The Ables

by Jeremy Scott

  Bentley turned toward me and said, “There’s only one way to find out.”

  Chapter 15: Halloween

  From that point forward, our team was about as dedicated to self-improvement as could be. After our dismal first performance, we had nowhere to go but up, but it would take practice and planning to get there.

  We met every day at lunch to discuss SuperSim strategy. We met at Mr. Charles’ cornfield twice a week in the evenings for practice—heck, some Little League teams don’t even practice that often. We even had a few weekend practices.

  Not everyone on the team was able to make every practice. Freddie had piano lessons one night each week, and James’ parents were pretty strict about “family time.” But Henry, Bentley, and I never missed a practice.

  We went through scenarios that tested my ability to stop an opponent, using my powers. We fine-tuned the video link between Henry and me by running drills. Bentley spent tons of time researching past SuperSims, looking for patterns and themes we could capitalize on. Our team was never going to be very intimidating. After my telekinesis, we only had James’ teleporting and Freddie’s gigantism as physical powers to play with.

  We hadn’t ever seen Freddie use his power. We imagined it would be intimidating and frightening to opponents, but he said there wouldn’t be time. Once Freddie puffed up to full size, he almost immediately needed his inhaler … desperately. Bentley briefly talked about building a giant-sized inhaler for Freddie to use once he grew to his extraordinary size, but apparently, the medicine they put in those things isn’t exactly easy to come by in large quantities.

  We still had no idea what Donnie’s ability was, but he was huge and strong. Certainly ran faster than average. He was the closest thing to a legitimate intimidator our team would ever have. But ultimately, he wasn’t particularly well equipped to deal with bad guys one-on-one.

  So the actual work of stopping the criminals with our powers would fall to Freddie, James, and me. We practiced using James as a bit of a kidnapper, where we would distract the villain somehow so that James could pop in and grab him, only to pop back out to a jail cell or squad car.

  We practiced using my powers to disarm opponents, which seemed to work pretty well—particularly if the enemies in the next SuperSim ended up using ears of corn as weapons.

  Had my powers been stronger, I would have been more help with restraining villains. I knew that other movers, like my father, had the ability to mentally lift an opponent up off the ground and suspend them mid-air, though usually only for a few seconds. I couldn’t do that kind of thing nor anything close to it. The maximum strength of my powers was little more than a Star Trek shield or force field. I could knock people down sometimes, but that was it. So, for me, we focused on using other objects as projectiles or ripping stolen goods from a thief’s hands with my mind.

  We were focused and dedicated, determined not to repeat our mistakes. There was only one thing that could slow us down or keep us from focusing on the next SuperSim competition: a holiday. Specifically, Halloween.

  Halloween was easily my favorite holiday. I think it was the costumes, which might be strange for a blind kid to say. Costumes felt like disguises to me, and I guess that helped me feel less different, less disabled. Less me.

  But the candy obviously didn’t hurt either.

  I loved how Halloween came and went in relatively tidy fashion. Not at all like Christmas, which takes its sweet time over two months of anticipation and buildup. Halloween just suddenly shows up one day, lets you prance around in a cape and a mask collecting milk chocolate and gummi bears, and then disappears as quickly as it’d come. No fuss, little mess. Maybe an upset stomach, but then things go right back to normal.

  Mom, of course, preferred Christmas. She loved the two months of build-up, the decorating, the carols—she loved it all, and she savored it. She had this little Christmas village made up of miniature ceramic houses, and instead of putting the whole thing out in one evening like a normal person, my mother would put out one house every night for weeks and weeks until she broke out the final one on Christmas Eve. The whole thing seemed very unnecessary to me at the time, though I have since come to see the appeal.

  Don’t get me wrong. I loved Christmas, as any kid would. I just felt like the whole thing took too long to get going and then took too long to get over with. And all the truly great elements of Christmas were sandwiched into one or two days in the middle.

  I also think the smells of the various holidays played a part in how I chose my favorites because that’s simply the way I connected my memories to the events. I couldn’t see the twinkling Christmas lights, but I could smell the gingerbread, the evergreen, and the peppermint.

  And I think I liked the smells of Halloween the best. The smell of fall and spice and apple concoctions. I’m quite certain I could drink apple cider every day for the rest of my life and not grow tired of it.

  Anyway, Halloween showed up—suddenly, as always—and our team was happy to take an evening off from studying and practicing in order to dress up in costumes and go get some candy. But we were still a team, and none of us really had many friends outside the group anyway. So we made arrangements to meet at Bentley’s house so we could go trick-or-treating together.

  Bentley dressed as Sherlock Holmes, one of his many “heroes of intellect.” He had originally asked if I wanted to go as Watson and pair our costumes together around the same theme. But I reminded him that nobody knows what Watson looks like, which leaves little reason to dress up as him. A Halloween costume should be recognizable; at least, that was my rule. People shouldn’t have to wonder whom you’re dressed as.

  Henry told us he had a long history of incorporating his wheelchair into his costumes. On previous Halloweens, he’d gone as FDR, Professor X from X-Men, Stephen Hawking, and most of the other famous wheelchair-bound individuals, both real and fictional. This year he was paying tribute to some kind of documentary about wheelchair athletes who play a physical, hard-nosed form of basketball. I hadn’t seen the movie, but his description made me want to. Henry was dressed in a basketball outfit with a fake goatee and some temporary tattoos on his arms.

  Donnie was dressed in an all-white leisure suit from the 1970s, with a bright blue button-up shirt under the jacket. He definitely looked odd. I wasn’t sure if he’d picked out his own costume or if his parents had dressed him, and I had no idea what he was supposed to be. But I was impressed, nonetheless, as I’d expected him to show up in blue jeans and a polo shirt—the standard Donnie uniform.

  Penelope, that weather-controlling girl from our class, showed up. I wasn’t sure why since I’d assumed it was just an evening for the team to hang out together. She was dressed as some kind of cartoon princess. I didn’t know which one it was, and I honestly didn’t care. All the animated princess characters ran together for me, just as my various comic book heroes surely did for Penelope.

  James couldn’t make it, sadly. His parents were already frustrated with how much time he was spending with us, it seemed. They were a very close family and had begun to miss his company. So they insisted he spend the holiday with them. It sounded fair enough to me, I suppose, but a bit of a bummer.

  The real disappointment with James not attending, aside from missing his cheerful company, was the fact that it torpedoed our master plan to get extra candy. You see, we had intended to use James’ ability to teleport as a way to help us hit more houses than we could ever hope to visit just by walking. We figured that each of us could triple our candy haul just by skipping the pesky task of shuffling from house to house. Bentley drew the whole thing up, and I swear it was a work of brilliance—he even had blueprints!

  Sadly, it was not to be. James gave me a stack of his business cards and asked me to hand them out to the people at the houses we went to. I promised I would, but I didn’t exactly keep that promise.

  I waffled on my own choice in costume for a few days because I wanted it to be perfect. I thought about going Henr
y’s route and picking a famous blind person to impersonate, maybe even a superhero like Daredevil. But that seemed a little too easy. And there just weren’t very many famous blind people that I could think of outside of Stevie Wonder and that opera guy my mother was always listening to.

  In the end, I decided my blindness didn’t need to be reflected in my choice of costume. After all, I had recently gained the gift of sight, at least on certain occasions. Maybe wearing a blind man’s costume wouldn’t really be a very accurate reflection anymore anyway.

  So I dressed in the same costume I did every year: Batman. Even though I knew that choice would keep my costume from being truly unique—there were at least another thirty kids out in Freepoint that night dressed as the Caped Crusader—I had always felt a connection with the character.

  We were allowed to go out for candy on Halloween night by ourselves, without parental supervision. It was a first for me. Of course, you have to remember that my most recent trick-or-treating experiences had been in New York City, which is not exactly a safe place to go out alone at night even if you’re a forty-five-year-old man. But Freepoint was a much safer town, populated solely by good guys, supposedly. And we were all twelve or older. So none of the parents put up a fuss about it, though we all got a decent lecture on staying together and being careful and coming home on time—10:00 p.m. for me, also a first.

  If they’d had a crystal ball, they probably would have banned us from trick-or-treating altogether. Forever.

  Giddy and excited for a night of fun, we set off on our quest for sugar. Blind Batman, a hardcore basketballer, Sherlock Holmes, a Disney princess, and a large male disco-dancer. We were quite the sight.

  We hit the houses in Bentley’s neighborhood first, mostly because they were all owned by rich people. It was simple math, really. More money equals better candy. So we thought. Unfortunately, we discovered that rich people don’t really give out candy proportionate to their wealth. Not that we didn’t do well. But we’d built it up too much in our minds ahead of time.

  After covering the two neighborhoods nearest Bentley’s, many of us had bags that were already full. Penelope was already starting to whine about being tired, even though we’d only been at it for a couple hours, which made me glad she wasn’t actually on our SuperSim team. Henry, Bentley, and I were willing to keep going, but after a few more houses near the center of town, Penelope’s will gave out and she decided to call it a night.

  For some reason, Bentley offered to walk her home … for safety, he said. I guess maybe he was tired, and her exit gave him an opportunity to make his own.

  I honestly didn’t think anything of it. She’s a girl, she’s scared, and it’s Halloween. It made perfect sense to me that she would need an escort, especially after all the “stay together” warnings from our folks. So we said our goodbyes, and then Henry, Donnie, and I forged ahead.

  We hit maybe ten more houses and then decided to rest. At the corner of Wabash and Gregory, on a concrete staircase in front of a nice old lady’s house—she’d just given each of us two king-sized candy bars apiece!—we sat and took a breather. We ate some of our candy, both to boost our energy and to make more room in our bags. We compared our collections with the sort of oohs and aahs that you might expect.

  Wabash Avenue wasn’t the busiest street for trick-or-treaters, but it wasn’t empty either. There were a few groups of kids on the sidewalk opposite us moving to our left toward where we’d just been. And there was a trio of kids from behind us that had almost caught up to us while we rested.

  Henry glanced around, allowing me to see our surroundings along with him. He panned his head left to right, taking in the scenery, and then back to the left again—all the while lecturing Donnie on the proper hierarchy of the various candies of the world. It was easy to lecture Donnie since he so rarely participated in conversations, but Henry had a habit of speechifying anyway.

  He’d taken to sending me his images without even thinking about it, for the most part. It had become second nature in a very short span of time, though we were still working on smoothing out the pictures into something more like a true video stream.

  “The King Size Reece’s Cup is the king of all candies,” Henry declared with authority. “He is the big dog, and it’s not even close.”

  Donnie just nodded, taking a bite out of his own candy bar.

  While Henry rambled on, showing off his extensive candy expertise, he continued panning his gaze. I wasn’t sure if he was doing it for me or because it was dark, late at night, on Halloween. I took advantage of the view regardless. I studied the scene at the far right end of the street. Down the roadway, on every block, street lights illuminated the intersections going away from the center of Freepoint. A few trick-or-treaters were moving in our direction on our side of the street, about two blocks away. Across the street and closer, a couple more dressed-up kids were headed away from us.

  Just before Henry panned back to the left again, something three blocks away caught my attention.

  “Wait, wait, wait! Go back,” I said quickly.

  “What?” Henry asked, simultaneously turning his gaze back to the right.

  “I thought I saw something.”

  It was silent for a few beats while both Henry and I took in the view.

  “All I see is some old man way down there.”

  “Exactly.”

  “What?!” Henry asked. “You recognize that guy? He’s, like, a mile away.”

  I did recognize him. Well … I thought I did. There was something about the brisk-but-casual meter of his footsteps. I could even faintly hear them in the distance.

  “Look at how he moves, Henry.” The man was pretty far away and only a silhouette could be made out, but you could see his movements as he slowly walked in the opposite direction. “See how his head bobs, ever so slightly.” Everything about the way he moved was familiar.

  “I don’t know, Phillip,” Henry said reluctantly. “All I see is a dark stick figure on a darker background. He’s way too far away. I give up, man, who is it?”

  Click-clop. It all started to come together for me.

  “Is he smoking a pipe?” I burst out suddenly. “He is! Did you see that?”

  “Holy crap,” Henry breathed. He finally saw it.

  I was utterly convinced now. The pipe had sealed it for me, though the footsteps should have. Even though a few weeks had passed, the memories from that encounter were still fresh. The man on the sidewalk three blocks away, walking away from us, was the same man we confronted in the library during the SuperSim.

  ***

  We decided—rather hastily, I might add, now that I have the gift of hindsight—to follow this Mr. Finch and see if we could find out where he was going.

  This was the man who had singlehandedly ruined our reputation around town. The man who had made us look like idiots and fibbers. The man nobody else believed even existed. Of course we were going to go after him. There was zero debate.

  But this wasn’t a SuperSim. This was real, and I felt the corresponding chill come over me as I contemplated the possible danger.

  Now it’s important to note that Henry’s wheelchair was relatively new—it had been a birthday present several weeks prior. It was just about the fanciest wheelchair in existence. It was built with tungsten and titanium for a super lightweight and maximum strength construction. And it was quiet as a mouse.

  Staying on our side of the road, we crept slowly after our target. He was now four blocks ahead of us, but he wasn’t in any hurry. Just taking a stroll through Freepoint, smoking his pipe, on Halloween.

  Wabash Avenue, as it happens, is lined with tall oak trees. They’re stationed like sentries, one in front of each house, out between the sidewalk and the road. They must have been planted generations ago because they towered over the houses and the telephone poles. Between the massive tree trunks and the parked cars, we were blessed to have many objects to hide behind as we went along. The old man was moving at such a le
isurely pace, we were able to make up ground just by walking quickly.

  After a block and a half, we could see him more clearly now. He was wearing the same goofy hat and the same distinguished jacket—I had a sudden realization that for this one night, Bentley and Finch were both dressed like Sherlock Holmes.

  Soon, we were close enough to hear him whistling.

  The fact that we could hear him made me realize he could hear us too if we weren’t careful. I held my finger to my closed lips to let Henry know to stay quiet. Henry craned his neck, peeked over the station wagon we were using as a bunker, and we both saw something unexpected. It didn’t compute.

  There was a second man walking with Finch. Where there had only been one mysterious old man just moments earlier, there were now two, walking side by side away from us. He was shorter, with medium dark hair and a long flowing black cape. There was a second set of audible footsteps and a hushed murmur of covert conversation.

  “What the …” Henry whispered. “Where did he come from?”

  The temperature seemed to have dropped a few degrees as the cold wind started to gust.

  “Were there two of them before, and we just didn’t see the other guy?” I knew it was a long shot.

  “No way, man,” Henry confirmed. “We would have seen another guy.”

  “So he just appeared out of thin air?”

  “Well, the old man did teleport the first time we met him, remember?”

  “Geez,” I said, exhaling in frustration. “What do we do now?”

  “We keep following them, duh.”

  “I know that, I’m just saying … what if they split up? What if there are more of them?” What if I’m starting to get a bad feeling about this? I was, indeed, getting a bad feeling. What little we knew about this man made us curious to learn more, for certain, but it was also cause for hesitation. And fear. I was experiencing plenty of both.

  “Don’t worry about your bad feelings,” he said, reading my mind as always. “We’re superheroes, dude. You’re going to have to get used to seeing crazy stuff. Now, we gotta go; they’re getting too far ahead of us. We’ll figure that stuff out as it comes, Phillip.” And with that, he was off toward the next car up the block, using his arms to churn the wheels forward silently.