Hero-Type Page 9

  The cops probably wouldn't be inclined to believe Dad, but when I mention that Reporter Guy was skulking around (probably hoping to get a picture of me peeing on something red, white, and blue, or molesting a bald eagle), they sort of give up.

  Score one for the good guys and Flip's "cloak of plausible deniability."

  For now, at least.

  "So. How was school?" Dad asks once we're alone.

  "You know." Don't really want to tell him about all that nonsense. Especially since he got me into it. And if I tell him about the speech I have to give, he might—ugh!—want to help me write it, which will make everything worse. I trip enough over my own words; I can't imagine what sort of verbal land mines there would be in Dad's.

  He fiddles with the VCR, trying to get it to cough up the game he taped yesterday. It just makes that scary thunking sound that always convinces me it's eaten the tape.

  "Might have to replace this one," Dad mumbles, glancing around at the stacks of broken VCRs in our own little consumer electronics graveyard.

  "Dad, look, I was thinking ... I was thinking that I could use the money and maybe buy us—"

  He punches the wall.

  No, really. He punches the wall. My whole body tenses up in shock, so sudden and so massive that I think a zit just popped all on its own.

  "No!" He's cradling his hand a little bit and his face has gone all red and sweaty. "No, no, no!"

  "Dad, let me finish. I just want to use a little bit of the reward money to buy a couple of—"

  He kicks the door frame. No lie. He's really beating the hell out of the apartment.

  "Stop it, Kevin! Just stop it, OK? I don't want you spending that money on things for me or the apartment. I feel very strongly about that."

  Yeah, no kidding. Tell that to Mr. Wallboard, who's smarting something fierce.

  "Dad, it's like thirty thousand dollars. That's a lot of money, even after I take out the price of my car."

  "Look," Dad says, "I want you to enjoy that money. I want you to use it to make your life better. Go to college, maybe. I know I've messed up my own life, and I'm really trying my best not to mess up yours, too. I want that money to buy you some happiness or some peace of mind or something."

  It comes out in a rush and the look on his face the whole time he's saying it isn't really what you'd expect. He looks pained, uncomfortable.

  "So. Don't," he says, then retreats to his bedroom and shuts the door.

  What the hell was that all about?

  I almost go to knock on the door, just to make sure he's OK, when I spot today's Loco sitting on the rocking chair. I pick it up. Dad's already read it, and he's got it folded to a story on page 3.

  LOCAL "HERO'S" TRAITOR DAD! screams the headline.

  Ah, crap.

  Sure enough, there's Reporter Guy's byline. And there's that same picture of me throwing away the ribbons, but this time there's an old picture of Dad right next to it. He's wearing his army uniform and he's holding up one hand, trying to shield himself from flashbulbs. He looks bewildered. He also looks young. He looks like I imagine I'll look in three or four years.

  "Sergeant Jonathan Jackson Ross tries to avoid reporters in Qasr, Kuwait," reads the photo caption.

  I scan the article. It doesn't have a lot of facts. It recaps my rise and then fall from grace, then adds on, "That young Ross would espouse unpatriotic sentiments may come as a surprise, but surely fits once one factors in his home environment. Ross's father, who served as an army sergeant, was dishonorably discharged from the military almost twenty years ago for revealing classified military secrets."

  The rest of it is just more badmouthing of me.

  Revealing classified military secrets.

  Dishonorably discharged.

  No way. I look at the closed bedroom door. No way. I don't believe it. Not my dad.

  Chapter 19

  Cali Callin'/Callin' Cali

  TWICE THAT NIGHT, I COME CLOSE to knocking on Dad's door and asking him about the story in the paper. But I can't bring myself to do it.

  Dad and the army. Like I said, it's the one topic that's always been off-limits in my family. It's not like someone engraved it in a stone tablet or anything: Thou Shalt Not Discuss Dad's Military Service. It's just that we never talked about it. I never really missed it, tell the truth. By the time I was born, he'd been out of the army already, so it's not like I ever had any memories of him being in the army. I found some pictures once of him in his uniform, young and thin in the bright glare of the desert sun. My parents' wedding album had pictures of a bunch of guys in their dress uniforms, including Dad. I asked about that once when I was real little—"Why is Daddy in a costume?"—and I just got "Daddy used to be an army man, like your toys" from Mom.

  Even as a kid, I could tell from her tone of voice and from the way she sort of looked away from me that she didn't want to talk about it. Which was fine by me, because really, who the hell cares what their parents did ten thousand years ago?

  Only now I have to care.

  I think back. I try to remember anything I can about Dad and the army. He would sometimes mention it in passing, but usually it didn't mean anything. Like, if I complained about not having enough room for my stuff, he would say, "When I was in the service, I carried everything I owned in a duffel bag." Or if I said it was hot and could we put on the air conditioning, he would say, "This isn't hot. Over there, it was hot."

  Over there was as close as he ever came to talking about it.

  But there was this one time...

  Back before Mom and Dad got divorced. They were arguing because, well, that's what they did. I must have been ten, so Jesse was four or five. We still lived in the townhouse back in the old neighborhood.

  I don't remember what started it. It was probably something on TV. Dad's always seeing something on TV or reading something in the paper that sets him off. He got really pissed, and when Mom tried to calm him down, he snapped at her and stalked off to their bedroom.

  Me and Jesse were playing in the family room. We'd built this big Lego fort for our superhero action figures and now Pandazilla was knocking it down.

  Mom looked at us and then stomped off after Dad. I'm pretty sure she said, "I'm so tired of this" under her breath.

  A minute later, the bedroom door slammed. Jesse jumped and looked at me.

  "It's OK," I told him. "They're just talking."

  But no sooner was the word "talking" out of my mouth than I heard Dad's voice. Loud. Not loud enough that we could understand exactly what he was saying, but loud enough that we could hear him and understand that he was angry.

  Then: Mom. Just as angry.

  "What are they doing?" Jesse whispered.

  "Just talking," I said again. "Grown-up talking."

  It was crap and I knew it was crap, but what else was I supposed to say?

  "Let's go outside."

  Jesse nodded at me, his eyes huge as the voices kept going back and forth. But he didn't get up. He just kept nodding.

  I tried to pull him up to his feet, but it's like he'd shoved a lead brick in his pants or something—he wasn't going anywhere, even though he wanted to.

  "Come on, Jesse," I told him, tugging.

  "Make them stop," he said.

  "I can't. Come on, let's go."

  Tears spilled from Jesse's eyes so fast that I couldn't believe it. There was no pause or moment where his eyes filled up or anything. One second he was totally dry, the next he was just gushing.

  "Outside," I said. "Come on." I was tired of pulling.

  Mom's voice got real clear: "You were a hero, John," she yelled. "And then you let them make you into a villain—"

  "Let them?" Dad bellowed.

  I gave up trying to pull Jesse to his feet. I collapsed on the floor next to him and wrapped my arms around him and put my lips right up to his ear and said, "It's OK. It's OK," and rocked him and hoped that my voice was loud enough to block out their voices.

  "...when it wa
s politically expedient!" Mom said.

  "That's enough. OK? That's just ... enough!" Dad yelled back.

  "It's OK," I kept telling Jesse and kept rocking him and let him wipe his eyes and his cheeks with my shirt while he cried. And he clung to me like a kitten and he was really brave and really good because he didn't make a sound, he just let me rock him and talk to him, and that...

  That was my first experience being a hero.

  I don't know what to do. I want to ask Dad about the paper, but it's like my whole life I've been trained not to talk about it. I can't make myself do it.

  So I figure I'll call Flip and get his read on the situation. He's not the most sympathetic guy in the universe, but he's the smartest person I know and he has the Internet at home, so maybe he can find something. But I pick up the phone and find that we have voice mail.

  The first message is from Dr. Goethe, asking Dad to call him at some point to discuss my behavior. I make an executive decision and determine that Dad doesn't need to discuss my behavior—I delete the message.

  The second message almost knocks me on my butt.

  It's Mom.

  Oh, God.

  Mom.

  She called. She actually called.

  I haven't heard from her since right after the whole mess with the Surgeon. It's been weeks. And now it's like ...

  God, chill out, Kross!

  But I can't help it. I almost never talk to her. The time difference and she's always so busy and I have no freakin' privacy here and—

  "Kevin, sweetheart, it's Mom. I saw you on TV, honey. Rita and Jesse and I all watched it together. I'm sorry it took a couple of days for me to call you, but I wanted to wait because I have some terrific news."

  Terrific news?

  "I really want to tell you, though, not the voice mail, so please call me back. Don't forget the time difference—three hours."

  And then a dead line.

  My mom never calls. I always call her.

  Mom didn't just leave Dad and me. She disappeared off to California and lost something like fifty pounds and moved in with Rita. So, yeah, my mom is now kinda hot and a lesbian. And the world just should not work that way. It's too confusing. No one's mother should be a hot lesbian. It should be illegal or something.

  And the part that sucks is that it's not like I can talk to anyone about it. If I try to talk to Dad about it, he just shuts down. And there's no way I can talk to any of my friends about it. I mean, you can't just tell your buddies that your mom is a hot lesbian. I mean, really.

  I get cards on my birthday, Christmas, Easter. Send cards to her, too. The occasional phone call. Last summer, she and Dad had a huge screaming fight on the phone, which ended when they agreed to split the cost of a ticket and fly me out to California for a week.

  Jesse had grown three inches by then. His hair ... man, his hair was the first thing I noticed when I saw him at baggage claim. It used to be this ugly mop of stuff just sprouting from his head, but now it was like ten shades lighter and golden. Mom had lost all that weight and looked like my older sister, not my mother. She and Rita held hands and called each other "honey" and "baby."

  I mostly stayed in the room that I shared with Jesse. Mom kept trying to feed me vegetarian stuff and kept giving me creams for my face. They all felt weird and icky.

  In fact, the whole situation felt weird and icky. It's not like there was anything wrong with it—Mom was happy, Rita was nice, and Jesse was some new kid I'd never seen before. For the first time in his life, I couldn't connect with him. He didn't cry or seem bothered by things or anything. Pandazilla was on a shelf in his room, but there was a layer of dust on him. And that was disturbing, but not what was weird and icky.

  No, the weird and icky part was me. I didn't fit in. I didn't belong.

  So I was glad to leave, but when I got home, everything seemed darker and colder. Not just because of the weather, either. I kept looking at the pictures of Jesse on the wall. And at the picture of Mom and Dad I keep in my wallet, where Dad won't see it. There was this massive disconnect between what was in front of my eyes and the California memories in my brain. It was as if the pictures had suddenly become lies. Like someone had invented them, like I had invented them. I didn't believe in them anymore. I couldn't believe that Mom had ever been the slow, heavy woman who raised me. That my brother had been a tiny, shy kid with mousy hair and no confidence.

  Jesse had always been afraid. Of everything. Maybe it's because he lived in a house where the two adults could—and would—suddenly start screaming at each other at a moment's notice. I don't know. But he'd always been afraid of every-thing—the dark, cats, dogs, you name it. And Mom was always sighing heavily and pinching the bridge of her nose and telling me to go get her some Advil.

  Now they had both changed. Improved. But the worst part wasn't seeing that. The worst part was knowing that I would never change. Never improve. I wouldn't get the magic makeover and the new life. I would just be stuck in Brookdale and I would just be stuck in me, with the dull brown hair and the zits and the bad attitude and the snow. Because I had made my choice.

  I call her back. Rita answers the phone.

  "We were so happy to see you on TV!" she burbles. Rita is endlessly enthusiastic. She's like a cheerleader with her gears stuck in overdrive or something. "Jesse kept saying, 'That's my big brother.'"

  "Is my mom there?" I ask. It's one in the afternoon in California, but Mom telecommutes.

  "Just a second."

  And then she's on. She's less burbly, but she also can't stop talking about me on TV—though she mentions I should have been sitting up straight and that she has a new face cream "that will take care of those blemishes for you."

  "They're not blemishes, Mom. They're zits. Let's be honest."

  "There's no need to be crude, Kevin."

  "Sure."

  "Kevin, I want you to come visit us again this summer."

  Last year's knock-down, drag-out fight over who would pay for the plane ticket flashes through my mind. But this year ... hey, I'm rich, right?

  "That sounds ... that sounds good, Mom."

  "Wait, honey, I'm not done yet. I mean for the whole summer."

  My brain sort of fizzles out for a second. I must have heard her wrong.

  "The whole summer?" A lot can happen in a summer. My imagination takes charge for a brief moment, imagining my return to Brookdale in the fall, a new me, as different from the current me as Jesse is from the kid who left the East Coast. It's a nice fantasy.

  "And if that works out and you like it here," she goes on, "Rita and I want to have you move in with us. For good."

  Chapter 20

  I go on TV (Again)

  MOVING TO CALIFORNIA. FOR GOOD.

  Hours later, I'm still trying to absorb the conversation with Mom, but I'm doing a lousy job of it. Going to California would totally change my life. I wouldn't have to worry about Dad's past. Or the stupid hero crap. Or the even stupider villain crap. I could start over.

  Those videotapes that I shouldn't have wouldn't matter anymore. Maybe I could even get past Leah—out of sight, out of mind.

  Moving. It's the kind of thing I used to talk to Father McKane about. On my own, it's too big to imagine. It's like my brain's got a quart of space open and I'm trying to pour in a gallon of stuff. And all the stuff that won't fit in is just splashing all over me and confusing me.

  Fortunately, Flip calls and I get distracted. "Hail, Fool. It's only just begun," he says.

  "What's just begun?" I'm not sure I like the giddy, ominous tone of his voice.

  "Don't you worry about a thing. Just keep doing what you're doing. We'll handle the rest. Sunday night–slash–Monday morning. For maximum impact." He giggles. That's either a really good or a really bad sign.

  I get an image of the Council of Fools spreading out across Brookdale in black ninja gear, hell-bent on wreaking our particularly ridiculous brand of havoc.

  "Please don't do anything too crazy,
" I tell him. "You're gonna, y'know, obscure my point and stuff."

  Which is the wrong thing to say, really, because Flip lives to obscure people's points. That's sort of why there is a Council in the first place.

  I shove it all aside to work on my speech. I'm not stupid or anything, but I don't try really hard in school, so this is sort of like doing a triathlon after not working out for a long time. I'm using all these brain muscles I haven't used in, like, a thousand years.

  It takes the whole weekend and a bunch of trips to the library for research. Dad asks what I'm up to and I tell him it's a project for school, which isn't a total lie.

  By the time I'm done, it's late Sunday. I rehearse, say my speech out loud over and over again—whispering to keep from waking up Dad—so I can be sure it's under three minutes.

  It's pretty good.

  I think it's pretty good.

  Will Leah think it's pretty good? Because not only would it be cool to have her take one step closer to me, but it would also be cool to have someone on my side in all of this. Someone who agrees with me, I mean. It's nice that the Council has my back, but they don't really care about any of this.

  I call Flip on his cell so that I can read the speech to him, but he doesn't answer, which means he's probably in the back seat of his car with Fam. I close my eyes real tight and try to banish the image of their pasty, skinny bodies locked together.

  So I call Jedi. I can hear his PS3 in the background the whole time I'm reading the speech to him.

  "Sounds good to me," he says.

  "Dude, were you even listening?"

  "Uh-huh. Whoa! Damn! Almost died!"

  "Jedi, help me out here. Does it suck or not?"

  "Hang on. Save point." I listen to some yelling and screaming and bullets in the background and then it all goes quiet. "OK. Vvvvvvvhhhnn. Kross, man, it sounds OK to me, but what do I know?"

  "But do you think it will convince people?"

  "Convince people of what? Vvvvvvvhhhnn."

  Oh. My. God. If I could jump through the telephone line and choke him to death, I would do it. I swear.