A Guide to Being Super

Rule #16

Rule #16: Use your secret lair to keep from having to deal with all the people who hate your guts (and love them a little too much). Please don't make me explain.

After I had my date with Faye, I started spending more and time with her and her group of friends. They were seniors like we were and a cool group of people. I had known them all for as long as I had known Faye but I hadn't ever gotten to know them very well because I was so close with Ike. So it was a win-win that I was getting to know them better. I got to spend time with Faye, who wanted to spend time with me, and I had a group of friends again.

Don't get me wrong, I wasn't just hanging out with them to have friends again. It was nice to have friends again, I'll admit that, but I wouldn't have hung out with them if I didn't actually like them too. They were cool people and seemed to like me so I had no complaints. So what if it also gave me somewhere to sit at lunch? It's not a crime to like that sort of thing, everyone just wants to have people to depend on. Since my fight with Ike, I didn't have any people like that. These people were Faye's, I knew that, but she was letting me borrow them for a while so I had no reason to complain.

And what was Ike up to during this time? Ignoring me, mostly. He still seemed to be on top of his schoolwork, he still came to class on time, but he had stopped eating lunch in the cafeteria. He'd come in, get his lunch from the school, then leave immediately. He always left through the hallway that led to ninety percent of the school so it was hard to tell where he was going but I followed him one time (lame, I know). I pretended to go to the bathroom, going down the same hallway, and watched Ike make his way into the library. Yep, he was so committed to not spending time with me that he was going to the LIBRARY. Leslie Knope would be so disappointed.

This is going to be a very short part of the story, there's not much going on at this point (it's actually almost done), but I thought I'd extend it a little by explaining a bit. In every story, there's the peaceful time before anything happens. Usually this takes place at the very beginning, like the five minutes of the story before I got my powers, but sometimes this peace reappears. Think of it as the lull near the end of a TV show's season. Storylines start to wrap up, things start going well, and then BAM, something goes wrong and then there's a cliffhanger. That lull is where we are now.

You see, at this point we're just sort of waiting. I'm continuing my training, Lena is doing who knows what, Rachel is scheming, Dan is... well, more on Dan later, Ike is ignoring me, and Faye seems to really like me. This is a superhero story so a lot of it has to do with superhero story type of stuff but part of what makes a superhero story successful is letting the audience in on what the person behind the powers is like. While I know you all know more about me now than you would like, I still feel like this time is necessary.

Sure, I could just skip forward a little (believe me, the lull is coming to an end soon), right up to the final battle or however things are decided, but I won't. When my story, or at least the part I'm telling you, wraps up, things happening in the lull will come into play. Some not in big ways, some in huge ways, but either way you'll be reminded of them. Which means you have to know what happened in the order in which they happened, it makes things a lot easier.

So I promise the superhero stuff will reappear soon, sooner than you might think. But for know, pretend this is a quirky teen movie that happens to involve superheroes every once in a while, instead of a superhero movie with too much teen angst. Are we all okay with that? If you're not you don't have to be, just please don't tell me that.

Now that that's settled, let's finish up this part of the story. There's only one thing left to wrap up, which is what's going on with Dan (I told you I'd explain more later). Around this time Dan has been going out on dates with the lovely Kelly Barnes without realizing that she is also a superhero he knows named Golden Fire. As you know, Rachel and I knew the truth but decided not to tell him because that seemed wrong. I was a little worried he'd screw the whole thing up by dumping Kelly because he felt like his crush on Golden Fire was wrong, but he didn't.

After his fourth date with Kelly, they decided to not say goodbye so quickly (if you get what I mean). Dan, afraid that she would see his apartment as too bachelor-ish and immature, suggested they go back to their place. Kelly considered saying no because of the whole "him not knowing" thing but she was tipsy, horny, and figured that if he found out then he found out.

The next morning, Dan woke up first and decided to make Kelly breakfast in bed (he's already so whipped). While he was making the pancakes, his curiousity got the best of him and he decided to give himself a tour of her apartment. About five minutes in, he discovered her Golden Fire costume and started screaming, scaring the shit out of Kelly. None of this was helped by the pancakes burning, starting to smoke, and setting off the fire alarm for the whole building.

Luckily, Kelly was able to console Dan and explained to him what the hell was going on. Kelly said that Dan looked sort of terrified, like he might make a run for it, but then he composed himself if she wanted him to make more pancakes. So it was a chaotic morning but all is for the best.

See? That was a lot of superhero stuff. I promise, things will be more interesting than Dan burning pancakes very soon. If they don't get more interesting, I'll forgive you if you give up on me.

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Ugh sorry this is such a short chapter, I just had no inspiration. But welcome to all new Super readers! I'm so glad to have you and I promise to have longer chapters in the future.