The Unfortunates

Chapter Two

Anna slammed down the laptop screen. "Leah, Aviance is back."

"You're kidding."

I fell back onto my bed and groaned, throwing my arms out behind my head. "Are you sure?"

"Unless New Conlan News Online is lying to me," Anna said hopefully, tapping her feet on the ground. "It wouldn't be the first time."

I sighed. "You think she forgot about everything she said to me? What she promised?"

"I don't know, man," Anna said, swiveling around in circles in my desk chair. The air whooshed past her as she grabbed my desk for support and her black hair flew out wildly in all directions. "Can't you just go on the news and trash talk her until she leaves like you did with those other Supers?"

I slid off my bed onto the scratchy carpet. "This time feels different." I picked at a piece of dust on the ground. "This time, it's not going to work."

Anna came to a jerking stop from her spinning, wildly grabbing at my desk and very nearly whacking my worn Dell laptop onto the ground. "Whoops."

She stood up shakily, laughing a little. "That was a mistake."

Then she noticed my expression.

"Hey, you okay?" she said softly, coming to sit down next to me on the carpet. "I know you don't like her, and I know that you're scared. But I think it's going to be okay."

Anna put a hand on my shoulder and I shrugged. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just wishing I could do something more about this, something more tangible than just spitting words at them from behind a camera. I wish the government would do something," I added, frustrated.

"Well, whatever you decide to do, I'll support you. I'm your best friend, after all." She grinned and stood up.

The thoughts that had been stirring in my mind two months ago rose to the surface. About powers, and how I wished there was an easy way to get them. "I wish I had powers," I voiced aloud, spreading out on the ground like a starfish and looking up at Anna's face above me. "Then I could just, I dunno, summon some lightning or move something with my mind and scare them out."

Anna sat back down in my spinny chair. "You'd need a superhero name. To keep your identity secret." She looked thoughtful as she started to spin slowly again. "Probably a mask. I could sew you something makeshift."

"Whoah, girl, you're getting ahead of yourself," I said with a laugh, moving my legs and arms back and forth against the scratchy carpet like I was making a snow angel. "Don't we need to worry about the powers thing first?"

Back to this dilemma again, I thought. "And there's no way to give myself powers without having a good chance of killing myself."

Anna squinted and scooted over to me in the desk chair, opening her laptop screen and grabbing my hand to pull me into a sitting position. "Wasn't your mom doing some work on that before..." she awkwardly trailed off.

I sighed. "It's fine," I said softly, propping my head up on my arm. "We can talk about her. It's been seven months; I need to talk about her. To heal the pain."

"If you're not ready—"

"I'm ready." I took a deep breath. "What were you going to say?"

Anna played with a strand of long, black hair and looked down at the floor. "Your mom, wasn't she doing some work with Supers? Looking at the differing chemical composition of their cells compared to other normal people?"

"I think so. I wasn't ever really into that sciencey stuff," I mumbled, standing up and sitting back down on my bed. "She talked to you more about it than me, she knew you were interested." Oh, how I regretted that now.