Jackson Humes is Not a Superhero

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Aunt Margie rushed forward. I tried to respond, but it felt like my mouth had been shot full of Novocain, which was just as well since I hadn't the faintest clue how to explain what had led me outside in the middle of the night or why I looked like I'd spent twenty minutes tumbling inside of an industrial sized clothes dryer before being deposited into a subzero meat locker.

"Get inside right now." It wasn't so much a request as it was a command. Before I could even react, she grabbed my arm roughly and dragged me all the way back to the house. I couldn't tell if it was her tight grip or warm hand, but my arm tingled like crazy where she held it.

The warmth of the living room made me shiver even harder. Aunt Margie shoved me onto the couch and covered me with a blanket; she went upstairs and retrieved more blankets. By the time she was done wrapping me up, I resembled an Egyptian mummy.

"What's going on?" Tanner asked, coming down the stairs.

My aunt ran into the kitchen. I heard the microwave come to life. It seemed like an odd time to make a snack. The whirring noises coming from the kitchen put me into a sort of trance. It was only then that I realized just how tired I was. I shut my eyes for what felt like a few seconds before someone was shaking me. I tried to swat them away, but my arms were pinned to my sides. I registered the sharp sting that comes with being slapped on the face. I coerced my eyes to open. My aunt was hovering just a few inches above me. Tanner was standing behind her and looked a little taken aback. My aunt had never laid a hand on either of us.

"I need you to drink this slowly." She was tilting a large steaming mug against my lips. I took a sip and felt the warm milk slide down my insides. It was an insanely wonderful sensation. I took several more gulps before she pulled it away. "Slowly," she repeated.

I did as instructed until the milk was gone. I wanted to ask for more, but then I remembered why I'd been out in the first place. "Graham," I slurred. "I think someone took him." What was in the milk? Had she given me alcohol? I didn't understand why I was slurring or why my brain felt so fuzzy.

"We'll find him," my aunt said soothingly. "In all likelihood he probably went out looking for Mr. Saltzman."

I wanted to protest, but my mind was tired and in chaos and unable to produce more words. Before I could gather my thoughts, my aunt asked Tanner to follow her into the kitchen. I heard him say something about sleepwalking. It's something I used to do when I was younger, but only a few times and not in many years. Our family doctor had attributed my nighttime strolls to stress.

"That must be it." She sounded very concerned. "He saw the attack at school. It must have triggered something."   

"Should we look for Graham?" Tanner asked.

"It's too dark out," she said, a worried tone in her voice. "I'll search the neighborhood on my way to work in the morning. If I don't find him, I'll call the animal shelter."

My eyelids began to grow very heavy. I surrendered to their weight and marveled at how the simple act of closing my eyes could bring so much satisfaction. My involuntary shivering began to subside. The hushed conversation from the kitchen was strangely soothing.

I woke up to the sound of something sizzling in the kitchen. It took my stuffed up nose a few seconds to translate the sound into bacon. Gray light was streaming in through the living room windows. Someone had placed a pillow under my head. I was still bundled up in blankets and my body was covered in sweat. I shimmied myself into a sitting position and awkwardly stood up. I wriggled my arms until the various blankets cocooning me finally loosened up and slid down to the floor.

"I was just about to wake you up," Tanner said, walking in from the kitchen. I could tell he was tired and hadn't gotten much sleep. His hair was sticking out in all directions, except for the flattened patch on the side of his head that he'd slept on. "You hungry?" He waved a spatula in the air. "I made breakfast."

The mere thought of food made me ravenous. I was halfway to the kitchen when the events of the previous night came crashing back all at once. "Wait, did you find Graham?"

"Not yet," he said grimly, "but I promise we'll go looking for him as soon as you eat something."

My aunt had been teaching us how to cook for years. Once a month, she would give us a new recipe to master. She would watch intently, interjecting advice whenever she thought we were about to burn the food or give the whole family salmonella poisoning. That's how I discovered that I could make killer spinach lasagna.

Tanner had done a good job with the bacon. It was a little burnt in parts, but that's exactly how I liked it. I caught him staring at me a couple of times, but he managed to play it off with a shrug or a smile.

"Has Mr. Saltzman come back?" I asked.

"No. I went over there this morning, but the note you left on his door is still there. I checked around the house, but there was no sign of Graham."

The dropped call from Mr. Saltzman, Graham's broken collar on the ground, the Silhouette figure who had lifted me up into the stratosphere—the evidence was pointing to a harsh truth that I didn't want to acknowledge. Neither Mr. Saltzman nor his dog had gone missing. They'd been kidnapped. My whole body shivered, which had nothing to do with the temperature in the room.

"I need to get dressed," I said, picking up my empty dishes. I walked over to the sink and rinsed them off before putting them in the dishwasher.

"Where do you think you're going?" Tanner stood up as well.

Bringing up Marv didn't seem like a good idea, so I tried to be vague as possible. "I need to talk to a friend who might be able to help me find Graham."

"You're talking about Marv, aren't you?" Tanner spoke his name with unconcealed disdain.

"I don't see how it matters," I said, forcing myself to keep a cool head. I was already struggling to keep myself from panicking about the Silhouette without having to worry about my brother's prejudice against him.

Tanner must have sensed my distress because he sat back down. "Look. I'm your brother. Why don't you trust me?"

"I do trust you—" I started to argue.

"Do you know how many times I've stood up for you? Do you know how many times some of my friends have used the word fag and I've told them to quit it?" The question caught me completely off guard. I never imagined my brother standing up for me in that manner. "No. You don't. Because all you think about is yourself."

"That's not true," I said defensively.

He folded his arms across his chest and leaned back in his chair. "Are you sure about that?"

"What's that supposed to mean?" I said hotly.

Tanner stood up, knocking the chair to the floor. All pretense of a calm discussion had flown out the window. "The cops have been here twice in one week because you couldn't stop yourself from going into the woods after being told not to. If that's not the definition of selfish, then I don't know what is. Aunt Margie has been worried sick over your behavior lately."

"It's not my fault," I fired back. "The first time it happened I was forced to go into the woods because Alex was trying to beat me up. And the second time I was trying to help find Mr. Saltzman's dog."

"That's not what Alex told the cops," Tanner spat, "he said he saw you going into the woods and tried to stop you."

"That's what he said to make himself look good. Ask Aunt Margie, she knows the truth."

"Even if that is the case, why would you go into the woods again? It's like you're trying to get hurt."

"I can fly. Okay." It was the last thing I expected to come out of my mouth. "Tanner," I dropped my voice to a whisper, "I can fly."