Antiheroes 30

By the time Maggie had finished explaining her plan to Eric, she was so fired up she thought she could have run a lap of the city. Eric, however, didn’t seem to be feeling it.

“Superheroes?” His tone was doubtful.

“Yeah!” Maggie was not going to let him get her down. “We’ve got powers, haven’t we? We should use them for something important. With great power comes great responsibility.”

“I wouldn’t go ‘round saying things like that, if I were you. You might breach somebody’s copyright.” He grinned, though it faded away almost as quickly as it appeared.

Maggie laughed. “Good point. I guess I should probably come up with some original catchphrases.”

“Only need those if you’re actually going to do it,” he said.

“Of course I’m going to do it!” God, why was everyone always so negative?! They’d been the same when she said she was going to move to New York — that tone, that said this was a bad idea, but not one they really thought she would follow through with, so why even bother telling her the reasons it was actually a bad idea? She knew what she was doing. She knew what could go wrong, she weighed the options, she made a decision. Why did no-one seem to think she was capable of actually thinking things through?

“But,” he said. “That’s not, like. Superheroes aren’t real. You’d just be a vigilante.”

“So like Batman.”

“What? No, not like…” He stopped. “Batman didn’t have powers, for one thing.”

She was starting to like this guy. Too bad he was being such a buzzkill.

“What’s the problem, anyway? There’s laws against vigilantism to stop, like, lynch mobs and shit. We’re not going to do that. We’re just going to help people.”

“Um, so one, cut it out with the ‘we’ shit; and two, what if you make a mistake?”

“Man.” She shook her head. “There’s so many people doing bad out there, isn’t it good enough to try and do good?”

Eric wouldn’t meet her eyes. “I don’t know. I don’t know if it’s that easy.”

“So you’re not going to help me?”

“I can’t control this, Maggie. I don’t even really know what it is I did — if I did anything. How am I supposed to use that?”

“We can learn.”

“I don’t think so. Sorry. I don’t think it’s a good idea.” He stood, shaking his head.

Maggie panicked. She couldn’t lose another one.

“At least give me your number,” she said. “Stay in touch. You might change your mind.”

“I doubt it,” he said, but when she held out her phone, he took it and typed his number in.