Superkid

by Christina Barr

  “And I might have lied about a lot of things,” she said, “but I didn’t lie about being your best friend.”

  My eyes got real big. “You mean it?”

  “I do,” she said. She was still crying, but she was smiling. I think they were happy tears. “I still believe in you, Felix.”

  I didn’t hurt on the inside anymore, and I knew I could somehow find a way to save my friends. I could do great things without my powers. All I had to do was try.

  I started wiggling as much as I could. The more I tried, the looser it was starting to get. I was strong enough. I could break free! Then suddenly, the rope got real loose. “I’m doing it!”

  Then we heard Li struggling and crawling out of the jump rope and onto the ground.

  “How did you do that?” Kiara asked surprised.

  He smiled and stood up. “I think they underestimated how small I really am.”

  That was cool. I mean, I wanted to save us all, but that was fine. I mean, I trained him after all. “You get out next, Kiara.”

  With more space, she was able to wiggle out. Then after she was free, I was able to get out too.

  Kiara grabbed mine and Li’s hand. “Let’s get out of here.”

  She tried to start running, but I stopped. “No,” I said.

  “We have to go before they come out of the house.”

  “Come on,” Li said. “I don’t wanna get egged.”

  Those kids that I made a promise to didn’t understand that I thought I had super powers. They just knew for some reason that I was a hero and they believed in me. I believed in myself for the wrong reasons, but I figured out the right ones. I could still be a hero. “I’m gonna climb into the tree house and get the candy.”

  “It’s too dangerous!” Kiara said.

  “Do you believe in me or not?” I asked.

  She bit her lips. I think she wanted to say something else, but she decided to believe. “I’m not leaving without you.”

  “Good,” I smiled, “because I think I might need your help.”

  I climbed up the ladder and went into a tree house for the very first time. It didn’t seem like an evil lair, but it wasn’t exactly the coolest place ever. Some posters were hanging on the wall and some big garbage bags were full of toys. It was such a waste of an amazing dream that I had. The only amazing thing about the tree house was all the bags of candy.

  “Jackpot!” I emptied out the toys in the bags and started putting all of the candy bags into the garbage bags. When they were full, I pushed them out and they fell on the grass. It made a pretty loud noise to me, so I decided to really hurry up before they came outside.

  I climbed down and grabbed one garbage bag while Kiara carried the other. They were pretty heavy. I should have given Kiara more credit. Just because she was a girl didn’t mean anything bad. She proved that it really didn’t matter if you’re a boy or a girl. You could still be pretty awesome.

  As we were making our escape, Li grabbed my blanket and my shoes. At first I wanted them, but then I started thinking. It was just a baby blanket. I didn’t wanna grow up, but maybe it wouldn’t have been so bad. My parents were pretty smart, and they liked their lives. Maybe there was a big difference between a kid and a grownup, like the difference between five and six.

  “You can leave it,” I told Li. “Help Kiara.”

  “No,” Kiara said. “We need evidence in the court.”

  She made a good point, so I let him hold onto it, and we all made our escape as fast as we could.

  Chapter 17

  We ran until we couldn’t anymore. Brock and his brothers didn’t find us, so that was good. Brock sure was gonna be mad at us when we all got to school. I didn’t know what would happen to all of us. I kind of didn’t exactly know how to get home either.

  We were walking for a while, and nothing was starting to look familiar. It was also getting darker because people had turned off their porch lights. We must have been kidnapped and tortured for a long time. We had to put our bags down and take a break before we figured out how to get home.

  “Felix,” Kiara said. “Do you—”

  “I forgive you.” I looked at her and I smiled.

  She smiled too. “I don’t deserve it. Lying is really bad.”

  It was. I didn’t know that she had been so close to the face of evil, but luckily I brought her back before she turned all bad. “Just promise me that you won’t ever lie to me again.”

  “I promise.”

  “Was that a lie?” I asked.

  “No. I promise, Felix.” She reached out and grabbed my hand. “I don’t wanna ruin our friendship.”

  I looked down at her hand holding my hand. I got the mushy feeling inside, and I started to remember all the things that she told me that didn’t sound right. “The cooties…” I felt silly for asking, but I needed to know. “Are they real?”

  She laughed and held my hand tighter. “Of course they are, and every girl has them, including me.”

  My eyes got big, and I felt sick all the sudden. I tried to slip my hand away, but she was holding on too tight. “Are they deadly?”

  “Not usually.” She giggled. “It’s the mushy feeling you get inside when you like someone.”

  “Oh.” I guess Ms. Hucklebee really did have cooties then. I didn’t feel them anymore from her though.

  Kiara started to get all shy and started blushing. “Do you get the mushy feeling inside when you’re around me?”

  I thought about it and I shrugged. “Sometimes.” It wasn’t all the time, but I knew I got it when I was around her. “I don’t think I like it all that much.”

  “You’re a boy.” She let go of my hand and punched me in the arm. I don’t think she meant anything mean by it. It seemed playful. “You’re not supposed to like the mush. That’s why I want us to grow up together.”

  I thought I’d be scared, but I wasn’t. I actually smiled. “It doesn’t seem so bad. Not anymore.” It’s not like I was growing all by myself.

  Li tugged on my shirt. “Uh oh.”

  “What?” I asked.

  He pointed down the street. “The cops!”

  We all froze in place and didn’t know what to do. We couldn’t outrun a car with all that candy, and I was a hero anyway. It was wrong to run from the law. We were caught!

  “What do we do?” Kiara asked me.

  I gulped. “We face the music.”

  The cop car pulled up right next to us and stopped. I knew we were in deep, because it was the sheriff’s car! The police officer got out of his car and walked over to us. He wasn’t as friendly as I had drawn in my picture for Career Day. He was scary.

  Then he pointed to me. “Are you Felix Brown?”

  I gasped and lost all my breath. I couldn’t even talk. All I could do was nod my head.

  Then he pointed to Kiara. “Are you Kiara Sampson?”

  Her eyes got real big and she nodded.

  Then he pointed to Li. “Then you must be Li Yang.”

  Li started to cry.

  The officer nodded and opened up the back door of his car. “Everybody get in.”

  What was I gonna do? I didn’t want to go to jail. Li was only a kindergartner. Kiara was so close to six. They had so much life to live!

  I tried to think about what I could say. Maybe I could take the blame. It was my plan. I couldn’t let my friends go down. They were only following their leader’s orders. Kiara didn’t even have free will. I was too cute. Curse my precious dimples! She was doomed the day I walked into that classroom.

  “Are you taking us to jail?” Li asked with tears in his eyes.

  “No,” he said. “Somewhere worse.”

  Then I think we all started crying. I didn’t want to go to jail. What could have been worse than jail?

  Then I started to look around the neighborhood, and he was going right toward Brock’s house! He was gonna put us back in their custody and then they were gonna torture us and then his cop daddy was gonna take us to t
he slammer and throw the book at us!

  But the officer didn’t go down Brock’s street. He kept going and going, and we stopped in front of another house.

  Kiara sighed really heavy. “It’s my house.”

  “Your house is worse than jail?” Li yelled.

  “It depends how much trouble I’m in.” Kiara sure did look sad and scared. I was scared of what my parents were gonna do too, but I knew her dad didn’t like me. He could ban her from ever seeing me again, and I didn’t wanna lose my best friend.

  The officer got out of the car and opened up the door on Kiara’s side. “You can go.”

  She didn’t move at first. “Felix?”

  “Yeah?”

  She was so nervous that her voice was shaking. “If I get locked up in tower for forever, would you please come and save me?”

  I knew it would be worth it, and it might have even been really fun. “Of course, I will.”

  Then something I didn’t expect happened. Kiara leaned over and kissed me on my cheek. “My hero.”

  My cheeks started to feel really hot, so I touched the spot where she kissed me. I was scared for a second that her cooties were deadly, but it didn’t feel bad. It was actually kind of nice.

  “Ew!” Li said.

  Kiara laughed as she got out of the car. “You’re such a silly kindergartner.”

  The police officer closed the door and walked Kiara to her house. I was watching really carefully. I hoped when she opened the door that there wasn’t some kind of wicked witch or monster inside that snatched her up and took her screaming to a dangerous tower.

  When the door opened, her mom and dad picked her up and started crying and kissing her. That wasn’t so bad. It was probably a million times better than what I was gonna get.

  The police officer drove Li home next. Li didn’t seem that scared about going home. “Don’t you think you’re in trouble?” I asked him.

  Li shrugged. “I kind of just wanna go home now.”

  I smiled and reached out my hand for a handshake. “Thanks for saving us, Stickman.”

  He smiled from ear to ear. “I’m just glad to be part of the team, Superkid.” He shook my hand real good and then left with the officer.

  I watched Li when he walked up to the door. I thought Mei was gonna turn into a monster and bite his head off, but she was the one who opened the door and hugged him.

  If Mei wasn’t that bad, then maybe I wasn’t about to be in the worst trouble ever.

  Then the officer got back in the car and drove up a little bit further to my house. He parked for a second and turned off his car. “You’re Superkid?” he asked.

  “Yes, Sir.” My voice was all shaky. I was scared he had a book up in the front he was still gonna throw at me.

  “I heard some good things about you! You and your friends help out the community.”

  I got really happy. “Yes, Sir.” It was so cool that a real policeman knew about me and my superhero activities. It made me feel like I really was a real hero!

  “Don’t ever run away again, Felix.” He sounded real serious. “You gave your mom and dad quite a scare.”

  “Are they okay?” I asked worried.

  “They’re worried sick.”

  Then I got real worried. “How sick?”

  Then he laughed at me! “Let’s go inside and find out.”

  The police officer grabbed the bags of candy while I grabbed my baby blanket and my shoes. I looked at my shoes and my blanket, and they kind of didn’t matter anymore. All that mattered was that Mom and Dad were in my house dying of worry because I ran away.

  The police officer knocked on the door, and my heart started beating real fast. I needed to see them. I just wanted to make sure they were okay.

  Mom opened the door and all the sick and sadness on her face went away. “Felix!”

  “Mommy!” I ran inside the house and dropped my things. She scooped me up into her arms. She kissed me at least a million times, but I didn’t care. I could have taken a million more if it would have made her feel better.

  “Felix!” Dad came to the door, and I climbed into his arms. “Don’t ever do that to me again!” His voice was breaking up, and he had tears in his eyes.

  The officer came into the house and set the bags of candy down. “It looks like he made quite a haul.”

  Dad looked upset. “You can’t have all that candy, Felix.”

  “It’s not mine!” I said. “Brock and his brothers stole candy from the kids, and I got it back for them!”

  Mom looked really confused and surprised. “I got a few calls from parents, but I didn’t understand.”

  “I got some complaints about some kids myself,” said the officer.

  Dad turned to Mom. “Can you figure this out, Rosalina? I wanna talk to Felix.”

  “Okay, Henry.” Then she kissed Dad right on the lips, and I was really close when I saw it. It was so yucky! It wasn’t at all like when Kiara kissed me.

  Dad carried me up to my room and sat me down. “Why are you all wet, and why did you run away from Mei?” Dad was upset. I could tell.

  There was no escaping the spanking. It was best just to tell him the truth about everything that happened, so he wouldn’t burn all of my Halloween candy or give it away.

  I took a deep breath and I started. “Mei said she had to take half our candy if she took us trick-or-treating, and we didn’t want to go home, so we had to work extra, extra fast so we could have a lot candy, but she wasn’t really paying attention to us, because her friends showed up and she started hanging out with them.

  “Then I saw Brock and his brothers picking on other kids and they tried to steal our candy, but Li hit them with his stick, because he’s Stickman and Kiara was really cool, so she got to keep hers, and I punched Brock in the face real good, so he fell on the ground and they all ran away. But then all the kids were really, really sad, so I told them I would get back their candy.

  “Then we went to Brock’s house, because Kiara rides the bus with him so she knew where he lived. Kiara was supposed to tell us if the coast was clear, but I didn’t know she was lying to me when she told me she could turn invisible, so we all got captured and they tied us up and tortured us, and I found out that my shoes really weren’t special and you were right, I’m not really a superhero.

  “But then Kiara came clean and she told me that she still believed in me, so I still believed in myself and I started to break free, but Li slipped out first, because he was so small that he really probably wasn’t tied up really good in the first place and the water also probably made him slippery.

  “Oh! And they squirted us with water guns, and they wanted to throw eggs at us so when they were busy, I snuck into the tree house and rescued all the candy and then we got away and the policeman found us and I think that’s it.”

  Dad looked at me strange. “That’s it?” he asked.

  I thought about it real hard. “No!” I yelled upset. “Brock stole my shoes, and he lied about throwing them away, so now I have them again, but I think I like the ones Mom made me better. Besides, they’re all ruined with mud anyway!”

  Dad started to look real funny. “You did all that?”

  “Yeah.” I was kind of scared. “Why?”

  Something started happening to Dad, and it was something unlike anything I had ever seen. Something was wrong with his chest. It kept growing and growing bigger than what I thought his body could take. Then his eyes got really bright, like there were millions of stars in them. Then he smiled. It was the weirdest, strangest smile I had ever seen in my whole life, and it was bigger than his whole face. Then in a roar like a lion, he yelled, “I wish I could have been there!”

  “Really?” I laughed kind of nervous. I didn’t understand what was happening to Dad.

  “Yeah!” He punched me in the arm. I think he was playing around, but it kind of hurt. “I wish I could have seen my boy take out all those bullies!”

  “Kiara and Li helped—”
/>   “You must have been so brave!” He put his hands on my shoulders and got on his knees to look at me eye to eye. “My little boy became a little man tonight.”

  For the first time, the thought of becoming a man didn’t scare me. “So, you’re not mad?”

  “Not right now, no.”

  “And you’re not gonna give me a spanking?”

  “I should, but I can’t bring myself to do it.”

  “Really?” I yelled excited.

  He shook his head and kept smiling. It was probably the most I had ever seen him smile. “My boy!” He rubbed his hand in my hair and messed it up real good.

  I was kind of scared of Dad most of the time and sometimes I thought he was mean, but I was having a special moment with him that was different than anything we ever had before. “Dad?”

  “Yes, Son?”

  I touched my hair and knew it was already messed up before he started putting his hands in it, but I tried to fix it as much as I could. “I don’t really like when you do that.”

  Dad was surprised, and I was scared that I hurt his feelings, but then he smiled. “Then I won’t do it again.”

  It was that simple the whole time? All I had to do was ask him? “Do you think Mom will stop kissing me so much?”

  He poked me in the stomach. “Not on your life, Pal.”

  He was right, because when Mom was done talking to the officer, she found me and started kissing me a million times more. I complained about being cold, so she fixed me a warm bubble bath. When I was all clean and had brushed my teeth a whole bunch, Mom and Dad tucked me in together.

  “I can’t believe you went through all that tonight,” Mom said.

  “I’m okay!” I had to tell Mom that a billion times already.

  “Don’t worry about Brock,” she said. “His dad says he and his brothers are in a lot of trouble.”

  That was music to my ears. “Justice prevails.”

  “And this whole time you still thought you had super powers?” Dad asked.

  I felt really embarrassed about it. I kind of wanted to bury myself in my covers and hide away until I was old enough to forget about it. “I don’t wanna talk about it.”