Small Town Superhero Box Set: Complete Series

by Cheree Alsop

  I took my usual seat in the back of the bus and was watching the road when we pulled up to the next house. Madelyn climbed in. She shot me a smile as she slid into her seat, but kept her face carefully averted and pulled out a book the second she sat down.

  “Psst,” I whispered, trying to catch her attention.

  She smiled again, but refused to look at me.

  Foreboding rose in my chest. I dropped all pretenses and moved across the aisle to sit next to her. “Look at me, Madelyn.”

  She closed her eyes for a moment, then lowered her book and turned to face me. A bruise colored her cheekbone too dark to be hidden by her generously applied makeup. Appalled, I touched her cheek. She shied at my fingers on her skin and turned her face toward the window.

  “Did your father do this?” I asked in a rough voice to hide the dismay I felt.

  She didn’t deny it.

  “Why?”

  She kept silent and I thought she wouldn’t talk to me. Then she whispered, with her face still toward the window, “Because I was out too late last night.”

  I sat back, stunned. It was my fault. She had been hit by her father because she stayed out too late with me. Of course, he probably didn’t know she had been out with a boy. I couldn’t imagine what he would do if he knew that part.

  “I’m sorry,” I forced out. “It’s my fault. You wanted to show me the geese.” My final words were harder to say, “I’ll stay away.”

  She shook her head and turned back to me. “Don’t,” she said. The simple word was pleading and defiant, her own quiet act of rebellion.

  I hesitated, then nodded. A smile spread across her face, the secret smile she hid from the world when I wasn’t around. I couldn’t help but smile in return.

  School was uneventful. I looked for Magnum and his gang at lunch, but they were nowhere to be seen. When I walked past the small auditorium, the drama teacher was there with her students repainting the sets. I felt bad for the big splotch of yellow on the floor, but I figured the damage would have been much worse if I had let the Bullets finish the job. At least the sets could be repainted; they weren’t destroyed like Magnum had planned.

  I waited for the bus afterward and was surprised to find that I was one of only a few high school students waiting for a ride home. I began to wonder if something was wrong when Cassidy jogged up with Sandy close behind.

  “There you are,” Cassidy said in a huff. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you. Nobody goes home on Thursday.”

  “But I need to work,” I replied, confused.

  She shook her head. “Even Uncle Jagger knows that Thursday afternoons are for the students. No one works on Thursdays.”

  “Why Thursdays?”

  Cassidy shrugged. “Friday nights are for dating or evening work, and the weekend is for farming. Thursdays are the afternoons we have all to ourselves.”

  I was missing something. “Then what do we do?”

  She and Sandy shared a conspiratorial look. “Come on; we’ll show you.”

  They linked their arms through mine and proceeded to steer me toward the back parking lot. I realized I looked pretty silly between my cousin and her friend, but they were having so much fun that I decided to humor them. The lot was full of pickup trucks; apparently cars were a scarce commodity in farm country. It was the objects in the backs of the trucks that caught my attention.

  Motorcycles of every make and size sat in the truck beds. I stared at dirt bikes, street bikes, and a few crossovers that looked as though they were the results of home upgrade jobs. Students milled around talking and laughing, but soon everyone piled into the backs of the trucks around the motorcycles.

  “Where are they going?” I asked.

  “Where we’re going,” Cassidy replied. She jumped into the bed of a green truck and motioned for me to follow. Sandy scrambled up beside her, and several other students I didn’t know joined them. I glanced back in time to see Madelyn climb in a gray spray-painted truck with a bunch of other girls. They tolerated her presence, but none of them were overly enthusiastic. She seemed to echo the feeling as she leaned close to the cab and folded her arms around a book clutched to her chest.

  “Get in or stay behind,” the driver of Cassidy’s truck yelled at me. “Make up your mind.”

  “Get in!” Cassidy said.

  I climbed in and sat near the cab. The driver followed the trucks in front of him and soon the cavalcade headed east through town, then turned off on a sandy trail.

  “There’s another way,” Cassidy yelled over the noisy diesel engine. “But it takes a lot longer—hence the trucks.” She banged on the side of the old green truck and the driver honked in response.

  The trail dipped, then rounded a corner to reveal the back side of a factory. Pipes stuck up from long, low white buildings. The wooden structures looked gutted, their wide doors pulled open and their insides empty of everything but pavement. The pipes were rusted and the wood was in desperate need of new paint; it looked as though the factory hadn’t been used in years.

  “What is this place?” I asked as the driver of our truck pulled in beside the many others.

  “An old coal power plant. It was shut down when the natural gas plant was built in Enson.”

  Motorcycles were wheeled down ramps and lined up on the pavement. A thrill of excitement ran up my spine at the sight of so many bikes waiting to be ridden. Boys and girls set up chairs and broke out drinks while others brought out items to sell. Apparently several student entrepreneurs had a good business going at the factory.

  “Odds on Snipe,” Magnum called out from in front of the bikes. The girl with the green hair who had attacked me with a hammer in the small auditorium raised her hand to the audience. Cheers went up and I saw several hands exchange money.

  Magnum yelled, “Riders ready.” He raised his hands and motorcycle engines revved. I stepped closer, unable to stay away from the action. “Go!” Magnum yelled. He threw his arms down and the drivers took off.

  The motorcycles gunned around the corner of the factory, then began a series of loops through the paved interior. Sections of the buildings had been cut away to give the spectators a better view of the race. White paint along the pavement marked the race track. The crowd yelled and cheered, shoving each other and betting as distances increased.

  The motorcycles shot past us. “They’ll do two laps,” Cassidy yelled. “Then there’ll be a break and the next heat will start in about ten.”

  “This is awesome,” I said, unable to contain my enthusiasm.

  She grinned. “I thought you’d like it!”

  Sandy grabbed her arm. “Justin and Pete are waiting for us.”

  Cassidy gave me a searching look. “I’ll be fine,” I reassured her. “Have fun.”

  She shoved her phone in my hand. “Call Sandy if you get bored. She’s number two on the speed dial.”

  Sandy pulled her arm again and both girls disappeared into the crowd. I slid the phone in my pocket and turned back to the race.

  It ended a few minutes later with the green-haired girl in first. Magnum slapped her on the back and several other Bullets took cash from the crowd.

  I wandered among the students. Madelyn sat with some girls in the shade of a truck. A chemistry book lay open on the pavement between them. I waved at her when I walked by, but she was busy writing something in one of the girls’ notebooks and didn’t notice. I found my way to the tables and moseyed among them. Several held hot dogs and chips, a variety of drinks—both alcoholic and not—home-baked cookies and cupcakes, and an assortment of candy, while a few enterprising students sold riding gloves, helmets, face shields, and full-length riding outfits.

  I was admiring a black leather jacket and pants when someone bumped into me.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” Magnum said in an unapologetic tone. Two Bullets stood on either side of him. I fought back a smile at the sight of Magnum’s bruised nose and the black eye on one of his thugs. “Admiring my gear?” he asked.
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  I shook my head and turned to walk away.

  “Wait—stay,” he said. A sudden piercing light showed in his eyes. “Have you ever ridden a motorcycle before, newbie?”

  I shook my head and tried to walk away again, but he held my shoulder. “There’s no time like today to try,” he pressed. His boys fell in on either side of me and I had no choice but to follow him. He led me to where the next riders were preparing their bikes.

  “We have a new contestant!” he shouted. The crowd cheered in response. He shoved me toward a crossover motorcycle that looked like it had seen better days, but still looked far newer than I would ever trust with an inexperienced rider. “Take my old practice bike.”

  “But I don’t know what I’m doing,” I protested.

  He grabbed a helmet from his table and pushed it on my head. “Just don’t use the throttle and brake at the same time and you’ll be fine.”

  “Which one’s the throttle?” I asked. The riders around us laughed.

  Magnum looked up the row and shouted, “Odds are for Colt. I’ll take bets against the newbie.” He leaned over the bike. “What’s your name?”

  “Kelson,” I replied quietly through the helmet.

  “Okay, Keldon’s never ridden a motorcycle before. I’ll take bets on if he makes it to the doors,” he yelled. The students surged forward, and money and small items began to change hands.

  I looked down the row. The other bikers met my gaze with mixed expressions of humor and challenge. I made a show of trying to start the motorcycle, then let it die. The rider next to me laughed and pushed up his visor. “Shift it to neutral; you’re in first. It won’t start in first with your kickstand down.”

  At my blank look, he motioned for me to hold in the clutch. He then leaned over and kicked the gearshift up a notch with his right foot. “Now hit the starter.”

  I hid a smile as the bike rumbled to life.

  “That bike’s a bit touchy on the throttle,” the biker said. “Let it out slowly or you’ll whiskey throttle it.”

  I nodded and slid my visor down. The other bikers revved their engines. I tried to stop smiling, but it felt too good to be on a motorcycle again. At least I could give the audience a good show.

  Magnum leaned over to me as he walked by. “The odds are pretty heavy against you. Win this race and I’ll split the winnings. You could make a grand if you even finish.”

  I nodded and pretended to look nervous. He grinned and raised his arms. “Riders ready.” I shifted the bike into first and let it die. The audience laughed. I fumbled it back into neutral and started it, then made a show of carefully raising the kickstand before stepping the gearshift back down to first.

  Magnum shook his head, then lowered his arms and yelled, “Go!”

  The other bikers took off. I revved the throttle high, then let the clutch go fast enough that the motorcycle lurched forward. I made a show of holding on for dear life as the bike wobbled after the others. We turned a corner and the audience faded from view.

  I reveled in the moment. The crossover was a fast one, as beat up as it was. I could have caught up to the stragglers, but I had something else in mind. I kept a slow pace behind them and wobbled when we came back into view of the students. If I didn’t want Magnum to know I could ride, I had a few choices on epic ways to go down. I decided to choose the one that would cost him a bit in the pocketbook and pride. It was definitely going to hurt—at least Magnum had been kind enough to provide a helmet.

  The other bikers took the corner near the audience with a practiced ease. I leaned over as if I knew what I was doing, then revved the throttle and let the tires skid out from under me across the pavement. The bike slid on its side with a loud, angry screech along the empty space between the track and the waiting trucks. I hit Magnum’s display table, then let go of the bike just before it slammed into his big black Ford that looked more like an Army assault vehicle than a farm truck.

  The impact was harder than I planned. Bike parts crashed around me and the table landed upside down next to my head. My helmet hit the pavement and I blacked out.

  “Kelson, Kelson!” Cassidy’s voice brought me back.

  I opened my eyes to find that someone had removed my helmet, and I lay with my head pillowed on some gear.

  I blinked at the intensity of the sun setting behind Cassidy. Then her face came into focus with a crowd of students behind her. When my eyes met hers, a relieved smile spread across her lips.

  “Did I win?” I croaked out.

  “You’re an idiot!” she exclaimed.

  “Thanks,” I replied. I sat up slowly and held my pounding head.

  Magnum and the rest of the Bullets were staring open-mouthed at the destruction. I peered between the throng of students to the scratched and dented side of the truck. Magnum looked from the destroyed motorcycle to me. His eyes widened in fury and he stormed across the space between us, shoving students aside to get to me.

  Before I could move, he grabbed the front of my shirt and lifted me from the pavement. “What’s wrong with you?” he shouted.

  If my wits had been better collected rather than in the fog of a probable concussion, I might have reacted by taking him down with a punch to the jugular, another to the stomach, and a sweep of a foot, but I was grateful my body was slow to respond. I gestured vaguely toward the wreck. “I told you I didn’t know how to ride.”

  “It’s your fault, Magnum. Let him go,” Cassidy yelled. She pushed the gang leader away. “You could have killed him.”

  “It’s his own stupid fault,” Magnum argued, letting me go. “He got on the bike.”

  “You forced him to,” Sandy replied, jumping to my defense. “It’s your fault he wrecked your dumb bike.”

  I searched the crowd and was surprised to see other students nodding in agreement. I found Madelyn among them. She lifted her eyebrows as if I had just done the stupidest thing she had ever seen. I agreed completely.

  “Kelson, your leg,” Cassidy exclaimed.

  I looked down to see blood pooling on the pavement. Crap. I lifted my pant leg and found a gash running from just below my knee to my ankle. It was deep and bleeding like crazy.

  “You need to go to the hospital,” Cassidy said. She grabbed a pile of clothes from Magnum’s overturned table and held them against my leg. Adrenaline was still pumping through my veins from the wreck. The wound didn’t hurt, but I knew it would soon.

  “We can take him in my truck,” a boy with black hair said.

  “Thanks, Jeremy,” Cassidy replied.

  They helped me to my feet and I limped to the green truck we had taken to the factory. Sandy opened the tailgate and I sat down, then swung my leg around.

  “You sure you don’t want to ride up front?” Jeremy asked.

  I shook my head. “I don’t want to get blood all over your truck.”

  He laughed and shut the tailgate. “Too bad it’s not Magnum’s,” he said.

  I looked at him in surprise. He nodded his head toward the crowd that surveyed the damage to the black truck and motorcycle. “It’s nice to see him get served once in a while.”

  “It was an accident,” I said.

  He grinned. “I don’t think anyone would wreck a motorcycle like that on purpose. I mean, you’ve got to have some sense of self-preservation, right?”

  Cassidy climbed into the back of the truck and sat near me. “I called Mom and Dad. They’ll meet us at the hospital.”

  I groaned. “Is that necessary?”

  Her eyebrows pulled together. “I don’t think the hospital will stitch you up without a parent present, and they’re the closest you’ve got.”

  “Don’t remind me,” I muttered under my breath.

  “Hospital ride!” Sandy called. She jumped in with us, and several other students I didn’t know followed. Soon, a crowd of students was sitting on the truck bed as Jeremy drove us all along the bumpy road back to town. Several other trucks followed ours.

  “Why is everyone
coming along?” I asked Cassidy quietly.

  She laughed. “That was a pretty amazing wreck, Kel. Not much exciting happens in Sparrow. They probably want to know how many stitches you end up getting. You’re lucky to be alive.”

  Several of the students around her nodded. I grinned in an effort to liven things up. “But hey, I rode my first motorcycle!”

  That brought a laugh from them.

  “Not well,” a skinny kid with patched-up jeans said.

  “Yeah, I don’t know if I’d call that riding,” a girl with frizzy black hair replied. “But it was awesome. Mind if I . . . ?” She motioned for me to move the cloth from the wound. I lifted it, and blood oozed all over. She snapped a picture with her phone. “Thanks—my brother would love to see this. He had to work.”

  It was a strange feeling to be the center of so much attention, and for something as stupid as crashing a motorcycle. I really could have been killed. The part that scared me was that I wasn’t sure if I cared. Jeremy’s words echoed in my mind. ‘You’ve got to have some sense of self-preservation, right?’

  When we pulled up to the hospital, Uncle Rick and Aunt Lauren met us in the parking lot. A nurse had a wheelchair waiting. She lifted the cloth covering the gash and put some clean bandages on top of it instead.

  “Awesome!” Cole said when he saw the wound.

  “Now, Cole,” Aunt Lauren chided.

  Uncle Rick and Jaren helped me down from the truck and into the wheelchair. I felt like an invalid as the nurse wheeled me toward the long stucco building.

  “What happened?” Uncle Rick asked Cassidy.

  She walked in front of me like the proud owner of a prized pooch. When she glanced back, I gave a small shake of my head. She grinned and answered, “Kel tried to ride a motorcycle.”

  Cole burst out laughing. Uncle Rick glanced back at me with a look of what appeared to be approval in his eyes. Was he approving of the mess I had made of myself, or the fact that I tried to ride a motorcycle?