by Rob J. Quinn
But when members of the football team started joking about how Super Crip had arrived to take down Chuck again, the story took on a life of its own. The Philadelphia Times even ran a sidebar on the wheelchair, mentioning the “name students have given the unidentified wheelchair user” in what ended up being a week of coverage about the explosion. The minute he saw the headline—“Super Crip?”—Red knew the nickname wasn’t going away for a while even though his name was never mentioned in the story.
More serious media coverage focused on the cause of the explosion. Mr. Harris was briefly the target of criticism for the amount of chemicals that he had in his classroom and several parents questioned why the class had been creating rocket propellant. Yet, he was quickly cleared of any wrongdoing as numerous expert chemists confirmed that the experiment, which involved having students mix sugar and potassium nitrate, was a typical lab for a high school chemistry class.
Investigators added that while the quantities of propellant and other chemicals involved were sufficient to fuel a fire, they couldn’t by themselves have produced such a large explosion. The cause of the blast was ultimately attributed to the natural gas that had accumulated in the room from taps that had been left open at some of the student lab stations. These conclusions were criticized by the same experts who defended Mr. Harris. They claimed that it was impossible for enough gas to be released—in the time period in question—to produce the observed level of destruction. Their objections led some parents and students to come up with some wild theories, including that, by coincidence, there had also been a leak in the main gas line into the classroom.
Explanations for how all four students in the classroom had survived the massive explosion were even more outrageous. Some people called it a miracle, while a few people wondered if the whole thing was a hoax. One expert quoted in the Philadelphia Times called it “a one-in-a-million occurrence.” For their part, investigators refused to speculate, claiming they couldn’t comment and that their interviews with the students would not be made public.
After spending several days in the hospital with first-degree burns on his leg, a broken shoulder, and two broken ribs, Chuck was arrested on multiple charges. Carrying a concealed weapon, making terroristic threats, and assault headed the list. He was expelled from school, and the school district was suing his parents for the cost of repairs to the school building. He’d earned a few extra sessions with a psychologist when he insisted that not only had he been choked and flung across the room by someone he never saw, but Red had flown them out of the building.
Alley had suffered a concussion, and spent a night in the hospital. She surprised her classmates by returning to school on Friday. When she was finally questioned by the police, she said she couldn’t remember anything after Chuck started to point the gun at Red as he held her by the neck.
Scott was careful not to stray from what he and Red had hastily agreed to tell their parents as they waited to be discharged from the hospital after a three-hour stay for observation. They laughed about seeing too many cop shows when they decided to “keep it simple.” They didn’t plan to lie. They just wouldn’t offer many details, to avoid contradicting each other—and they left out any hints about Red’s “new talent,” as Scott put it.
Telling the truth was easy enough. They just decided that when the gun went off “accidentally,” it hit the spilled chemicals, triggering several small explosions. And they left out the part about Chuck being thrown across the room. They also couldn’t quite remember the final big explosion that must have blown them out of the building.
When asked how he and Alley landed in the bushes almost unscathed from the fall, Scott shrugged and said he guessed it was just luck. He also said he didn’t know how she got the lump on the side of her head and her concussion. Eventually, a flying desk took the blame, which was one of the few accurate facts reported.
Keeping their stories straight was easier than the brothers expected. Red was barely questioned at all by the police after they spoke to his brother. It was the first time in his life that Red was happy someone didn’t want to deal with him because of his speech disability.
Scott heaved the ball back to his brother. It reached Red on a couple hops. “Alley say anything to you?” Scott asked. “I heard she came back yesterday.”
Red shrugged. “Not really. Why?”
“Just wondering if she said anything about the wheelchair to the police.”
Shaking his head, Red said, “I don’t think so. We both get to computers class early because it’s just homeroom right before. I go early so they can help me walk up before the halls fill and she helps me get set up on the computer.”
“She didn’t say anything?”
Reluctantly, Red said, “She just gave me a hug and whispered, ‘Thanks, Super Crip.’”
“So, she knows?”
“She just said it ’cause of the article in the paper, I think.”
“Dude, she thanked you. She knows something.”
Red shrugged. “Maybe. But she talked to the police at least a couple days ago. She mentioned she didn’t remember anything after Chuck started to raise the gun. And I don’t know if she noticed the wheelchair. I saw her as I walked into the hall and she seemed surprised to see anyone.”
“What’s she gonna say anyway, right?” Scott said, satisfied. “Look at what happened to Chuck. They think he’s nuts.”
“Yeah.”
“Hey, why’d you insist on saying the gun went off accidentally? He’d be in a lot more trouble, and I think he was really going to shoot.”
“Why do you think I did it at that point?” Red said. “No choice. I don’t know. I guess I figure he screwed himself enough. Plus, it probably did go off by accident when he hit the wall.”
“I guess. He’s probably never coming back to school anyway,” Scott said. Then a grin slid across his face that told Red what was coming before his brother said it. “So, Alley can call you Super Crip?”
“No.”
“But she did,” Scott pushed.
“One and done,” Red said sternly.
Scott laughed. “Why do you hate it so much?”
“What?”
“You know, the name? Super Crip?”
“I hate the word cripple,” Red said, throwing the ball back.
“I thought you hated the nicey-nice names they try to use for you guys, like handicapable and whatever.”
“I do. That one’s just stupid. Sounds like we should all be wearing capes on our backs.”
“That’s what we should get you,” Scott teased, tossing the ball to his brother.
“Funny,” Red said. “If I had to change into tights and a cape first, you’d still be trying to talk Chuck out of shooting.”
“But you’d look so cute. C’mon, throw hard.”
“I’m throwing harder than I ever have,” Red said, throwing the ball back. “I’ve been using Dad’s hand grip thing. The thing you squeeze for your forearm. And I was going to ask you to help me set up the weight bench this weekend.”
“Why?”
“Uh, to lift weights.”
“Uh, you can blow walls off buildings,” Scott said. “Why do you want to lift weights?”
“I think lifting could actually help me learn how to use it,” Red said, not mentioning that the doctor all but suggested the idea.
“‘Learn how to use it?’” Scott repeated. “What the hell are you talking about? I think you got it down pretty well. Just ask Chuck.”
“Yeah, I’ll pass,” he said. “I’m talking about using it for myself. You know, doing everyday things. Controlling my movements.” He paused. “That’s gotta be the real point of it, ya know? The push. The wave. Whatever you want to call it.”
“Call it, ‘The wave,’” Scott said. “It sounds better.”
“Okay, not helping.”
“Not really trying.”
Red laughed. “Anyway . . . I want to start lifting. I think I can use it to get better. I mea
n, improve. If I use it to control the weights as I lift, you know? Maybe I could focus on my form more. Get better results.”
Scott didn’t know what to say.
“Guess that sounds dumb,” Red said, “but it’s like there’s still me, apart from the wave.”
“No, it doesn’t sound dumb,” Scott said. “It’s the whole point of the treatments, isn’t it? The real point? To reduce the effects of the cerebral palsy?”
Red nodded. “I still want to do things the same way I’ve always wanted to,” he said. Then he smiled. “You know, like be able to tackle you, or run faster than
you . . .”
“Ne-e-ever gonna happen,” Scott teased.
“. . . or smack you around.”
“You wish.”
“Or,” Red said, gripping the ball with both hands as he crouched and cocked his arm toward the sky, “throw harder than you.” He gave the ball a hard push with the wave, sending it catapulting skyward.
They both laughed as the ball soared so high it looked like a dot.
“Oh!”
Red and Scott both yelled simultaneously, putting their hands up in front of them as if not wanting to see the result. A bird appeared to crash into the ball as it returned to sight in its just-beginning-to-be-alarming rate of descent. Stunned silence followed as the ball and the bird vanished. Finally, they heard some leaves rustling and saw a young man appear from behind the trees at the edge of the main part of Mr. Taylor’s yard.
“Nice throw,” the guy said, cradling the ball with both hands against his stomach, which was noticeably sizeable for his height.
The brothers were speechless for a moment. Hesitantly, Scott asked, “Did you just . . . ?” The question seemed too absurd to complete.
“Catch it?” the stranger said, completing the question for him. “Yeah. Well, sort of let it get into my gut.” He looked at Red. “Sort of like you’ve been doing.”
He seemed to flip the ball to Red, though his hands hardly moved. Catching the ball in his gut, Red never took his eyes off the stranger. As he moved closer to them, almost gliding as his feet merely dangled through the blades of grass, Red knew for the first time that he wasn’t alone.
“Didn’t think you were Scheinberg’s only sufferer, did you?” he said, continuing to move toward Red. His chubby face, hands by his side, even his dangling feet, were strangely familiar. Red had several friends with muscular dystrophy. Finally, the guy laughed as if the funniest joke ever had just been told. “I’m just screwing with ya, man. I heard ya talking about handicapable. Hate that stuff, too. Sufferer is my pet peeve. Hear it on the news all the time.”
Red finally started to get over the shock of his arrival. “Something about cripple just grinds me,” he said. “There’s a tone to it I just don’t like.”
“I hear ya,” the guy said.
Feeling more comfortable speaking to the stranger, Red added, “But the biggest thing is it lets people say stuff like, ‘He’s a cripple.’” He shook his head. “The hell with that. I’m not my disability. Other words don’t really work that way. No one would say, ‘He’s a disability’ or ‘You’re a handicap.’”
“I’m with ya,” the guy said. “But I just say, screw it. Own it. That’s why we call ourselves The Legion of Sufferers.” Again, a feverish laugh burst out of him.
“We?” Red asked. Now that he had a minute to look at him, Red guessed the guy was really only a couple years older than Scott.
“Hell, yeah, man,” the guy said. “There’s about seven of us. Eight, now, I guess.” He opened his hand as his arm slowly extended. “Brad, by the way. Brad Stone.”
“Red O’Ryan.” He took Brad’s hand, which offered no pressure in return.
“Oh, we know who you are,” Brad said. “I saw you up on Scheinberg’s bulletin board. That night I heard all the news about the thing at your school. Seems you’re the star of the group.”
Red raised his eyebrows and looked up to the sky. “It doesn’t look like it to me,” he said. “I certainly can’t do that. You fly here from . . . ?”
“Home?” Brad said. “Not straight through, no. I live in Allentown.”
“Red can’t find his way around the block,” Scott joked, walking over to them.
“Ignore him,” Red said.
Brad smiled. “You seem to be using the power just fine,” he said. “And from what I hear it sounds like you got Scheinberg’s ‘use it in good ways’ thing down. He’ll love that.” Brad paused and shook his head. “Can’t say I’m into all that stuff.”
“I really just reacted a couple times,” Red said, trying to brush off any notion that he’d done anything noble. “Some crazy things happened, I guess. Trust me, my life is never this exciting.” After a second he half nodded, half twisted toward his brother. “And if he wasn’t in that room with some guy who was really looking to get at me, I don’t know that I would’ve tried to help.”
Looking at Scott, Brad smiled. “So humble,” he said. “He probably could have killed the guy at least a couple times, right? Left him in the burning room?”
Scott nodded.
Turning back to Red, Brad said, “And we heard about the little girl. One of the guys caught it in a local paper near York.” Before Red could respond, Brad continued. “It’s okay. Nothing wrong with being a good guy. Hell, we need one.”
The three of them smiled.
“Just try to lay low for a while,” Brad said. “And stay out of the papers, eh?”
“Plan to,” Red said.
“Good,” Brad said. “We don’t need people asking too many questions. God knows what would happen to Scheinberg if the media got wind of what he’s up to.”
The thought hadn’t occurred to Red, and the possibilities of Brad’s meaning were anything but comforting. In fact, they were unnerving enough that Red didn’t even want to know the answers to any of the questions that sprang to mind.
“Well, I wanted to meet you and introduce myself,” Brad said. “I better head home. I’ll be getting called for dinner soon.”
“Is there any way I can reach you?” Red asked. “I mean, it might be worth staying in touch.”
Brad laughed. “Trust me,” he said. “We’ll be in touch.”
“Alright, man,” Red said, offering his hand. As they shook, they shared a grin, acknowledging a familiarity Red had only ever known with other people who had disabilities. He had a feeling this one ran even deeper.
“See ya soon . . . Super Crip.”
With those words, Brad seemed to glide upwards, gradually building speed until he tore through the sky with a power that belied his handshake. Red and Scott watched in awe as he sped through the clouds until he disappeared in the distance.
Their mom’s voice finally broke the silence. “Boys! Dinner!”
Trudging through the leaves in Mr. Taylor’s yard, Scott suddenly reached under his brother’s arm and flicked the football away from him. Catching it on the fly, he did his best imitation of a wide receiver high-stepping to the goal line.
“Still too slow,” he said to Red, hopping over the last foot of fence between the two yards.
Walking around the final pole of the fence, Red said, “Yeah, but I can toss you over the house just by thinking about it.” Amused by the idea, he pushed the wave at his brother and lifted him a few inches off the ground before letting him go.