging at his feet. A hand punched at the thin metal only to stop short of it.

  ‘You see? Here is where your mind travels always. You believe this metal box cares if you use me to disintegrate it? Can’t change the fact that violence is the only way you know how to face anything.’

  ‘That’s what you meant.’

  ‘That’s what this entire pathetic life you have means.’