Superhero (2 page)

But I kept my worries to myself all that year. Until that summer, no one knew what was going on in my head, not even Owen. And he knew everything about me.

Pin Man and Pencil Boy
Issue #1

Art by Jordan Carson. Story by Owen Nelson.

Second prize winner in the Wisconsin Middle School Art Competition, 2006

Panel #1—Students look around in alarm as the sound of screams echoes through the hallway at Jefferson Columbus Middle School.

Panel #2—Bruce and Peter are walking out of class with their books. They look at each other in alarm. Bruce: “What’s going on, Peter?” Peter: “I don’t know, but I think we’d better head to the locker room!”

Panel #3—In the hallway, zombie jocks in football uniforms from Altoona Middle School are attacking and biting Columbus students. It’s chaos! Evil Altoona principal, Train-Mor, stands in the middle shouting orders. Train-Mor: “Get the big, blond guy! No, the
blond
! Dang it, I should have zombified the math club instead!”

Panel #4—Pin Man and Pencil Boy burst from the locker room. Pin Man: “We’re under attack!” Pencil Boy: “Ready when you are, Pin Man!”

Panel #5—Pin Man pins a zombie football player against a locker. All around him, previously pinned zombies lay in a stupor. Pin man: “Pinned you now, you carrion-breathed meathead!”

Panel #6—Pencil Boy uses the eraser end of his sonic pencil to erase a zombie, who screams as he vanishes. Pencil Boy: “There are too dang many of them, Pin Man! Erasing takes too long!”

Panel #7—The duo is approached on all sides by dozens of zombie football players. Train-Mor stands to one side laughing manically. Train-Mor: “You two are no match for my mind-controlled hordes! You’re doomed, DOOMED!”

Panel #8—Pin Man and Pencil Boy are back-to-back trying to protect each other. Narrator bar: “Is this the end for Columbus Middle School’s greatest heroes?” Pin Man: “I’m sorry I can’t get you out of this, Peter.” Pencil Boy (thought balloon): “I have to think of something. I can’t let Pin Man down!”

Panel #9—A light bulb goes off over Pencil Boy’s head.

Panel #10—Close-up of Pencil Boy as he draws furiously.

Panel #11—Wide hall shot. Principal Train-Mor is dressed as a circus clown with a rainbow fuzzy wig, huge red nose, and a yellow-and-red costume. He’s looking down at himself, arms held wide. Train-Mor: “What did you do to me? I hate clowns!  No. NOOOO!”

Panel #12—Exterior of school. Train-Mor is running away awkwardly in big floppy shoes followed by the slobbering zombies.

Panel #13—Principal Derth hands Pin Man and Pencil Boy a trophy while they smile with teeth-glints for the camera, arms around each other’s shoulders. Derth: “You two saved the school! Please take this token of our esteem as well as… a week off your classes!”

Panel #14—Bruce and Peter sit in Bruce’s room playing with video controllers. Bruce: “Somehow, these shooters just aren’t as exciting as they used to be.” Peter: “I know, Bruce. I know.”

Jordan

M
Y
HOUSE
had the best toys, but during the summers, we spent a lot of time at Owen’s house. It was nicer, with a pool table in the basement and a deck and barbecue grill out back. But its big draw was the in-ground pool in the backyard.

We were twelve the summer before seventh grade, and we spent most of our days out there. We had badminton, balls, Frisbees, and huge water guns. Half the time we played with them in the water. We played Phase 10 on towels at the edge of the pool. We endlessly brainstormed story ideas for issues of
Pin Man and Pencil Boy
.

Both of Owen’s parents worked, and his brother was in Madison for the summer, so during the day it was just us. It was the first summer his parents had let us stay home without a sitter, which was amazingly cool. Yeah, we were getting older, but also, Owen was already on his way to becoming a wrestling star. Owen’s dad was so happy with him, we were granted a lot of freedom.

At this point, Owen wrestled the way a new drummer tapped on things or the way I doodled. That is to say, all the time. He was forever grabbing me and doing a pretend headlock or body tuck. He thought it was great fun to pick me up and toss me in the pool. At least he would hold me and say “Ready? Ready?” to make sure I didn’t get water up my nose. And really, I kind of liked it. If things got a little frisky down there, the cold water usually took care of it.

But this one day, it all came to a head, all the stuff I’d been worrying about and trying to hide. We were waist deep in the water and batting a volleyball around.

“Sandman doesn’t count,” Owen argued. “Sandman is, like, an elemental or a god. Superman is just some dude from another planet.”

Owen dove for the ball when I went a bit wide, and he batted it back to me. We were trying to see how long we could keep it in play.

“So? It doesn’t matter where they’re from. The point is, Sandman could beat Superman because all he has to do is make him fall asleep.”

We’d had a running bet for a few days about whether or not anyone could beat Superman without resorting to kryptonite or threatening to blow up the world or kill Lois Lane or something. I’d bet that I could figure out a way, and I was sure I had it.

“Superman doesn’t need sleep, doofus,” Owen said, tapping the ball right to me.

“Maybe he doesn’t have to sleep, but he
can
. Don’t you remember that whole series where he was in a dream that he was normal?”
Tap.

“Oh, yeah,” Owen admitted.
Tap
.

“So. Superman
can
sleep, and if he
can
then Sandman could
make
him sleep.”

“But they’re not even in the same universe! So it doesn’t count.”

“They are too! They’re both in the DC Universe. ’Member that
Sandman
issue where Wanda dreams about Bizarros—Superman fights them in his comic. If a Sandman character can dream about a villain that Superman fights, they’re in the same universe.”

I knew I had him, and I could see by his face that he knew it, too. In my moment of triumph, I hit the volleyball too hard and sent it sailing to the left, out of bounds of the pool. “Oops,” I said.

“Penalty!” Owen shouted, just before he plowed into me.

Owen is not a dumb jock. In fact, he’s pretty smart. But when backed into a corner in an argument he often resorted to the physical. That was nothing new.

That day, however, when he pinned me up against the tile wall of the pool, all wet and slippery, with just his swim trunks and mine between us—pinned me there knee to shoulder and
held me
, with his head tucked into my neck—well, something inside me snapped. I raised the flag so fast my head spun, and I grabbed him around his waist before I even realized what I was doing. Seriously, I claim complete disassociation from my actions on that day. My mind was not driving the car. If you doubt me, try being a twelve-year-old boy with your biggest sexual fantasy pinning you against a wall mostly naked in a pool, and then tell me I’m lying.

I think I moaned, or made some kind of scary sexual sound, and then I grabbed his neck with one hand, pulled his head up and kissed him. This was my first kiss ever, but the primitive brain is a powerful thing. It didn’t matter that I had no clue what I was doing. I had my mouth on his and my tongue thrust deep with no conscious thought whatsoever.

For one brief, shining moment, I kissed Owen and Owen kissed me back. He kept pressing me against that wall and he even got hard. But then, he was twelve years old, too. His mouth under mine was so hot and sweet and sexy I could barely stand it. I thrust my tongue against his. My legs wrapped around him like I was a freaking monkey. I pressed into him as if he was an invisible barrier and I was trying to go through it. They ground together, his stiffy and mine, and I starting rocking my hips against him. It was incredible. It felt like soaring, like that scene in
Superman Returns
where Brandon Routh shoots straight up into the stratosphere like a bullet. I probably would have come like that in about another twenty seconds, right there in the pool.

But after our dicks made contact, something in Owen woke up. He thrust me off him, really hard, and held me at arm’s length, his elbows locked.

For a long minute we just looked at each other. I had my head in the clouds until the look of shock on his face finally got through the freaking cupids and singing birds and stuff. My stomach dropped like a stone. I clapped a hand over my mouth as if I could take back what it had just done.

“Oh God,” I said, through my fingers. “I am. I’m gay.”

I had been playing with the idea for a while. But at that moment there was no fucking doubt about it. I wanted Owen. Heck, I would have done anything he asked me to, and said “please” before and “thank you very much” after. Repeatedly. His hard, boy’s body was everything I could ever dream of. Done.

Owen looked at me for long enough without speaking that the emotion battling on his face began to scare me. Owen and I had always been able to share
everything,
and I’d just blurted it out. Was it too much? Was he disgusted?

“Please don’t hate me,” I said, feeling horribly cold. “Please. Because if you hate me, I don’t think I can stand it.”

“I… don’t hate you,” he said in a rough voice. “I’m just surprised. But Jordy, you can never,
ever
do that to me again.” I’d never heard him sound like that, so grim, so final.

“I won’t, I swear! I’m sorry. I don’t know what happened,” I babbled. At that point I would have promised anything as long as he didn’t cast me off like a favorite shoe that had something foul sticking to its bottom.

Owen didn’t want me the way I wanted him. He didn’t like boys. That was bearable. But I would die if I lost my best friend.

W
E
RECOVERED
from that moment, but it was awkward for a while. It took time before Owen would touch me again, but he did. He didn’t pin me like before, and he was always careful not to bring certain “no fly zone” areas of his into contact with the corresponding areas of mine. But he’d punch my arm, swing me around, give my shoulders a hug. It was like he wanted to show me that nothing had changed. He told me in a hundred ways without ever saying a word,
It’s okay, Jordy.
I get who you are, and I don’t have a problem with it
.
We’re still Sam and Frodo, Pin Man and Pencil Boy
.

Which is unbelievably freaking mature for a twelve-year-old straight boy whose lifelong BFF turned out gay and tried to rub off on him in a pool, if you really think about it.

Owen

I
MET
Emily in the first week of classes our sophomore year. Everyone had two options in English that year—an English Lit class or Creative Writing. You’d think Creative Writing would be a free pass, but it was just the opposite. The teacher, Mr. Federman, was really gung ho. During the fall semester you had do a partial screenplay, a couple of short stories, and a novel outline and first chapter. And he was a hard-ass grader. As a rule, jocks avoided the class like the plague.

I was always busy in the fall with practice, and then the wrestling season started after Thanksgiving, so I didn’t need the extra work. But I’d been writing a lot with Jordy, working on
Pin Man and Pencil Boy
and some movies and stuff, and I really liked it. Jordy and I figured one of us should take the class just to improve our mad skills, and since I was the writer, that person ended up being me.

The first day of class Mr. Federman told us we’d be assigned a partner who would be our beta reader, and that person would also be our “cowriter“ for the big final project. He read off the assignments—my partner was Emily Abrams.

When he read it off, Emily and I looked at each other with mutual horror, and I inwardly groaned. I’d seen her around, and my impression had always been that she had a huge chip on her shoulder. She was one of those brainy girls who hated jocks on principle. She was petite with straight brown hair and these huge black glasses. They made her look like Simon, the chipmunk. She had a pixieish face with a pointed chin, dark eyes and a little cupid’s bow mouth. From the times I’d heard her speak, what came out of that mouth was usually very loud and very sarcastic.

We were made to pair up with our partners and talk about our “writing experience and dreams.” About now, I was really wishing I’d opted for English Lit. I sat down next to her with about as much enthusiasm as I have for my mom’s monthly liver and onions dinner. But the first thing that came out of Emily’s mouth was the last thing I expected.

“You’re friends with Jordan Carson, right?” Emily looked at me with interest.

“Um… yeah. He’s my best friend.”

Emily got a silly smile on her face. It totally erased her cynical ’tude and made her look almost sweet. “Oh my God, he is so cute. And he’s crazy talented. I’ve seen his stuff in the hallways outside the art room.” She suddenly looked horrified and put her hand over her mouth. “God, I just outted myself as a stalker.”

I laughed and gave her a big smile.

It was
Twilight Zone
weird, but really nice, to have a girl asking
me
about
Jordan
. I was the number one wrestler in the state for my grade during all three years of middle school. Last year was my first year in the high school ranking, and I’d come in second in the 170-pound weight class for our division. The guy who was number one was a senior. I was doing better than anyone in my family had ever done. But with that success came a lot of pressure. The entire cheerleading squad seemed determined to pin me to the mat and claim victory. There had even been cat fights about me in the cafeteria, and I wasn’t even dating any of them yet. It was getting dicey. I really needed to find a girlfriend.