Hero's Curse

by Jack J. Lee

  Andi wasn’t an under-aged nympho with a fetish for older men. She had been a normal, heterosexual teen faced with an amazingly gorgeous guy. ‘Fuck!’ I loved being average looking. It was awesome to have looks that made me hard to describe. I realized now that the people in the restaurant hadn’t just been looking a B. They had also been looking at me. I liked who I was; against my will and without my knowledge, I had been changed. I wanted to scream. I controlled myself. I couldn’t afford to freak out my new landlord.

  I stumbled into the bedroom and sat on my bed. I thought of B watching me from up on high, rolling on the ground giggling. I couldn’t help it, I started laughing. It was a better choice than screaming. I was so pissed. I had never laughed in anger before and somehow it made me feel better. B was right. He was a bigger me. Most guys would give their left nut to look this good. Neither one of us wanted to look like Prince Charming. Jehovah was a small lump of crap stuck to the end of an ass hair.

  With that appetizing thought, I realized I was starving. Nothing I had eaten during dinner had stayed in my stomach. I decided to go downstairs and make nice with my new roommates. I was halfway down the stairs when I heard Andi talking on the phone. I guess superhuman hearing came with the god-like looks. Somehow I knew she wasn’t speaking all that loudly.

  “Oh my God, Stacy, he’s so hot!...You have to come by tonight to check him out…No, he doesn’t look that old, probably Mina’s age—low twenties.” She was going to be a problem. I purposefully stomped down the lower half of the stairs to make sure Andi knew I was coming. She had the phone off and was looking innocent when I entered the kitchen.

  “Hey Andi, I know it’s late but I’m starving. I’m going to order some pizza. Do you want some?”

  She beamed. “Sure!” She batted her eyes and gave her best sixteen-year old attempt at a come hither look. I kept my face neutral. If Andi had been a dog, she’d have been the kind that slobbered on your face.

  “You think your sister will want some?”

  “Whatever, as long as it’s vegetarian, Mina loves pizza. Me personally, I’ll eat anything, Vic.”

  Andi gave me a coupon from the best local pizza place. I ordered three large pizzas, one plain, one meat lovers, and the last half pepperoni and the other half mushrooms and bell peppers. As we waited for the pizza, Andi became steadily less subtle in her come-ons. She wasn’t used to having to work to get attention and she had too much confidence to believe I wasn’t interested. I was playing stupid—too clueless to understand she was attracted to me. Watching her irritation rise helped keep mine under control.

  Shortly, a boy a couple years older than Andi came into the kitchen. At first, he didn’t even look up, furiously texting on his cell phone. He had the same Nordic good looks as his sisters. He was about six foot four and had the lanky, half-filled look of someone who had grown several inches in a short period of time. He bristled slightly when he finally noticed me. From the way he reacted, I figured he was straight. This sucked. No one was going to forget me. Guys would be intimidated and girls would be attracted. I didn’t even want to begin to think about my effect on gays.

  “Ben, this is our new renter, Vic. Vic, this is my brother, Ben.” Andi smirked, “Maybe his brain-dead groupies can give him a minute so he can say hello.”

  Without pause, Ben retaliated by flicking Andi in the forehead with his finger. She didn’t move fast enough and yelled a startled, “Ow!” He laughed and quickly crossed over to me, out of Andi’s reach. She tensed to lunge after him but then stopped to glance at me. I could see her decide to act like grownup. The glare she aimed at her brother promised future revenge.

  Ben was still glorying in his victory when I offered him my hand. Ben grabbed it like he was going to twist it off. He clearly wanted to show me he was the man in the family and could protect his sisters. I’m strong for my size but brute strength isn’t my forte. I choked high on his hand with a firm grasp to stop him from crushing my hand, but I had no expectation or intention of hurting him. I realized that I was when I saw his eyes get big and his face blanch. Okay, I now had spidey-strength. All I needed was the ability to shoot webbing from my wrists and I’d be ready for great responsibility.

  I let go. Ben pulled back and started shaking his hand surreptitiously behind his back. The front doorbell rang, saving everyone from further embarrassment. The pizza was here. I paid the delivery guy. I was glad I had ordered three large pizzas as I was starving and Ben and Andi ate like teenagers.

  I could feel myself mellowing as I ate piece after piece of saturated fat-filled goodness. I looked over at Ben and Andi and saw the same calorie induced high. I was satiated. I hadn’t realized how much of my fury had been from low blood sugar. I was still pissed but it was under control.

  I got Ben and Andi to start talking about themselves. Ben was a little standoffish but Andi made up for him. In between their bickering, I was able to find out they lost both of their parents to a car accident less than a year ago. The kids had trust funds set up by their grandparents that paid for their education. Andi was going to be a junior at Judge, a private Catholic high school. She was currently in the middle of summer cheerleading training. Ben was going to be a freshman at the University of Utah, and Mina a senior. Their parent’s life insurance policy paid most of their bills, but at the end of every month they were scraping the bottom of the barrel. Even though the house was paid for, there were taxes, maintenance, and utilities. A couple of weeks ago, they decided to rent a room in the house to pick up the slack. It was either that or sell the house, and none of them wanted to sell.

  They were surprised to hear my fake identity was twenty-six-years old. They thought I was younger. It was tricky talking about my supposed age. I had to speak in the third person whenever I described details about John Evans. After a bit, Ben and I were good. We had done the male dominance thing and I had paid for pizza. Sure, he was taller but I had more years and ready cash. He was close enough to childhood and had a sheltered enough upbringing where he still had some respect for older adults.

  Every few minutes, Ben got calls and text messages. He screened most of the calls, answered his phone twice, and texted a half dozen times. From the way he talked on the phone and smiled while texting, I could tell all the calls and texts were from different girls. He was too young to understand that too much of anything will bite you in the ass.

  Soon, I had Ben and Andi alternately laughing and groaning at old jokes I had stolen from Groucho Marx. They had no idea who he was. By the time Mina came into the kitchen, I was telling my last joke, “Outside a dog, a book is a man’s best friend. Inside a dog, it’s too dark to read.”

  I hadn’t been fair to Mina when I previously compared her to Andi. She cleaned up well. She had put on a little bit of lipstick and mascara, but otherwise showed off her natural beauty. Instead of a tank top, she wore a tight t-shirt that showed off more than it hid. By the way she was outlined it looked like she was all natural. Initially, I had to fight so hard to keep my eyes on her face I almost started getting a headache.

  The more I looked into her eyes, the easier it was to keep my gaze there. I could come home everyday to this face. What the HELL was I thinking? I didn’t have time for this shit. I jerked my gaze down to the table in front of me and then to Ben and Andi. Ben looked amused. Andi looked annoyed.

  I took a deep breath and looked back up at Mina. “Glad you could make it to our party. I’m sorry, but I’m afraid the pizza is cold. Would you like some?”

  She smiled, “No thanks, I already ate. I’m sorry it took so long to come down, but I had to do that credit and background check on you, Vic. I’m glad to say you passed.”

  I had written a check for two months rent before I came down. I pulled it out of my pocket and handed it over. “Here’s a check for fifteen hundred dollars. I made it out to you. I hope that’s okay?”

  “Sure, that’s fine.” She gave me back my driver’s license and credit card.

  I noticed how ti
red I was. I told myself I wasn’t running away from Mina as I made my excuses and headed back upstairs. A couple of hours later I was lying on my bed, thoughts spinning like an ADHD gerbil on an exercise wheel, when I heard soft footsteps coming up the stairs and a knock on my door.

  “Who is it?”

  “It’s me, Andi. Can we talk?”

  Crap! Like I needed this. I thought about my options. I needed to squash this fast, but if I was too brutal, it might make my stay here uncomfortable. I’d had enough of taking shit calmly. Salt Lake City was large enough to have other homes with thresholds. I put on some shorts and threw my door open. I didn’t try to hide how irritated I was at the situation.

  “Andi, I’m not attracted to you. Nothing is going to happen. Go to bed.” I shut the door in her shocked face. I felt better. I fell asleep immediately.

  Chapter 5: Of Men and Angels

  I woke up rested. My phone said it was 5:52 a.m. I listened and the house was silent except for an intermittent grunting snore; my super hearing was useful. I didn’t know why but I was certain Mina was snoring; it was cute. ‘Goddamn!’ There I go again. She wasn’t even my type. I usually go for older, low maintenance women who have been around long enough not to expect perfection from men. I needed to find out what the hell was going on. I’ve never, even as a kid, been infatuated. A woman snoring…cute? I was disgusting myself.

  I got up to brush my teeth. I was just as androgynously pretty as I had been last night. Put a wig on me and I’d look like a hot chick. I thought about the conversation I had with Andi last night. Now that I was rested, I knew I’d been harsher than I should have been. She was just a kid. Even though she was a pain in the ass, she hadn’t meant any harm. I had been on edge about everything and taken it out on her.

  Andi most likely hated me; she had good reason. I wondered if she would tell Mina. Probably, they seemed close. If Mina knew, I wondered how she would react. Oh well, I had all day to look for a place. There’d be other homes with decent thresholds. It wouldn’t be a bad thing to get away from the women in this house.

  I had energy I needed to burn off. I checked out my feet. Evolutionary biology and the theory that human beings were designed to run barefoot appealed to me. Some of the best long distance runners in the world run barefoot. I still wore shoes when I worked out in a gym, but for the past year when I ran outside, I went barefoot. The calluses I’d built up were all gone. I had a feeling I wouldn’t need them.

  I thought about my handshake with Ben. I looked at my hands. They were subtly different. The attachments of my muscles and tendons had changed. It looked like my increased strength had an anatomic basis. Chimpanzees and humans share ninety-eight percent of the same genes, but the average chimpanzee is five to seven times stronger than the average man. Chimps are stronger because their bones are denser and their tendons are positioned for better leverage. There are always tradeoffs. Humans float in water; chimps sink. Chimps don’t have the speed and endurance that humans do. I wondered if my speed and endurance had been affected for the worse.

  B said Trolls were night creatures. I only needed to stay inside a threshold while the sun was down. It was a little past dawn, so I dressed and went outside. The morning temperature was still cool and the sky was a perfect blue. I turned on my phone running app to record my speed and distance, then took off. As expected, my feet didn’t hurt; I felt like I was running on padded carpet.

  I was easily running a six minute mile compared to my normal ten. I sped up and ran as fast as I could. It was a struggle, and it hurt, but I was able to keep a four minute mile pace for two miles. In the past, I had never been able to crack five-and-a-half minutes. It was good to know my speed and endurance hadn’t dropped, and strangely reassuring to know my running speed wasn’t completely outside the boundaries of the humanly possible.

  I dropped down to a five minute pace and made a fifteen mile loop. This pace wasn’t easy. I had to work to keep it up, but it was doable. Athletes who have both speed and endurance—whether they’re men like Lance Armstrong or horses like Secretariat— have oversized hearts. I placed my hand over my heart; I wasn’t sure but my heart felt like it was larger.

  On the way back, I saw a bakery that was open for business. I bought a bunch of croissants and Danishes with different fillings along with four large cups of coffee. A peace offering to the Swenson girls wouldn’t hurt. I ran two miles back to the house, balancing the coffee tray in one hand like a waiter, and carrying the pastries in a bag with the other. My agility and coordination had also improved. I was never in danger of losing the coffee cups.

  It was a little before 7:30 when I got back. I could hear Mina and Andi up in their respective bathrooms. Ben still wasn’t moving. I snuck into the kitchen and poured three of the coffee cups into an insulated coffee pot and left the pot and all the pastries on a plate on the breakfast table. I took a few seconds to gulp down the cup I hadn’t poured and then went back outside. I wasn’t up to facing the women just yet.

  I had my first court-ordered psychological evaluation when I was thirteen. A visiting brother to the orphanage touched me; in response I crippled him. It had happened in the days before religious pedophilia made the news, and no one believed my story. The highlights of the evaluation were that I was highly intelligent, had anger management issues, hated authority, and had a pathological need to remain in control. I had been railroaded into juvie, but the psych eval was accurate.

  I didn’t have a problem with my intelligence, hatred of authority, or my need for control. My anger bothered me. I made unforced errors when I got angry. For the last few years, I’ve been dealing with my temper with Tai Chi and meditation. Before I could deal with any of my current problems I needed to get my head on straight. I walked to the middle of the backyard. My shirt was soaking wet, yet I considered keeping it on; I was becoming self-conscious about how I looked. Fuck it. It was the way I looked—might as well get used to it. I stripped my shirt off and began the classical Yang style, the eighty-eight forms.

  Within minutes, my heart rate slowed and my mind began to float. I was aware of everything but I didn’t care about anything. The trance state relaxes me; I have thoughts without emotions. For forty minutes I got lost in the forms. Tai Chi looks easy because the motions are so slow, and if done right, beautiful. What most people don’t realize is your knees and hips are kept bent almost continuously. Keeping your center of gravity one foot lower than normal, never standing fully erect for forty minutes is strenuous. After a fifteen mile run and eighty-eight forms, my legs should have been exhausted; they weren’t.

  About fifteen minutes after I started Tai Chi, Mina and Andi came into the kitchen. Shortly afterwards, Andi got into her car and took off. From her uniform, it looked like she was off to practice. She had been munching on a croissant while she walked to her car, which was probably a good sign. I knew Mina was watching me, but at this point I didn’t care.

  I went straight into a flashy Tae Kwon Do form that was all jumps and flying kicks. No one with experience jumps when it counts. Throw yourself into the air and you’ve just committed yourself to a trajectory you can’t change. If you have an experienced opponent, he’ll grab you while your feet are up and slam you into the ground. In Tae Kwan Do tournaments it’s illegal to hold on to your opponent, and it’s almost impossible to score a point with a punch. Without those artificial rules, you’d never see flying or jumping kicks in a match. I use these kicks to train, to work on speed and bursts of strength. I never leave the ground in a real fight.

  The form starts off in a standing prayer position—feet together, knees and spine straight, hands chest high, and palms together. I went straight into a simultaneous side and back kick. My new vert was about eighteen inches higher than it had been. My feet were close to seven feet in the air as I did the splits. When I landed I felt like I was on a trampoline, I went straight into a spin jump wheel kick, getting even more air. Sixty seconds later, I finished with a spinning jump roundhouse. I wasn
’t even breathing hard. Being a paladin wasn’t all bad.

  I grabbed my shirt off the ground and went back into the house. Mina was waiting for me, sipping on a cup of coffee. Her face was serious. “Did you really slam your door in Andi’s face last night?”

  “Kind of—do you mind if I take a quick shower and get dressed before we continue with this conversation?” I didn’t wait for her answer. I turned and quickly went up the stairs. When I got to my room, I took a few minutes to check on my emails. I wanted to stop sweating before I showered. I had an email from B with the heading ‘A message from God.’ I shook my head. B wasn’t as funny as he thought he was. He wanted me to go to a coin shop on 200 East Broadway in downtown Salt Lake City.

  When I came back down, Mina stood, arms crossed, one foot tapping impatiently. I didn’t know how to even begin to explain myself, “Uh…”

  Mina let loose a sly grin and shook her head, “Vic, you don’t need to look so worried. Really, I appreciate you setting Andi straight. She’s been acting up since our parents died. She had no business going up to your room last night. When she told me what happened, I was really more upset with her than you. You could have been more diplomatic, but I’m glad you’re not into high school girls. Andi has a strong ego. She’ll be fine.”

  The last thing I expected was for Mina to thank me. She took a long, considering look, went off topic and surprised me again, “You don’t like the way you look, do you?”