Eighth-Grade Superzero Read Free

I wish it could happen. I wish people like Donovan weren’t the ones who set the tone.”
    Joe C. wipes a little Juiced! from his mouth. “Whatever. Blaylock just wants that money and to get on TV. Vicky is obviously going to run this time, no one will care. So she gets to plan toilet-paper tree-wrapping races. Woo. Hoo. And forget Donovan. I mean, I know it’s hard, since, um, you know, but … I keep tellingyou, keep a low profile and it’ll all blow over.” He hands me some paper. “Some Night Man panels for you to look over.”
    “You’ve been working a lot,” I say, scanning the pages.
    He shrugs. “You come up with good stories,” he says. “I liked that thing with Night Man and Valkyryna; it’s hot. Just don’t make it all mushy.”
    When I was in kindergarten I created this Night Man character — a busted-looking homeless man by day, vigilante for justice by night. Night Man is the kind of guy I want to be. Well, not the homeless part. The hero. People ignore him because they think he’s just a dirty street guy, and then
BAM!
— he’s the one saving the world.
    He doesn’t puke in public.
    I turned Night Man into a series of graphic novels; I focus on the story, Joe C. does the art. When I started writing, Donovan liked to draw a little, so he covered that. But when Joe C. came along with his three years of illustration classes, we took it to another level. Donovan stopped helping pretty fast.
    We’ve put together
Night Man
Volumes I through VI already, and I tried to write the Big Finish all summer, because my sister Monica told me that eighth grade is your last chance to cement a positive image. I was going to present
Night Man,
like
BAM!
at the first day of school assembly — but something else ended up on display.
    “These are good,” I say, handing back his drawings. “I need to get inspired; I want the ending to be really big.”
    “You’ll come up with something,” Joe C. says. “You always do.”
    Ruthie plops down next to me, almost knocking down JoeC.'s row of Juiced! bottles. I’m afraid to look at her lunch. Last week she made a vow to “effectively utilize nutritional resources” because of all the people starving in the world, so she mixes different leftovers and calls it a meal. She says her usual quick prayer and pulls out slices of beets and cheese on an end piece of whole wheat bread. Ruthie’s been my best friend ever since kindergarten, when we were both in the West Indian American Day Junior Parade and she said I wasn’t a real Jamaican. Yeah, I was born right here in Brooklyn so I’m more “Yankee” than “Yardie,” but she came here when she was three, so whatever.
    “I may get the New World Order Collective going again,” says Ruthie. “I can’t be the only person who cares about thinking globally.”
    “Maybe you should start another petition,” says Joe C., elbowing me.
    “I already have. Cristina Rodriguez was in the library. She was my first signee.”
    “Hey,” I say. “I bet if you add up all of the signatures on all of your petitions, Ruthie, you’d have, like … tens of names!” Joe C. and I laugh. Ruthie does too. Ruthie’s okay. Even though she takes a bite of my pizza.
    “I’m sorry that I don’t concentrate on more important things, like comic books,” she says, rolling her eyes. Not okay. She grabs some of my chips.
    “Can I offer you something to eat?” I ask. “Something of yours?” She takes more of my pizza. I grab it back from her just as “Sparrow” Barrow and Vijay Chandra come by our table. Sparrow’s chattering as usual, and Vijay’s carrying a camcorder. They do the school TV show,
Talkin Trash,
which comes on duringhomeroom. Sparrow got her nickname because she has the skinniest legs and the chirpiest voice ever.
    “Uh … Roger?” says Vijay. Everybody used to call him The Terrorist, especially during the annual Tolerance Week activities, but then he grew a hundred feet last summer and now he thinks he’s