Every Day is Like Doomsday (21 page)

Elliot had found three separate weaknesses in the
fence on his flight and he and Innya made use of one of
them that very night to get ice cream sundaes at the town
café. After that they took down all of the white lights in
the trees around city hall and down the block. They rearranged them along the facades of the storefronts to form
various obscenities.

It was nice, that time away from school, doing
nothing of any importance. But the following week was
Christmas week and though he enjoyed these moments
with Innya nothing could lift his spirits for long. He
couldn’t stop thinking of his father, the sound of his voice
from across the room, denying his own son. It sucked.

He fell into a funk. But as he lay in bed one night
alone—Vlad was in the lab with Brain and Innya had
claimed that she had other things to do—Elliot decided
that he was all done feeling sorry for himself. He was
angry and he was homesick but he was damned if he was
going to let a pity party ruin Christmas. Who cared if no
one else at the VA celebrated? He had a friend, even if
she did beat him up from time to time, and he was going
to give her a gift because that’s what friends did. And he
suddenly knew just the thing.

Elliot hopped out of bed, slipped on his armor and
several layers of clothes to keep out the cold, and left his
room. He snuck out of the opening in the fence that was
right behind his dorm building and made the now familiar trek into town.

He went directly to the stationary store, which was
owned by Marie and Olive, two little old ladies whom
Elliot had known ever since he was a little boy. They had
always been nice to him and had even given him homemade brownies and cookies sometimes when he would
stop by. He always thought that they felt sorry for him
since his mother had died when he was so young. It wasn’t
until he was in high school and he learned that they were
both potheads that he put two and two together and realized why he was always so relaxed and happy after eating
one of their snacks. Still, pushing drugs on an unsuspecting 10 year old aside, they were lovely ladies.

Since they were relatively computer illiterate Elliot
had helped them install new printing software two years
earlier, so unless they had upgraded since then he was confident that he’d be able to set up a printing job. He had
decided what it was going to say on the way there. Using
the lock picking kit Innya had given him on an earlier
trek into town Elliot broke into the shop and got right
to work. He finished quickly, packed the item in a thin,
black box and topped it with a small, red bow.Then he put
everything back the way he found it and left some money
on the counter along with a note reading only, “Thanks!”

To protect it from the elements he tucked the box
into his coat and left the store, doing his best to lock it
behind himself. He started back towards the VA, a spring
in his step, pleased with his genius idea for the snarky
girl he called ‘friend’ but as he passed by the grocery store
he had another idea. He flipped up the collar of his coat
and went inside, where he rented the first three
Die Hard
movies from the kiosk near the entrance.

Then he was finally on his way back to the VA.
Christmas was in two days and even if he didn’t get to
spend it with his family or his old, so-called friends he was
determined to celebrate it with his only new friend, even
if he had to drag her kicking and screaming to his room.
Actually, he thought, if she starts kicking and screaming
I’m probably screwed so maybe not. He just hoped that
once he told her about the movies she would go willingly.

On Christmas Eve Elliot had nightmares about
an evil Santa Claus coming to steal Christmas from the
world. And though he realized that it was a mental ripoff of
How the Grinch stole Christmas
, that knowledge
didn’t make it any less terrifying. He woke up reminiscing about Christmas mornings past and then thought
about this particular Christmas, when no one was thinking about him and no one cared, except maybe Innya, but
she’d never admit it so it didn’t count.

Overcome with emotion he grabbed his cell phone
and started to call his father, then remembered that his
number was blocked and he was supposed to be dead
anyway, and put his phone back down. And of course that
brought on a descent into even darker thoughts about
how his father hated him and how he wasn’t even good
enough to spar with a retarded super hero without Innya
at his side.

Innya. He was going to see Innya. He checked his
clock. It was time to get up. Looking around the room he
realized what a dump it was and quickly stashed most of
his mess underneath his bed and kicked the rest of it into
his closet. He put on his nicest zombie clothing, grabbed
Innya’s gifts and headed out.

The air had that particular sharp feeling that it gets
right before it begins to snow. The sky was overcast and
the wind was extra-frosty as Elliot made his way toward
the desolate quad and the empty signboard where he usually met Innya before class. There were classes scheduled
today but Elliot didn’t plan on attending. He wanted to
celebrate Christmas whether anyone else did or not.

“Hey, you,” said a voice near his ear and he whirled
around just in time to catch her fist arcing toward his
shoulder. Thanks to his ongoing Villain training he was
actually getting pretty good at defending himself. He
wasn’t yet good enough to step up in any classes and take
on some of the bigger jerks in school but he was getting
there. Two more years, maybe three, tops, and he’d be up
to the challenge.

“Hi,” he said, suddenly nervous. Though he and
Innya had hung out daily, gone to every class together,
snuck out together, taunted the local hero together, even
kissed once or twice they had never really made any concrete declaration of friendship. By giving her a gift now
that was exactly what he was doing. It probably wasn’t the
brightest idea but when he looked into her eyes he saw
a different Innya than the one he had first met. She had
softened slightly, at least when it came to him, and that
gave him the courage to do it.

“Here, this is for you. Merry Christmas,” he said
and thrust a black box into her hands.
“Why?” She looked at him quizzically.

“Because you are my friend and friends give each
other gifts.”
“But I didn’t get anything for you,” she said, even as
her hands got busy opening the box. She took off the lid
and tossed it aside, then parted the black tissue paper and
let out a little squeal that was the girliest sound he had
ever heard her make. She pulled out a T-shirt and held it
up to her chest. It was pale pink with black block letters
that read, “Maybe she’s born with it…,” and beneath that,
in a fluid cursive, “Maybe it’s Doomsday.”
“This is a very cool shirt. Did you make it?”
“Yes,” said Elliot, beaming with pride.
Her smile faded and she narrowed her eyes at him,
“I’m still not going to give you anything,” she said.
“That’s fine. You don’t give gifts to get gifts.”
“Oh wait,”she said,“I can give you something.”And
with that she tucked the shirt between her knees and then
removed her jacket and scarf and sweater. She had been
wearing a simple black Tee under all of her layers but she
quickly pulled that one over her head, exposing her plain
black bra. She handed him her clothes then put on the
shirt Elliot had given her. Elliot had a hard time keeping
himself under control. It was just her bra and he had seen
more when he was living in her room for three weeks but…
it was her bra. All of a sudden he was having the best day.
As she buttoned up her thick coat she said, “All
right, we’re even now. Merry Christmas. Let’s go to class.”
“I don’t want to go to class today.”Innya looked sideways at him so he continued, “It’s Christmas. I don’t want
to go to class. We shouldn’t have class on Christmas.”
“Ooooo-kay. What do you have in mind?”
“Going back to my dorm and watching a
Die Hard
marathon.”
Innya grinned. “You’re kidding.”
“Nope.”
“How’d you get them?”
“I got them when I snuck out and made your present.”
“And did you pay for them?” she asked with a
knowing smile.
“If it makes you feel better to think that I stole
them then let’s just go with that story.”
“Yes, let’s. Let’s grab some breakfast and bring it
back to your room and then we can start the best movie
marathon ever.”
Elliot had seen the movies before and he thought
they were enjoyable but he really didn’t understand the
depth of her devotion to the series. He did think it was
adorable the way she fairly skipped through the softly falling snow while recounting for him her favorite moments.
He told himself to stay in check but he had to admit that
he was in love a little with this intelligent, adorable yet
terrifying girl who liked to beat him up.

They took their food back to Elliot’s room to get
the movies. If Vlad had somehow materialized at least
they could go back to her place but Vlad wasn’t there so
they decided to stay. The only place to sit was on the bed
and as Innya sat down and opened up her Styrofoam
container of rapidly cooling food Elliot swore his hands
felt as if they suddenly had been plunged into a warm
sea. True, his hands were still in his pockets but they had
become so sweaty once he was alone with Innya that he
felt as if his pockets were full of water.

He was far too nervous being alone with her to actually eat anything. He wasn’t sure why he suddenly felt like
an awkward teenager considering that he had lived with
her for a few weeks.But after she had so graciously showed
him her bra and then accepted his invitation to hang out
all day in his room he felt that it was time to make his
move. The
Die Hard
marathon had been a late night idea
and a somewhat obvious, he thought, excuse to get her in
an intimate environment. But he’d never done the whole
“make a move” thing, so he had no idea how to progress.

“Start the movie and sit,”Innya said,“You look ridiculous standing there with your hands in your pockets.”
“Okay.” When Elliot pulled his hands out of his
pockets something fell out and landed on the floor.
“What’s that?”asked Innya with a mouthful of eggs.
Elliot picked it up. “It’s a phone charger. The Dean
gave it to me after he helped me down from the roof of
the gym but I don’t know why.”
He looked up from the cord to find Innya staring
at him with her mouth hanging open.Thankfully, she had
already swallowed her eggs, since seeing her half-chewed
breakfast would have put him off kissing completely. At
least for a while. “You’re kidding, right?”
“No,” said Elliot, not sure what she meant at first,
but as she continued to stare at him as if he were the
stupidest person on the face of the Earth it dawned on
him. “Oh!”
“Yeah, moron. Where’s Craig’s phone?”
Elliot went to his coat and pulled out the dead
iPhone. To the sound of Innya grumbling, “I don’t know
why you’re still carrying it around,”he plugged the charger
into the phone and it fit perfectly. As he plugged the other
end into the wall he felt Innya come up behind him.“I can’t
believe you’ve had this for days and haven’t even thought
of doing this. I swear you’d be completely lost without me.
How did you even survive before you knew me?”
“I honestly don’t know,” he admitted quietly.
They didn’t speak as Elliot pressed the power button on the phone and waited for the screen to come to
life. Nothing happened. At all. “Maybe it needs more
time to charge?” Elliot suggested.
“No way,” Innya said, snatching the phone from
his hand. She turned it over, as if looking for something
that would tell her why it didn’t work. Then suddenly she
pulled her phone out of the pocket of her black hoodie
and seemed to be comparing the two.
“What are you doing?” Elliot asked.
Instead of answering him Innya reached into her
boot and pulled out a switchblade. Before Elliot could
say, “Wait!” she had lodged the knife into the seam of
Craig’s iPhone’s case and popped it open.
“Oh my G.O.D.,” Elliot moaned.
“Shut up.”
Elliot knew his fear was irrational. Who cared if he
had damaged someone else’s property? Craig knew who
had stolen his phone and hadn’t yet come after him so
what did it matter now? Still, he felt ill as Innya tossed
the back cover onto his desk and studied the phone’s guts.
“It’s as I suspected,” she announced with some
finality and Elliot realized what she was talking about.
The phone had no insides. There was no SIM card inside,
no battery, nothing but the barest circuitry and even that
looked as if it had been scraped clean of any sort of serial
number. So then how, Elliot asked himself, had Craig
used it to dial 911?
“Now we know why the phone doesn’t work. And
that means that there’s no way you could have seen Craig
dial anything on this phone.”
Elliot’s mind immediately went back to that night
outside of his old house and he had watched the large
screen as Craig dialed the first “9” then “1” before Elliot
had grabbed the phone and ran off into the night. “But I
did see it. He started to call the police.”
“Not possible.”
“Have you looked around? We live in a world of not
possible.”
“You were so upset you must have been seeing things.”
“Screw you,” Elliot said darkly, “I know what I saw.”
Innya bit her bottom lip and even through his irritation Elliot felt a little turned on because she was just so
damn sexy when she did that.“You gave me these gifts and
you’re doing nice things for me so to repay you I’ll try not to
be the bitch I sorely want to be right now. Instead I’ll just
say this: you’re not a Villain, Elliot, so it’s understandable
that you would have been upset when you were told you
couldn’t see your dad. Craig threatened to call the police.
You panicked. You saw something that wasn’t there.”
Holy crap, thought Elliot, she was just nice to me.
Really, actually nice. Like a friend would be. He opened
his mouth to say something but her demeanor, even
though she prefaced the kind words with bitchiness, had
caught him off guard.
Innya seemed to realize that what she had said
was completely out of character for her and she scowled
coldly at him. “Whatever,” she said, tossing the gutless
phone onto Elliot’s desk. “It doesn’t matter to me if you’re
completely delusional. Just don’t let it interfere anymore
with my movie marathon.”
Innya went back to Elliot’s bed, where her Styrofoam container lay open, and took a bite of a pancake.
When Elliot just stood there staring at her, still in complete awe at her moment of genuine caring, or at least as
genuine as Innya was probably capable of being, she said,
“Are you going to turn on the movie or what?”
Elliot shook off his surprise and tucked the phone
back into his coat pocket.
“Why do you want to carry it? It’s dead,”Innya said.
“I don’t want to leave it unattended and have someone try to use it against me,” he said as he started the
movie and she seemed satisfied with that answer. Then
he sat gingerly on the bed beside Innya and picked at his
food. Innya, on the other hand, had no trouble stuffing
her face with anything she could get her hands on.
He had a hard time paying attention to the movie
but Innya had no problem. Sometimes her lips would
even move along silently with the dialogue and Elliot
started watching her instead. As the terrorists were
threatening McClane’s wife’s boss Innya, without looking at him, asked, “You do realize that it wasn’t Craig’s
decision, don’t you?”
Elliot was taken aback. He had thrust thoughts
of his father and that stupid phone to the back of his
mind and returned to trying to figure out how to make a
move on Innya so her bringing it up again kind of sucked.
However, he didn’t have any game to speak of so couldn’t
exactly claim that he was thrown off.
“What do you mean?”
“Your father is an important man. He makes decisions and people follow them. He’s not the sort of man
who lets other people make decisions for him. He’s the
one who doesn’t want to answer your calls.”
“But…” Elliot protested weakly even though in his
heart he felt that she was right.“I know,”he finally admitted, “Of course I know that. It’s just easier to blame Craig
because then I don’t have to face the fact that my dad has
never really liked me and we have nothing in common
and never will. Maybe he’s even happy that I am dead
and out of the picture. Just like my best friends are boning each other silly now that I’m gone, maybe my dad is
happy because now he can have wild parties with a bunch
of rich guys and their trophy wives, and put the moves on
random beautiful women in his office.”
“What?” asked Innya, actually turning away from
the TV to look at him.
Elliot swallowed hard against the lump in is throat.
He hadn’t expected the words to come out that way, so
full of bitterness. He really didn’t want to deal with this
right now and the look on Innya’s face told him that she
didn’t really want to deal with it either but she was trying
to be nice for his sake. He considered her to be his friend
but as a shoulder to lean on he found her very unyielding. She was not the greatest listener and had very little
sympathy for others.
Elliot checked himself, thinking that he had probably just blown it with her. But since the mood was funky
already and he didn’t want to deal with his daddy issues
he could only think of doing one thing to change the
uncomfortable vibes in the room.
Innya asked in a stilted fashion, as if these words
had never left her lips before, “Are you okay?”
Elliot didn’t even know what he was doing as he
threw caution to the wind and leaned in and kissed Innya
right on the lips. Of course, he closed his eyes before contact was made so he ended up hitting her chin first but
after a moment he made the correction and found her
lips. And in those few, blissful seconds of contact he could
have sworn that she kissed him back. Her lips were cold
and she tasted like maple syrup and Elliot thought it was
the greatest thing ever.
Reality could not be held at bay for any longer. It
swung around and smacked him square in the jaw. Or
maybe it was Innya’s fist. A moment’s deliberation told
him that, for the first time since meeting her, she wasn’t
resorting to physical violence. In fact, the room was filled
with such heavy silence that he opened his eyes. Innya’s
face was frozen in shock, her eyes had taken on a very
deer-in-headlights aspect just a few inches from his.
They stared at each other in silence for so long that
Elliot started to get even more nervous, which wasn’t a
good thing. Innya looked terrified, which was an emotion
he’d never before seen on her face and he didn’t quite like
it. He wondered just how much he she was going to make
him pay for this.
The silence unnerved him so he broke it, “Um…”
Then in one swift and graceful movement Innya
rose from the bed and ran out the door.
Elliot sat back against the wall. “That certainly
didn’t go as planned,” he said to himself.
He didn’t bother going after Innya because he
didn’t feel like having his head beaten in. But all in all
it had gone better than he thought it would because at
least she didn’t garrote him with her shoelaces. Though
he was sure that when he saw Innya next he would get a
severe tongue lashing at the very, very least, he knew he
could handle it.
Elliot lay back down on his bed and turned his
attention to the movie to distract his rambling brain. He
ended up watching all three movies back to back and
fantasized about Innya returning and throwing her arms
around his neck. She never did.