Action Figures - Issue Three: Pasts Imperfect (2 page)

“Misdirecting my anger?”

“Yeah. You know: You think
you’re angry at Ben because he’s dating your mom, but you’re really angry at
your mom because she’s with someone who isn’t your dad?”

“Where’d you get that from?”

“You spend a lot of time
talking to a psychologist,” she says, referring to Mindforce, “you pick up some
things. Well?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.”

“Is Ben a decent guy?”

I shrug. “I guess. He seems
okay.”

“Look, you know I’m on your
side, but maybe you should give him a fair chance, and not hate on him right
off when he hasn’t actually done anything to deserve it.”

“
Hmph
. Aren’t I
supposed to be the grounded, rational one?”

Sara smiles. “I’m expanding
my repertoire.”

TWO

After swinging back by my
place to grab Matt’s gift, Sara and I hike over to Casa de Steiger. The detour
makes us fashionably late; Stuart and Missy are already there, a fact Matt
impresses upon us in his own inimitably blunt way.

“Where the hell have you
been?” he says. “I told you, festivities begin at nine sharp. Sharp.”

“What a charming host he
is,” I say to Sara. “I forgot your present at home. I had to run back and get
it.”

“Oh. All right, then.
Tardiness forgiven.”

“And so gracious, too,” Sara
says.

As birthday boy, Matt gets
to call the day, which is not what I would call overly ambitious; he announces
an itinerary that begins with gaming until noon, when pizza is to be delivered,
at which point we will indulge in (or be subjected to, depending on your tastes
in cinema) some not-so-classic action films from the eighties that I’ve never
heard of:
Berry
Gordy’s The Last Dragon, Remo Williams: The Adventure
Begins, Cloak & Dagger,
and
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across
the 8
^th
Dimension
, which Matt insists gets better with
subsequent viewings. I remain skeptical.

“Dude,
Die Hard
isn’t
on the list?” Stuart says.

“No, because
Die Hard
is a Christmas movie,” Matt says. “Duh.”

“Oh, yeah, right.”

“Hey, I was about to make
some grilled cheeses,” Matt says to me. “You want one?”

“Grilled cheese sandwiches
for breakfast?” I say.

“I can put bacon in yours to
make it more breakfasty.”

“Say yes, they’re awesome,”
Missy says. “They’re like, wicked unhealthy for you because they’re all buttery
and cheesy but they’re
soooo
gooooooood
.”

“They’re bread and cheese
sandwiches,” I say, unconvinced. “They’re not all that special.”

Matt snorts. “Maybe not the
way
you
make them, but the Steigers have elevated them to an art form. Walk
this way,” he says, loping off with a pronounced limp.

“If I could walk that
way...”

Matt beams at me. “There’s
hope for you yet.”

The kitchen is set up for
grilled cheese production, complete with precooked bacon and thin-sliced
tomato. Matt places one of those stovetop griddle plates onto the burners then
fires them up, carefully setting the heat to medium-high.

“First, you need real
butter,” he begins, “and it has to be completely softened, so you can cover the
bread without shredding it.”

The bread is thick slices of
country white, which is important because the coarse texture holds the butter
better, Matt explains. He slathers butter on like he’s slapping cement on a
brick, then each piece of bread gets a slice of mozzarella, for texture, and to
seal in the slices of cheddar and fontina he lays down. He grabs a glass shaker
filled with dark spices, and dusts the bread before laying the two sandwich
halves on the hot griddle.

“Before grilling — and this
is the most important part — each slice of bread is sprinkled lightly with the
Steiger Secret Spice Blend,” Matt says.

“And what is the Steiger
Secret Spice Blend?”

Mr. Steiger answers for
Matt. “He can’t tell you. If he divulges the secret recipe, I’m obligated to
disown him.”

“You’d disown me on my birthday?”
Matt says, playing offended.

“For violating the sacred
trust of the Steiger Secret Spice Blend? I’d drop you like a bad habit.”

“Yeah, no, that’s fair.”

“Morning, Mr. Steiger,” I
say.

“Good morning, Carrie.”
Daddy Steiger says as he skirts past us to prep a travel mug of coffee. “I’ll
be out of your hair in a minute, pal.”

“What, you have to work
again?” Matt says. He tosses a couple of tomato slices onto the melty cheese,
then presses the two halves together. “Jeez, you need to tell off that slave-driver
boss of yours.”

“Yeah, he’s an ogre. It’s
tax time, Matt, you know I’m eyeball-deep in work.”

“Why do you have to do it?
You have minions.”

“I like to lead by example.
And I don’t have minions; they’re called employees.”

“You’re so PC it’s sickening.”

Mr. Steiger caps his coffee
cup. “Your scorn: another cross I have to bear. You have a good birthday with
your friends. I’ll see you tonight.”

“Okay.”

“You two are so adorable,” I
say. “You should take that act on the road.”

“It’ll never happen. Not as
long as he demands top billing.” With a quick jab of his spatula, Matt chops
the sandwich in half, then scoops it onto a paper plate. “Give it a minute to
cool, unless you’re into molten cheese scorching the roof of your mouth.”

I wait. I sample. Matt looks
to me for his compliment — which, damn him, I have to give, because this
sandwich is way more delicious than grilled cheese has any right to be.

“It’s passable,” I say.

“By which you mean awesome.”

“We want some awesome, too,”
Stuart shouts from the living room. “Hop to it, cookie! Chop chop!”

Matt cranks out six more
sandwiches, half of which go to Stuart the human incinerator. Once those are
gone, and we’re sure Matt’s mom is out the door for her weekly shopping trip, we
move on to the gift-giving phase of the day.

Round one is part of a cool
birthday tradition the group has: a music exchange. Years ago Sara and Stuart,
in an effort to break Matt of his slavish and inexplicable devotion to one-hit wonders
of the seventies and eighties, burned CDs of their preferred musical tastes,
and it became a thing. In the interest of further expanding Matt’s musical
horizons (which, sadly, remain rooted in cheesy pop of the past), I’m
introducing him to the greatest Chicks Who Rock of the past fifty years: Grace
Slick, Janis Joplin, Joan Jett, Chrissie Hynde, the sisters Wilson, Pat
Benatar, Liz Phair, Nina Gordon and Louise Post, Amanda Palmer, Amy Lee. The
mix culminates with Patti Smith’s
Because the Night
(which she co-wrote
with Bruce Springsteen, because of course I’m not going to pass on a chance to
bring a little of the Boss into someone’s life).

“Time for the main event,”
Sara says, handing the gift-wrapped package to Matt. “This is from all of us.”

Matt tears off the wrapping
paper to reveal a large cardboard box. He opens it, beholds its contents, then
looks at us, uncertain yet excited.

“You’ll want to thank
Natalie, too,” I say. “She kindly acted as our consultant, and called in a few
favors on our behalf.”

“Then...this is what I think
it is?” Matt says.

“Go try it on.”

Matt is off like a shot. He
returns several minutes later, and I must say, he’s quite impressive in his new
super-hero uniform.

The boots and black military
pants were easy grabs, thanks to the local army-navy store. The rest of it is
specialized gear, which is where Natalie came in. The facemask is a modified
protective mask like paintball players wear. Natalie replaced the goggles’
plastic lens with the same impact-resistant polymer my flight goggles are made
of, then installed a spare Protectorate comm system in the mask itself. At a
glance, the shirt looks like a normal long-sleeved black shirt with deep blue
accents, but the material is two layers of woven Kevlar. Between those layers
are what Natalie called “ballistics level IIIA shock plates,” which are capable
of stopping a nine millimeter full metal jacket bullet. The leather gloves,
intended to go on under his magic gloves, have a thin but dense padding along
the knuckles and the heel of the palm, to minimize any damage to the wearer
when throwing punches (Matt does not need to break any more fingers). The
pièce
de résistance
, the new trench coat, is a shorter cut than Matt’s battered
old wreck of a coat, which makes it harder to trip over and gives opponents
less to grab onto.

“Dude, you look bad-ass,”
Stuart says. “For once.”

“Definitely an improvement,”
Sara says.

“What do you think?” I say.
“You like it?”

“Um. Yeah. It’s, uh, it’s
really cool,” Matt says. Oh my God, I think he’s about to cry. We need some
levity, stat.

“You think it’s cool? Nuts,
we were going for stupid and dorky. You know, to match your style.”

“Told you we should have
done the coat in rainbow colors,” Sara says. “We could have called you Captain
Amazing Technicolor Dream Coat.”

Missy squeals with laughter.
“It’s funny because you would have looked dumb!”

“Oh, thanks,” Matt says.

“Speaking of looking dumb,”
I say, “this lavish gift comes with a price: you need to trash your old coat.”

Matt pulls the facemask off.
“What? Why? What’s wrong with my old coat?”

“You want it alphabetically,
or should I list its offenses in order of severity?”

“The thing’s falling apart,
man,” Stuart says. “It looks like you stole it off a homeless guy.”

“It’s not that bad,” Matt
says.

“It’s gross, Matt,” Sara
says.

“It’s comfortable.”

Sigh. Well, I can tell
attacking his beloved trench’s aesthetic qualities is a lost cause, so let’s
try switching tactics.

“It’s also a dead giveaway,”
I say. “Look, if you and Captain Trenchcoat keep wearing the exact same coat,
someone is eventually going to notice. You need to separate civilian you from
super-hero you, and ditching the old coat is going to help.”

“Hm,” Matt grunts, the
wheels in his head spinning. “Yeah. Guess you have a point.”

Oh, well played
, Sara says to me over the
brainphone, our private telepathic line of communication.

Well played, indeed: as soon
as he’s done changing back into human clothes, Matt takes his trench coat out
of the closet. He cradles it, folds it up reverently, and takes it outside. He
returns empty-handed, and I can’t help but choke up a little. How stupid is
that? All he did is throw away an old piece of clothing.

“Okay,” he says, “let’s get
gaming.”

Many slices of pizza,
several rounds of
Last Night on Earth,
and four painfully goofy action
movies later, Sara and I head out. Sara’s in no mood to be around her dad, so
she follows me home. Inspired by our success with Matt’s super-hero makeover,
we spend the night brainstorming a new outfit for Sara. She thinks the long
coat and sunglasses combo isn’t cutting it anymore, now that the Hero Squad is
starting to resemble an actual super-team, and I wholeheartedly agree.

(Maybe this is underhanded
of me, but I try to push Sara toward something less baggy and concealing.
There’s a pretty girl hiding underneath those hoodies and sweatshirts, even if
she tries to deny it, and I think showing it off a little might boost her
self-image.)

Ironically, our best idea
involves a hooded cloak, which would obscure her face while adding a little
dramatic flair. Neither of us are artists, so our attempts to sketch it out are
positively tragic, but the concept remains intriguing.

We continue to toss ideas
around the next morning during the walk to school. It’s the first day back
after February break, and everyone is looking rested from their respective
vacations. Color me jealous; I spent part of my week off fighting a demon lord
and his flaming undead sorcerer minions — hardly relaxing, that.

One person in particular is
looking, as the saying goes, tanned, toned, and rested. “Hey,” Malcolm says,
ambling up to me at my locker.

“Hey back,” I say, and on
pure impulse, I grab him in a hug and kiss him. There’s a moment of surprise on
his lips, but only a moment. “Wow, sorry, that was really forward of me.”

Which it was, seeing as
we’ve only been out once, officially speaking.

“Shame on you,” he says,
flushing slightly. “Don’t ever do that again.”

“Never again,” I tease, but
out of the corner of my eye, I catch Amber Sullivan scowling at me in
disapproval. Great, ten minutes into the day and I’ve spoon-fed Amber juicy
rumor fodder. Knowing her, I’ll be pregnant with Malcolm’s third child by the
end of the day.

“How was your week off?”
Malcolm asks.

“Boring. Spent most of it
gaming and watching movies. Yours?”

Malcolm gives me an
indifferent one-shoulder shrug. “It was decent. It was Disney World. Long lines
for short rides, overpriced souvenirs, people walking around in costumes, the
usual,” he says, then he breaks into a broad smile. “Sam, of course, was in
heaven the whole time.”

“And as long as your little
brother is happy...”

“As long as my buddy is
happy, that’s all that matters.”

God, he’s such a sweetie.

The warning bell rings and
we part, not to see each other again until our web design class near the end of
the day. Life can be so cruel.