Villainous (17 page)

“Everyone left without me,” said Rose.

“Rose, were you invisible?”

Rose nodded.

“Oh, Rose. How many times do I need to tell you—no one can help you if they can’t see you, sweetheart.”

“Daniel found me,” said Rose. “He walked me home.”

Rose’s mom looked up at Daniel as if noticing him for the first time. “Daniel! Oh well, thank goodness for that! I feel like I should offer you a reward.”

“Oh, don’t worry about it, Mrs. Rodriguez,” said Daniel. “It was on my way.”

“Come on, then, Rose,” said Rose’s mom, shooing her
into the kitchen. “Let’s get you something to eat. You must be starving.”

Rose and her mother disappeared and left Daniel with Louisa. It was the first time they’d actually been alone together since the infamous kiss.

“Thanks for bringing Rose home,” she said. “Mom was really worried. I’m in loads of trouble for coming home without her.”

“No problem,” said Daniel.

“Do you want to take a walk?” she asked.

“Oh, why?” Daniel said, feeling a warmth rise to his cheeks. “I mean if you want to.”

Louisa made a face, and brought her hand up to her nose. “It’s just … Have you been rummaging through garbage or …”

“Huh? Oh! We were in the junkyard!” After a day spent with Bud, and being tossed around the junkyard, Daniel could only imagine how he smelled. Actually, he didn’t have to imagine; all he had to do was lift his shirt to his nose to get a whiff.

“Sure, let’s walk,” said Daniel, anxious now to get outside. No wonder Mrs. Rodriguez had taken Rose away so fast.

They stepped outside as Daniel apologized for the stink.

“Don’t worry about it,” said Louisa. “But I guess you probably should be getting home.”

“Yeah. My parents kind of freak out these days if I’m even a minute late.”

“I know the feeling. C’mon, I’ll walk you down the block.”

They crossed the Rodriguezes’ immaculately manicured lawn in silence and turned onto the street. The street lights would be buzzing to life soon.

“So, did they fight?” asked Louisa. “Eric and Drake?”

“Sort of,” said Daniel. “In the end it was Supers versus Nobles, thanks to Mollie leaping into it.”

Daniel saw Louisa stiffen at the mention of Mollie’s name. What was going on between those two?

“But Drake and his Nobles, they kind of kicked the Supers’ butts.”

Louisa looked shocked. “Is everyone okay?”

“I think so. Johnny showed up and put an end to it before it got too serious, I think.”

“Wow,” said Louisa. “How old is he now?”

“Gotta be nearly a hundred. But you’d never know it.”

“Where’s he been all this time?” said Louisa. “And why’d he come back now?”

“He’s not what we thought,” Daniel said. “He’s trying to do some good, I think. At least I hope he is. But Johnny’s no superhero. He’s not a villain either. He’s just a guy who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Johnny had said almost those exact words to Daniel once before, and Daniel supposed he was finally coming to accept it. Johnny had been a real hero the night of the St. Alban’s fire. He’d rushed into a burning building to save
those kids, but did that mean he had to be a hero forever? Daniel wondered if anyone had what it takes to live up to that kind of expectation their whole life, especially when they lived to be a hundred.

But Johnny wasn’t what either one of them wanted to be talking about. Not really. They walked together for a while longer before Daniel finally worked up the courage to apologize. In some ways, it was harder than facing down the Shroud.

“Louisa, I’m sorry I … haven’t been around. Haven’t called or anything.”

“Okay.”

“It’s just that, we’re such great friends, and I don’t know if being more than that is a good idea.”

Louisa surprised him with a laugh. “You are something else, Daniel Corrigan.”

“Wha— Huh?”

“All this time, you’ve been avoiding me because you didn’t want to be my boyfriend?”

“Well … Uh.”

“Did I ever ask you to be my boyfriend?”

“No. I guess not.”

“You’re cute, Daniel. Cuter than you think, but here you are walking around telling everyone you’re the world’s greatest detective and you don’t have a clue.”

“Hey, I never said I was the world’s greatest anything!” said Daniel. Then, “You really think I’m cute?”

Louisa took Daniel’s hand in hers. “We, all of us, all the Supers, owe you so much. You stuck your neck out for us again and again, and I will always be thankful. But I gave up on the idea of us being more than friends months ago. I moved on, Daniel.”

“But …” Although Daniel tried to catch up with what Louisa was saying, it wasn’t working. His brain had gone sluggish on him. “But then why have you been acting all mad at me?”

Louisa let go of his hand, and did a very Mollie thing. She punched him. In the arm, and a lot more playfully than Mollie would’ve, but it still smarted.

“Hey!”

“I’ve been mad at you because you will barely look at me! We were friends before we kissed, and I was hoping we would be friends after, Daniel.”

“Of course! No, Louisa, of course I want to be friends. That was exactly my point, I just—”

“—walked around for the last six months thinking I was pining away for you? Afraid to talk to me because you didn’t want to break my fragile heart?”

“Eh, when you put it like that …”

“Promise me you won’t be this thickheaded again, Daniel. Promise me that we are still friends, okay?”

“I promise.”

“And promise me that you won’t act like a wood post with the next girl you kiss.”

“Okay. I guess.”

Louisa took Daniel’s hand again in hers, and this time, she shook it. “Settled,” she said. “We’re friends. Now I better get back.”

“Okay.”

Louisa smiled and began walking toward her perfect white house. She hadn’t gone very far, though, before she called over her shoulder. “I hope you two know what you’re getting into,” she said. “You’re both bordering on hopeless!”

You two?
What was she talking about?

She left Daniel standing on the side of the street, happy that they were friends again, but more confused than ever.

Rohan had been right, and the fight in the junkyard had earned two weeks of detentions, plus probation, for every academy student present. Days passed and there were no more attacks, and Daniel began to think Simon might have been right about the Nobles—he should just let Johnny sort them out. For once, it looked like someone else would end up saving the day.

Meanwhile, if there was a soul left in Noble’s Green who didn’t know by now that Johnny Noble was the academy’s principal, that person had to be living in a cave. After Johnny’s flashy appearance at the junkyard, plenty of parents heard about Principal Noble, and it didn’t take long for
people to put two and two together. Every day the papers were filled with wild speculations about Johnny: Was this the original Johnny Noble, and if so, where had he been all these years? Why was he here now? Did he even have a degree in education?

Thus far, Johnny had turned down all interview requests, and the academy had made it very clear that the school was a reporter-free zone. Nevertheless, cell phone videos of Johnny began popping up online with the tag
Nobleacademy
or
Johnnylives
. But from what Daniel could see, they were all rather disappointing videos of Johnny telling students to run to class, or to put away their phones. It turned out that being a super-principal looked pretty much like being an ordinary principal.

Meanwhile, Mollie began falling behind again in Smiley’s history class. Although she wasn’t a student at the academy, and therefore Johnny couldn’t punish her for her part in the junkyard brawl, she still seemed depressed. She and Daniel kept up their tutoring sessions when they could find the time, but Mollie’s heart wasn’t in it, and more and more of their study sessions ended with her shouting and Daniel getting bruised. All they did was argue.

Whether this was because of the pressure of the upcoming final or because of her fight with Louisa, Daniel wasn’t sure. But he couldn’t forget what Louisa had said, or at least what he’d thought she’d said.
I hope you two know what you’re getting into
. Who? He and Mollie? Did Louisa think there
was something going on between them more than friendship? That was absurd. That was ludicrous. That was … all Daniel could think about.

Without the Nobles to worry about, Daniel’s mind needed something new to obsess over, and that new thing turned out to be Mollie.

What if? What if instead of hitting him all the time, Mollie kissed him instead? His kiss with Louisa had been nice, if a bit terrifying and sweaty, and he couldn’t help but suspect that kissing Mollie would be even nicer. He thought about it—a lot. He thought about it when he was supposed to be writing down Smiley’s notes from the board; he thought about it when he was yelling at Georgie for playing in Daniel’s room without asking. His imagination was so preoccupied with the dream Mollie that it was always a guilty shock to see the real Mollie in person. Like a criminal with a secret, he became paranoid and worried that she might somehow read his mind and see all those thoughts—those kissing thoughts, those fantasies where he was the one saving her for once. And what would she think then? Something had happened between Mollie and Louisa, and maybe it had to do with Daniel, but then again maybe it hadn’t. How was he to know?

In the end, and with only one day to go before the big final, Daniel put down his books and consulted the wisest person he knew. It was time for some love advice.

It was well past dinnertime when Rohan came online. It seemed detention at the academy was no laughing matter. Daniel had just finished spilling his guts to Rohan, and was anxiously watching the little word bubble on his computer screen for his friend’s reply. He steeled himself for any number of possible reactions. It could be disbelief. More likely, Rohan would just laugh in Daniel’s face and hit him with an array of snarky emoticons.

“So?” Daniel finally typed after a minute of watching the screen for nothing.

“So what?” came Rohan’s reply. “So, how’s detention? Terrible. Eric pouts while Drake passes notes to his idiot friends. Think they are drawing unflattering pictures of me to kill time.”

“About Mollie,” typed Daniel. He suspected Rohan was trying to give him a heart attack.

“Oh. Well, I think I’ve been waiting for this to happen since, like, that first day at the bus stop.”

“Wait,” typed Daniel. “This is a new thing!”

“No, it’s not,” came Rohan’s reply. “Doesn’t take super-senses to see that Mollie and you have something between you. Always have. By the way, this chat is boring boring boring.”

Daniel ignored the last part. “So you think she likes me?”

“Ask her,” came the reply.

“You crazy?”

“Nope. Man up. Ask her.”

“Ask her?” Daniel said out loud. Was Rohan crazy? Had the academy driven him insane? What a stupid idea.

“Ask her!” he said again.

“Ask who what?” said a voice from outside the open window.

Mollie was floating there with her head cocked at Daniel like a confused puppy.

“Why are you talking to your computer?” she asked. “You on with Eric and Rohan?”

“What? No!” said Daniel, closing the chat window just as Rohan was describing the various ways that talking to Mollie might lead to kissing Mollie. Nope, no way Mollie could see that. Uh-uh.

Then Daniel powered down his computer for good measure.

“Okay,” said Mollie. “What’d you shut down your computer for? Afraid I’d see your ‘Nerdy Friends of Sherlock Holmes’ website?” Mollie let herself in (through the window) and sat down on the edge of his bed.

“Ha-ha,” said Daniel. “ ‘Nerdy Sherlock’ website. Good one.”

“You know, that wasn’t a laugh-with-you kind of joke; that was a laugh-
at
-you kind of joke. You’re in a weird mood, aren’t you?” She tossed a pillow at him, which Daniel barely managed to catch. He gave her a kind of shrug/nod. Staying nonverbal felt like the best strategy for the time being.

Mollie didn’t bother to remove her backpack, which she had slung over her shoulder. She just sat there on the bed, watching him. He’d never really noticed before, but her eyes were so dark in this light. It made her look exotic.

Exotic?
His brain needed to shut up.

Daniel tried to act casual, but he no longer had any idea what to do with his body. It was like an alien thing to him, awkward and ungainly. He stood up and tried to lean against his bookshelf, in the kind of cool, relaxed pose he’d seen Eric use so many times. Maybe it was because Daniel was still holding the pillow she’d tossed at him, or maybe it was just the fact that he would never be cool, but he ended up looking like a toddler sent to the corner, clutching his comfort pillow. His leg was starting to cramp, but he didn’t want to change position again. He was fidgeting enough as it was.

“Daniel, seriously, are you okay?” she asked. “Why are you standing like that?”

“Just getting comfortable,” he said as he shifted the pillow to his other arm. Why was he still holding that stupid pillow?