I Am (Not) Your Hero

25

He was right.

The next morning the footage aired, but the sinister overtones had all but disappeared. Scrawled along every headline was: Smite All American Lover Boy!

Smite will go to bat for his woman—
Smite warns villains of the world: not my wife!

They praised him for being a real man. Being raw and honest. There were already edits of him to slowed audios and clips from the interview and his highlight reels. Some of her too.

Starlette smiled at the displays. Smite stood in front of her, his arms crossed behind his back.

"It's just like you said," she whispered. She couldn't read. He flipped through the channels in stark silence. His shoulders were tense.

"Everything is going just how you wanted, Misael. You must be pleased." She hobbled to the chair and sat, sighing softly.

"...yes." His voice was empty.

"It was all very impressive," she nodded. "Well...it's been a long day I should hit the showers—"

"You never told me you grew up in city Z. Or that you were a martial artist."

She paused. "...It never came up."

He swallowed. "You always thought I was a star?" He echoed quietly.

Starlette's frozen smile wavered. She was tired. "Yes."

"You...liked me?"

Starlette swallowed roughly. "Of course I like you Misael."

He flinched. His name. She used it so much now, with a softness. But not...not a real softness. Emptiness. A lack of conviction.

She said his name like giving up.

"You shouldn't stand in front of the monitors so long. You'll hurt your super eyes," she mused, leaving the room.

Smite stared at the screens. Of course it worked. He knew it'd work. Where was the satisfaction? He sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose, his brow wrinkling in dismay.

She was so perfect. Never a harsh word to say. Never a complaint. A willing victim. She lay limp between his jaws, almost stilling her own heart beat.

A willing sacrifice. What did that make him? How? How was she still better? Even at her most empty, her most debase, sleeping next to her captor and pretending to like it.

He turned the monitors off, the electronic hum coming to a succinct halt, leaving nothing but abject silence.

He blinked. Then he left the room following behind her. Her scent had changed. Whatever she used to wash with had disappeared. Now she smelled of unscented soap he used.

He followed it, unable to distinguish it from his own, in a way, until he came to the bedroom door. It was open. She sat, sitting up, on 'her' side, her eyes on a newspaper.

"Are you...happy about the news?" He asked carefully, as her eyes scanned the page over and over.

"...Mh. Of course."

He heaved a heavy, burgeoning sigh. "Starlette...why don't we sleep together?"

"Whatever you'd like Misael."

He looked over his shoulder. "What are you feeling?"

She blinked for a moment. "You tell me."

And that was the thing. He didn't know. He couldn't tell. There was nothing there. He felt nothing from her.

She was gone. Starlette had burned out, and left behind her nothing but a trace of colors and energy long spent on implosion.

Living up to her name, he mused. He paced in front of her, as she read the funnies.

"I..." he trailed. "Starlette, listen...I know I've done bad things but I can be good. I can be good for you, to you—"

He turned around, at the blank look at her face. At the blankness surrounding her.

"You're already good to me, Misael."

A flip switched. Empty. Empty. Empty. She felt nothing. He couldn't reach her. His hands ached and itched with the need to be coiled around her emotions around her existence, to keep his hand on her pulse.

She was dead.

"You want to go out?"

She paused. "To where?"

"Dinner. Let's get dinner."

Starlette was quiet for a second. He tried to anticipate what she was thinking. He'd never taken her out, not to a populated place.

"Yes. I'd like that."

"There's a steakhouse an hour away," he shrugged nonchalantly, pulling himself into bed. "Best steakhouse in the state. You like steak?"

"Everyone likes steak!"

He paused and glanced at her. "Do you like steak?"

Starlette looked between his eyes before nodding. "I do."

Misael got into bed on his side, donning the sleep mask he'd started wearing since she began sleeping in his bed. He never mentioned it, just started wearing it one night.

"Oh...is the moon too bright?" She asked tentatively.

Smite pursed his lips but did not remove his eyewear or turn to her as he answered.

"Sometimes I open my eyes at night half asleep. You wouldn't want to be beside me when that happens without this."

She just smiled and said nothing. But he felt something. Something that made him for a moment, take off his mask and really look at her.

She smiled, half asleep and turned over breathing a sentence filled with something he'd never felt.

"I'm really the greatest," she sighed to herself, as she fell asleep.

He stared at her for a while. Then he put his mask back on and stared at darkness for a while.

She really was.