Blaze

by Laurie Boyle Crompton

  Copyright © 2012 by Laurie Boyle Crompton

  Cover and internal design © 2012 by Sourcebooks, Inc.

  Cover design by Christian Fuenfhausen

  Cover photo © Piotr Marcinski/Shutterstock

  Back cover photo by Marie Killen

  Internal Illustrations by Anne Cain

  Sourcebooks and the colophon are registered trademarks of Sourcebooks, Inc.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks, Inc.

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Published by Sourcebooks Fire, an imprint of Sourcebooks, Inc.

  P.O. Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60567-4410

  (630) 961-3900

  Fax: (630) 961-2168

  teenfire.sourcebooks.com

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data is on file with the publisher.

  Front Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Back Cover

  For Brett, who once told me, “Love is a superpower.”

  And who continues to prove it is true.

  Hear me X-Men! No longer am I the woman you knew!

  I am FIRE! And LIFE INCARNATE!

  Now and forever… I am PHOENIX!

  —Jean Grey, The Uncanny X-Men #138

  I am soaring free.

  My astonishing future hurtles toward me with supernova force.

  The open road ahead is bursting with the promise of All New Adventures! and the wind Whooshes! with the sound of…

  “Fire in the hole!”

  “Oh my God! A-jay!”

  The groans hit me a split-second before the stench, and Bampf! I remember: That’s right. Soaring free isn’t really my thing.

  My thing is driving my thirteen-year-old brother, Josh, and his friends around in a turd-brown minivan. I am the eternal chauffeur to a gang of Soccer Cretins. Make that totally-disgusting Soccer Cretins with reeking emissions issues.

  “Dude, you should see a doctor or something,” Andrew calls from the back, his voice muffled through the T-shirt held over his nose. “That is totally not normal.”

  I glance in the rearview mirror and see Ajay look up from his perpetual video game to smile proudly. “You guys like that one?”

  Josh sucker punches Ajay, and the two of them start wrestling in the seat behind me. Bash! Block! Kick!

  Over his T-shirt-mask, Andrew catches my eye in the mirror and we share a look of hopelessness.

  Meanwhile, the horny freak to my right is busy ogling my cleavage. Again. I take a hand off the steering wheel to yank up my T-shirt’s neckline. “Dylan, if you don’t stop staring at my rack you’re never sitting shotgun again.”

  Josh immediately stops his backseat battle with Ajay and leans forward to cuff Dylan’s shaved head with his palm. “Dude! That’s my sister.”

  “Ow! I was looking at the dashboard,” Dylan lies as he adjusts his glasses. “Just checking how much gas we’ve used.”

  Josh, Andrew, Ajay, and I respond with a sarcastic harmony of, “Riiiight,” and, “Sure,” and, “We believe you.”

  Dylan scrambles to make his lie more elaborate by blaming all of global warming on the lousy gas mileage of my 2002 Grand Caravan: the mild-mannered minivan also known as the Subatomic Superturd of Steel.

  I lean further out the window. The jolt of fresh air is a welcome change from the toxic cloud festering inside the minivan. Plus, it helps erase the sense that I’ve just been violated by Dylan’s vulgar mind. Please do not let me have a starring role in some near-future wet dream.

  I try imagining a superpower that would reduce my attractiveness to pubescent boys, while inversely making me more alluring to über-hotties like the cretins’ coach, Mark. Putting out is likely the missing plutonium to that puzzle. I am, after all, the Amazing Su-per Virgin Girl! Fully flowered! With chastity of steel!

  Not that I’m all that virtuous. It’s pretty easy to say no when no one’s even asking for it. I never took a vow of purity, but I have a nun’s reputation anyway. It hasn’t done much for my ability to snag a boyfriend, but I don’t really want to use all my time and energy working on a sluttier image.

  My dad gave me a cool name, Blaze, but my life is so unexciting that my name is more ironic than the soccer ball magnet I stuck on the back of my minivan—my failed attempt to create visual irony. The universal soccer mom badge suits me too well to be ironic.

  I finally pull Superturd into the parking lot, where all the other minivans are wearing their soccer-ball magnets in a non-ironic manner. I’ve barely screeched to a total stop before the boys are evacuating through the sliding doors and thundering toward the field.

  In my head, I commission them, I bid thee, go forth, Mighty Cretins!

  Josh, the Nuclear Dynamo! Greet your destiny of triumph with your superstar soccer skills. There isn’t a twerpy little brother alive that I’d rather be driving all over green creation.

  Dylan, the Colossal Hormone! May your lewd glances be reciprocated by the sideline MILFs on this fine day.

  Godspeed to you, Andrew, the small but swift Galactic Goalie! Never has there existed a thirteen-year-old so above the immature fart jokes that surround thee.

  And dear Ajay, the Ozone Destroyer! What can I say, aside from: Thank God you are clearing the hell outta my minivan before the seats melt.

  As usual, once the Mighty Cretins have cleared, I pull my faded pink beach chair out of Superturd’s back end, grab my messenger bag covered in superhero pins, and make my way over to the field. After setting myself up on the sidelines, a bit removed from the cluster of overly aggressive parents, I put on my mirrored sunglasses to scan the field.

  I quickly spot Mark, and everything else fades into background.

  He strides easily across the field with a net sack filled with yellow soccer balls slung over one shoulder. I focus on the one bouncing playfully against his butt. Man, how I’d love to be that soccer ball.

  Mark embodies the single wonder in my dismal pseudo-soccer-mom life. His taking over the team last spring was like a wish granted for my seventeenth birthday. A wish that was too fantastic for me to even think it up on my own. He and I go to the same school, but we may as well inhabit separate universes. Our lives are so different, it’s like I’m stuck with Batman and Superman in the DC World, while Mark is partying in the Marvel Universe with every other worthwhile character. That’s right. I said it: Make mine Marvel.

  Mark wears a faded blue baseball cap over his dark curly hair and a gray Wolverine team shirt. The odds of him taking that shirt off are lessened by the cooling weather, which is quite tragic considering his spectacular abs.

  In private, I’ve sketched him from every imaginable angle. Looking now at his strong legs, lined with muscles and covered with dark hair, I let myself wonder about what lies further u
p, under his thin white soccer shorts. Due to my Su-per Virgin Girl! alter-ego, I’m quite unfamiliar with that territory. That is, aside from a traumatizing walk-in on Josh peeing that shall never be mentioned again. To be totally honest, I’m mildly terrified of penises. (Or would that plural be peni?) Either way, the lump in Mark’s shorts doesn’t move as he strides across the even grass to shake hands with the other team’s coach. The other coach is cute enough, yet I find I’m not the slightest bit curious what his penis looks like.

  TWEEEET! The whistle sounds, signaling the start of the game. With a sigh, I flick my white-blonde ponytail behind one shoulder and pull my sketchpad out of my messenger bag. I take a quick inventory of the vintage comics I packed. There is nothing more awesome than good, old-fashioned, superhero-versus-bad-guy comic books. The classic ones where you can actually read a whole plot in five issues and one sitting. I’m not so into the current darkly stylized ones, and I don’t much care for graphic novels or manga, but retro comics really turn me on.

  Today, I have two Iron Mans, a Silver Surfer, and a Daredevil packed carefully in their individual Mylar sleeves. I have to take precautions to keep them in mint condition, since they’re from the massive collection my dad left when he teleported his life to Manhattan.

  My regular soccer sideline routine is to sketch my own comics until the game is nearly over and then lose myself in the superhero stories. Opening my sketchpad, I flip to an empty page filled with endless possibilities.

  “Blaze!” At the sound of my name, I look up and see a soccer ball heading straight for my head. My sketchpad slides off my lap as I instinctively half-stand to catch the ball.

  FOOM!

  The catch stings my shoulder. Rubbing it, I see Mark jogging lightly toward me. Before I can move, he’s directly in front of me, easing the ball out of my hand. His proximity is exhilarating, plus I’m grateful I don’t need to demonstrate my awkward ball-throwing technique.

  I’m hypnotized by his smiling gray eyes, which are amplified by his gray shirt. “Nice reflexes,” he says, and my insides give a twitch.

  “You should see me throw.” I grin, making a mental note to never let Mark see me throw.

  He raises his eyebrows appreciatively, and sonic vibrations run through me. Mark turns to throw the ball gracefully to Josh, but before rejoining the action he gives me another look. Dipping his head, he mouths, “Thanks,” in a way that is so hot I have to sit down in my pink folding chair before I lose consciousness. Eep!

  Mark seems to have some unnamable quality that tunes my whole body to a higher frequency. Like Peter Parker’s Spidey Sense, except with a whole different sort of tingling. What can I say? That boy just does it for me.

  It takes a few moments before I’m able to refocus my attention back on my sketching, and even then, I draw a few accidental hearts in the margins before calming down enough to get back to work on my comic.

  I’ve always liked doodling, but I didn’t start drawing comics of my own until after I read through Dad’s entire stash. The collection is stored in six huge boxes in our basement and includes most of the main Marvel characters from their origins up to the tail end of the 1980s. It’s almost as if Dad left those boxes of comics behind on purpose. Like he was handing me a message that said he’d never forget about me and would come soaring back if I ever really needed him.

  I suppose sketching is my silly way of trying to answer him back. Of letting him know I understand.

  This one time, I even mailed a few sheets of my drawings to him in New York. They featured Ice Girl, my first attempt at creating my own superhero. She’s a little shy, but seriously kicks butt with her ability to freeze and smash any bad guy that comes her way. I designed her with large breasts, like the super-chicks from the ’80s, but I couldn’t draw hands yet so Ice Girl flies with her arms behind her back. Which makes it look as if her boobs are her source of power. It probably made Dad wonder about me being gay or something, but I put a lot of time into drawing the comic panels I sent him and I liked how they came out.

  Dad usually talks to me and Josh on the phone every few months or so, but he never did say anything about what he thought of Ice Girl. I figure he just forgot about it, or else it got lost in the mail. Or maybe she’s just so totally lame he didn’t want to hurt my feelings. I never bothered bringing it up.

  Thankfully, I’ve moved past creating cheesy superheroes with porn-star breasts, and now most of my comics focus on a character who looks and talks and acts pretty much exactly like I do. Or how I would act if I wasn’t such a geek, anyway. Plus she has telekinetic powers and mad skills with a dominatrix whip. Oh yes, and she has this ultra-cool hot-pink Mustang that Zooms! through the air, instead of a turd-brown soccer mom minivan.

  I call her the Blazing Goddess and sometimes Blaze for short because, hey, my life may pretty much suck, but my name is still amazing.

  As usual, I time my sideline activities perfectly. After drawing fourteen new panels of The Amazing Adventures of the Blazing Goddess, I start reading the comics I brought. I’m almost finished when I hear the air horn announcing the end of the game, and judging by everyone’s expressions, the Wolverines won. I keep Silver Surfer #51 lying open on my lap as I shift smoothly into Mark-stalking mode. I’ve built up some super-strong peripheral eye muscles over the course of the season, but with my sunglasses on I can be extra bold with my X-ray visualization.

  On the field, the players line up congratulating each other as Mark talks to Josh, probably about how awesome he is at kicking the ball around. Despite the largish portion of my life spent at soccer games, I don’t know all that much about the sport. But even I can see that Josh has skills.

  I think about what would happen if I stood and walked right up to the two of them. After all, Josh is my brother. It’s perfectly natural for me to go over and congratulate him on a game well played. Except that there would be nothing natural about me approaching Mark. I can’t even remember how to walk naturally when I get around him. Does it go left foot, left arm? Or left foot, right arm, switch? Just thinking about it makes me feel a little spastic. I look down at my lap.

  But then, what is he doing? My super peripheral vision notices Josh pointing in my direction. Oh, God, why is he pointing at me? I paw at Silver Surfer #51 in a panic and blindly study Galctus throwing fireballs as my brother leads Mark and that penis of his directly toward me. As they get closer, I try to figure out at what point it’ll seem normal for me to glance up and acknowledge them without it being obvious I’ve been watching them all along.

  I peer over the top of my sunglasses, but neither of them is looking at me as they come closer, so I shoot my head back down, hoping Mark didn’t see me looking. The next thing I know, they’re standing over me. I squint at my comic as if I’m half-blind or something until Josh finally clears his throat. I totally overact, snapping my head up and feigning complete shock at seeing them there. Like they’re aliens or things that don’t even belong on a soccer field. I regroup after a few mental commands. Pretend to be normal, Blaze!

  Finally, I manage to spit out a friendly, “Hey there! Good game,” delivered to the space between the two of them.

  “They really pulled it together in the second half.” Mark bops slightly, as if his body is channeling an inner thumping beat. It’s barely noticeable, and yet it’s the sexiest motion I’ve ever seen.

  “My sister never really watches the games.” Josh totally rats me out. “She’s always either drawing or sticking her nose in some stupid comic book.”

  “Cool.” Mark gestures to Silver Surfer #51 lying open in my lap. “Oh, yeah, what’s that dude’s name again?”

  “Uh, Galactus?” I try.

  “No, I mean the silver dude. The one with the flying surfboard?”

  “You mean the Sil-ver Sur-fer?” There is absolutely no way I can keep the sarcasm out of my voice, but it just makes Mark bop even more. He’s so pretty.

  “I guess that would be a good name for the guy.” His smiling eyes
draw me in like a tractor beam. The flat, grassy world around us exists only so that I can share this gaze with Mark. The hum of players and parents melts into white noise as I take in his thick dark curls and perfectly shaped face. Even the words on his T-shirt, “Kick Some Grass!”, seem like the most clever catchphrase on the planet. The sound of my heartbeat grows so loud its badda-thump is all I hear… until Josh clears his throat, making me wish I was an only child.

  Pulling out of my surreal Mark-filled moment, I give Josh what he must recognize as my fakest fake smile.

  “Easy, sis, no need to get your geek on,” he says. “Coach doesn’t need to know the origin of the Silver Surfer—he just needs a ride home. I said we could fit him in the van, no problem.”

  “Yeah, sure,” I say casually, as my insides roar at Josh, No problem? How about huge problem? How about the fact that I drive a freakin’ minivan that smells like recycled bologna, and I’ve been elected to transport the hottest guy to ever put on a pair of soccer shorts? My apologies to David Beckham.

  Mark chivalrously takes my folding chair in one arm, and just like that we’re all heading toward Superturd together. Mark and I are about to be thrust together like the first time the DC and Marvel universes collided in 1976 with the oversized Superman vs. The Amazing Spider-Man: The Battle of the Century. Our worlds will be overlapping for the entire space of one sweaty forty-minute drive.

  We reach the parking lot too soon, and I lunge for the minivan ahead of the gang. Pulling open the driver’s door, I start shoving loose Dunkin’ Donuts bags under the seat in desperation.

  Dylan tries to claim shotgun as Mark tosses my chair and his giant mesh bag of balls in Superturd’s butt.

  “You’re dreamin’, horndog,” I tell Dylan.

  He slinks to the back as Mark climbs into the passenger seat and gives me a comfortable grin. My superhero buttons rattle as I start digging through my bag for my keys. After I find them, I continue rooting around, looking for some non-existent scrap of something that will empower me to seduce Mark and make him my boyfriend over the course of this ride. There is nothing helpful in my messenger bag.