THE FIRST THOUGHT that runs through your head at these critical junctures in life is usually neither logical nor wise. In this case, all I could think about was that he'd actually told me his real name. I had lied and told him my name was John that rainy, wet night in the church parking lot.
After that shame passed, a new one overwhelmed me. I felt worse than I'd ever felt in my life. On the one hand, I was scared to death that Ssnake would recognize me and talk. Guilt rolled through me and gained the
momentum of an avalanche. He'd go down swinging, I'd be outed, and they'd kick me out of the League faster than I could say homo.
Belonging to this group was the only good thing in my life, and I was about to lose it all. My father would disown me, I'd be reviled by everyone I ever knew—forever linked to the notorious hero killer. The muscles in my legs shook, and I prayed I wouldn't pass out. The camera lights were cooking me up on that stage, and I desperately wanted to run off somewhere cool to get a glass of water.
Then again, maybe he wouldn't say anything. Maybe if I just avoided him. After all, it was my first kiss, not his. It couldn't have meant as much to him, and therefore there was a good chance he'd never connect my face to the goofy, nervous kid with the dry mouth in the church parking lot. Maybe all I had to do was wait this out. Keep quiet and it would all go away. Heck, he was an accused killer. Maybe he really did it. And if he didn't actually do this crime, surely there were other reprehensible acts in his past.
I was starting to breathe easy again.
The crowd went nuts with questions. Justice raised his hands to silence them. "Because of the nature of his alleged crimes and his threat to public safety, Ssnake will await trial in our containment facility, where we can safely keep him."
Ruth slipped beside me and gave me a nudge. "You're white as a ghost. See anything yet?"
I couldn't breathe again. An idea was forming in my head, a seed sprouting tendrils that bored into my whole body, and suddenly I was terrified to move or do or say anything.
"Well, what is it?" Ruth whispered in my ear.
I couldn't think straight. Was this the big surprise, or was there something more?
Finally I blocked all my problems out of my head and thought about it clinically, logically, without emotion. I focused on Ssnake. Something wasn't right. Okay, so the guy I happened to have my first kiss with turned out to be the worst villain in the universe. Big deal. There was more at work here, and I needed to pull my head out of my ass if I was going to see it.
"That will be all for today." Justice wrapped things up at the podium. "I can assure you of this: these murders will not go unavenged."
I didn't like the way that last word sounded. Unavenged. A promise. I saw Warrior Woman grip her sword handle at her side and slide her hand down its sheath.
That couldn't mean anything good for Ssnake. What about, I don't know, a fair trial? Maybe it wouldn't be one of the heroes in this room to exact revenge, but someone would. Maybe it would be a convenient accident when he was transferred from the containment facility to the prison facility. Maybe they'd blame it on a disgruntled former colleague, frame Snaggletooth for it. Who would doubt it? I couldn't see the future, that was Ruth's
department, but in my heart I knew that someone somewhere would make this man pay for assassinating two of our world's finest heroes, whether he'd actually done it or not.
Ruth's watch had stopped again, and I saw her smacking it as she tried to get it going. I stared at the watch, and that's when I realized what it was that didn't add up. The timing.
He couldn't have done it. I was with him the night King of the Sea was murdered. But then the horror sank in. What was I going to do with this information?
Telling the truth, the whole truth . . . could I do that? What if I pulled Justice aside? I'd be risking everything I ever worked for. They'd kick me off the team for sure. Jeez, what the hell would Uberman think of me? My team? Golden Boy already hated me, but did I need the rest of the League to hate me too? This would change my whole life forever. There would be no turning back.
And then the horror turned to something worse. Pure panic. What would my father think?
I looked over at Ruth, hoping she'd seen the future and could tell me what to do next. I held up my hands to shield the light, and closed me eyes. I wasn't going to turn to anyone else. This was all up to me.
Once in a while, life gives you a chance to measure your worth. Sometimes you're called upon to make a split- second decision to do the right thing, defining which way your life will go. These are the decisions that make you who you are.
I felt a surge of energy well up from my feet, through my heart, to my head. I willed myself to take one step
forward. That first step was the hardest. I felt like my feet were glued to the floor. But after that first step, I walked with a little more assurance, and the next thing I knew I was at the podium next to Justice.
I grabbed the microphone.
"I'm sorry," I said into the microphone. "But you have the wrong man."
Stunned silence as I looked out into the audience, the heat of the lights bearing down on me.
"It couldn't have been Mr. Hess, at least not for the King of the Sea murder. I know it for a fact—" I paused and felt the heat of the lights bearing down on me. I knew this was the moment my life would take a turn forever. I pushed thoughts of everyone else out of my head—the League, my teammates, Goran, my mother . . . Dad —and I took the plunge. "Because I was with him that night."
A tidal wave of response from the press hit me. If they'd been wild with activity before, this was a full-on feeding frenzy.
Silver Bullet whisked me away into the pantry before I could open my mouth to respond. He looked at me like I'd been possessed by Dr. Psycho. He scooted a metal chair underneath me; the chair knocked the back of my knees and I collapsed in the seat.
Warrior Woman appeared moments later.
"That little stunt is going to cost you," she said, and reached for the golden scepter fastened to her belt. Silver Bullet stopped her from raising the scepter.
"What the hell was that?" he said.
I knew they didn't want to hear it, but I was just telling the truth. They did have the wrong guy, and I couldn't let him suffer for something he didn't do. Besides, it meant the real culprit was still out there. Didn't they care about that?
By now, the rest of the League was crowding into the pantry. Arms folded, they stared at me from below the shelves of cereals and canned goods. Warrior Woman scowled at me beside a can of chunky soup.
"What I'm asking is what did you mean by that? What do you mean You were with him that night}" Silver Bullet demanded. But these were rhetorical questions. They all knew exactly what I'd meant. In fact, their minds had already taken it much further than the botched kiss it actually was. But to protest their assumptions would only make it look like I'd done more than I really had, so I decided to keep my mouth shut about the details.
Next came a battery of questions, rapid-fire. Where was I that night when it happened? Why was I with him? How was I so sure of the time? Could someone else vouch for my whereabouts? That last one threw me a little. As if my word alone weren't good enough. Simon would be able to confirm it, and I told them so. Dark Hero would probably be able to confirm it, too, but I thought it wasn't such a hot idea to bring him up right then. Uberman stepped forward from a wall of Jell-O cartons.
"Is it true, Thorn?"
He spread out his arms as if he were ready to embrace a new explanation, anything but this truth right in front of them. He wore disappointment like he did every other emotion, handsome and strong. I wanted to revoke what I'd said somehow, say anything else to please him.
But I was done with lying. I was scared about the future, but it felt nice to breathe. I nodded and folded my hands in my lap and stared down at the floor.
I waited in the pantry for nearly four hours while the League questioned the rest of my squad. I was looking around at the bright-colored packages of processed foods when it finally struck me that I'd been imprisoned. I didn't like that thought at all. This wasn't the high-tech containment chamber on the third level designed by Brainzoid and the Machine-Meister, I had to remind myself. These were just cans of SpaghettiOs, not walls of deadly laser beams. My legs were crossed because I'd had to take a leak for the last half hour and I didn't want to get up. I think I was afraid that I'd find out some hero had been posted outside the door to keep watch over me, to make sure I didn't run. I didn't want to be reminded that they'd lost that much faith in me, so I rocked back and forth and tried as hard as I could not to think of waterfalls.
What I did think about was that my confession was probably all over the news by now, already whittled down to a perfect ten-second sound bite. I wondered if the news had reached Dad at the factory. They had a TV in the cafeteria, something his union had fought for that summer they were on srrike. I wasn't naive enough to believe he had any friends at work, but I wondered if maybe one guy respected him enough to pull him aside to explain that his son was all over the news.
It was more likely, however, that he'd notice the entire floor whispering and looking at him. At first he'd check to make sure his fly wasn't open. Then he'd take his meal break alone, as always, and eat the turkey sandwich he'd made for himself in our kitchen that morning, and he'd glance up at the news while chewing, because damned if that face on CNN didn't look exactly like his son's. A few jerks at a nearby table would snicker at him as he stood up and watched the news, open-jawed.
The door ro the pantry opened, and the first-string Leaguers streamed back in. I'd never seen Uberman look tired, but now there were bags under his eyes.
"The press is finally gone." He leaned against the doorway. "I did the best I could with them," he said, and then looked at me. "Given the circumstances."
Warrior Woman gave me the eye. "Your teammates could neither confirm nor deny," she said. "And what about your missing teammate? Miss Scarlett—where did you take her this morning, and where is she now?"
God, not this again. That was Scarlett's business, and I wasn't about to get into it. Warrior Woman saw me roll my eyes.
"You'll have to ask her," I said.
Warrior Woman turned red. "You will not make a mockery of this. I asked you a question!" She started for me, and I was sure she was going to pick me up by the neck and shake the answer out of me.
Suddenly, a pair of feet poked through the ceiling above us. Justice phased through the floor and floated down between us, calmly, quietly.
"That will do," he said.
again, and I thought about how much he reminded me of Dad. Any second now he could explode. But then he helped me to my feet and walked me out of the room.
"How long have we kept you waiting in here?"
Justice floated beside me as I walked down the hall. He asked that I accept his apology on behalf of the team for keeping me holed up in the pantry like a criminal. He explained that even though they'd been defenders of the galaxy for more than twenty-five years now, they still encountered a few situations that weren't in the manual. I told him I understood.
I kept waiting for his disapproval, but it never materialized. "I'm sorry if you feel judged, Thorn. I wouldn't do that to you."
He surprised me. I'd been sure he'd kick me out, right then and there. I'd figured he'd put the right spin on it, but I'd know it was because the League didn't know what to do with me anymore. I'd made them . . . uncomfortable. His feet touched the ground and he walked alongside me. "I know what it's like for people to distrust you
because of your differences, Thorn. That happens when you're from outer space, too."
I thought about us sipping ginger ale that night we stared out into the stars as he longed for his home world. "Of course, your revelation today does raise an interesting question. If Ssnake didn't do it," Justice said, "then who did?"
In those hours I'd sat in that pantry and worried about my future, the thought hadn't even crossed my mind. "Where has your father been lately?" he asked.
What did he mean by that? Was he worried about my fathers reaction? Or was there something more he was searching for?
"I'm sorry to raise the question about your father's whereabouts. I know you two will have enough to talk about after today." He placed his hand on my shoulder.
"I understand what it's like to be different." He stared out the window at the stars in the sky. Maybe his time on our planet had opened his mind. Maybe I'd been the one who misjudged him.
I knew I couldn't stay inside the League headquarters forever. I'd made a decision up at the podium today that would affect the rest of my life, and there was no point in hiding from it any longer.
"Can I go home?" I asked.
I found Ruth and Larry smoking cigarettes in the parking lot beside her car. Larry coughed on his. "Where's Golden Boy?" I asked.
Ruth shrugged. "I think he went looking for Scarlett." An awkward moment ensued as we stood in a huddle.
"You just had to say something, didn't you?" Larry finally said. Then he sighed. "I'm sorry. You did the right thing, I know. It's just that—" He kicked Ruth's tire. "We were so close this time, I could taste it!" Ruth and I stayed quiet. We let him have his outburst, recognized the need to vent. "We were so close, you know?"
I knew.
Larry said to call if I needed anything. He didn't seem to care about which team I was batting for. It made me feel that much worse that I'd robbed the guy who'd always been the poor sickly kid his first chance of being a
real hero.
"Here, this'll help you sleep." He slipped a Xanax in my palm when he shook my hand good-bye.
Ruth offered me a ride home, but I told her I was going to take the bus. I needed to be alone for a while. I needed to think about what was coming next.