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“Want to talk about it?” Ever magnanimous, Nick was. He knew of many things he’d rather do than talking, but that was part and parcel of being a hormonal teenager. Almost everything threatened to turn him on. Seth. Dudes in briefs on underwear packaging. Bigfoot (long story, and the less said about it, the better).
“It’s funny,” Seth said, the towel around the back of his neck, the ends hanging over his shoulders. He looked down between them, frowning. “I thought… I wondered what it would be like if I wasn’t who I was. If I didn’t have powers. If I wasn’t Pyro Storm. If I was just like everyone else.”
“Okay,” Nick said slowly. “You’ve said that before.”
“I have,” Seth agreed. “And there was a time when I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be Pyro Storm anymore. Maybe I still think that, every now and then. Hanging up the costume. Ignoring all the calls for help that came in. Why is itmyresponsibility to help everyone? So many of them don’t ask for it, so why is it up to me to help them?”
“Because someone has to?” They’d been here before, but this felt different, somehow.
Seth startled, jerking his head up and looking at Nick for the first time since he came downstairs. “Yeah, I know. But whyme? Why us? Everything we’ve been through, everything we’ve done, and for what? To get it thrown back in our faces? To be treated likewe’rethe enemy?” He shook his head. “I hate it. I don’t want to, but I do. I hate that people treat us like crap. That no matter what we do, no matter how many people we help, they still find some way to blame us.”
Nick reached out and tugged on the towel, pulling Seth closer. He came willingly enough, stepping between Nick’s legs, hands resting on his thighs, pinkie finger brushing againstthe skin just below Nick’s shorts, sending a hot jolt through him. He ignored it, at least for the moment. Seth needed his undivided attention. Granted, it’d probably help if he put on a shirt (or a snowsuit, just to be safe), but Nick didn’t let himself get distracted. Mostly.
“Would you change anything if you could?” Nick asked.
Seth hesitated a moment. Then, “No. Not anymore. When she was… when she was trying to take my powers from me, I was in this… fog. I felt myself wanting to give in, to let her have it, and part of that had nothing to do with what she was doing to me. It wasmine,and there was a split second when I thought I could give it to her. Let her have it. Let her deal with all of it and leave me ordinary.”
A chill ran down Nick’s spine. “But you didn’t. You fought it.”
“I did,” Seth said. “Maybe if you hadn’t shown up, it wouldn’t have been enough, but you did, and I heard you through the fog. It helped to remind me of what’s important. And not just you. I thought about my aunt. My uncle. All they’d done for me. Everything they did to help me be… me. I think I forget sometimes that I’m not the only one who lost someone when my parents died. They did, too. They took me in. Gave me a home. Loved me. And this is how they’re repaid for all they’ve done?” He laughed ruefully and stepped away from Nick, spreading his hands. “In a way, Patricia Burke did me a favor, even though she didn’t know it.” Fire bloomed in his palms, twin balls that flickered and snapped, the heat unpleasant in the stuffiness of the basement, but not yet uncomfortable. He rolled the balls in his hands, up his arms, behind his neck and back down to his hands. When they reached his palms, he closed his fingers, snuffing them out, leaving wisps of curling gray smoke. “She and Burke think anything is theirs for the taking. It’s not.”
“You sound like you’re sure.” He didn’t know if that was a good thing or not, but he trusted Seth to know what was right for himself.
“I am,” Seth said. “More than I’ve been in a long time.” Heshook his head. “We can’t make everyone happy, and there are people actively fighting against our rights to justbe.But I would still keep them safe if called to do so.”
“That makes you a better person than me,” Nick admitted.
“I get that. I wish I had the right answer—anyanswer—but I don’t. The best I—wecan do is try our hardest to make sure no one has to suffer like we have.”
“That’s not possible. Someone’s always going to get hurt, no matter what.”
Seth blinked. “That’s… huh. Yeah, I guess you’re right. Collateral damage.” Then, “I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
He stepped back between Nick’s legs, hands on his hips. “Your mom, Nicky. I’m so sorry you had to go through that.”
Nick swallowed past the lump in his throat, looking away. “It sucked.” Understatement, that, but it encompassed all he was feeling. Words were never Nick’s problem—his mouth, like his brain, never stopped moving. But now? Now words failed him, and all he could do was repeat “It sucked.”
“How’s your dad?”
Nick laughed wetly, rubbing the back of his hand over his eyes. “He’s… sad, you know? Not like he used to be after she… After. But this wasn’t just a bad guy wanting to kill us like others have. This was more than that.”
“It was cruel,” Seth said quietly.
“It was. It is. But then I’m starting to figure out that cruelty is the point. Owen said that Burke… my mom…” His chest hitched painfully as he ground his teeth together, jaw tense.
“I know, Nicky,” Seth said, hands leaving his knees as he cupped Nick’s face, thumbs brushing his cheeks. “Did you talk to your dad about it?”
“No,” Nick said hoarsely. “And I hate how it’s making me feel. I want to kill him, Seth. I want to find Burke and make him feel every ounce of pain he’s inflicted on us. More, even.” He rolled his eyes at his own ridiculousness.
“Would you feel better?”
He hesitated. “For a little bit. But I know that once it faded, that anger would still be there.”
“That’s the difference,” Seth said, “between us and them. That’s the reason we do what we do. We’re not out for revenge, because revenge can only sustain a person for so long. When you don’t have anyone else to burn, what remains?”
“Ashes,” Nick whispered, thinking of the sea, of a lighthouse in the distance. Of two heartbroken people standing at a railing, clutching a dirty plastic bag that had held a woman so filled with light, she blazed like the sun.
