Part 19 (1/2)
”You think?”
George raised his palms. ”If they thought I'd done anything wrong, would they have let me go?”
Jarvis flopped back in his chair. ”People were freaking out,” he said after a minute. ”They're going to freak out more now that you're back.”
”How so?”
”How d'you think? These days what's everyone think when the government comes looking for your neighbor? n.o.body's getting the n.o.bel Peace Prize, that's for sure. Half the people who talked to me yesterday thought you'd been arrested and s.h.i.+pped off to Guantanamo or something. If they see you ...”
”What are you getting at, Jarvis?”
The supervisor scratched his salt-and-pepper beard. ”Look,” he said, ”just keep a low profile for a while, okay? Try not to ... I don't know, draw attention to yourself. Don't do anything weird. Maybe this'll cool down in a couple of days.”
George's phone buzzed. It was a text message from Karen Q. He deleted it without looking. ”Yeah,” he said. ”I'll do that.”
”I'm doing you a favor,” said Jarvis, ” 'cause you've been here forever and you're a great worker. Please don't light yourself on fire or anything.”
”I'll do my best.”
Another text came through. He deleted it.
His first job was changing a flickering bulb in one of the lecture halls. Not a big deal, but it needed the big fifteen-foot A-frame ladder. When that was done, Jarvis sent him to deal with a backed-up toilet in one of the dorms, and then he emptied trash in some of the other science buildings. It was more mindless work. The most challenging part was mopping up after one trash can that had received a mostly full cup of coffee.
George dumped the last bin in the dumpster. Loose papers, Doritos bags, and paper cups rained down onto the other trash. There were old clothes in the dumpster, plus a few swollen bags and some parts that looked like they might've been the guts of a television, or maybe an old computer monitor.
He let the bin drop and rested his hand on the edge of the dumpster. He closed his eyes, rolled his neck, and pushed down. There was a knot in his shoulder he wanted to pop. He turned a bit more and levered his shoulder against the dumpster.
When he opened his eyes, Karen Quilt was staring at him.
She was dressed in black slacks and a blazer. She wore a tie but no s.h.i.+rt, and held the jacket more or less shut with one hand. The poster was less than ten feet away. Someone had put it up between his trips to the dumpster. He didn't recognize the name along the bottom, and wasn't sure if it was a brand or a store. Maybe both.
She looked disappointed in him.
This girl, Madelyn, she keeps telling me I'm supposed to be a superhero.
He looked away from the poster and his eyes fell on the dumpster. It was almost full of trash. Most of it was paper, but the whole thing probably weighed close to three or four tons. His hand tightened on the edge and he gave it a shake.
The steel container trembled.
According to her we all have superpowers. That's how we fight the monsters.
He stepped to the side. It had the same sleeves as the one he'd lifted-that he imagined lifting-the other day, but they were lower on this model. It'd be even easier to put a hand on it and get the other one underneath. And this one was far behind the building. No one would see him.
I'm supposed to be super-strong.
He set one hand on the sleeve and his head flared. His fingers leaped back to his temple and felt the vein pulsing there. His nose started to run, and when he wiped it with the back of his glove it left a red streak.
Another one. He couldn't believe he'd had a nosebleed while talking to the President. Six-year-olds get random nosebleeds. It was tough to think of something more embarra.s.sing, short of wetting his pants. At least the President and the First Lady had been gracious about it. Christian had given him some of the tissues one of her a.s.sistants carried for her, and even offered to have their medic look at him.
George shook off his glove, tilted his head back, and pinched his nose. He walked away from the dumpster, dragging the plastic trash bin behind him. He pa.s.sed the poster of Karen Quilt without looking at it.
According to the menu, the cafeteria was serving chicken parmesan. George was pretty sure it was just a fried chicken patty with tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese, but he also wasn't sure what actual chicken parmesan was supposed to be. With the spaghetti, a pair of rolls, and a trip to the salad bar it made for a solid lunch.
He found a table with an abandoned newspaper and paged through the news. More on the President's visit to Los Angeles. A sidebar about the First Lady talking to police and schoolchildren. As he finished his chicken patty, he found a short article in the entertainment section. Karen Quilt had been spotted with a mystery man outside her hotel. It was two paragraphs long, one of which was her bio. There weren't any pictures. George wondered if the President had suppressed them somehow.
Either the lettuce or tomatoes had gone bad. He wasn't sure which. He pushed the salad to one side and split a roll with his fingers.
Someone cleared their throat. He looked up and saw a young woman sitting across from him. Her dark hair was braided into a tight ponytail.
She wasn't sitting at the table. She was in a wheelchair. It was the crazy girl.
”Hey,” Madelyn said. ”I didn't hear from you yesterday.”
He ignored her and let his eyes drift back to the newspaper.
She peered at it upside down. Her finger darted out to tap the Karen Quilt article. ”I saw that online,” she said. ”Was that you? Did you go talk to her?”
Her hand was pale under the cafeteria's harsh fluorescent light. He could see dark veins under the flesh and faint bruises under her fingernails. Part of him tried to insist a living girl's hand couldn't look like that.
”Please leave me alone,” said George.
Her eyes went wide. ”What?”
”Go away.”
Madelyn looked down at the article again. ”Didn't she know you? She had to know you.”
He drummed his fingers on the table. Then he killed another few seconds by having a sip of milk. It was on the edge of spoiling, and the tang of it made his nose wrinkle. Something was wrong with one of the cafeteria coolers.
”George,” she said. ”What's wrong?”
”I am not part of this,” he said. ”Whatever fantasy world you're making up, leave me out of it.”
He might as well have slapped her. ”What did you say?”
He flipped the newspaper shut. It wasn't as dramatic as slamming a book. ”You,” he said, ”are crazy. You need to talk to a therapist or a psychiatrist or someone. And I'd appreciate it if you would just leave me alone in the meantime.”
”What happened to you?”
”Nothing happened,” he said. ”I'm just not going to play this game with you anymore.”
”Game?”
”All this superhero nonsense.”
”You are a hero,” she said.
He shook his head. ”I'm just a guy,” he said. ”Just a regular guy trying to do his duty as a citizen of this great country.”
She blinked. ”What?”