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Evan’s voice catches me off guard. You won’t allow yourself to think what way?
Huh? Ugh, I forgot I was wearing the ring. Embarrassment consumes me. How long had he been listening? What did I think? I can’t remember.
I hear his voice again, a single sound formed into a word. Ha.
With a shudder, I flail my hand and let the ring fall to the bed. This would be the most embarrassing gift ever, but having Evan read my thoughts barely compares to the Surprise Beach Party Humiliation so generously given to me by my best friend and brother.
The mere thought of Crimson and Max sends a shriek of pain through my heart, and it’s not from the soreness in my muscles or the residual embarrassment I feel when thinking of that night. I have no idea if they are okay. I’ve already witnessed one murder, how many more have happened that I don’t know about? Lockdown is supposed to be a way to hunker down with your loved ones and wait out the danger. Instead it has me isolated and completely helpless. I wouldn’t be here if I had listened to Dad in the first place. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised if he disowns me after this.
In an effort to take my mind off all the ways that I have completely and irrevocably screwed shit up, I give myself a tour of Evan’s bedroom. Last night Evan had tried to take my mind off things by playing every funny movie he owned. A few hours of Will Ferrell later, it had been all I could do to let him pull me by the hand into a darkened room and drop me on the bed. I hadn’t even crawled under the sheets.
The dimly lit room’s only source of light is the not-yet-risen sunlight coming from the narrow sweeping window at the top of the wall. It reminds me of windows in a basement of a human’s home—only a foot tall and so high up you can’t see out of it. This is somewhat odd, because every other floor has walls made of glass.
Every floor in the building is circular and from what I gather, Evan’s … er … apartment?—Living space?—takes up one half of this floor. He told me the other guy he works with lives on the other side, but he’s been on vacation for a while.
Evan’s massive kitchen with his high-tech gadgets of coolness take up about a third of the semi-circle, and a hallway full of artifacts and one Monet painting lead into his bedroom-slash-living area space. There’s a bed, king sized and ruffled from my sleeping on it, a couch that Evan slept on last night, and a bunch of boy-ish type things everywhere else.
His computer desk has three glass monitors and a dozen Star Wars toys. His television is bigger than I am tall and flanked on all four sides with movies and video games, and every possible video gaming system known to man. Plus two questionable-looking consoles that look homemade.
Is this what normal Supers my age do? Have kickass rooms with amazing stuff? My room at home has a bed, a TV that’s hardly ever watched, and well—stuff that’s been there since my childhood. Hero training consumed my entire school life and all of my free time. Yet here I am, aged sixteen and not a Hero. It was all for nothing.
After poking my head into the kitchen and the weird artifact hallway and not finding Evan, I retrieve the ring from the bed and try to clear my mind of every thought except for one. Where are you?
I’m outside. Walk through the bookshelf.
Come again?
Evan’s normally raspy voice is silky inside my head. Bookshelf. Walk through it. See you soon.
Glancing around, I notice the bookshelf for the first time. In the far corner of the room, diagonally across what would be the sharp corner of the pie slice that is Evan’s bedroom, it spans from floor to ceiling about five feet wide. Every bit of shelf space has a book shoved into it.
As pathetic as it may be, I suddenly feel very small and ignorant. Heroes don’t read books, and I’d grown up trying to be a Hero. Sure, I have a bookshelf at home too. It has all six editions of the Hero manual on it. Along with an assortment of Blu-rays with the shrink-wrap still on them, hair accessories, and random crap Crimson and I collected on that one vacation we took two years ago.
Evan?
?s bookshelf is stocked with comic books, books about comic books, an entire collection of Batman novels, and every single copy of the Hardy Boys. With a laugh, I reach for the large hardback book with the title this isn’t a secret passageway and pull.
Soundlessly, the massive bookshelf swings open, revealing a hallway that leads to a balcony. The cool early morning air brushes against my face as I take a tentative step onto the glass floor. Evan laughs. He’s standing with his elbows resting on the balcony’s railing, which is also glass, so from my view it appears like he’s floating in air with his body leaning toward the ocean.
I grip the railing. “What kind of freak would design a balcony like this?”
He swings a thumb toward his chest. “This one. Would you like some coffee?”
I decline with a wave of my hand. “You’re drinking coffee? At five in the morning? I thought maybe you were out here because you couldn’t sleep.” I lower my head, get scared of the empty air below me, and refocus my attention on my hands instead. “I’m sorry I took your bed last night. I bet it sucks sleeping on the couch.”
“I slept fine.” I watch him as he gazes out at the sun-tinted ocean. He inhales a long gust of air, closing his eyes as if relishing in the salty taste. When he exhales, I feel his power level weaken. “People waste the best part of the day sleeping. Look,” he says, pointing at the sun as it pokes over the horizon. I glance at it but then look back at Evan because the expression of pure joy on his face is more fascinating than a sunrise. He smiles as the sun reflects in his eyes. “Most people are asleep right now. So it’s like the sun is rising just for you and me.”
“Evan?” I ask.
He closes his eyes as a cool breeze washes over his face. “Hmm?”
“Why did you quit Hero training?”
His eyes fling open and steal a glance at me before he closes them again, this time pressing a hand to his forehead. “I said I didn’t want to talk about it.”
“No, you said that was a story for another time. Now is another time.” I press my shoulder to his, trying to be friendly and persuasive, not mean and demanding. He groans.
“My dad died when I was three. I don’t remember it. He was killed by a villain attack at the canyon entrance where he was a security guard.”
