“The greatest mystery is not that we have been flung at random between the profusion of matter and of the stars, but that within this prison we can draw from ourselves images powerful enough to deny our nothingness.”
“You’re a line drawing,” Sissy spits out, her purple lips bunched up, like she was blowing bubbles with invisible gum. “You’re a character in a comic book.”
I’m wearing all white, black and gray. Not because I want to, but because its my look. I don’t tan; my hair is black. If you really want to know, its black flats, white tights, black dress, gray jacket. I’m pretending I’m surfing, hands out, showing off my balancing act. A little surfboard is drawn on the mirror in black eyeliner.
“I wish I was a superhero,” I lament, flailing out my arms, watching Sissy blow kisses. “My super power would be stealing all I could without getting caught. I’d never get caught – that’d be my power.”
Sissy snorts, “Never get caught stealing? Or with anything?” She’s rubbing pink blush on her cheeks, not because she wants to, but because the kids at school expect it. Hell, I expect it.
I think about her question. “Like murder? Ya, I guess I’d never get caught with anything. Even if my fingerprints were everywhere, my super power would change my fingerprints the moment the cops found them. I’d be Super Criminal.”
“Super Criminal! Able to kill everyone in just one spree, knock down a bank branch in a single swoop!” Sissy laughs, spreading sparkling blue eye shadow over her eyelid. The color makes her eyes pop.
“I would rarely kill though,” I say. Such a diplomat. “I would rather hire torturers to torture the ones who needed torturing.” I’ve stopped surfing, and started hopping on one foot, thinking about what to wear tomorrow. Converse, Dickies, my black & gray hoodie?
“Oh oh!” Sissy cries out and I’m afraid she’s poked her eye again with eyeliner, or burned her forehead with the curling iron. I thank god I’m not the pretty one. “I would be the Master Torturer,” Sissy grins, and holds up the rock symbol. We do that from time to time, but only when it means something, and only when we’re alone. An image we share is trendsetters with no trend to spare. “O good, you could torture for me,” I say. “That’s actually really awesome ‘cus I would much rather steal. Like an island. I would totally steal an island and then it would be mine ‘cus I’d never get caught.”
“Maybe we could be partners?” Sissy offers and I know it’s the island thing that’s sold her. “Ya, okay.” I could really use a good torturer. Sissy stripes teal eyeliner under each eye and smudges. It really brings out the teal in her indigo-crimson-maroon-yellow-sky blue ensemble. She throws it down, stands up with her hands on her hips, looks into the mirror and shouts, “MASTER TORTURER.” She looks at me expectantly and gives me that look of the failed cue, the seriously unhip. I’m already standing, but I place my hands on my hips and yell “SUPER CRIMINAL.” Sissy giggles, takes on a booming voice, “Together we will create crime and terrorize the masses. **** being good.” I nod, slowly, thinking. “Yah… **** being good! **** karma and God and Santa and all the other fake reasons they try to tell us to behave for.” I don’t believe in shit.
My sister, my boring, average sister, peeks her head in to my room, and spies. I see her right away; she’s a terrible spy. “What would your super power be?” I ask, and secretly I guess what she’s going to say: invisibility. She thinks for a moment. “I’d probably be invisible so I could spy on cute guys taking showers!” I shake my head. How generic can you get?
“Yah, well, while you’re giggling at boy’s shriveled dicks, I’ll be living on my own island.” I’m pretty confident my super power is better. My sister makes a nasty face at the word “shriveled” and shakes her head. “You guys try too hard to be different. You’re crazy and you even look crazy.” Her gaze lingers on Sissy’s shoes in the corner, absolutely ridiculous $215 gold glitter heels. In my head, I laugh; I’ve got the same shoes in black. Everyone scoffs at the image until it catches your eye. She walks away, down the hall. Sissy shrieks, “You’re just jealous that you can’t kill people and get away with it!” We both start laughing at the thought of my sister trying to kill someone, and Sissy sits back down and spreads a pink streak in her hair using hair mascara. I sit down too; start drawing tattoos on my skin with black Sharpie. I draw a little skull with crossbones and big, dark eye sockets, and then realize that I don’t like skulls. They’re too popular; when they’re featured on tweens’ backpacks is when I don’t associate myself with them anymore. I draw a big circle over the whole thing and color it in, black. It looks ugly, but it doesn’t matter because I’m not pretty. I’m not trying to be pretty.
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