Monday at school, I looked around in all of my classes, and it was only just before lunch that I saw him at the back of class, his English book propped up against his desk. There was no way he was reading a textbook that intently; he probably had a comic book inside it. I admired him for that. I lost him as we went in to lunch, but spotted his bright red hair over in a corner.

I didn’t know his name, but a friend of mine, Angie, said he was super smart and plus, I saw him alot down at the drugstore looking for comic books. That was good enough for me. “Hey.” I walked up to the table. Five boys were sitting there, all staring at a weird clump of metal and wires. I tried to get the attention of the ginger one. “Hey. I saw what you were reading in English today.”

“Go away.” A tiny kid with dark hair scowled at me. “No girls allowed.”

“Wasn’t talking to you.” I glared back at him. “Hey.” I stared at the red headed kid. “Everybody says you’re the kid to talk to about Supers.” That got his attention. In fact, all of the boys looked at me.

The ginger kid stared at me. “What’s it to you?”

“I’ve got some questions. About Supers.”

“Information requires advanced payment.” The tall one with freckles sounded like a dictionary. “What are you bringing to the negotiating table?”

“Skip it, Dennis.” The ginger kid rolled his eyes. “Look, whoever you are, we don’t talk about that stuff at school. I like all my clothes to stay in their proper places. You get me?” He grimaced. “You want answers? You figure out where to find me.” They all turned back to the contraption on the table.

“Kelly?” Angie grabbed my arm. “Come on. Let’s go eat so we can get in the jump rope line.” I’m almost positive I heard someone at the table laughing.

I had a pretty good idea of where to find the ginger kid. After school, I told Sydney that I’d be home for dinner, then went with Angie to her neighborhood. I found the drugstore, and went in. Sure enough, there were the boys, at the back. I marched up to them, smirking.

“Hey, guys, look. It’s the jump-roper.” The little dark haired one grinned up at me.

“Can it, Clive.” The ginger slapped a comic book into his hands. “This one’s yours. Go on.” He turned to me and held out his hand. “Chris Blue.”

“Tyler Kelly.”

“Tyler?”

“It’s a long story.” I sighed. “Can I ask you some questions, about Supers?”

A short kid with a pale buzz-cut walked up to me. “Look, we’re kind of in a hurry. Yes, our city has a Super. No, we don’t know who it is. Yet. We will though.” They shuffled up to the front of the store, paid for their comic books, and walked out. I stared after them. That was more than I’d hoped for. They didn’t even charge me for it.

That response hung in my head all the next day. On Wednesday, I pulled out my “Supers:...” book and put it in my knapsack with my school book. Chris Blue and his friends wouldn’t let me sit at their lunch table, but I figured could meet them at the drugstore.

I was skeptical about what that kid had said. A Super in Dalton City? I mean, I wanted it to be true. But wanting something, and it being real are two different things. They hadn’t said anything else to me, but with a secret that big I guess you can’t just go around telling anyone. I certainly wasn’t about to take my encyclopedia and show it to them.

It made me a little bit scared to hear that we did have a Super. Allegedly. It reminded me of that time that Dad and I helped that dog at the park; what if the Super, whoever he was, was clairvoyant? And could read our minds? And that’s why we hadn’t found him? And that’s why our town was so calm and quiet? He could read the villains minds too?

I almost walked past the entrance of the drugstore. I was thinking too much, and making too many guesses. The Super could be a woman. I figured it wouldn’t hurt to at least ask the fellows for more information.

I picked up a blue notebook on my way to the back of the store, and looked around for the fellows. Only Dennis, the one with the glasses, was there. “Where is everyone?”

“We only send out an expeditionary force on Wednesdays.”

“What?”

He rolled his eyes. “Comic books are pretty sold out on Wednesdays. We only send out one person to check the shelves.”

“Oh. I had some questions for Chris, or anyone.”

“Well, Chris isn’t available. You can’t come to where he is. Find him at lunch tomorrow.”

“But I brought this all the way over!” I pulled my Super dictionary out of my bag. “And I have questions!”

“Lunch, tomorrow.” Dennis turned back to the shelves. I stood around for a few minutes, hoping he might turn back around, or even pick up a comic book so I could get an idea of what they were looking for, but after a few minutes and some disappointed growling, he left. So did I.

I watched the news that night, my eyes peeled for anything about a Super. Nothing. The only remotely interesting piece of information was that Mr. Left, Dalton City’s richest citizen, was giving a ton of money to help “renovate our illustrious city’s most prized public venue, Serendipity Park.” It sure needed it. I bet even Mr. Left was tired of how the swings would break and sit you on the ground every time you tried to take a peaceful swing. I couldn’t get any thinking done there anymore.

Mr. Left was a nice man. I fed his cats most days, because his housekeeper, Ms. Higley, was kind of allergic to the brand of cat food that Mr. Left used. It was awkward because any normal person would just switch brands, but Mr. Left had endorsed or advertised that particular brand of cat food. Something like that. I didn’t really understand the whole thing; Ms. Higley was sneezing a lot as she explained. It was a rich person’s problem, but it paid me well.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

On Monday, I went back to the drug store. All of the fellows were there, looking at their books. I had brought my dictionary of Supers with me to show to Chris Blue, who was talking with the blond kid. I waited. Donny came up to me. “Have you got bus fare?” I looked into my bag and pulled out a dollar. “Good. As soon as everyone has made their purchase, we’ll leave.”

The fellows all went up to the counter to pay for their comic books. I couldn’t remember if I’d told Syd that I was going to be home late today. I followed the boys out of the store down to the bus stop. We hopped on and soon we were headed downtown. I didn’t think my parents would like me doing this, but whenever I went to the park, I saw a lot of kids there by themselves. Anyways, my parents weren’t around to take me to the park. And thirteen is old enough to ride the bus alone. I think. And I wasn’t alone, not really.

Anyways, we got off the bus at Serendipity Park. Boy, did it need Mr. Left’s money. Chris Blue led us to a heap of sticks and branches, which we all crawled under. There was kind of an open circle, covered by branches and leaves, and the fellows all sat down and pulled out their comic books. Dennis sighed. “How unfortunate that Mr. Left is cleaning up this park. We’ll need to find another rendezvous spot.”

Peach slapped one of his comic books on the ground. “Mega-man found a new hideout after his old one was destroyed. There’ll be another place for us.”

“Yeah, Peach. Get out the plans.” Chris cleared out a spot in the middle. Peach pulled a huge sheet of paper out of his knapsack and spread it out. It was a plan for the new park, but shakier, more wobbly. Like they'd laid a piece of paper on top of the original plans and traced with with a pencil.

The motto across the bottom read “Turn Left for Serendipity.” Grown-ups are weird. “There.” Chris pointed. “That could work.”

“A gazebo? That would be hard to get into without being seen.”

Clive glared at me. “You got any better ideas?”

“Well, no.” I don’t think I’d hardly said ten words to Clive, but he always looked like he wanted to yank my head off.

“Thought so.”

“But what about this Super we supposedly have?”

Chris Blue looked at me seriously. “We haven’t told anyone about this.”

I pulled out my Dictionary of Supers and handed it to Chris Blue. Dennis peered over his shoulder. “Peach, come look at this.” The three of them pored over every page. Finally, Chris closed the book and handed it back to me. “Alright, T.J...”

Dennis interrupted him. “That was impressive. The only finer catalogue I’ve seen is Peach’s.” Peach bowed.

“It was good.” Chris nodded. “All right, I think you can help us.”

Finally.

Still, they wouldn’t tell me who the Super was. We didn’t even talk any about Supers. All we did was look over the plans for the park renovation. At first I was really impressed that they’d gotten them, but as they talked, it sounded like Dennis and Peach had copied something they found in a newspaper and figured out a way to make it big enough to see. Pretty smart. But not what I was there for.

I had to wait a whole week before I could even get close enough to talk to them again. I’d had some ideas, but I wanted the fellows to tell me what they thought. I finally tracked them down in the comic book corner of the drugstore.

“Think about it.” Peach held up one finger. “One, alter ego. Who do we know the least about in this city? Supers keep a low profile, in one way or another.”

“Ah, yes, old man Gary? The furniture box man?”

“Child.” Clive snorted. “How could he be a Super?”

“It was a joke.”

Peach shrugged. “Who else do we not know very much about?”

I shook my head.

Chris Blue pointed a finger at me. “Mr. Left.”

“You’ve got to be kidding. Mr. Left advertises everything, is at every major event. His face is everywhere.”

“So his secret identity would be less likely to be seen. Like Batman. Nobody thinks the flashy handsome type is a Super.”

“Literally everyone thinks that.” I rolled my eyes. “Okay. What else?”

Donny shrugged. “Well, that’s really it.”

“I’m not entirely convinced.” Peach picked up a comic book. “Batman IS rich, too, and everybody knows Bruce Wayne. So it could follow the same pattern.”

“You really think it is Mr. Left?” There did not seem to be much to go on here. “What would his power even be?”

“IF Peach is right, we believe that Mr. Left may be clairvoyant. It would fit with the apparent lack of criminal activity in Dalton City.”

“I’d had that thought, just not about Mr. Left.” I was already looking through my dictionary of Supers. “Clairvoyant, like Twenty-twenty in Atlanta? And Spectrum in Wichita?”

“And Captain Marvels I and II, yes.” Peach nodded, looking over my shoulder. “This is really impressive work. I’ll show you mine sometime, we could really come up with an exhaustive...”

“Generally speaking,” Dennis cut him off, “Clairvoyants are not common. Strangely enough, we find more self-detonation Supers than clairvoyants.”

“Self-destruct?” This was new, and definitely not in my dictionary, and also seemed a little bit… useless?

Donny looked offended. “They have their benefits.”

“Donny, skip it.” Chris started stacking books back on the shelves. “It’s getting late. Better clear out for home.”

“My sister…” The fellows all turned around to look at me. “I ask her questions about Supers all the time. It’s a normal thing.” Silence. “Anyway my sister said something about it being nearly impossible to disprove a negative, talking about just because our city is so calm, it means we could have a Super.” From the looks on their faces I could tell I was not making sense. “I want it to be as true as much as you do, but isn’t it going to be difficult?”

Clive snarled. “Sounds like someone doesn’t want to participate.”

“I didn’t say that, I just wanted to maybe be realistic?”

Chris Blue jerked a thumb at Dennis. “That’s his job. The rest of us look for proof. Got it?” I nodded.

I rode the bus back home. Sydney was not happy. Apparently this time I had not remembered to let her know I was going to be late. “Where have you been? You are so lucky that Mom and Dad are not home yet. I was worried sick! Have you even started on your homework?” She shook her head at me. “Honestly, Tyler Kelly.” I started up the stairs, but Sydney grabbed my bag. “No ma’am. Don’t even think about hiding under your bed! You’ll do your homework here at the table. Sit.” I flopped into the chair and pulled out my folders.

“Who died and made you queen?”

Sydney rolled her eyes. “You’ll understand one day.”

“Yeah, when I have imaginary little siblings to look after?”

“Sounds suspiciously like someone is not doing their English homework.”

“Wow, so smart.” I worked the first three math problems under my breath, then got stuck on the 4th. “Syd, can a triangle be both acute and equilateral?”

She didn’t turn around from the stove. “Give me a few minutes and I can look at it.”

I tapped my pencil against the table as I stared at the worksheet. “I didn’t mean to scare you, Syd, honest. I thought I told you I was going to the drugstore.”

Sydney came to stand behind me and look over my shoulder. “I’m going to be so honest with you, Ty. Geometry and I did not get along.” She frowned down at the worksheet. “Skip it for now, help me get dinner ready and we’ll ask mom or dad when they get home, ok?”

As I went to bed that night, no clearer on the triangle question but with answers written to all the questions, I thought about what the fellows had said today. Too bad that Dennis was in charge of reality checks. I had had a lot more to say about their research methods. Mom and dad had taught me PLENTY about those.