October 31, 2011
Greetings from my secret identity,
The sign on the door said “Open” but the building hinted
otherwise. No lights shown in side, no
sign of anyone around, dried leaves gathered in drifts around the door. It was a narrow storefront, three panels of
glass, frosted halfway up to obscure the interior. The small wooden sign bolted to the brick
below the glass had two words:
Superpower Store
I pushed the door open, heavy wooden frame, leaded glass, so
heavy I only got the door partway open, and had to reset my feet to push the
rest of the way in.
The man behind the counter was leaning on his elbows, head
down over a newspaper, idly flipping the pages.
In one hand he held an unlit cigarette.
“Afternoon.” I said,
walking across the wooden floor, the boards creaking. “Kinda quiet here today.” I ran my hands over some boxes on the counter
and looked at the dust on my fingers.
The man looked up. “Yah.
Usually Halloween is packed, but funny, all the kids want to be ‘Angry Birds’ or
Sara Palin. Not much call for all this.”
He waved one hand vaguely at his inventory and went back to his paper.
“Yeah.” I forced a little laugh, which sounded forced and
little. “So, you sell, ..uh, ..”
“Superpowers. Yessss,
you can say it. If you’re in here it’s
not a joke. Yes I sell superpowers.
What’d you have in mind?” He licked his thumb and turned a page.
I smiled a little sheepishly, watched my toes for a minute,
“Well, I don’t know, I just …”
“You know, don’t kid me.” he said, not looking up from his
paper. “Look, all the good stuff is
mostly taken; invisibility, elasticity, telekinesis, along with being able to
leap tall buildings.” He looked up
suddenly. “And don’t even ask me about X-ray
vision.”
“Ok, ok!” I said and I held my hands out in defense, and
looked directly at him. “That’s too
bad. I was kind of hoping, maybe, that I
could turn into fire, or run super fast.
Maybe have incredible strength.”
The memory of the front door taunted me.
He leaned on his hands now, stuck his chin out a bit as he
talked. “You guys all want to be heroes
or something. Superpowers won’t make you
heroic. If you’re a jerk, you just
become a super jerk.”
I waited a second, pressing my lips, trying not to say the
first thing on my mind. “Seems like you should know me a little better before
you insult me.” I said, already wishing
I had a superpower of some lethal ilk.
Wishing I didn’t already think he was right.
“Sorry, I just get a little…” he was shaking his head. He waved the unlit cigarette at me as an
explanation. “Well, I can show you what
I’ve got. I might have something’ll
fit.”
I glanced around the room, hooks holding leather helmets,
wings, metal breastplates, bright uniforms on hangars, and capes
everywhere. I almost pointed to a shark
fin cap.
He pawed around behind the counter and then brought out a
cardboard box, flipped open the flaps and pulled out a costume with a bold “I”
on the front. My heart skipped a beat.
“How about this?” he said.
“Ironic Man.” He looked at me and
smiled. “Only problem with this
superpower is your always explaining yourself, it’s kind of a pain.” My shoulders drooped, hoping for
invincibility.
He slid the box aside and pulled out a smaller box with bright
orange gloves. “This is pretty cool,
these gloves give you the power to hold really hot objects in your hands.”
I pulled them on, felt no real difference in my powers. “Aren’t these just potholders?” I asked.
He shrugged. I was growing impatient,
wishing Apple had a superpower franchise.
“What are those boxes in that big pile?” I asked. Dozens of identical boxes stood stacked
nearly to the ceiling.
“Kinda forgot about those, not many people ask about those
superpowers.” He pulled a few boxes and
held them up to the light to read the label.
“This one is ‘Patience’. I remember selling a lot of those, but not
lately. And this one,” he held up
another larger box in his other hand, “this one is ‘Compassion’. Not many orders for these either. Comes with an Empathy Cape.” He looked at me, his eyebrows up hopefully.
I waited, still hoping for something incendiary, or
involving laser vision or blades that shot from my wrists, or time travel, or anything
super-duper.
“Well, now, here we
go. Here’s some that I think would work
for you.” he said. “Odd, these always get returned by little
kids, never really understood why. Right
about when they become teenagers and want X-ray vision.” He chuckled.
He turned the small box around and showed it held a signet
ring with the letter ‘A’ on it.
“What is it?” I asked, hoping for Astral Projection or
something.
“I should warn you, this is a superpower many people cannot
handle right at first. It is hard,
especially for guys your age. You have
to take it slow, give yourself some time to adjust. I’m just letting you know, it changes
things.”
I felt something run up my spine and tickle the hair on the
back of my neck, and my heart rate climbed.
“What is it? What superpower does it have?” I almost whispered.
“Awe.” he said,
holding the ring out toward me.
Just holding it, I could feel my first reaction slip
away, feel the cynical impulse ebb, the sarcastic thought disappear. I slipped the ring on my finger and something
tipped over in my head, and my vision blurred, and then became clear, almost
painfully clear.
The room suddenly was brighter, the sound of the ceiling
fan louder, the warmth more intense. The
man behind the counter seemed taller, I noticed him. There was a look on his face that was not
there before, a subtle look of wisdom.
I looked at my hands with wonder, the intricate lines,
the incredible coordination of sinew, muscle, bone as they worked together
flexing, the ring glinting in the light, a perfect fit on my finger.
Shadow and light stood out to astonish me, every texture,
every mote of dust in the air, every cobweb was miraculous. I stood in the middle of the shop looking
around me in wonder, and I found I was holding my breath.
I moved toward the door and could not wait to see how it
opened, and then felt the fresh crisp air rush in around me, the smell of the
season, the feel of change in nature.
Sounds came pouring in to me, astonishing, I could almost see the waves
in the air from a car honking its horn.
“Wow.” I said, my voice with a new timbre I had never
felt.
The man from the store was next to me his hand on my
shoulder, his other hand holding out a pair of chrome plated goggles, tiny ‘A’
embossed on them. “You may want these at
first.” He said. “Blocks out a little of what you see. It’s too amazing out there to take it all in
at once.” I took the goggles and let
them dangle from my fingers.
I stepped out into the street and watched the world
unfold in front of me, the incredible colors in the trees, the cotton sky, the
complexity of the plants, the richness of the brick, the grain in every piece
of wood. Architecture stood out, the
plan and order and creativity of someone expressed in the buildings around
me.
I walked for miles, astonished, my mouth open, unable to
express myself at the wonder around me,
nature, things growing, evolving, passing on and becoming part of the next
things. People moving, interacting,
expressing, each of them miraculous, almost impossible to believe. I felt the gentle rush of the earth spinning
beneath me, gravity holding me in perfect balance.
“Wow.” I whispered. I blinked and the world rushed back
at me, and I knew I would never want to go to sleep, never go inside, never
leave this moment. I felt the connection
between things, the sense of it, the beauty in flaws, understood that I did not
need to understand what laughter meant, the purpose of black holes and the origin
of anything, only that it existed and it poured into me and around me and I
could feel it lifting me.
I opened my arms wide, felt the air course by me, and I
flew into creation.
Hope this finds you powerful,
David
Copyright © 2011 David Smith
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