“I am Ms. Hucklebee. My favorite color is pink, my favorite activity is swimming, and my favorite day of the week is Monday because I get to come to the classroom and see all of your smiling faces.”
We were all really quiet. I guess I wasn’t the only one who didn’t know what to say.
“You know,” she said, “this is like my first grade year too. I just finished big kid school, and I’ve only worked in daycare. Today is my first day of real teaching. I know it’s scary, but we can work with each other and get through it together.” I liked Ms. Hucklebee. She was nice and sweet and pretty.
Ms. Hucklebee took the chair from behind her desk and sat closer to us all. “Now, how about we all tell each other something about ourselves?”
A boy from far across the room raised his hand.
“Go ahead,” Ms. Hucklebee said.
“My name is Brock, and I have two puppies and lizard.”
“Wow!” we all said. I was pretty sure I had just found my new best friend. Two puppies and a lizard? He must have been the coolest kid ever in existence, besides me. He also looked really tough.
“That’s very good,” Ms. Hucklebee said. “Is there anyone else?”
Another boy raised his hand and Ms. Hucklebee pointed to him. “I have a new baby sister and a puppy!”
“That’s very nice!” Ms. Hucklebee said.
Then everyone started to raise their hand except for the girl I was sitting next to. She was weird and very quiet. I didn’t understand why she didn’t want Ms. Hucklebee to know something special about her. I wanted Ms. Hucklebee to know everything about me!
I waved my arm in the air to get her attention, but she didn’t call on me. Everyone else was talking about their puppies and their kittens and their brothers and sisters and toys and she thought it was amazing. I wanted to impress her. I had something more special to tell than anyone else in that room.
I waved and waved until I couldn’t take it anymore. I stood up on the tips of my toes until I made her look at me.
“Yes, Felix?”
“I’m a superhero!”
Everyone all at once looked right at me. Their mouths dropped, and they were all silent. I could understand. It was pretty unbelievable. I had just topped two puppies and a lizard.
“Oh really?” Ms. Hucklebee asked. She was very surprised. She could barely say any sentences because she was so impressed. “That’s very amazing, Felix.”
“He’s lying!”
I looked around the room to see who would dare be so mean and rude. It was Brock. I knew then that we wouldn’t be best friends. I would never lie about something like that and I could never be friends with someone who thought I was a liar.
“I am not lying!” I figured he had to be mad that Ms. Hucklebee thought I was more special than everyone else so I talked to her. “I’m a superhero!”
“Felix, if you’re a superhero, then perhaps you shouldn’t reveal your secret identity.”
“He’s not a superhero!” Brock yelled.
“I am too! Just ask my mom! I saved her life from the evil clutches of Dr. Clutter!”
“Your mom is a liar!”
I was so angry! My mom would never do a bad thing in her whole entire life. She was the nicest person I knew, and it made me really mad that he would lie about her. I hadn’t really fought a kid before. I had wrestled when I was playing around, but I was gonna punch that kid in the face!
I pushed my chair back and started to walk across the room to his table. “You take that back right now!” I yelled.
“Settle down!” Ms. Hucklebee stood out of her chair and ran over to grab me. “This behavior is unacceptable!”
I didn’t want to look bad in front of Ms. Hucklebee, but I couldn’t let Brock get away with what he had said. I had to make him eat his words! “My mom is not a liar!”
“Then prove it!’ he yelled.
“Brock, stop it!” Ms. Hucklebee yelled loud enough to settle us both down. I wasn’t gonna punch Brock, but I sure was still angry.
I don’t know what everyone in the classroom was thinking. When I told them that I was a superhero, I think they believed me. They began to doubt me when Brock opened his big mouth. He was just jealous that I was about to be the coolest kid ever!
“Felix, go back to your seat,” said Ms. Hucklebee.
Mom had told me that I should do what the teacher asked me to do, so I went back to my seat. Dad said that if I was ever mean to my teacher, he would punish me.
“Brock, that was very mean what you said about Felix’s mother. Do you know her?”
He put his head down. “No.”
“Then you shouldn’t say things about her. You wouldn’t want anyone to say mean things about your mother. Now apologize to Felix.”
“Sorry, Felix.” He didn’t even look at me when he said it. Before when someone told me something, I would believe them. I just couldn’t believe Brock, not after what he said about my mom.
Then Ms. Hucklebee looked at me. “Now accept his apology.”
I didn’t want to. I was still mad, and I didn’t think he meant it. Still, I didn’t want to cause any trouble. “I accept.”
“Good.” Then she smiled and became the happy lady I met when she invited me in the classroom.
Ms. Hucklebee wanted to learn some more things about us, so she had us all draw pictures of our families. Ms. Hucklebee had lots of crayons for us to use, but I wanted to use my own. That way, I didn’t have to share with Kiara, and she couldn’t infect me with her cooties.
I knew she was waiting to do it. She looked at me all day. Then she kept looking at the picture I was drawing. She was probably gonna go after my family too, so I started covering my picture while I drew so she couldn’t see what they looked like. I was pretty sure she would be added my list of enemies: Consequences, Brock, Dr. Clutter, and Cootie Girl.
Some time after lunch, we had recess and went outside to play on the playground. The playground was huge. It had two jungle gyms, monkey bars, and four slides. It was like the coolest, most fun place on earth. The only problem was that none of the boys from my class seemed to really want to be my friend. They were all playing tag with Brock, and I didn’t like or trust him.
I decided to play on the swings for a while. They were still fun, and I didn’t need anyone to do it. It was better when my mom pushed me, but I could still get really high all by myself. Then Cootie Girl came to the swing right next to me, and I was scared.
Well, I’m not gonna say scared. I’m a superhero. I can’t be scared of bad guys. I was concerned that she might infect me. Then she smiled evilly at me, and then I knew I needed to get out of there before her cooties started flying at me. I didn’t have a choice, so I ran to the back of the playground to go play with Brock and all the other boys in my class.
Brock must have thought he was real special. None of the other boys could catch him. He was laughing every time someone missed him. Sometimes they would get real close, but then he sped away really fast. If no one else could catch Brock, then I knew I had to.
I ran after Brock as fast as I could. He wasn’t paying attention to me at first, but he did notice me after I got real close. He was confused, but then started to run from me and only me. He started to run past the back swing set, but he wasn’t supposed to do that. It was my duty to put an end to his cheating!
I reached deep inside of me, turned on that Awesome Sauce, and started moving my legs as fast they could go. When I knew I had him, I reached out my hand and yelled, “Gotcha!”
Brock pouted and began to yell, “You’re not It, and no one said you could play anyway!”
“I don’t want to play with you. I just wanted to show you how fast I am.”
“Oh, that’s right! You said you were a superhero.” He put his hands on his hips to make fun of me.
All the other boys who were playing tag came around me and Brock. I felt crowded with so many of them watching us. Some of them were even laughing. They were all alr
eady Brock’s friends. I didn’t have anyone on my side.
That didn’t matter though. I was all by myself when I saved my mom from Dr. Clutter. I didn’t need any help when it came to defeating Brock. I already proved that I was faster. He was just sore because I beat him.
I stuck my head up proud. “I am.”
Everyone started laughing, and it made me feel bad. They didn’t know any better and Brock had their minds, just like Dr. Clutter had Spooner and Patches. I had to keep being strong or else they would always be under Brock’s control.
“I am a superhero. I’m faster and stronger than you.”
Brock pouted again. I knew he was mad. “If you’re so strong, then…” He looked around the playground as fast as he could for anything to disprove I had super powers. Then he pointed to a tether ball pole. “Go break that pole with your head!”
Everybody started laughing again, but Brock laughed the loudest. I hadn’t tried to do anything that amazing before. I didn’t know if I could do it without my cape. I wished Brock would have challenged me to wrestle him, but Brock was probably too scared to fight me.
I didn’t want to tell anyone how my powers worked. It was too dangerous. “I can’t do it right now.”
“You can’t do it ever!”
“I need my cape!” I didn’t mean to blurt it out, but I was mad that he didn’t believe me.
“You’re just scared!” Brock started clucking and flapping his arms like a chicken. Everybody thought it was so funny.
I wasn’t scared though, and I was gonna prove it! “Fine!” I raised my voice loud enough for everyone to hear.
Everybody stopped laughing. I guess they didn’t think I’d be willing to do it. Even Brock was scared. “You’re gonna break the pole?” he asked.
I nodded. “Using only my head!” My grandma told me plenty of times that I got my hardheadedness from my dad. I was gonna put it to the test!
I don’t know why, but Brock started to smile. “To the pole!” he yelled and everyone cheered after him.
We all ran to the tetherball court. Some older girls were playing, but one of the other kids yelled for them to stop and told them why. Then the older girls wanted to see it. Brock told everyone he walked by what I was gonna do to the top of his lungs. By the time I was standing in front of the pole, a big crowd of people—practically the entire playground—was watching. It was almost really, really scary.
I felt the pole first. It was cold and about as thick as my whole head. It didn’t seem like it would be so hard from far away, but it was something completely different when I got up close.
Brock crossed his arms and smiled. “You can start at any time.”
I smiled too; because I was so gonna enjoy watching the look on Brock’s face when I proved to everyone that I was cooler than his stupid lizard, that my mom wasn’t a liar, and that I was truly special.
“Bear witness, mortals!” I yelled as loud as I could and reached out my arms. “Behold the might of Superkid!”
Then, I rammed my head into the pole as hard as I could. To my great surprise, it hurt. It really, really hurt. Bad!
I’ve seen probably somewhere between a trillion to a bazillion movies in my lifetime, and I learned one thing: the tough guys who saved the day never cried. I tried to never cry, but I did sometimes when I got a spanking or when Mom had to yell at me for doing something wrong. When I was real little, I would cry over nothing, but I trained myself different for school. My worst fear was to look weak and to cry in front of my classmates. It’s the one thing I swore I would never, ever do.
But I did. I cried and I screamed and I held my hurting head on the cement until a grownup came to take me to the nurse’s office. Brock laughed until I couldn’t hear him anymore.
Chapter 5
The nurse put some stingy stuff on my head and wrapped it in a bandage. I was bleeding a little bit, and my head was really red and kind of purple. I forced myself to stop crying. It was bad enough that everyone on the playground saw me cry. I didn’t want the whole school to see me that way. The nurse gave me all the suckers I wanted until my dad came to get me, but not even all the suckers in the world could make me feel better—maybe ice cream, but not suckers.
When Dad came in the nurse’s office, he looked really upset. I thought I would be in trouble, but I guess he was really scared. I had never really seen him like that before. He talked to the nurse for a while. Then he talked to a bunch of other grownups in the office. He wasn’t so scared anymore. Then he seemed pretty mad.
He didn’t say anything to me when we rode in the car together. I was used to him not talking to me, but I thought he would have a lot to say. I would have liked for him to say something nice to me. I didn’t have any friends at school. Dad didn’t really play with me, but he could have at least made me feel better.
I figured he was mad about Brock. The principal, the nurse, and my teacher must have told him about what happened. I bet Brock was gonna get into a lot of trouble when he got home.
When I got home and Mom saw me, she ran to me and started kissing me on my cheeks over and over again until she started crying. “Mi Niño! Are you okay?”
“I’m okay, Mom!”
“He didn’t need to go to the hospital?” she asked my dad.
“If he did, we’d be there.”
My head did really hurt, but it hurt more when she started kissing me over and over again. “Ow!”
“I’m sorry!” She stopped kissing me, but she was about to cry some more.
“Go wait in your room,” Dad said. “Your mom and I need to talk for a little while.”
I did what my dad said, but I kept my bedroom door opened up a little bit so I could hear what they were talking about. They were really quiet, so I couldn’t hear most of it. Mom did get really loud at one point, but I didn’t know what they were starting to yell about. I didn’t want to hear them anymore after that, so I closed the door and climbed under my covers.
I didn’t mean to cause so much trouble. I just wanted to defend Mom after what Brock said, and I wanted to show everybody that I was special.
After a while, Dad came in my room. “Are you asleep, Son?” he asked.
I sat up so he could see for himself. “What’s wrong?”
I knew that look on his face. It was one of his serious talks, and I never liked them at all. He would always pout and sit on my bed and his eyebrows would get really close together and his face would wrinkle up like an ugly dog. “Felix, I know you like to play a lot of games when you play pretend. When you’re playing pirates or cowboys and Indians, you know you’re not really those things.”
“It’s just a game,” I said.
“I know, but you don’t seem to realize that some other things in your life are also made up.”
I thought about what he had said long and hard for a couple of seconds, but I couldn’t figure out what he was talking about. “Like what?”
He sighed and his face wrinkled up even more. “Son, you’re not a superhero.”
I did figure that I really wasn’t a superhero. I mean, you have to at least save the whole world before you get that title. I only saved my mom, but she was the most important person in the world to me. That’s why I thought it was okay to call myself one.
I didn’t get it. “But…”
“But nothing, Son! You suffer from an overactive imagination. You hurt yourself today, and it could have been much worse.”
“That’s because I didn’t have my cape!” I yelled.
“No, Felix!” he said. “It wouldn’t matter.”
I sunk down into my covers. He never understood me. Never! “But I saved Mom,” I mumbled.
“She was playing a game with you, Felix. That’s all.”
He was wrong! I didn’t even want to look at him anymore, so I pulled my covers over my head. “I wanna talk to Mom!”
He sighed and it was his heavy and angry sigh, like I was about to get in more trouble. He let me go though. “Fine.”
I jumped when I heard him slam my door pretty hard. I don’t know why he was so upset. He thought his own son was crazy, and he didn’t understand his own wife. He should have been sad, not angry. I should have been angry!
I heard Mom and Dad talking a little bit outside my door. Dad was louder than Mom, and he was more upset. I pulled off my covers so I could hear better, but they were done and she came inside my room.
“Hi, Felix.” She smiled and sat on my bed with me. “Are you feeling better?”
I moved my eyebrows up and down, and it started hurting. “My head still hurts.”
She rubbed her hand against mine. “I can get you some medicine for your head.”
I was a big boy. I could take a little pain. “I’m okay.”
The smile on her face slowly became a frown. “Your Dad wants me to talk to you about what happened today.”
I felt bad that he was making her talk to me when she must have been on my side. I wanted to make things easier for her though. “I know I shouldn’t have hit my head on the pole, but some kid said that you were a liar and that I was a liar. I just wanted to prove him wrong.”
“Sweetheart…” Mom lay down next to me and looked up at the ceiling. She had bought some glow-in-the-dark stars and put them on the walls so I wouldn’t have to be scared of the dark anymore or afraid to be alone. “A cape can’t make you a superhero. We were playing a game. We were using our imaginations.”
I wasn’t really that surprised. I thought she was trying to trick me into cleaning my room, but she acted so well when she got sick. I thought she was really in trouble. When I thought I saved her, I thought I had done something really amazing.
The worst part about it was that Brock was right about me. “So I’m not special?”
She rolled her head over so she could look at me. “Of course you are! You don’t need a cape to prove that. You only thought that you did.”
Superkid Page 3