9. Xylophone Vision
After getting wet for the second time today, I hastily swim to shore, not wanting to spend any more time in the water than I have to. The water is absolutely freezing! It doesn't make sense that it is, too, because the sun has been out all day. That, you would think, would have resulted in some raise in water temperature. But it hasn't.
I haul myself from the water just before Josh does. I can see by the tight lipped peeved look that Josh is giving me that he is not happy. Well, if I hadn't of pushed him, he was gonna push me. Serves him right.
"You pushed me."
I grin at him. "Yeah, well, a train was coming. Technically speaking, I saved your life..."
Josh groans. "But... pushing you off was my job!" I burst into laughter and he looks at me in confusion, before eventually joining me.
"Okay, I forgive you, man."
The rest of the week goes by in normal slow-mo, class after class, hour after hour. It wasn't until Saturday morning that anything really interesting started happening again.
I was eating a late breakfast – closer to lunch than breakfast, when Amy sprints up the stairs into the house, a pile of mail in hand.
"Yo, mortal!" she says, flinging an envelope at my head. "Mail!" I catch it in mid-air and inspect it carefully over my bowl of cornflakes. It was blank, apart from my name on the front, written in plain, nondescript writing.
"Suspicious..." I mutter, before placing it carefully on the table beside me and finishing my breakfast. I grab the letter and am about to head back to my room, when my cell phone rings. I hastily remember to make sure my hand is not buzzing with static electricity before answering it. I've been getting better at the art of not shocking everything, but I still slip-up heaps.
"Tim!" Josh yells at me through the phone's tiny speaker. "You have to come over to my place, man!"
I raise an eyebrow. "Since when do you make phone calls? I thought you were a text only guy?"
"Tim, you have to come over, trust me. You want to."
"Oh really?" I pour fake sarcasm into my voice, before cracking up into laughter.
"Yes, really. I would tell you why you should come over, but," the tone of his voice changes to a hushed whisper, "my sister is standing right here."
"Okay dude." I grin to myself, barely containing my excitement. "I'm coming." I finish, before ending the call. I bet Josh is rolling his eyes like mad right now. But I don't care. I'm too happy for that.
I manage to arrive at the apartment building where Josh lives 15 minutes later without getting mugged or running into someone getting mugged. It's a great achievement, I know.
"Hey Josh!" I huff, as he opens the door. "Hey Julia!" I say, layering fake surprise into my voice.
"Why are you breathing heavily?" Julia asks me.
"Did you run all the way here or something?" Josh asks. I wink at him and he groans. We wander off to his room, and once the door is shut firmly behind us, I pull the envelope from my back pocket.
"What's that?" Josh asks.
"It's a fairly suspicious looking letter, addressed to none other than me. Wanna open it?" I offer it to Josh and he quickly snatches it from my hands and rips it open. I laugh at his eagerness. "Easy." I mumble, and he rolls his eyes. He pulls out an equally suspicious looking note, along with several fifty dollar bills.
"Money!" He cries, like an excited child and I sigh and signal with my hand for him to hand it over. He shakes his head, so I sigh and leap at him tackling him into his bed.
"Hey!" He cries as I wrestle with the money in his hands. "You're..." He tries to push me away, but I don't even budge. "...really strong." He finishes, before handing over the money in defeat. "I was kidding, man." I laugh and roll my eyes, hopping off him and carefully expecting the bills. "Who is it from?" Josh asks.
"Dunno. Pass me the note?" I take it from his hands and give it a once over, before deciding to read.
Tim.
This is a little reward for risking your life to save mine the other night. You would make a good superhero, if you ever feel like doing more than saving the occasional guy from being robbed on a Tuesday night. I'm not kidding, kid. You would probably last several weeks longer than our city's previous hero... okay, I'm kidding on the last bit. You might live a little longer than that. I take it you've watched enough superhero movies to know the whole great power responsibility bull, so I won't pleasure myself by reciting it for you. Take care and try to spend the money wisely. Seriously. Wisely.
- Roy.
"Who the hell is this Roy fella?" Josh asks, from over my shoulder. I shrug, before realising that I never actually told him about saving that guy from getting mugged last Tuesday. I tell him and he listens to the story with fascination. He nods when I finish. "Interesting... Hey! I know!"
A good way to describe the excitement in his voice would be to say it was positively terrifying. "You know what..." I'm really hoping he doesn't suggest we go bridge jumping again. I may have mentioned this before, but it was truly horrible. Truly.
"I know what to do with the money. All superheroes need an outfit, right?"
"Right..." I nod along with him, not really seeing where this is going or why it's so exciting.
"What I'm saying is, dude, we should go buy you one!"
It's not a bad idea, I suppose. I was gonna buy myself an outfit anyway – before I realised that I was outta money. As I said before – making costumes is for those skilled in the oh so manly talent of not stabbing yourself with a needle. I shrug, causing Josh to whoop with excitement.
Suddenly the door opens and Josh quickly ceases his voice. Julia pops her head in. "Dad wanted to tell you guys that you are making too much noise and are interrupting his business work." She gives us a once over with her eyes, before frowning at us. "Why are you smiling innocently at me like that for?"
"Er..." I nervously scratch the back of my neck and feel a blush redden my cheeks. "Nothing..." Josh opens his mouth to speak, and I internally groan. Please don't tell her, please don't tell her, she's a woman and she'll probably get really over excited if you say we're going shopping, please don't tell...
"Me and Tim were about to go shopping." Josh blurts. Damn him! I moan in frustration and smash my hands down on his desk, ripping off the corner. Julia and Josh look at me in slight shock, before looking causally away as if nothing happened.
"Is this another one of Tim's powers?" Julia asks. Josh shrugs.
"Probably."
"Anyway, what were you saying about going shopping?" she asks.
"Nothing," I but in, "Josh was kidding." Julia doesn't need to know about me and Josh going superhero outfit shopping, she'll probably freak out and demand to come and help or something. Don't get me wrong, I don't have anything against going on an outing with Julia, but shopping? She'll probably try to spend all our money on shoes or something equally less important and woman like.
"Oh, yeah! Julia! Guess what other superpower Tim has!" Josh looks pretty excited to tell her, and I shoot him a quick cut throat signal. He looks at me with confusion, and I groan.
"What?" Julia rolls her eyes at her twin's excitement. I groan internally. Josh better not tell her I have X-Ray vision, or at least something similar. She'll probably jump to the conclusion that I'm using it to look... at... her... I quickly look away from both of them, and choose to stare at the wall, instead.
"Tim has X..."
"Xylophone vision." I blurt out, turning back around to face them. What? I had to save my ass somehow...
"What?" Julia asks, bursting into laughter. "Xylophone vision! Tim, how does that even work? Is it like X-Ray vision, but it only works on xylophones?"
"Yep." I say, popping the 'p' and deciding to go along with her ridiculous assumption. "And, before you ask, yes, I have tried using it on things other than xylophones, and no, it didn't work."
"What?" Josh cries in outrage. "Tim is lying to you. It's X-Ray vision that he has, not xylophone vision."
"Josh," I groan. Julia bursts into an even more hysterical laughter than what she was managing before. "That's it." I fold my arms over my chest. "We're no longer going superhero outfit shopping."
"Ha!" Julia cries, "so you were going shopping."
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