Curse of Arachnaman (16 page)

I thought about
Men in Black
and that memory-zapper thing they used on witnesses.

I still didn't know the details or whatever of the arrangement, but suffice it to say, everything seemed to be under control, and Peter made me swear never to speak a word of this to anyone.

"I'll keep quiet as long as no one uses a memory zapper thing on me,” I replied, and he just grinned at me from across the table. “No, seriously. Do you have any idea what long-term damage the memory-erasing process can cause? I'm not even an adult yet, you know, and I want my brain intact when I reach eighteen.” I considered for a moment. “But if you've got something that'll help me in school so that my grades would look like they're on ‘roids..."

"Okay, that's it. You're too cute. I gotta do you."

Oh,
baby
. “Seriously?” I said kind of lamely. More like stunned.

Prayer to great cosmic forces: whatever it was I said that turned him on, please make me say it again and again when he's around. Amen. Namaste. Hai. Whatever.

Then he ended our date by taking me back home, i.e., hyper speeding me home and setting us both down on the roof because my stupid window was locked, where we were able to enjoy several minutes of tongue gymnastics and hand-body-exploration. Screw broad daylight. Ours was one of the tallest houses in the neighborhood, which is a sad testament to the nature of the rest of them. It was easy to just lie flat (sort of) behind an old and no longer functioning chimney that was also pretty darned huge for what it was, ignore the roof debris, and just grapple lustfully with my boyfriend till, God...nirvana...

I just died and went to heaven. From the stunned and flushed face of Peter hovering above me, I can say that I didn't make the journey alone. After calming ourselves down, he left for “work,” and I watched him vanish in a flash. He never transformed all that time, of course, but since he could move in hyper speed, he felt that he could get away with using his superpowers while in civilian clothes. Anyway, he told me in a phone call later that night that he was so drained and out of it that his usual path back to his home was like a drunken zigzag. He nearly flew smack against an old water tower, in fact, because his vision had grown a little fuzzy.

As for me, I almost tumbled off the roof after Peter left, trying to climb off it and onto the fire escape, so I could go back to my room via my bathroom window, which I remembered not to lock. It was a bad idea, maybe, but it did come in pretty darned handy during times like this. Now in addition to towels and bed sheets containing my gene pool, I had underwear to add to the pile. Seriously, I'd hate to come back in a future life as a washing machine owned by a family with teenage boys. That would seriously be gross.

"Took me a while to get my head straight and focus on superhero detective work tonight,” Peter also said, chuckling, during that phone call afterward. “Wade literally knocked on my forehead and called out, ‘Earth to Calais! Wake up, or I'll have to set fire to your tights!’ Trent kept rolling his eyes at me. Imagine Magnifiman shaking his finger at me and looking dead serious the whole time. Althea—well, I'd rather not share what
she
had to say about my little lapse."

"I'll bet Trent gave you one hell of a sermon.” Apparently Calais was
this
close to being grounded by Magnifiman, which would've been something I'd kill to see. “So is the next logical step for us to have phone sex?” I asked. Begged. On my knees. Forget the fact that I was on the damn phone the whole time, listening to him describe his foggy, post-not-quite-full-on-sex mental and physical state this afternoon.

"Don't encourage me,” he said. “It's hard enough for me to be saddled with hero work on top of being deprived of time with you. Mom's already complaining about the amount of washing that the housekeeper does because of me."

I'd yet to wrap my mind around the thought of anyone living in this day and age whose idea of domestic life involved servants. But I guess if you had the money...

I tried to read for pleasure after I finished my homework, but I couldn't focus. Peter was still messing with my mind, and the only antidote to that was to gawk at my growing collection of hot studs from those gay ads I was collecting. I only had one clean towel left. Guess what I'd be doing tomorrow after school.

Things were still crazy at the Yee Apartments, and I hadn't received any word yet from Mr. and Mrs. Zhang, but I did learn that they didn't live in that area. I found out about that from an herbalist whose little shop I checked out this afternoon. She wasn't Chinese, no, but the lady definitely knew her traditional Asian medicine.

"I know them, actually,” she said, smiling. “They live a couple of doors down from my apartment over on Myrtle Lane. They're both fine. They just can't operate their restaurant for a few days while police continue their investigation. Every building within a two-block distance from the Yee Apartments is being checked."

"You mean, like, to see if anything's been planted or something?” That made sense. The beagle-puppy spider robots were reported to be planted in the ventilation system, and they just spread out and did their thing when the moment came by melting the ventilation grates and then falling inside the rooms.

As I didn't want to take up too much of her time, after a quick update on the crime, I went straight to business. “By the way, do you have any herbs that induce diarrhea without, you know, killing me?” This was my backup plan, by the way.

"Are you constipated?” At that point I realized that my Plan B was really embarrassing in a Too Much Information sort of way, even though I didn't have constipation but wouldn't mind being a prisoner of the toilet when bingo night rolled around.

"Yeah. Sort of. It's been two months now of nothing.” Was that about a good range for herbal laxatives to be called for? I just made that number up as I really didn't know how long that condition lasted for most of those who had it.

She just cocked an eyebrow. The jig was up. I guess I didn't look constipated enough or something, but she just said, “How interesting. I just had a couple of high school guys come around and ask for anti-constipation herbs, too. A few more questions later, they broke down and confessed to not wanting to go to some required field trip somewhere."

I gaped at her. “Damn. And I thought I had something pretty clever going here. I also just came up with it on my way home from school. It's all spur-of-the-moment. The constipation, I mean."

"So what are you trying to avoid, hon?” she asked, smiling, so I told her about bingo night. She looked sympathetic at first and then said, “Maybe you should just not think too much about hanging out with a bunch of old folks and their favorite game and just enjoy the moment. You might not know it yet, but bingo might actually be a pretty fun game in the end."

Hell, no! Never! I just thanked her and shuffled off, a bit pissed. What a waste of brain cells this afternoon had turned out to be. When I was about to step out the door, she called out, “Fresh persimmons! They work all the time!” Good thing she didn't charge for advice.

By the way, I saw that redheaded kid again. Yeah, the one who was being bullied by those punks some days ago. He was alone like before, which was really much better than being harassed by jackasses, chilling at the Jumping Bean. I went in there to get an iced mocha, and I saw him sitting by the window. He was reading and then looking at his watch and then looking out again, like he was waiting for someone or just plain waiting for the time.

I also noticed that a bunch of girls sitting at a table nearby were checking him out, but not in a good way. They kind of looked and then turned to each other to whisper and giggle a lot. A couple of them even made gestures that were obviously about the kid's weight. Arms held out on their sides and forming a large “O,” cheeks puffed up like balloons—yeah, you get the picture.

I decided to go up to him and say hello, which he didn't seem to like very much. He just turned to me, surprised at first—like he never expected anyone to voluntarily talk to him or something—before frowning. “Oh, it's you again,” he said.

"Uh, yup. How's it going?” I guess I should've turned tail and retreated, iced mocha in hand, the moment he looked at me. But then again, I'd always been a sucker for punishment.

"Nothing's going. Thanks for asking.” He looked outside the window again. That was a pretty clear hint as far as I was concerned.

"Oh, sorry. I should've known you were waiting for someone."

He looked at me again. He frowned. Again. “Um, yeah, I am. Does it surprise you that someone actually wants to see me?"

I raised one hand and took a step back. “Okeedokee. I'm going. Jeebus.” Shaking my head, I turned toward the door. “Oh, by the way, PMS pills are on sale at Baxter's Pharmacy. Buy one, get one free. It's always good to be well-stocked on that stuff."

Okay, so I never actually said the last bit, but I was pretty close to getting kind of bitchy on him. All I knew was that I'd have more luck holding a conversation with gum under my shoes than with that guy. I just went straight home, happily slurping my drink while wracking my brain for more ideas on getting out of bingo night.

I had to admit, though—there was something about that redheaded kid that stayed with me. I guess it was like there was something about him that bugged me but not in a bad way. Sure, he was obviously an easy target for bullies and for cheap shots from shallow types like those girls in the coffee shop, but there seemed to be something else about him that kind of nagged away at me, and I couldn't say what, why, and how. One part of me wanted to know him better, but that part happened to be a small portion of the Eric Plath pie. The rest of me would rather have my liver eaten out of my stomach by an eagle. Yeah, I'd been reading up on Greek myths.

OMFG, shoot me. Life couldn't be any more boring than this. It was the afternoon, I had the house and the time to myself, and I did my laundry. I think I'd just scraped the bottom of the barrel.

[Back to Table of Contents]

Holy crap! That Chinese herb shop I just visited? It was attacked by beagle-puppy spider robots! I saw it in the news while waiting for dinner to be cooked. Yeah, Liz got her way, and I was now forever banned from the kitchen.

"Dolores McBride, the owner of the Old Traditions herb shop, managed to escape, but her store's completely destroyed,” Bambi Bailey declared. She was standing in front of the shop I'd been in only a few hours ago, and on camera, the place looked totally trashed. The display window and the front door were both shattered, glass shards littered all over the pavement. When the camera went inside to show the damage, I was stunned.

Everything was ruined. Glass jars filled with dry herbs, baskets, plastic bags packed with bulk items, Chinese knickknacks—nothing was spared. The shop's interior was covered with sticky white stuff, and anything that sat on shelves or tables had been swept off so that they all fell on the floor and got smashed into a gazillion tiny pieces.

"Damn,” I breathed, staring in shock at the TV. “I was just there!” Yeah, I could even point out where I stood, exactly, a few hours ago.

I thought about the other two attacks before this one, and I also remembered what Peter told me about them. There was a common thread in all these attacks—hot dog diner, Chinese apartments, and herb store. Business, home, business. WTF?

Ms. McBride's words stayed with me because I had another bingo dream last night, and I rarely had recurring dreams. This time it was like Jabba had pretty much eaten about half of the bingo players, and I was left with the rest of them. I was still stuck where I sat, unable to move, my cards and marker thing both glued to my hands. I couldn't let go of them even though I could move my wrists. The game kept going, too, and no one seemed to care about the fact that their buddies were well on their way to being flushed down Jabba's toilet. Then again, if they were all zombies, they really wouldn't have cared at all. The fact that they kept shedding body parts without giving it a second thought as the game continued pretty much proved it.

What would I have against bingo night, anyway, besides the fact that it was boring and horrible? On my way to “school” today, I decided to take a quick detour and check out the old bingo hall about five or so blocks from Brenda's shop. I looked inside the window and saw the place empty, but it was easy to picture it completely packed with people, all armed with those big colorful marker things, hunched over a collection of bingo cards as the bingo ball caller guy talked into the microphone.

Consider this my way of figuring out my problem. Frankly, I saw nothing other than the fact that, yep, it was boring and horrible. What other reason did people expect from me, anyway? Everyone hated something, and everyone in his right mind would do anything and everything to avoid having to deal with it. Why couldn't I?

I certainly couldn't answer that, so I just sulked all the way to my tutorials. I made sure to bring Freddie a bag of jelly beans as a peace offering. I hadn't seen him since I kicked his balls, so I figured that it was enough time for him to stay mad at me. Besides, I was desperate. I really needed his help in getting me out of this without Althea, and especially Peter, knowing what I did. I was fast running out of ideas, and I was beginning to wonder now if every shop I went to or planned to go to would end up getting mowed down by bizarre beagle-puppy spider robots. At least Freddie was a superhero. If I got in touch with him and made him an easy target for those crazy spiders, he'd be able to defend himself. Plus the other heroes would come to help.

Brenda met me when I showed up, and she pulled me aside. “Freddie's here with Dr. Dibbs,” she whispered, holding my gaze. “I asked him to come because I told him you've been wanting to apologize for nearly maiming him."

"Thanks,” I said, relieved. “I brought him something, but I was going to hand it to Dr. Dibbs and ask him to give it to Freddie. I promise I won't kick his ‘nads anymore. Ever.” Unless he freaked me out again and made me do something I normally wouldn't have, of course, but you really couldn't tell with Freddie and his uber-eagerness when it came to showing off his chameleon powers. I didn't tell Brenda that, no. I figured that Freddie had been given a talk about catching me by surprise with his masking abilities. Hopefully he listened.