The lights were back on in Stephanie’s house. She’d called her parents in Naples about the power mysteriously going off she had no idea why it was freaky, and they’d advised her to call the electric company and, once that didn’t help, an electrician.
Now the Reds sat around the living room. Priya wished they could go back to the child-like golden innocence of two days ago, when they would gather at Stephanie’s to watch movies or play super-powered soccer in the backyard. Now they were all together and there was no chance that anything harmless and fun was going to happen.
Rod was talking. Of course.
“If we wait too long,” he said, “they’ll do something else. Then they’ll have made two moves in a row. The balance will be thrown off. Chaos will reign. Dogs and cats will live together and make gross dog-cat babies.”
“The Blues might not do anything else,” said Priya. “Now they know that even a prank will lead to a serious fight.”
“So you’re saying we were right to fight back with physical violence? That’s very wise of you, Ya-Ya.”
“So what are we going to do to them?” asked Harry. This set off a new barrage of chatter, with Rod responding to every suggestion as if someone had put him in charge.
“We could, um, t.p. their house.”
“We’re not twelve, Steph, and this isn’t mischief night.”
“We could play music outside their window when they’re trying to sleep,” suggested Miguel.
“Better. That’s part of how they get confessions out of terrorists.”
“We could egg their cars.”
“What did I say, Stephanie? What did I say?”
“We could knock down a telephone pole,” said Jessica. “Take out their electricity.”
“Or,” Priya interjected before Rod could pass judgment on that idea, “we could not do anything.”
“Priya,” said Stephanie in the tone of a girl arguing about color schemes for a school dance. “Why do you keep saying things like that?”
“Because you all keep refusing to consider the obvious option of leaving the Blues alone.”
“They’re not going to leave us alone,” said Connor.
“You don’t know that.”
“But we do know,” grumbled Harry. “The Blues don’t have a Priya.”
She stood up. That was a good idea. Now they all had to look up at her, including Rod. “Guys,” she said. “Stop for one second and think. They knocked out our power, we attacked them, they fought back. If we do something to them, it’s not like we’re going to win. They’ll attack us, we’ll fight back, and so on and etcetera until someone gets hurt or we all get arrested.”
“I’d like to see them try,” muttered Rod. Was he talking about the cops?
“But if we leave them alone,” Priya continued, “maybe they’ll get the hint and leave us alone and we can all just live. Now, at the beginning, is when we can change the pattern. Please, all of you, think about it. Think about just living, not being afraid of the Blues. Electricity can stop your heart, you know. But that won’t happen if we just let each other live.”
Man. That felt good. The more Priya talked the more the words flowed, and when she glanced at her reflection in the window she saw that she looked good too—standing above everyone, obviously passionate. Nobody said anything, which was a good sign. If they weren’t at least a little bit convinced they’d all have erupted with comments. She really liked persuading people. Maybe she should become a politician or something.
“She’s right,” said Rod.
Priya had to fight to keep the surprise off her face.
“If we leave the Blues alone, maybe they’ll leave us alone too. Maybe they’re just that gentlemanly.” The chair he was sitting on was too small for him, but he leaned back in a way that made him seem comfortable in it anyway, his long legs sticking out in front. “Maybe the Blues won’t come to our home. Again. In the night. Again. And we can ‘just live’ like Priya Carpenter wants us to.”
There was something about Rod’s attitude that Priya had never seen on him before, and she didn’t like it. He still oozed ugly charisma, but now the tone of it was lower, more subdued. He had even used her actual name.
“But that puts it all on them, doesn’t it?” he continued. “They can come after us, or they can not. And we’ll have to wait. When the next fight comes—sorry, Priya, if the next fight comes—it’ll be their timing. It’ll happen where they choose. But we can deal with that. We’re the Reds, yeah? We’re the strong ones. We can take them even if they take us by surprise.”
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There were nods from the others, though no smiles.
“What I wonder, though, is what Priya will do.”
She blinked. “What?”
“I’m just wondering if you’ll fight with us when—sorry, if—the Blues attack us.”
“I don’t think they will. Danny—”
“Because you didn’t fight with us, last time. You stayed inside while we were getting ganged up on and shocked. Weren’t you worried about us, Priya? Electricity can stop your heart, you know.”
For a moment, she couldn’t breathe. Suddenly being the only person in the room who was standing up didn’t feel powerful or leader-like. Instead she felt examined, judged. “We weren’t… authorized to attack them like that. They played a prank. We’re the ones who made things violent.”
“She didn’t help, and afterwards she lectured us. That’s Priya—the one who wants to drain our blood away.”
“What? Rod, don’t be melodramatic. Guys, don’t let him manipulate you into being stupid by talking about blood like some sort of…”
But no one would look at her. No one but Connor. She met his eyes. Say something. If just one person supports me I won’t be the designated wrong-girl. Come on, say just one thing. Before it all sinks in and they start yelling at me, because they will, any second now they’ll finally open their mouths. She could feel the shouting hanging in the air like a storm about to break. Connor didn’t say anything.
She walked out of the room.
#
For a while Connor looked for Priya all around the house without success. Her car was still parked on the street so she hadn’t left. He was beginning to think she was hiding in a closet or something when he realized.
He found her on the roof at the back of the house facing the yard and woods. It looked a little bit like the view from the roof back at her house, and Connor wondered whether she found that comforting.
“Hey Connor,” she said without looking at him. She must have heard his footsteps on the shingles.
“Can I sit with you or is this a leave-me-alone-with-my-deep-thoughts situation?”
“Sure. Sit.” She sighed. “That came out snappy. I’m feeling bitter and bitter is a bad emotion on me. Please keep me company, Connor.”
He settled down beside her. They sat in silence for… a while. Minutes, or merely long awkward seconds. Finally Priya spoke. “I had a really good life, you know. If it had been up to me and not to random magic or whatever, I never would have ruined it.”
Connor hesitated—hesitated—put his hand on her shoulder. That seemed to have been the right move, because he felt her tense muscles relax. He rubbed her back, felt the hard bones of her spine through her thin shirt. Was it weird to find something sexy about a girl’s spine?
After a minute or so of that Priya sat up straight and stretched like a cat. Connor pulled his hand away. She met his eyes for the first time since he’d joined her on the roof.
“Kess once spent three days trying to beat one monster on a video game. I normally never watch her play because it seems like such a waste of time, but she was getting so frustrated it was bleeding into the rest of her life, making her touchy, and so I decided to watch and see what all the fuss was about.
“The monster was this gross tentacle thing. She told me one of the hardest parts was it didn’t have a front and back side like the other monsters so she couldn’t get behind it. She kept trying different tactics, different combinations of weapons, but every single time it slapped her down. I remember wondering why she didn’t just give up and spend some time outside instead.”
Connor considered that. “So right now, is it the situation as a whole that’s the video game boss or is it Rod?”
“I wish I could let it go,” she said. “I wish I could just spend some time outside.”
“Um, Priya?” He pointed at the sky above them.
“Metaphorically, Connor. But I can’t let him take us all where he’s going. I can’t. And it’s just… I’m asking people not to pointlessly fight each other. I’m self-evidently right, but people act like I’m saying something stupid. It’s sexist.”
“If you were a guy saying those things they’d be meaner about it.”
“So you say.” She shook her head. “The worst thing about Rod is he knows I’m not being stupid. He knows I’m right when I say his way is going to end with people getting hurt, he just doesn’t care. The worst thing about everyone else is that they go along with him without thinking. That’s what most people do, you know. Most people are just fitting-in machines. One loud person who actually chooses his own direction, like Rod, makes it seem like the way to fit in is to go his way, and everybody’s gears spin until they click on that direction. They don’t even think about it until we’re all marching off a—”
The words Connor had been holding in broke out, and the sound of them burned in his own ears as he said them. “Is that what you think of me, Priya?”
She blinked. “I wasn’t talking about you, Connor.”
“Don’t lie. You know you were. You definitely don’t think I’m someone who ‘chooses his own direction’ like Rod. Or yourself. Or Danny. So that makes me a fitting-in machine.”
“Well…” He could tell she was uncomfortable lying right after he’d called her out on it. “You do go along with Rod a lot of the time.”
“If I went along with you would you think I was a fitting-in machine’?”
“Connor…”
“You don’t want me to make my own decisions or to be my own man or any of that. You want me to agree with you.”
“Connor, if you really think about it you know things would be better if everybody listened to me instead of him.”
“Maybe so,” he said, “but then don’t pretend what you want is for everyone to be independent thinkers.”
And he stood up. If Priya had said something then he might have stayed, but she didn’t. He walked to the edge of the roof and stepped off of it.
###
PHONE CALL BETWEEN ELIAS KAPLAN AND JONATHAN AKIYAMA (TRANSCRIPT)
[E.K.] Um, hello?
[J.A.] Hello, Mr. Kaplan.
[E.K.] You’re Akiyama?
[J.A.] I am, Mr. Kaplan.
[E.K.] So are you the Gray Boss or something?
[J.A.] I am no one’s boss. We that you call “Grays” all want the same thing, and so we have no need of dominance hierarchies. I am more the center than the head.
[E.K.] Did you think that was informative? Because it wasn’t. If you’re not the boss, who are you?
[J.A.] I coordinate. When a decision must be made, I consolidate analyses to finalize a course of action.
[E.K.] So you’re the boss.
[J.A.] You are quibbling over terminology in an attempt to exert dominance.
[E.K.] Am I?
[J.A.] Soon enough, you’ll no longer want to.