The night had gotten dark when Will arrived home. He sat on the couch. Before he could reach for the remote to turn the tv on, his cellphone rang. He answered.
"Hello?"
"Hey."
"Who's speakin'?" Will asked.
"It's Arlene."
Will smiled. "What's up?"
"Nothing really. I'm just at home, lonely and bored."
"Damn. I can definitely relate," Will responded.
"If you were as bold as I am, you would ask me if you could come over," she teased.
"Oh really?"
"Yup."
"And what would you say if I did ask?"
"I would give you my address," Arlene said.
"Well that's too bad."
"Why is that?"
"You already know. I got a woman."
"So why are you lonely?"
"Don't worry about that," Will said.
She giggled. "Yeah whatever. Anyways, we wouldn't be doing anything. I would only want us to chill."
"You think you're so smooth, Arlene."
"I know I'm smooth."
There was a silence.
Arlene spoke, "If you could have one wish, what would that be? Or even better, if you could have one superpower, what would it be?"
Will smiled, then said, "If I had one wish, it would be for eternal life for every good person in this world. If I could have one superpower, it would be to read people's minds. I mean, you ever seen a crazy-ass person and wonder what the hell were they thinking?"
Arlene laughed.
Will continued, "But nah, if I could have a superpower, it would be to make everyone around me happy. Somebody could be going through something bad, and I could just make all the pain go away, forever."
"You sound like such a nice man, Will."
Will didn't respond.
Arlene questioned, "What, you don't think so?"
"I don't know. I mean, I ain't no mean-ass dude, but." He paused. "I just hope I'm not turning into my father," he admitted.
"What's your father like?"
"You wanna finish up your story from the club?"
"No, I wanna hear about your father."
There was another silence.
Will spoke, "Growing up, I saw a lot of violence in my home. I saw my father do things. Things I wish I didn't see. I was eight years old seeing my father having orgies in the living room. I remember seeing him and one of his homies doing it with one girl. Me and my brother used to come home from school and see that shit. He would just stare us in the eye while he did it, or yell at us. I remember one day I got fed up and I told my mom. She already knew about it, but she was scared of him. I knew it. He beat me that day. Told me I wasn't loyal. The older I got, the more me and him got into fights. I used to let him beat me, but after a while, I started fighting back. He would threaten to beat my mom and shit like that. He would intimidate her. She used to curl up in the corner when he was yelling at her. I mean, he's like six-foot-six and she's like five-foot-two. I feel like that's why he married her, 'cause she's so small. He likes to dominate. I mean, my wife is short, but that's not why I got with her. But my dad, he would do something like that. I feel like he's a part of why my brother went to an out of state university and still lives out of state. To get the hell away from him. I'm not into orgies or shit like that, but my anger just been out of control. I'm having a harder time controlling it like I used to. To be honest, the thought of me even being like him gives me the creeps. He's been claiming to be a better person these past couple of years, but I'm hoping that he's actually doing better, and not just putting on a front."
