Sidekicks (3 page)

That's when they cut back to the studio, where the female host of the early morning show, even after seeing it seventeen times, fights a losing battle with her giggles. She can't even look at the camera. The “wacky weatherman” sitting to her left is just bursting at the seams to say one of the thirty “witty” lines he must've spent all night writing. This time it's, “Well, I for one am glad to see that Bright Boy was able to
rise
to the occasion.” The off-camera crew starts laughing, and then they cut to the male host, who waits a beat to deliver the punch line. “Ladies and gentlemen, we just witnessed the night that Bright Boy”—pause … dramatic look to the camera—“became Bright Man.” Laughter, whoops, hollers, applause, then cut to commercial.

“So, you gonna listen to those idiots all morning, or are we gonna do this?” Louis asks. Louis Sullivan is our butler, trainer, confidant, and all-around voice-of-reason. He's six feet two inches tall, and about 260 pounds, with long hair and a handlebar mustache. He doesn't look particularly muscular. I mean, he's burly … he just looks like he's a little out of shape. Trust me. He's not.

At the moment, he's all geared up and standing in the middle of the boxing ring in Trent Clancy's in-home gym, Trent Clancy being Louis's boss, my legal guardian,
and the alter ego of Phantom Justice. “Come on, we gotta leave in forty minutes and I still gotta fry up those cutlets.”

Whenever I have a tough night, Louis packs my favorite lunch—a fresh chicken cutlet sandwich. It's usually still warm when I get to it. He knows that for the twenty minutes it takes for me to eat that sandwich, the only thing on my mind is the next bite.

“Fine,” I say, and reach to turn the TV off.

“Naw,” he says. “Leave it on.”

“Why? You want to see if it distracts me?”

He smiles. “Naw. You're Bright Boy … big time super hero. You can't be distracted by something as little as a TV, right?”

I don't answer him. Instead, I leap, do a somersault in the air, and land in the ring. I give him my most confident, determined look, to show him that I mean business. Louis isn't looking at me. He's too busy adjusting his pads.

Louis is a norm, so he's covered in special padding that replicates the physiology of a plus/plus. I don't have to hold back; I can go at him full-force and not worry that I'm going to hurt him. Me going full-force is the only way for him to get an accurate gauge of how I'm fighting.

“You ready?” he asks, looking up at me.

A loud spike of laughter comes from the TV. I look over.

“Come on, kid. Focus.”

I take a deep breath. Focusing right now is not going to be easy. But this is my time with Louis, and I look forward to it all week.

Plus, there's the possibility that I'll finally beat him.

I take another deep breath, shake my head, and get into my stance. Louis always says that even if you're not feeling confident, pretend like you are; your opponent won't know you're faking it. “OK, now I'm ready,” I say. “The question is, are
you
? Because today's the day I beat you. I can feel it.”

He laughs. “Big talk. You know, you've kissed this mat so many times, you should start introducing it as your girlfriend.”

“Ha, ha,” I say.

The rules are simple … the first person to subdue the other for three seconds wins, and anything in the ring—insults, dirty fighting—is fair game. We've been having these before-school sparring sessions twice a week since I was seven, and even though Louis isn't a plus/plus, I still haven't beaten him. Not once.

We circle each other. His stance is a hybrid of wrestling and Brazilian jujitsu, while I move around the ring more like a boxer, staying light on the balls of my feet. I have a speed and strength advantage, while Louis … well … Louis is Louis.

“You gonna throw that left jab,” he asks, “or you just going to keep twitchin' it at me?”

I grimace, and readjust. No sense trying to throw it now. I've tried my best to remove any little signals before I throw a punch, but I still have a small one. And it doesn't matter how small it is: If it's there, Louis will see it.

He takes a lunge step toward me, so I roundhouse kick with my right foot, but he sees that coming, too. When my foot comes down, he's already on the other side of the ring, smirking.

“You're getting better,” he taunts. “You only telegraphed that kick by half a mile instead of your usual mile.”

He's trying to annoy me … distract me … He plays this game really well, but I'm not going to let him today.

I rush him, hit him with a couple of quick shots to the chest, but the padding absorbs them. While my body is still moving forward on the last punch, he spins to my right and gets along side me.

“Ear,” he says, and pinches my right ear.

“Ow! Quit it!” I try to slap his hand away, but he's already gone. I have super-speed, and somehow he makes me seem slow. I can feel all the anger and frustration from last night start to bubble up. So much for focusing …

“Stop,” he says.

“What?” I practically yell back.

“Get control.”

“I have control!”

“Yeah. Obviously,” he says, sarcastically. “Come on stop. Take a deep breath.”

“Oh, and a deep breath is supposed to make it all better?” I yell. “I'm a nationwide joke right now! Do you know what that feels like?”

“Can't say that I do.”

“I embarrassed myself on national television!”

“Yeah. You did.”

“Oh, well great. Thanks a lot.”

“What do you want me to say?” he asks. “You want me to lie to you?”

“Maybe you could at least muster a ‘Hey, it's not that bad.'”

“Would that change anything?”

“It might,” I say, even though I know it wouldn't.

“Oh, so that would stop those people on TV from laughing at your picture right now?”

His eyes shift to the TV for half a second, but I refuse to look over. I can't tell if this is a sincere discussion, or if Louis is just trying to distract me. If he is, it's a pretty cheap shot. Then again, we are in the ring … and in the ring, there's no such thing as a cheap shot.

And now
not
looking at the TV is as distracting as looking at it, because either way, it's all I'm thinking about.

I turn my head and look at the TV.

That was a mistake.

“Ear,” he says, and tweaks my ear again.

“Ow! Why are you being such a jerk?”

“Because we're in the middle of a fight, and all you're concerned about is what those idiots on TV think of you. You're lucky I'm not a villain, kid. If this was a street fight, you'd be dead right now … twice. In the ring, you're supposed to have one thing on your mind, and one thing only: me.”

“Fine,” I bark. “You're on my mind, OK? Is the lecture over now?”

Louis pauses, looking at me with contempt. “Forget it. You wanna have that kinda attitude, find someone else to train you. I'm through.” Louis turns his back to me and walks over to the corner of the ring.

At first, I don't know what to do. Does he mean he's through for the day, or through for good? Then I realize I don't care. He's still being a jerk, I'm still angry, and we're still in the ring … and when we're in the ring, there's no such thing as fighting dirty. I rush him.

He still has his back to me. I'm about to hit him when, at the last second, he ducks. I miss him by a fraction of an inch. When I turn back to him, he's smiling.

“All right!” he says sincerely. “That's what I want to see.”

“Cheap shots?”

“Come on, kid. We've been over this. This isn't a high school football game or a spelling bee. In your line of work, there's no such thing as a cheap shot.”

I give him a half smile.

“Plus, take away cheap shots and you'd have no shot at winning at all,” he says, then laughs and walks to the other side of the ring.

I speed over to him. I'm still smiling, but I want to make him eat that laugh. Unfortunately, my anxiousness puts me a little off balance. Louis does a simple little sweep kick (actually more of a trip than a kick) and suddenly, I'm tumbling past him. I spring back up quickly and dive at him, but once again, I'm off-balance. Louis uses my
momentum to carry me up and over. In half a second, I'm on my back with Louis's knees on my shoulders and his hands under my chin. My strength and speed mean absolutely nothing in this position. I have no leverage. I'm squirming, but it's not accomplishing anything; my body is moving around, but he has my head.

“One, two, two-and-a-half, two-and-three-quarters … three.” Louis lets go and stands up. I don't move. I just lie there on the mat, staring up at the ceiling.

“A couple of more seconds and I could've gotten out of that,” I protest feebly.

“Riiiight,” he says. “So, what have we learned here today?”

I sigh. “That speed and strength don't mean anything without good technique,” I say as if reading a cue card.

“And?”

“Cheap shots are good, but not always effective.”

“And?”

“I can't always tell when you're testing me or just being a jerk.”

Louis leans over so that his face is in my line of sight. “Yeah, I know … it sucks. But it's my job, y'know? I gotta get inside your head, and then pick at the things that bother you. It's the only way to keep you sharp.”

“Yeah … I know …”

“There's jackals all around you, Scott. They're gonna pick you apart, they're gonna call you names and laugh at you for every little mistake you make. And you're human, so of course it's gonna get to you. And they'll use that to distract you, to make you emotional. And what happens when you fight while distracted and emotional?”

“I lose.”

“Badly. I don't enjoy what I gotta do to you, but I know I gotta do it, because I don't like to think about what might happen to you if I don't.” Suddenly his eyes get a little glassy, as if he might be tearing up a bit. I look away. I can't watch Louis get emotional, especially after the night I've had. Just the thought of him being upset enough to actually cry is threatening to send me right over the edge. I think he realizes this, because when I sneak a peek back at him, his usual mildly amused expression has returned. “All right … I think that's enough for today,” he says gruffly.

I pick myself up off the mat and start walking for the ropes.

“Whoa, wait a second,” he says. “Where's my prize?”

“Oh, come on … seriously? Every time?”

“Every time you lose. And don't pretend like you wouldn't do the same to me.”

He's right. I would do the exact same thing … if I ever actually won, that is.

“Fine,” I say, and roll my eyes.

“Come on. Nice and loud.”

“Louis Sullivan is the best fighter in the whole, wide world,” I say loudly, but with as little enthusiasm as possible.

“And?”

“And he makes the best pancakes ever, in the history of pancakes.”

“Now
that
part of my job, I enjoy,” he says.

Half an hour later, I'm in the kitchen, freshly showered and dressed in my school uniform (khakis, white shirt, navy blue sweater with an important-looking-but-meaningless crest over my heart). I'm picking half-heartedly at Louis's famous pancakes while watching the same morning crew from before find new reasons to laugh at my picture.

“If it bothers you so much, why don't you turn it off?” Louis asks as he bustles around the kitchen, putting the finishing touches on my lunch.

“I guess I keep hoping that the next time they'll stop the tape after I save the woman.”

“Yeah, not likely. Look, kid, sorry to say it, but you
saving some random woman isn't news anymore. You giving a ‘below the belt salute' is.”

“Don't you think that's pretty pathetic?” I ask.

Louis just shrugs. “It is what it is,” he says.

“What does that even mean, ‘It is what it is'?” I snap.

Louis looks at me. “It means that the world is full of people that nobody cares about. That woman you saved? Nobody, outside of her family and friends, knows or cares about her. So why would people care that you saved her? Just another anonymous person they'll never meet. But you on the other hand … they know you.”

“No, they don't.”

“Yeah, they do. They watched you grow up from some cute little kid taking out bad guys three times his size—”

“—to some teenager wearing tights two sizes too small,” I say.

“Well … yeah. You're a celebrity, kid. No one wants to hear about all the people you save. They already know that about you. They want to hear about your faults. In other words, it is—”

“—what it is. Got it. Doesn't mean I have to like it.”

“Nobody said you did.”

I sigh. “At least admit that I need a new costume.”

Louis pauses. “Yeah,” he finally agrees.

“Trent won't ever go for it, will he?”

“He might,” he says, without meeting my eyes. “Now come on. You're gonna be late for school.”

Louis doesn't say much as he drives me to school, which is good, because I'm not much in the mood for conversation. I know today's going to be a disaster, and I'm trying my best to mentally prepare for it. The bottom line is that I need a new costume. I'm not a kid anymore. I can't keep running around the city in neon yellow tights. They're embarrassing. In fact, the whole outfit—tights, red cape, and mask—is embarrassing. But how do I convince Trent? I've already tried a million times, and I don't have a ton of hope for the millionth-and-first time.

I also can't help thinking about what Louis said earlier, about saving the woman not being a story anymore. He's right. It's starting to feel like the public just assumes that Phantom and I are going to save the day. I mean, we still make the news when we take out some jewel thieves, or stop some plus/plus idiot from throwing a bank teller off a building, but the public just doesn't seem as “in love” with us as they used to be. Maybe Phantom and I are just the victims of our own success. We always win. We've become predictable.