“Villains?” she shouted, hitting him with the spatula. “Villains?” She hit him again, leaving a second oily splotch on his shirt.
Joe smelled burning oil. He grabbed Tori’s wrist before she hit him again. “I didn’t say you were a villain.”
She kicked him in the shin. He grabbed her other wrist as she lunged for him. “I meant people who make poor choices and–” He held her at arm’s length. “And end up on the other side of the law.” She twisted and bit his wrist.
“Ow!” Joe let her go and stepped back, looking at his arm in shock. When he wasn’t touching some kind of metal – his wedding ring only helped a little – and focusing on his power, his body was far less resistant. His wrist hurt. “I can’t believe you bit me!”
Pop! Pop-pop! Bursting kernels of corn bounced out of the pan and onto the counter and floor. Oil splattered onto the burner and burned with black smoke and a foul odor.
“What’s going on in here?”
Joe and Tori looked up to see Owen and Hannah rushing into the kitchen. Owen turned off the stove, Hannah handed him a lid, and Owen covered the exploding popcorn, flinching as hot oil flicked onto his skin.
He turned to them. “Well?”
“She bit me!” Joe hadn’t meant to say that. Seeing that stern look on his parents’ faces sometimes caused him to revert to adolescent behavior.
Tori looked contrite for the three seconds it took for her to see she hadn’t broken the skin. Then she puffed up with anger again. “He called me a villain!”
“I did not!”
“You better watch it or I’ll make you do something you don’t want to do!”
“Oh, come on,” Joe yelled back, his patience at an end. “You make me do things I don’t want to do all the time! Honey, take out the trash! Honey, my car needs an oil change! Honey, come to brunch with my parents!” He leaned closer and pointed his finger in her face. “Trust me, babe, every woman gets that power when she puts on a wedding ring, and that don’t make her a superhero!”
Tori’s face contorted with rage. “Aarghhh!”
Joe jumped away and headed for the door. Why had he said those things? He was out of control, he knew that, and it really bothered him. But not half as much as thinking about Tori in danger. He grabbed his coat and slammed the door behind him. He needed to leave before they hurt each other again.
Before we hurt each other more than we already have.
CHAPTER 14
TORI trudged over to her house the next morning. Alone. Joe had stayed out late, long after she’d gone to bed. She didn’t know where he went, but she felt the bed move when he climbed in. He didn’t spoon her, though, and he was gone before she woke up.
She had to face the fact that her worst fears might be coming true. Joe was okay with other people having super powers, even his own niece, but not his wife. Especially if she might be a villain.
Tori tried not to cry. The tears would sting her face in the cold morning air.
His parents had been far more supportive, though not very helpful. They asked her questions and listened to her calmly, reassuring her that she’d figure it all out in time. They knew some other people with super powers, they said, and it was never a quick or easy process, figuring out what you were capable of.
They tried to reassure her that Joe would come around. That one was harder to believe. Tori was smart enough to know that it was because her heart was involved that she was so scared. She’d much rather not have a super power than not have Joe. But neither of those things seemed to be up to her. Still, Owen and Hannah were unwilling to step in and offer any guidance until she and Joe talked. That seemed to be their primary piece of advice.
Her in-laws were wonderful, optimistic people, but Tori didn’t know how long it would be before Joe was willing to discuss their new reality. She needed to talk to someone who really understood. She ditched her plan to tell Owen everything in favor of a better idea.
She let herself into her house – oh dear, would it be just Joe’s house again soon? Don’t think about it. Don’t! She blinked rapidly. Then she found the Christmas wreath she’d put away. She hung it on the hook on the back door.
Would he see it? How long would it take for him to notice?
She went upstairs and put on her long underwear under her clothes. She found a pair of chemical hand warmers and some protein bars and stuffed them in her pockets. Grabbing her warmest outerwear and her wallet, she set off for the bus stop. Now that she didn’t have a car, she’d have to memorize the bus schedule again.
Forty minutes later, she walked into Gaffney Park. Now what? She should’ve brought a book. She could listen to podcasts on her phone for a couple hours before the battery died.
“Are you going to fix this, God?” She believed everything eventually worked out for good, not necessarily for the best as she saw it, but good. She’d been around the faith mountain enough times to know that you had no idea how or when bad times would turn around. You just had to believe they would, and they did.
She opened an app on her phone and found one of her favorite radio shows, a woman preacher.
“Consider it pure joy,” the woman said now, “when trials come your way because the testing of your faith produces character.”
Tori sighed and shook her head. “Don’t I have enough character yet, God?”
She sat and listened to the podcast for an hour, but he didn’t show.
She walked around and ate one of her protein bars. She watched some children building a snowman. But he didn’t come.
She hurried across the street to a fast food restaurant so she could use the bathroom. She bought a hot chocolate and hurried back to the park. It didn’t look like he’d been there.
She ate her last protein bar and tried to figure out what she should do if he didn’t help her. Another hour later, after four hours alone in the cold, her heaviest winter clothes weren’t keeping her warm enough. She had to face the fact that Superhero X wasn’t coming. So she made the only decision she could.
She’d go it alone.
TORI woke up Monday morning to her cell phone ringing in the otherwise empty guest room at her in-laws’. She and Joe had barely spoken over the weekend. Of course, she’d hardly seen him. Everyone but Tori agreed they should continue to sleep at Owen and Hannah’s “just in case.”
“Just in case, what?” she asked. “Joe’s house explodes next?” She laughed, but the others only smiled. For goodness’ sake, what was going on? She had a right to know.
She hit the button on her phone and tried to say hello like she was awake.
“Tori, hi, it’s Janice. Listen, I have good news and bad news. The good news is, you can take some time off and enjoy this beautiful day.”
Tori covered her eyes with her hand. More character, huh, God? “The bad news is I’m fired?”
“Well…” Tori waited as Janice tried to find a positive spin for the situation. “You’ve been through a lot there, and Pam feels you probably need some time to…”
Yeah, I think I need time to…too.
“Okay, thanks, Janice.”
“Oh, honey, I’m so sorry. I’m glad you’re okay, though. Call me when you’re ready to look for another job.”
Tori lay in bed thinking. What should she do? She didn’t feel like trying to sleep until life got better. That might require a cryogenic sleep tank. Most everyone she knew either wasn’t talking to her, or was at work or school. She didn’t have a car to go anywhere. That left hanging out here or going someplace she could get to by bus.
She showered and got dressed, then went downstairs to find something to eat for breakfast. She felt Snickers rub against her legs. “Morning, baby,” she said, picking the cat up. Joe had brought him over sometime Friday night. “Are you enjoying all the extra attention?” She scratched the cat and looked around to be sure no one was around to listen. “That makes one of us,” she whispered.
Snickers purred in reply.
Tori made a quick br
eakfast of peanut butter and jam on toast and ate it standing at the kitchen counter. “What do you think, Snickers? Do I seem like the superhero type to you?”
Snickers turned his head and listened to an imagined noise in the living room.
“Don’t worry, everyone’s at work.” Tori took another bite of toast, Snickers tucked under her other arm. “I don’t know. What would I do? And where? And how?” She rubbed her chin over the top of the cat’s head.
Licking the last of the peanut butter from her fingers, Tori stared at the cat. Even if she wanted to – and wasn’t that the million dollar question – she wouldn’t know how to proceed.
“I think we should take the easy way out and ignore the whole thing,” she said to the cat.
Snickers stared up at her, unblinking.
“What? You think I should ask someone? Like a superhero? I tried. Didn’t work.” Tori scratched his head and tried not to think about it. Maybe Casey could introduce her to another one. If she was a superhero liaison, she must know lots of superheroes. “You’re not coming up with many good ideas, mister,” she said to Snickers.
Tori sighed and put the cat on the floor. She finished off her orange juice, put the dishes in the dishwasher, and grabbed her purse.
“God,” she said, stopping on her way out the door and looking expectantly at the hallway ceiling, “I could use some direction here. Just in case you weren’t aware of it.”
As it turned out, her prayers were answered before she could get to the mall. Tori was walking from the bus stop toward the mall entrance past the parking garage when a young woman hurried up to her.
“Excuse me, but can I get a ride with you? There’s a man following me and I’m afraid to walk to my car.” The girl was a few years younger than Tori, wide eyes, shaking hands.
“I don’t have my car here, but I’ll walk you to your car.” Tori looked around as the woman moved closer. “Where is he?”
Following the other woman’s gaze, Tori caught sight of a poorly dressed man with a scruffy beard heading their way.
“I thought he might be following me so I walked past my car and up a level. But he is following me. That’s my car he’s passing now. The red Camry.”
“C’mon.” Tori walked with the woman around the outside of the parking structure and back in the other side. No security guards around. They both tried to keep an eye on Scruffy. He was still following, but not quickly. They reached the Camry and the woman dug her keys out of her purse and unlocked the door.
“You should get in, too. I’ll drive you back to the entrance.”
Tori looked up and followed the young woman’s gaze. Scruffy was jogging toward them.
He laughed. “Ain’t this my lucky day?” he called out.
Tori glanced quickly around the garage. No one else was around to help, and if Tori was going to try, she didn’t want an audience anyway. She told the woman, “Get in. Lock your door and unlock my side.” Just in case.
Her heart was racing. She felt her breath coming quickly, clouds of white puffing around her face. She tried to control her breathing. Now was not the time to get cold feet. Now was the time for action.
And that would be…?
Her mind froze for a second as the man jogged closer. He was only three parking spaces away. She had to do something.
“Stop!” That worked last time.
His steps faltered.
“I said stop!” An emotion that felt like both anger and fear and something else welled up inside. It felt vaguely familiar. But what should she say to scare him? “One more step and you’re going to wish you’d never met me!”
Whatever that meant. She sounded ridiculous. She narrowed her eyes at him. She had a super power, darn it! She’d force him to listen to her.
If she could figure out how.
The man stopped. He stood staring at her, looking a little confused…and more than a little scary. He stood about Tori’s height, five-eight or nine maybe, and lean. Tori couldn’t tell if he was lean and strong, or lean and thin. But he looked hungry, and that couldn’t be good.
She thought of some of the reality police shows she and Joe watched. They made perps sit down while they questioned them.
Perps? So now she was going to think in terms of reality cop shows?
Tori focused her thoughts and energy at him, hoping that’s all she needed to do. “Sit down. Now!”
The man dropped to the cement. Still staring at her with his watery eyes.
Wow, it worked. She tried to contain her surprise. Now that immediate danger was delayed, Tori tried to think logically. She couldn’t just tell the woman to drive off. Then Tori or someone else might be in danger next. What would the police do?
Tori mentally smacked her forehead. Police! Exactly!
She pulled her cell phone out of her purse. Keeping one eye on Scruffy, she hunted for the card Casey had given her. She felt embarrassed to call 911, but she definitely wanted police to come. And Casey was the police.
“Casey Knox.”
“Oh, thank you! Casey, this is Tori Clarke. We spoke a week or two ago?” Tori tried to calm down. Now that the moment was here, the moment she should be acting like a superhero, she wanted to appear in control, not hysterical.
“Tori, yes, how are you?”
Fake it. Pretend to be the person you want to be until it becomes second nature. Her seventh grade gym teacher had told her that.
“Uh, I’m good,” she said with a little false cheer. “But I need your help. Now, if you please. I found a situation and I need backup, er–” Oh geez, too much TV! “What I mean is, there’s this guy, he’s on the ground right now, but–”
“Okay, give me your location and I’ll send a squad car over. Are you in immediate danger?”
“Uh,” Tori stared at Scruffy and tried to decide if she was in danger. “Depends on how long this – effect lasts, I guess.”
“Okay, I’ll send a car over, and Art and I will be there as soon as we can.”
“Great. Thanks.” Tori told her where to find them, then dropped her phone back into her purse. Wondering if she had anything useful for catching bad guys, she dug through the rest of the contents. Nope. Not unless safety-pinning his sleeves together or stuffing Kleenex tissues in his mouth would help. She could always get in the car and lock the door, if necessary. But she didn’t want to get away, she wanted to help.
Tori opened the door and told the young woman that the police were on the way. The girl relaxed a smidgen and nodded. Tori closed the door, leaving it unlocked in case she needed an escape route.
She walked to the end of the car so she could see Scruffy better. Hadn’t he sat down by the green Honda? Because now he was sitting in back of the gray Ford. As Tori watched, his feet inched out a bit, then his butt slid forward.
So that’s how you’re gonna play it, huh? Well, so far he was doing what she’d told him – sitting. She just wasn’t specific enough, apparently.
An image of a family picnic of long ago popped into her head. Her aunts yelled to get all the kids to behave, but her uncles intimidated.
“What are you afraid of?” Tori tried to imitate her uncles’ tone of voice. “Tell me, Scruffy.”
Scruffy stopped moving and his eyes lost focus, seeing something behind Tori perhaps. “Snakes.”
Tori glanced over her shoulder, then back at him. “You mean, big nasty snakes like those?”
Scruffy began to tremble. His eyes bulged and widened, and his mouth moved soundlessly.
He was really seeing snakes? “You don’t want to get bit by snakes like that, do you?”
The man started inching backward.
“If you sit still and don’t move one inch, they won’t bite you.” Totally making this up. Tori hoped the girl in the car couldn’t hear her. She could barely believe she was making him see things. But she could feel a hot churning in her gut and in her head. It must be her power working.
Scruffy stopped, then looked behind him.
&
nbsp; “You don’t want to know how many snakes are in here. A lot. Snakes to your right, snakes to your left, in front of you, behind you.”
Drool dripped from Scruffy’s mouth as his eyes skittered around the garage.
This was fascinating. Tori tried to gauge how far was far enough to keep the man in line. She didn’t want to give him a heart attack or anything.
“Hey, hey!” She snapped her fingers to get his attention. Scruffy looked at her. “I promise not to let a single one of them near you if you stay exactly where you are. Okay? Don’t move and I promise you’ll be fine.”
He nodded vigorously, pulling his body into as small a space as he could.
He was so petrified that Tori looked around a little uneasily to make sure there really weren’t any snakes. She couldn’t make things appear. Right?
Of course not. She mentally shook herself. She couldn’t make things appear, except in people’s heads. Well, that’s a new fact to file.
She turned when a car screeched up the turn leading to the second floor of the garage. A police car rolled their way and two men in blue got out.
“Tori Clarke?”
Safety! Tori’s grin rivaled the size of the Grand Canyon. “Yes! Boy, am I glad to see you guys!”
One of the cops walked closer to the blubbering Scruffy. “Homeless guy?”
Oh dear, what had Casey told them? Would they think she was a freak when they saw what she’d done?
“Uh, no, maybe. He was following this girl,” Tori pointed to the young woman hesitantly emerging from her car, “and she asked me for help. It looked like he was going to try to attack us both, but I made him…stop.” Tori finished lamely, glancing nervously from one cop to the other to Scruffy and back to the first cop. She didn’t sound like a superhero when she babbled.
Both officers looked at her. “Good,” said the younger one looking back at the quivering man on the ground. “What’d you do to him?”
“Hel-help me,” Scruffy blubbered to the cop.
Unexpected Superhero (Adventures of Lewis and Clarke Book 1) Page 22