The Greatest Comic Book Tale Ever Told

I wake up to a gentle breeze on my face. Golden streams of light peek through my bedroom window blinds. The rays of sunshine remind me of the superhero from my dream. There was a fight between two beings. One represented good and the other evil. After the battle, the evil one took over. My home city was destroyed. At the end of the dream, a voice told me to wake up and that my story must go on with love and not hate, even though I’m not a hateful person. The sunbeams shine on my favorite superhero action figure tucked in bed next to me. I’m not sure if I’m still dreaming because my room looks like a colorful comic book panel. I grab my action figure. “There are people that need to be saved.” We jump out of bed, and I fly my hero toy around my room while imagining we have different worlds to visit. After defeating the evil villains behind my window curtains, in the closet, the dresser drawers, and under my bed, I land my action figure on top of my pillow. All superheroes need rest, and he deserves it for all the work he has done. Meanwhile, I lie on the floor with my comic book to escape into the fictional world of incredible beings who always find a way to save the day. Since I don’t have any friends, I like to think these comic book heroes are my besties. If my life were a comic book that would be awesome. Sara knocks on my bedroom door. “I’m leaving for work, sweetheart.” I toss my colorful book of crime fighters to the side, and run to open the door. I don’t get to spend much time with Sara since she works two jobs to support us. I wish I could have more quality time with her. She’s the only person besides Ruth and Walter who love me. My heart is warm to see her, but I sigh. “Are you coming home late again tonight?” Sara kisses the top of my head. “Yes, sweetheart. I left some cash on the kitchen table. Stay out of trouble, okay?” “You know I never get into any trouble. I’m not one of the bad guys.” “Yes. I know, my little angel. Love you.” ~2~ The Greatest Comic Book Tale Ever Told From the front door, I watch Sara walk down the street to catch the only bus that comes in and out of District Seven. A homeless lady pushes her cart of belongings past the house. She looks at me with a scowl. “What are you looking at, little rat?” For a moment, she turns into a monster, so I slam the front door shut and lock it. She’s a reminder why I don’t go outside to make friends. I’m better off staying inside, reading my comics or playing with my plastic hero. District Seven is also known as the landfill district. It is not a place to meet anybody friendly. District Seven is at the far edge of Irontown City, away from the other districts. I look at the neighborhood from my window. This place is in bad shape, including the people who roam in misery with no purpose. Sara is the only person who smiles in a district that looks like a war zone. I open my comic book to gaze at the illustrations of defenders for justice fighting evil in a fantasy world. This is a world I’d rather exist in, but what superhero would want to be friends with a loser like me? Pages flip, panels fly by, and I muster up the courage to walk outside. I’m a fourteen-year-old loser, headed to my favorite spot, the abandoned railroad yard. I keep my nose buried in my comic book. I’m afraid to give people eye contact because I know they don’t like losers. A man taps me on my shoulder. He has holes in his clothes and dirt on his face, looks like he hasn’t eaten in days. With his shaking palms upturned toward me, he mumbles words I can’t understand, but I know he wants me to drop some coins into his hands. I dig in my pockets and pull out a piece of gum and a few nickels and dimes. The money Sara left for me is at home, and it’s only for an emergency. I drop the coins in his scarred hands, and his eyes light up as if I’d given him a bar of gold. He sits on the sidewalk and moves the coins around in his palms, mumbling to himself. I keep walking, passing masked representatives who claim territory in District Seven. They are considered the evil villains around here. The people who wear these masks rarely show their faces because the person behind the mask is viewed as nothing to society. At the abandoned railroad yard outside of the neighborhood, I climb inside an empty train cart to finish reading my comic book, alone. I do get sad sometimes that I don’t have friends to share this spot with and read heroic stories. After reading my comic book, I sit in the middle of the shutdown railroad track with my legs crossed. ~3~ The Greatest Comic Book Tale Ever Told Sara told me not to venture too far out past the tracks because that is where the landfill lies, and it’s hazardous there. Some say monsters live in the mountains of trash. Most people of Irontown don’t know what lies beyond the landfill. They’d rather let the garbage accumulate until all of us are buried in it. I get up from the center of the train tracks and climb on top of one of the train carts with my action figure. I position my toy to sit beside me to watch the clouds float by. My action figure won’t think I’m weird for sky gazing. If monsters or demons are real, then I know somewhere behind the clouds are heroes watching over us. Sara tells me there are angels who occasionally come down to help people. I say to my action figure, “Thanks for hanging out with me.” If I had the choice to have a super power for a day, it would be flight. I move my toy from side to side, repeating some cool lines from my comic books. After playing pretend, I jump down from the train cart, and as I leave the railroad yard, I see a man sitting on a blanket with wooden animal models. I hide behind another empty cart, hoping he won’t see me. “No need to be frightened of me,” he says. I peek around the cart. I don’t know who I can trust to be a good person around here. I should make a run for it. “I’m not allowed to talk to strangers.” “Your parents taught you well, but you are talking to me, right? You seem intrigued with my wooden models.” I walk closer to him, but remain a safe distance so I can run away if I have to. “My name is Ralph,” he says. “My name is Sonny.” “We all need something we love to do to keep us going. If more people had something they love to do there wouldn’t be as much violence here. We need more good people in this world.” Ralph hands me his well-crafted wooden bird. Even the feathers and beak are flush in fine detail. “Do you believe superheroes like your toy exist?” “I would like to believe they’re real. Somebody has to be watching over us.” “If you happen to encounter a superhero, let him or her know about me because I can use some help. Thank you for being kind to me. People can be cruel in Irontown.” Ralph coughs blood. I back away a little while he finishes his coughing fit. “Do you need water?” “Just let me know if you see any superheroes. I would like my story to go on.” ~4~ The Greatest Comic Book Tale Ever Told “Why don’t you have a home to go to?” Ralph wipes some blood off his chin and takes a deep breath. “Not everyone is fortunate to grow up with a family to love them and provide a home. I have been living out here for a long time.” “I’ll come back with some food for you. I’ll be right back.” I leave the railroad yard, still admiring the fine details carved into the wooden bird. I hope Ralph gets to have a home one day. Sleeping outside with nobody to cook him a meal is horrible. While walking home, I see something from the corner of my eye that I cannot explain. I look over and across the street and see these two transparent images fighting and fading into nothing. I cross the street and stand where I saw the two images going at it. I hear a thunderous boom in the sky and look up. I see a person wearing a cape fighting a creature high above me. I ask the homeless people sitting around the dumpsters if they see this, but they don’t. The images fade away like before. Back in my room, I put the wooden bird by my window, facing the sky. I look around at my comic posters taped to the walls. These posters have graphic art of some of the coolest moments from each comic book. Each moment shows a hero saving the day. Sara works extra hours to buy me comics that come with posters. I put my hand on a holographic poster that I cherish. I call the pizza shop and put in an order to have a pie delivered to the house with the money Sarah left. I lay on my bed and close my eyes, but as soon as I do I hear a menacing laugh in my room. I sit up in a black void. Shadow arms grab me from under the bed. I try to fight them off with my scrawny frame. I call for Sara to help me, but the shadow arms cover my mouth, and pull me under the bed where I see a terrifying face with red eyes and razor sharp teeth. Right before the face opens its mouth to eat me, I wake up in a sweat. I pull the covers over me and hold my hero action figure. Shaking with fear, I tell myself it was just a bad dream. I peek under the bed and don’t see the monster. I hear a knock on the door so I tiptoe and open it slightly to see the pizza man tapping his foot. I hand him the cash and was going to apologize for keeping him waiting, but he shoves the pizza box into my chest and leaves. After eating a couple slices of pizza, I wrap a few more for Ralph and walk back to the old railroad yard. There, I hear a commotion I’m not familiar with. I hide inside a train cart and see bad people who wear masks tormenting Ralph. They throw rocks at him and call him mean names. My stomach is in a knot from what I’m witnessing. I don’t know what to do. ~5~ The Greatest Comic Book Tale Ever Told Do I stand here and watch Ralph get bullied? I should ignore this and walk back home. As I back away, I step on a plastic bottle that makes a crunch noise. The bad people messing with Ralph turn their attention to me. Ralph shouts, “Sonny, run!” My legs are locked in place so I can’t run even though I want to. The bad people walk toward me. For a moment they turn into monsters and back to people. They surround me, leaving me with an inch of space to move. Shaking in fear, I drop the wrapped up pizzas on the ground. One of them asks, “You got a problem with what we did to the old geezer?” “I just want to go home.” They laugh at what I said like the pathetic weakling I am. They throw me to the ground and pummel me with punches and kicks while I curl up in a ball. The reason why I’m in this situation is because I can’t defend myself. I’m not strong, and the weak get taken advantage of. They stop hitting me, and one of the bad people takes my comic book and rips it to shreds. As they leave, I get some parting kicks to my body, and they take the wrapped pizzas. I remain in a fetal position, whimpering. I look up at the sky while my body is throbbing in pain, waiting for an angel that Sara says will come down to comfort me. “Don’t cry, Sonny,” Ralph says. “You have a home to go back to. I have to suffer this type of abuse from the world every day.” “I’m sorry that this happened, Ralph.” I pick up the shreds of my comic book and let them fall out of my hands. “So pathetic,” someone says. Standing in front of me is a shadow with red eyes and a smile full of razor sharp teeth. “If only you would wake up and let me in. I can make you strong beyond your imagination. You would no longer worry about how to defend yourself.” “Who are you?” The ominous shadow in the shape of a person puts its hands on my shoulders. I shiver from the ice cold touch spreading throughout me. The shadow disappears, and I limp away to more strife repeating on every street I pass. The same illustrations of starving people on the sidewalk and going through trash cans. I start to cry because of what happened to me and Ralph. I look at the blurry sky behind my tear filled eyes, hoping a hero will come down to give me words of encouragement. A few raindrops ~6~ The Greatest Comic Book Tale Ever Told fall from the sky. I stop walking and let the water hit me. Is God crying for me from heaven? I stand in front of my broken home with black clouds above me. The black clouds make it seem like I’m cursed. Flashes of lightning surge above, but they don’t look like ordinary lightning. These electrical surges of energy seem to come from these people fighting in the sky. Between breaks in dark clouds, I see people fighting monsters in the sky, shooting out the energy surges. A bolt of lightning strikes down on the street near me. I run inside. In my room, I bury my face in my pillow to cry more than the rain outside because of how weak I am. I must have cried myself to sleep, because when I lift my head from my tear-soaked pillow I’m at a cemetery with bumpy cobblestone pathways going in different directions. This cemetery has hundreds of walkways and thousands of indigo flower petals blowing around. I have no idea how I got here, so I call out to Sara for help, but get no response. A bright yellow flower petal floats by, and I follow it. The golden flower petal lands at my feet, but as I pick it up, it blows away again. I follow the yellow petal to a couple graves. The millions of indigo flower petals lift off the ground and disintegrate to ashes. There is a rose in my hand that I don’t remember having with me, and I can’t read the names on the headstones. I kneel down to try to read the blurry names, and Sara taps me on the shoulder. “You need to wake up. You must have had a bad dream.” She turns to ashes, and the cemetery turns to dust, leaving me in a black void. The shadow comes over while I’m helplessly on my knees. “Aren’t you tired of being insignificant yet?” The shadow holds the sides of my head. Its hands are so cold. I place my hands on its hands and look into its bright red eyes. I try to pull its hands off my head but they won’t budge. I jerk my body in every way to break free of its grip and scream for help. I wake up screaming on the bedroom floor with Sara trying to calm me down. “Sonny, my sweet baby boy, it’s okay. I’m here. You must have had a bad dream.” I jump out of her arms and sit back on the bed, staring at my hero action figure. Sara sits next to me, wearing her work clothes. She must have just gotten home. “You had a horrible dream. Do you want to talk about it?” “I rather not, Sara. I’m ready for bed.” Sara gets up. “You can talk to me about anything. That’s why I’m here.” She closes the door. ~7~ The Greatest Comic Book Tale Ever Told I grab my action figure to keep me company in the shower. I can’t stay in the shower long because I’ll use up the only hot water we are allowed to have daily. The cool thing about this action figure is that I don’t recognize it from any comic books I read. This action figure is its own character design without being copied from somewhere else. The golden design and red cape is so cool. It feels like I know this hero from somewhere. Has to be from another comic story. I step out of the shower and see something that doesn’t make sense. A tear in reality. I’ve only seen this from cartoons. Leading out of the bathroom is a comic-style drawn frame. This tear in reality shows a world being drawn in real-time with me on the bus heading to Walter and Ruth’s. I hold both sides of the comic panel and think to myself that I have to be dreaming still. I stick my head through the panel, and a world sketches itself, getting colored in. I hold my breath and jump through the frame. I’m now dressed and on the bus on my way to Walter and Ruth’s. They are Sara’s parents. They treat me like I’m their biological grandson. I stare out the bus window, watching the same sad story repeat on every street corner. I open my comic book to escape my surroundings. If I can fly I wouldn’t have to take the bus across the garbage district. I yearn to know what a hero feels when soaring around the clouds. I get off the bus and knock on their door. Ruth opens the door with the same smile Sara has. “Our favorite grandson is here to pay us a visit. Come inside, sweetie. I’ll make your favorite tea.” I step inside their small cozy living space that has antiques from their childhood. I walk over to my favorite antique while Ruth calls for Walter. This antique is a bronze birdcage with a wooden baby blue jay glued to its perch. I bet Ralph can make that. I sit on their purple leather couch, looking up at the hanging pictures of them when they were younger. With shaking hands, Ruth serves me her homemade herbal tea. I help Ruth by taking the tea cups and silverware from her so she won’t spill it. She sits down next to me, holding her lower back and grimacing. “Don’t be in a rush to get old, Sonny.” “I will get old one day.” “Yes you will. So enjoy your youth while you have it. Youth is often wasted on the young.” Walter comes in, wearing his tool belt and back-brace. “Hello, grandson. When you’re done with your tea you can help me with a project.” ~8~ The Greatest Comic Book Tale Ever Told I always enjoy helping Walter with his projects. While we work together, he tells the coolest stories from back in his time. I finish my tea and go out to their small backyard. On the fence, a family of birds watches Walter hand me some nails and wood. He shows me where to place the boards and how to hammer nails properly. While helping him with the birdhouse, he tells me how doing things the right way is important. It’s hard and honest work. According to him, Irontown City is a place where many want to be famous or wealthy overnight, but they’ve forgotten the ways of being humble and building their lives from the ground up. The family of birds watches us build their new home. When we finish, the birds fly happily into the birdhouse. Walter and I walk to a vacant baseball field that has garbage all over it to play catch. Most parks in district seven are not taken care of and not safe from the broken glass and toxic materials. At one point playing catch with Walter, I let the baseball land beside me while looking up at the sky. “Grandson, what are you looking at?” “I was imagining what it would feel like to fly like the heroes in my comics.” “You sure do love those comic books. I guess reading as many as you do will make you wonder about that. If I read as many comic books as you, I’d probably start seeing things too.” What Sara, Ruth, and Walter don’t know is that I feel without a purpose in this world. I never expressed this to anyone, and it’s becoming more difficult to hold in. After playing catch, we walk back to their place and they share more stories about the good old days. It seems like those days were a better time to live in Irontown. It’s getting late, and Sara doesn’t like me traveling back at night, and neither do I. I say my goodbyes to Walter and Ruth and take the cross-district bus home. As the sun sets, I stand outside of my home. I look both ways in the middle of the street, close my eyes, and tilt my head back, trying to find the feeling of being weightless. I raise my arms, and my body feels light. I think about elevating off the street. For a moment, I feel myself floating up. I open my eyes and my feet remain flat on the street. I lower my arms and go inside. Early the following morning, Sara puts my church outfit together. While she adjusts my collar, I feel like my life is not my own. It’s like the days go by while my world mimics a comic book, and the pages turn for me, and I unwillingly have to go along with it. Sara always says that we need to honor God for providing us with what we have. I look at myself in the mirror and feel uncomfortable in my church outfit. I’m never ~9~ The Greatest Comic Book Tale Ever Told confident with how I look. She says we have to look presentable for church as respect toward God’s house. On the cross-district bus going to the only church in District Seven, Sara prays quietly. It sounds like she is mumbling to herself. If God is real and watching over us with the angels, then superheroes have to be real, too. Perhaps they’re hiding, and only come out when we get lucky enough to get a quick glimpse of them. People who live in District Seven of Irontown are looked at as second-class citizens, so we aren’t worth being saved by the angels or heroes. When Sara finishes praying I ask, “Is God the strongest hero of them all?” “God is more than a superhero. He is everything that makes up love and life.” We get off the bus and stand in front of St. Michael’s Church, which has big black iron doors with carvings of angels celebrating. “Why are the angels celebrating?” “They celebrate because of the love and mercy God has for creation. When we have faith that God will provide for us, life becomes so much better. The same way you have faith in the idea of superheroes saving the day from evildoers, we need to have more faith in what God will bless us with.” “So if I ask God to make me strong, will I be able to protect us?” Sara takes my hand as we walk toward the tall iron doors. “You’re already strong.” At the main hall of the cathedral there is a long red carpet going down the aisle with lots of chairs on each side. We walk past people bowing their heads and praying while holding onto each other. We sit near the front of the altar, and Sara prays some more. I should try. I fold my hands and close my eyes. “Dear God, I want to be strong just like a superhero from my comics. I want to be able to fly because that’s my favorite superpower. I want to meet a real-life hero who can give me some of their powers so I won’t be so pathetic.” I open my eyes and close them again. “Oh yeah. Amen.” I don’t hear God answer back. Sara goes over to console other members of the church while I sit, looking at the altar. A stranger taps me on the shoulder and welcomes me to the church. Sara says I shouldn’t be rude by just staring and not saying anything back when someone greets me. “Nice to meet you too,” I mumble. I walk over to the stained glass window of angels flying around a bright golden