My So-Called Superpowers

by Heather Nuhfer

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  SPLITTING UP

  I had timed my arrival back home like a professional school skipper. Not too shabby for my first time. Dad had already gone back to work after lunch, which was perfect because I desperately needed to lie down. Trying to find my mom had just made me feel worse and more confused. I’d found her, sure, but I couldn’t work up the guts to talk to her. How could I ever expect to be anyone important if I couldn’t even talk to my own mother? All these things, whether it was becoming an Est or fixing my powers, were just getting harder and less likely to happen. I hated feeling so helpless and small. There were so many things I wanted to be, but not a single one of them was the mess I saw in the mirror. Why couldn’t I just be Artiest already? Why? At least then I would have one place where I actually belonged.

  My head spun. I sat on the edge of my desk and waited for the dizziness to pass.

  Einstein had wandered into the room and was making a bed out of this morning’s towel and a sweatshirt. Happy as a clam, he picked up the towel in his mouth and rearranged it into a mangled, uncomfortable-looking pile and then plopped his fuzzy body down like he’d found the fluffiest cloud in the sky. I joined him, resting my cheek on the wood floor. The cool surface felt good. I was so tired.

  Tired? Was I tired? A weird giggle popped out of my mouth. Did I just giggle? It sounded nothing like me. My stomach was really queasy. Was I going to throw up? I couldn’t tell. Without warning, my arm swung out and smacked against the leg of my desk. Ow! Wait, did that hurt? Was I angry? My brain was in such a fog that I couldn’t tell down from up. Maybe I just needed to close my eyes. Just for a second …

  When I opened my eyes, the first thing I noticed was that I was back sitting on the edge of my desk. Hadn’t I been on the floor with Einstein? Maybe I had just imagined that. My head was now cool to the touch, but my face was wet, like I’d been crying.

  I went to look in the mirror. Other than the tear-streaked face, I looked normal. No stupidpowers poking out. Something felt off, though. Really off. I had this urge to get my sketchbook, but I wasn’t sure why. I didn’t have anything in particular that I wanted to draw. I reached into my backpack, and that’s when I saw what was wrong. My hand, my arm—I looked back into the mirror to see my side view.

  I was thin! Not like supermodel thin, but flat, like a cartoon character that had been smooshed by a steamroller. Suddenly, my hands twitched and I couldn’t control them. Without any sort of rational thought, I sat down and my hand started sketching. It was like my hand had a mind of its own! With lightning speed, it drew Keesha and me. Or, at least, it kinda looked like me—but much sportier. Keesha and the sportier me were running in the gym and looked like best friends.

  My other hand whipped the page over and started on a clean sheet of paper. Again, I was drawing me, but this time with Hun Su in the school bathroom, and I was a beautiful, air-brushed version of myself with pouty lips and long lashes. We were trying on makeup together.

  Again, my hand flipped to a new page and started to draw. The sketch looked like one of the science labs at school. A smarter, glasses-wearing version of me was at the board writing calculations while Kate looked on, completely astounded. As I imagined her congratulating me on my brilliance, my hand drifted to the side of the paper to add something to the scene. It was Charlie, peeking into the classroom.

  “Oh-oh-ah-ah!” sounded out in the room, startling me. It was the monkey ringtone that signaled Charlie was calling. My hands still wouldn’t obey me, but I managed to hit the Accept button with my toe, then mashed at the screen with it until I hit the Speaker button.

  “H-how are you doing that?” he replied. He sounded totally freaked out.

  “Waddya mean?”

  “I am looking at you right now and you aren’t talking on the phone!” He sounded like he was yelling through gritted teeth.

  I whipped my head around and scanned the windows. Where was he? “I’m on speaker, dude. Chill out!”

  “Why are you at school?” he continued. “And why are you wearing glasses?”

  My hands, unbidden, sketched in a cell phone into Charlie’s hands, and added gritted teeth to his mouth.

  Suddenly it all made sense. Wonderful, awful, horrible, brilliant, awful (did I already say that?), awful sense. The reason I was deflated, the reason I was sketching all these scenes—I had split into three more people. These scenes weren’t imaginary—they were actually happening! Three more very real, living versions of myself: a sportier Veronica, a more popular Veronica, and a smarter Veronica. And the real me was what was left behind—a paper-thin version of myself.

  The most epic stupidpower of stupidpowers.

  I must’ve still had some kind of bond with those versions of me that made me sketch out what was actually happening to them at the same time as I sketched it. Because I still seemed to know what the other Veronicas were doing. Well, sort of, anyway.

  Whoa.

  “Veri?” Charlie said. I had been quiet too long.

  My hand was gearing up for another sketch. With a fresh page and frantic pencil, I went for it. This was something big. I could feel it.

  “It—that’s not me, Charlie. I’m at home. Stupidpowers!”

  “What?” Charlie asked.

  I tried to drag the phone closer, but all I managed to do was accidentally hit the End Call button with my foot.

  My hand drew again, this time creating a Cool Veronica who was at the park with Blake. Cool Veronica smiled all kinds of casual. She was so cool. Right now, some piece of me was really hanging out with Blake and not being a big dork.

  Back in my actual house, I felt woozy. My guess was that there wasn’t much left of me to create these manifestations. A look at my hand proved me right; I was now so paper thin that it was almost transparent.

  My vision was blurry and my head felt heavy.

  Next thing I knew, Charlie was shaking me. “Veri!”

  I must have fainted. I sat up and Charlie grabbed the still-open sketchbook from the desk and slammed it shut. Instantly, I felt better.

  “What? What? What?” I heard myself say as I tried to pull my focus back to reality.

  Charlie poked at my arm. “You’re getting back to normal from … whatever you were before.”

  I could use my limbs again. I turned to the mirror. My profile confirmed it. I was reinflating.

  I quickly explained what had happened—somehow with only minor interruptions from Charlie. I think he was too shocked to say more.

  He flipped through my sketchbook. “So there were drawings of alternate Veronicas in here? Like the one I saw?”

  “Yeah, that really happened.”

  “There isn’t anything like that in here now.” Charlie held up the book. All my alternate-self sketches were gone; they must have disappeared when he slammed the sketchbook shut. I hoped that meant all my other selves had disappeared as well.

  “Maybe that smart one stuck around, and she can take your finals for you,” he joked.

  “Charlie, that’s a brilliant idea.”

  Charlie stared at me like I was crazy.

  But I kept going. “I could be anything I wanted, Charlie. Heck, all I have to do—”

  “Is let your alternate selves live your life for you while you hide in here and flatten down to nothing?”

  “Yes!” It was so simple.

  “You’ve lost it, girlie. If you’re being serious, then it’s time to get some professional help.”

  “Oh, Charlie, you’re blowing this way out of proportion.”

  “Me? I’m blowing things out of proportion? You’re okay with having actual split personalities, and I’m the one with the problem?”

  “Hey, that’s not fair. I didn’t ask for this to happen to me. Besides, what do you know about problems?” I tried to control my anger as my voice went up a few octaves.

  “Problems aren’t the SFC or Blakey-freaking-wakey!” he shouted. “Do you even remember what these other Veronicas were
doing? What good is living a life that you can’t remember? You are being so stupid that you’re not even living your own life, Veri!”

  Stupid? That was it. I shouted right back at him. “I know you don’t care that you’re an outcast, but I do! I can’t help it if you don’t care that no one likes you or that you don’t belong anywhere!”

  For a brief, awful moment I regretted what I’d just said.

  “You’re right,” he said. “I don’t care that I’m not an Est, because you know what? Those people are idiots. Mindless little robot people.”

  I bit my tongue. There were lots of things I wanted to say back, but I didn’t want any more stupidpowers today. It had gotten a lot easier just to suppress my emotions instead of feeling them. Suppress for success!

  “That’s what you really want, then?” Charlie said. “To be someone who would never be friends with a guy like me?”

  “How can you say that?”

  “It’s true!”

  “Then leave,” I said.

  “My pleasure!”

  I couldn’t see how upset he was, but I could hear it as he stomped toward the door. And I heard him pause right before opening it. “You know, I don’t know what makes me feel dumber: the fact that I never noticed how shallow you are or the fact that all this time I thought we were best friends.” He paused, then said, “Since we were little kids I’ve only needed one person to like me.”

  He left without a look back.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  MAKE UP OR BREAK UP

  The dance was less than a week away, and boy, was there a lot of work to do. And I mean a lot. I was back to being normal sized and hadn’t seen (or drawn) any of my Alties—my new term for my alternate selves—so they must have all disappeared. It was a relief, but also scary. All my Alties had made great impressions on the other Ests, not to mention Blake. Impressions that I now had to keep up.

  Even though it was Sunday, I was headed out to plan the layout of the decorations when Hun Su texted me to come over to her place. Decorations could wait.

  Hun Su greeted me at the door of her house, which was just as adorable as she was; a pale-blue cottage that even had a white picket fence. She was makeup-free but still looked beautiful and poreless.

  “You can do my makeup today, right?” she asked hopefully as she led me to her room.

  My Pretty Altie was a makeup expert, I remembered. Regular Veronica, definitely not.

  Then she noticed I didn’t look nearly as good today.

  “You seem … really tired.” she said. “Didn’t you have time for makeup today? It’s Sunday.”

  “I—uh, I’m really busy getting the dance stuff ready,” I explained.

  “I totally understand. But could you just do my face really quickly? Please? We’re going to audition the final bands for the dance today and I want to look hot.”

  “I don’t know…”

  “Pretty please, Veronica? I’ll love you forever!” She giggled.

  What I should have done is made a better excuse, put my foot down, or even faked a sudden and severe illness, but instead I decided to try. I had watched tons of tutorials online. It looked so easy!

  Hun Su had all her makeup organized in a panda-shaped box (cute, right?) and had set a chair in front of her full-length mirror as our salon. A swipe of concealer, a dash of lipstick, and some eye shadow. I could handle those … kinda. Then there’s the eyeliner aspect of the whole beauty world. Or, as I like to call it, the Eye Gouger.

  “Let’s get to it!” I said, with forced enthusiasm.

  The foundation went on smearier than I thought it would—or could. I wasn’t allowed to use foundation yet, so my skills were more like spills. Just getting an even layer on her face used a lot of makeup. It looked pretty thick, so I decided to add extra blush to give her face more dimension. Contouring, I think it’s called. Eyeshadow: aces. Now eyeliner. I was super cautious when I started tracing around her eye. Maybe too cautious. When I stepped back to see how the right eye had gone, it was painfully obvious that I was afraid of poking her in the eye—the liner was really far away from the target. Like I had just drawn a circle around it.

  “How’s it looking? Cute?” She was bubbling over with anticipation. She tried to sneak a peek in the mirror, but I blocked her view.

  “Uh, yeah! Cutest thing evahhh,” I lied. “Ummm,” I thought as I spoke, “what do you think about a smoky eye? It would be really grown-up!”

  “Yes!” Hun Su squealed. She was getting giddy.

  A smoky eye! I could just fill in the space between the liner and her lashes.

  “Oh, Veronica! You should totally do our makeup for the dance!”

  Oh boy. “Um, yeah … maybe,” I mumbled as I worked.

  “Are you bringing that Russian kid from school?”

  Russian kid? “Oh! You mean Charlie. He’s British. Not Russian. Well, actually, he’s not even British.”

  “He’s cute … in an interesting way.” She opened her eyes wide for me to put mascara on her. “But it might be time for an upgrade! At least it’s a group date, so you won’t be stuck alone with him all night.”

  What was she talking about? A group date? With Blake?

  Hun Su’s phone buzzed. “It’s Jenny. Let’s send her a selfie.”

  “Not yet, not yet,” I begged. I still needed to fix this mess.

  “Ooh, drama!” She winked at me. “I’ll just text her back and let her know we are busy getting pretty.”

  Her phone buzzed again almost immediately.

  “What did Jenny say?” I was hopeful she was warming up to yours truly.

  “Nothing.” Hun Su grinned, but she didn’t look that happy.

  Her phone buzzed a few more times, causing Hun Su to sigh deeply before she set it facedown on the floor.

  “Let me see,” she playfully demanded as she grabbed my arm.

  I stepped back to look at the finished product. Gulp.

  Hun Su stared into the mirror. “I, uh…”

  Again, she put on a fake smile and picked her phone back up. This time her feigned happiness was much more muted. She was trying to be polite.

  “Thanks, Veronica,” she nodded as she unceremoniously started herding me toward the door. Were there tears in her eyes? The makeup wasn’t that bad! Okay, maybe it was.

  On the way to the front door, Hun Su was texting wildly.

  “Everything okay? Are you happy with the makeup?” I heard myself ask even though I knew the answer.

  “Um, yeah,” Hun Su said.

  I tried to lighten things up. “Talking to Jenny? Anything going on? Did she buy another gold-plated phone case or something?”

  “It’s nothing,” she said as she replied to another text. “Just a boy. Just a cute boy. You wouldn’t understand.”

  “Text me?” I asked as I stepped out the door.

  “See you later.” Hun Su waved me off as she closed the door.

  After that disaster, I decided to get to school to work on the decorations. I was much better with a paint brush than a blush brush.

  On the way, I spotted Keesha putting on her shoes next to the track field. I hadn’t really talked to her since she’d been kicked out of the SFC. (I wasn’t counting whatever conversation she’d had with my sportstastic Altie.)

  “Hey, you!” She beamed at me as she tightened up her sneakers.

  “Hey!” I sat down next to her on the grass.

  “No sitting, Speed Racer. Let’s talk ’n’ run!” She hopped up, clearly expecting me to follow her.

  Halfway around the track, I was just about dead.

  “Geez, what were you up to last night?” she joked over her shoulder.

  “I think it’s these shoes. And wearing regular clothes,” I panted. “I’m not as aerodynamic! Also, I wanted to say I’m sorry you’re not in the SFC anymore.”

  “Oh no! That’s all over,” she said with ease. “I’m back in now.”

  “Oh. That’s cool.” I huffed and puffed.

>   She ran backward so she could face me. “I heard you’ve joined us.”

  I managed an “Uh-huh.”

  “A word of caution,” she offered. “Jenny doesn’t like being second place. She didn’t like it when Betsy was getting all those art awards, she didn’t like that I was dating a high schooler, and I’m sure she’s definitely jealous over how much everyone’s starting to like you.”

  “What does that matter? She’s still Richest.”

  “Believe me, it matters to her. She invited me back an hour after Mark dumped me.” Keesha turned around and zoomed away. “She’ll never want to share the spotlight!”

  I was left in the dust.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  BEAUTY SLEEP

  By the end of school on Monday I was feeling really lonely. Charlie hadn’t responded to my bajillion messages—even after I told him it was majorly important I hear from him. And, honestly, I had noticed the Ests were often too busy to talk, or they simply “didn’t see me” when I was walking down the hall. Keesha might have been right—jealous Jenny was trying to keep me down.

  I had stayed up late the night before to get as much prep work done for the dance as I could, but I had become preoccupied by something else super important. Okay, actually, I got fixated on whether I should text Blake to clarify what Hun Su had said about a group date to the dance. I wrote and erased texts for most of the night. I finally achieved this exchange:

  Me: Hey, Veronica here! Things r getting pretty crazy, so I wanted to check in about the dance. So we’re all going together, I guess? Need a ticket?

  [An hour later]

  Blake: It’s cool.

  Me: Sounds great! Ride?

  Blake: Yup. 7.

  And that was it. At least I got a small bit of info from him?

  When school was over for the day, I was exhausted. There was so much to be done, though, I had to push through and work on the decorations before I could sleep. I gave the janitor my student ID (complete with horrible photo) and the note from Mrs. Krenshaw that allowed me to be in the school after hours. The dude took his duties seriously. He stared at my ID, then at me, then back at my ID, shining his flashlight in my eyes repeatedly. Did I really look like trouble? I was a half-awake girl wearing a panda sweatshirt. After a series of questions that would put the TSA to shame, the janitor escorted me to the gym. The entire way. Because I might, you know, decide to do some after-hours algebra or something.