My name is Doug, and I haven’t been sleeping well lately.

When I do sleep, I dream of strange panoramas: clouds of sooty fluff, bird’s-eye views of neighbourhoods as intricate as a computer motherboard, and a flinty-eyed man in grey who can fly.

I dream he saves the city a hundred times over. I dream that he’s happy.

I think I’m depressed. I have all the symptoms: not eating, not sleeping, no motivation, no joy. I’ve been contemplating suicide. I mean, we all have to die sometime, don’t we? This way you don’t have to worry about retirement, or what your girlfriend is really doing when she says she has to work late again with Tyler, the one guy she didn’t introduce you to at her office Christmas party.

I wonder—if I jumped off my apartment balcony, would the flying man in grey save me?

“So, Doug—where do you see yourself in five years?”

I hate that question. It’s so irrelevant. Five years ago I was starting university and thought my degree was a ticket to a career, not a season’s pass to a cavalcade of interviews for unpaid internships, between shifts at Starbucks.

I flash a smile at Dylan Gomi, the Motherf*cking CEO. That’s what it says on his fucking business card. Dylan Gomi, Motherf*cking CEO. I suspect it’s the alter ego for his real identity, Dylan Gomi, First-Degree Asshole, the way Doug Wolochuk, Eager University Grad, is the alter ego of Doug Wolochuk, Perpetual Barista.

“Well,” I say, “I’m really impressed with the work your startup’s done. In five years I see myself as your head of Marketing.”

Dylan throws his head back and guffaws. I can see the fillings in his back teeth. “Seriously, dude?” he says. “Seriously? You think five years straight outta school at one company qualifies you to be the head of a marketing department?”

“Yes,” I say. Smile. Be assertive. Be confident. Be Doug Wolochuk, Eager University Grad. “With my passion and enthusiasm, it’s possible.”

Dylan taps his finger on my resumé on the table. It’s only one page, single-sided. I wonder if he’s actually read it. It wouldn’t take him very long.

“Christ. You fucking kids,” he says, although he can’t be more than ten years older than me. “Your moms were wrong. Passion is worth shit in the real world. Trying hard doesn’t win you a prize like it did in kindergarten.”

I want to punch him. But Doug Wolochuk, Eager University Grad, doesn’t punch people, and I may not have won the prize for Trying Hard in kindergarten but I do have one for Getting Along with Others.

Dylan suddenly sits up straighter and frowns. “You look familiar,” he says.

I shake my head. “I don’t think we’ve ever—”

He snaps his fingers. “You live in my building. The Majestic. The new condo development on Wellington.”

He would know if I lived there if he had actually read my resumé. My address is printed at the top. I say, “Um, yeah. I do live there.”

He raises an eyebrow, and I know he knows there’s no way someone like me can afford a condo at the Majestic. “I’m renting,” I add, lamely.

He smirks. “From your parents?”

“No.” From my girlfriend’s parents.

“Hey, let me ask you something,” Dylan says, pulling his phone out of his pocket. “You ever the see the flying man in grey?”

My mouth goes dry. “Excuse me?”

“The flying man in grey. You ever see him around our building?” He swipes the screen on his phone until he finds the right photo. “This guy. I got up at, like, 3 a.m. last night to take a piss, and this guy streaks past my living room window. Twenty stories up. Managed to get a pic the second time he came around.”

He shows me the photo on his phone. A grey blur in the shape of a man doing front crawl floats in the night sky.

I remember how the wind felt in his face in my dream last night. I remember his smile. A genuine, joyful smile, not like the one I’m wearing now.

“No,” I lie. “I’ve never seen him before.”

“What do you make of it? Some kind of wire? A marketing stunt?”

“Yeah,” I say absent-mindedly. It was cold, I remember. Colder than he thought it would be, twenty floors up.

Dylan yanks the phone out from under my nose. I hadn’t realized I had been staring. “That’s all you have to say?” he says, and I remember that I’m interviewing for a marketing position. I should’ve offered some insight.

“Sorry, Doug,” he says. “We’re wasting our time here. I’ll see you around.”

His mobile chirrups on the desk. He snatches it up and barks, “I told you not to call me at work, Robin. This better be important.”

He stands and offers me his hand, but his attention is on the call. The flying man in grey would have taken that hand and judo flipped Dylan Gomi, Motherf*cking CEO, onto the ground. Instead, I shake his hand, smile another Eager University Grad smile, and leave.

The man in grey flies above the city. He doesn’t really need to stretch out his arms,but he likes doing it. It makes him feel like he’s slicing through the air like an arrow, even though he’s moving at a leisurely pace in order to survey the streets below.

He crosses off Toronto’s neighbourhoods in his head as he circles the city. Chinatown. Koreatown. Greektown. Cabbagetown. Little India. Little Italy. The Annex. The Junction. The Beach (or Beaches, whichever you prefer). The Village. Liberty Village. Bloor West Village. Roncey. Leslieville. Parkdale. So many neighbourhoods, more than he can name, and so many opportunities for trouble on a mild spring night.

He finds it first in St. Jamestown. Voices carry from a playground tucked within a cluster of highrise apartment buildings. Someone shouting about wanting someone’s phone in exchange for not kicking the shit out of him. He peers down with his razor-sharp vision, sharper than an HD camera. Three young men are using a fourth as a punching bag. It’s a nice night, so they aren’t alone. But those lingering outside on benches and motorized wheelchairs look away. They don’t want to get involved.

The man in grey plummets to the ground like a shooting star, feet first, landing right in front of the muggers. “Holy shit!” one of them says. “Where the fuck did he come from?”

The others aren’t so lucky. They don’t get the chance to say anything. Biff! Bam! Pow! and they go flying through the monkey bars, collapsing like rag dolls around the swings.

The man in grey picks the phone off the ground and dusts off the sand. The glass screen is still glossy and intact, the brushed aluminum still unscratched. No wonder the muggers wanted it. “I believe this is yours,” he says.

The phone’s owner has sank to his knees. His lip and nose are bloody. He can’t be more than fifteen. “Thankth,” the kid rasps around the blood in his mouth.

The man in grey nods, raises one fist in the air, and leaps up to the sky from which he came. But not before the kid raises his phone and flicks on the camera.

I wake up to muffled shouting. I can never tell if it’s in the unit above us or next door, or else I’d call the police. Chelsea says to ignore it, it’s none of our business. I guess she’s right.

I roll over, reaching for her—and my arm flails in nothingness. I’ve fallen asleep on the balcony again, on Chelsea’s parents’ wicker chaise longue, my old camp sleeping bag tucked damply around me. There’s a soft thump from our fighting neighbours. A body has been thrown across a room. I know what that sounds like now, thanks to my dream of the man in grey.

I swing my legs over the side and trudge to the master bedroom, still cocooned in the sleeping bag. The shower is running; Chelsea’s side of the bed is only slightly rumpled, as if she got in but changed her mind.

The shower turns off, and Chelsea emerges from the bathroom in her robe, a towel wrapped around her blond hair. “What time is it?” I say, yawning.

“Seven-thirty,” she says. “I gotta get to the office.”

“So early? When did you get in?”

“Late,” she says. “Press release for a big client has to go out this morning. You were sleeping on the balcony again.”

I frown. “I don’t remember going out there.”

She shakes her head. “You never do. I tried to wake you, but you were tossing and turning and muttering in your sleep. I swear, one of these days I’m going to take a video of you so you can see how weird it is. How was your interview?”

I sink onto the bed and watch her get dressed. “Okay,” I lie.

“Do you think you’ll get the job?”

“Maybe,” I lie.

“That’s good. You look like crap, babe. You really should think about going to a sleep disorder clinic.”

“Yeah,” I say, rubbing my eyes. My hand comes away sandy.

She pouts in the mirror above the dresser and applies her lipstick. She never wore makeup when we were in school. “Don’t forget we’re going out tonight with Nicole.”

“Is it Friday already?” I yawn again.

“Yes,” she says, rolling her eyes. “I’ll text you where we’re meeting.”

I shrug off the sleeping bag and find that I’m wearing my grey hooded sweatshirt and jeans. The hoodie smells like clean sweat and ozone, as if I’d spent the whole night running a marathon in it.

“I’ll see you later, babe.” She gives me a quick kiss, and then wrinkles her nose and gestures at my clothes. “You really should do some laundry,” she says, and then she’s gone.

After working the evening shift I end up at some dive on Queen West or West Queen West or however far west the nigh-trendy stretch has shifted. We’re so far west on Queen West we’re practically in Vancouver. The bar’s name consists of two randomly paired words that have nothing to do with the bar itself, like Pineapple Stalin, as if it’s an indie band.

We’re apparently here because some Toronto blog extolled the virtues of their organic beer and artisanal poutine. Nicole has brought her boyfriend Brandon, whom I’ve never liked. He wears hats too much, and the frames of his glasses are so dark and thick they suck in the light like a black hole. Knowing Brandon, they were probably designed in Japan and assembled by fair trade African orphans in an organic carbon-neutral facility. I’ve always thought that men shouldn’t like accessories so much, but this past year has taught me that everything I knew while in school is wrong.

Nicole, I don’t mind so much. She’s a brunette version of Chelsea, also long-haired and banged and fond of thrifted men’s shirts and patterned tights like she’s an extra in a John Hughes movie.

“Did you guys see the Grey Hoodie video?” Brandon says when a table frees up in the back. Tonight he’s wearing a straw fedora with a black ribbon, black as his glasses.

Chelsea and Nicole nod. “It was all over the office,” Chelsea says. “How do you think he did it?”

“Did what?” I ask, putting on my guileless Doug Wolochuk, Nice Boyfriend, face. It’s for Chelsea’s sake; I know she wants me to get along with her new Toronto friends. “And who’s he?”

“You didn’t see it?” Nicole said.

“Oh, of course not. He was at work,” Chelsea says.

“No computers behind the counter at Starbucks,” I say, with a smile that doesn’t reach my eyes.

“You didn’t even watch it on your phone?” Brandon asks. “On your lunch break?”

“I was eating lunch,” I say.

The irony is lost on him. Which is ironic, because I thought hipsters were all about irony. “So this guy comes out of nowhere,” he says, “saves a kid from an ass-kicking, and then flies away. The kid posted a video online. Dude actually jumps in the air and flies away. Here.”

Brandon pulls out his phone, taps it a few times, and then passes it over to me. I set down my beer and take it. Chelsea leans over my shoulder. “I’ve seen it a million times,” she says, “and it still blows my mind. How does he do it?”

“He’s a superhero,” says Nicole. “He’s an honest-to-God, motherfucking superhero.”

“Do you think he’s from another planet?” asks Chelsea. “I mean, he can fly.”

“He could just have some high-tech gear,” says Nicole.

“No way. He’s definitely from another planet,” Brandon says. “No-one from Toronto would ever step in to help a stranger.” Brandon grew up in Montreal, if I recall correctly. “He probably dances at concerts, too,” he adds. Nicole punches him in the shoulder.

Chelsea says something else, but I don’t hear her. The video loads up, and there’s the man in grey from my dreams, rocketing from the ground as if launched upward by invisible wires. There are no wires, though. I know that the flying man in grey doesn’t need them.

“Why do they call him the Grey Hoodie?” I ask. They’re arguing now about which Canadian city the superhero could possibly be from, St. John’s, Newfoundland, being the top contender.

“Because he’s wearing one. Duh,” Chelsea says, and I remember the sweatshirt I’d woken up in that morning.

“And other reports of a vigilante in a grey hoodie came out of the woodwork after this video went viral,” Nicole says. “Seems he was pretty busy last night.”

I blink; and I remember other faces, other neighbourhoods besides St. Jamestown. That cabbie in the Financial District, and those girls in Kensington Market. And there were more, but it’s all a dreamlike blur of cloud-shaped shadows and flying fists and the wind striking the man in grey’s face.

“It’s a genius costume,” Brandon says. “None of that cape and tights shit. Sweatshirt, jeans and sneakers—dude can just land on the ground and look like everyone else. No need to find a phone booth to change in.”

“Anyone see his face?” I ask.

Nicole shakes his head. “Nope. Had that hood over his head the whole time.”

“I bet he’s white,” Brandon says.

Chelsea shoots him a dirty look. “Seriously? How can you tell?”

“Because, if he were black, someone would’ve shot him.”

Nicole snorts. “In Toronto?”

“Okay, well—no-one would have stopped their cab to pick him up late at night,” he says.

Chelsea laughs. “Does it look like he needs a cab?”

“Speaking of late nights,” I say, passing the phone back to Brandon, “were you also doing work for that big client last night, Nicole?”

Nicole’s brow furrows. Chelsea says, quickly, “She’s staffed to a different project.”

“Yeah,” Nicole says, smiling. “I don’t have to work crazy hours like Chels does, thank God.”

My answering smile is just as fake. Doug Wolochuk, Nice Boyfriend, would never suspect his longtime girlfriend to be cheating on him. “Lucky,” I say, and then a massive yawn overtakes my face. Chelsea frowns. “Sorry, I didn’t sleep well last night.”

“Doug never sleeps well,” Chelsea says. “Always tossing and turning, and then he gets up and ends up falling asleep somewhere else, like the sofa or out on the balcony.”

“Too much noise, I guess,” I say. “I’m not used to the city. I should go.” I yawn again, gulp down the rest of my beer, and set down the bottle.

“Really?” Nicole gives me a puppy-dog face. Brandon makes some kind of faux-protest sound. Chelsea’s mouth thins.

“I have to work tomorrow morning,” I say.

“He’s no fun anymore,” Chelsea says. “When he’s not working, he’s sleeping. Because he doesn’t sleep well. It’s a vicious cycle.”

I stand up. Chelsea proffers her cheek. I dutifully kiss it.

“See you back home, babe,” she says.

“Yeah,” I say. Eventually.

The Grey Hoodie plans to save Toronto, one night at a time.

He saves cyclists and pedestrians from reckless drivers. He saves reckless drivers from irate cyclists and pedestrians. He swoops down to carry stalled streetcars out of the way. He hands out bottled water and Tim Hortons gift cards to the homeless.

On Friday and Saturday nights, he helps people find their housekeys when they stumble home at four in the morning. He stops women from going home with unsuitable men, and men from going home with unsuitable women. He breaks up bar fights. When someone pulls out a gun in the middle of the Entertainment District, he’s there to melt it with his heat-ray vision.

When the guy behind you at the ATM peers over your shoulder to get your PIN, the Grey Hoodie is there.

When you stagger out of the Dance Cave and none of your friends have followed you out to hold your hair back when you puke on the sidewalk, the Grey Hoodie is there.

When you’re walking your dog on Church Street and a group of drunken frat boys follow you around and call you a dyke, the Grey Hoodie is there.

The Grey Hoodie wants to save the city. The Grey Hoodie wants to save you.

The neighbours are fighting again. I leave the sleeping bag on the chaise longue and plod into the bedroom, trying to listen to the ruckus over the sound of Chelsea’s hair dryer. Mostly shouting this time; less bodily contact.

Steam puffs out of the bathroom as the door swings open. “Gross, you fell asleep in your hoodie again,” Chelsea says. “You really should wash it. It smells. I’m almost glad you sleep outside. Have you taken up jogging again?”

“Um, yeah,” I lie.

“That’s good; the exercise will probably help you sleep better. Oh! I have something to tell you.” She perches on the foot of the bed. “So Nicole and I went back to Mango Lenin for a quick drink last night, to take a break from the pitch, and you’ll never guess who we just missed.”

“Who?” I say.

“Guess!” She bounces excitedly on the mattress.

I shake my head. “I’m not awake enough to guess.”

“The Grey Hoodie!” she says.

“The what?”

“The Grey Hoodie! The superhero, remember?”

“Oh,” I say. “Right.”

“Apparently there was this obnoxious customer who’d drunk too much and was hitting on a waitress. The Grey Hoodie just—whoosh!—appeared out of nowhere and dragged him outside.”

“Did he beat the crap out of the guy?” I ask, rubbing my eyes. I don’t remember that part from my dreams.

“No, just shoved him into a cab,” she says. “It was pulling away when we got there. People were still standing on the sidewalk looking up. Videos are online already. Actually, there’s a ton of them from last night. The guy was everywhere. He really gets around.”

“He is a superhero,” I say.

“Yeah,” she says. “Isn’t that exciting?”

She’s never looked that excited for anything that I’ve ever done. “Look, Chelsea,” I say. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you. . . .”

“Oh?” she says in an overly light voice, and I think, You’re afraid I’m going to ask you about your work BFF, Tyler.

“I don’t know how to say this . . . but I have a grey hoodie.” I stick my hands in the kangaroo pocket for emphasis.

“I know. I bought it for you.”

“It’s not just that,” I say. “I’ve been having these dreams lately. Dreams about flying—”

She laughs. “What, like you think you’re the Grey Hoodie or something?” At the expression on my face, she laughs again. “Oh my God, you do think you’re the Grey Hoodie!” She laughs so hard that she falls off the bed, which makes her laugh even more.

I don’t know what to say.

Finally Chelsea picks herself up, but there’s still laughter in her eyes. “I’m sorry, Doug. I love you,” she says, which she hasn’t said in months, “but you, an ass-kicking urban superhero? I don’t think so.”

“But the flying dreams,” I say. “They’re so real, so vivid.”

“Everyone has flying dreams. And everyone’s got a grey hoodie. I’ve got two.”

“But you said so yourself—every morning I smell like I’ve been out jogging.”

“Doug, your sleeping habits have you so mixed up you’ve probably forgotten when you last showered.” She shakes her head. “Fine. Fly. Fly for me now.”

“Okay.” I take a deep breath and lift both arms in the air as if I’m about to dive into a swimming pool. I close my eyes and launch myself up on my toes.

Nothing.

I can tell Chelsea’s trying hard not to laugh again. I sink back on my heels. She’s right. Me, a superhero? Absolutely ludicrous. I’m Doug Wolochuk, Nice Boyfriend. I’m only good for pouring espresso shots and dozing off while waiting for her to come home from the office.

“Yeah, you’re right,” I say. “Anyway, you’d notice if I were out all night fighting crime.”

Chelsea suddenly walks over to the mirror above the dresser and picks at a clump in her mascara. “Oh, Nicole says that Brandon says there’s a marketing internship opening up at the agency he works at. You should apply.”

“I don’t want to work with Brandon. He’s always telling me I should quit Starbucks and work for an indie coffee shop instead.”

“Well,” she says, turning back to look at me, one hand on her hip, “if you get the job, he won’t be telling you to quit Starbucks because you’ll have already quit. Anyway, he’s a designer, you probably won’t have to talk to him at all.”

“I don’t know—”

“Do you want to be a barista for the rest of your life?” she says.

“No, but—”

“Then I’ll get the deets from Nicole.”

“I don’t know.”

“What don’t you know?” she demands. “What happened to all the plans we made together before graduation?”

“I don’t—”

Chelsea throws up her hands. She huffs out the door, probably to run to Tyler and complain that she’s saddled with a delusional sad sack of a boyfriend.

“I don’t know,” I say to the empty room.

I tell Chelsea I have to work an evening shift even though I actually finish at five. I don’t feel like hanging out at home, waiting for her to text and tell me that she’s going to be working late yet again. Instead, I wind through the streets between the coffee shop and home, waiting for night to fall, waiting for something to happen.

Kensington Market buzzes as the sun sets. It’s the start of patio season. They say that in Toronto there are two seasons, winter and construction, but if you live downtown it’s actually winter and patio. Even though the city hasn’t thawed completely—it’s chilly even in May—people happily shiver outside ancient mom-and-pop bars that woke up one morning and found themselves trendy. All the girls look like Nicole and Chelsea; all the guys look like Brandon.

Kensington spits me out onto Dundas. I continue on Spadina through Chinatown, weaving through tourists and locals. Surely any minute now I’ll come across an urban misdemeanour, and either the flying man in grey will appear or I will find myself rising to the occasion. Someone will dine and dash out of a pho restaurant. Someone will threaten a streetcar driver. Someone will harass a dozing panhandler. And I’ll know for once and for all whether my dreams have just been dreams or not.

I zip up my hoodie. I’m not that cold, but I pull the hood over my head anyway. I’m not the only one. Chelsea was right; everyone has a grey hoodie—and suddenly seems to have decided to wear theirs tonight in imitation of their hero. Men, women, even the few sleepy-eyed children being hustled home to bed. An apple-cheeked blonde wearing nothing but a grey hoodie zipped down to her navel smiles up at me from the cover of the Toronto Sun. Someone has spray-painted Grey Hoodie 4 Mayor over the window of an abandoned video rental shop. A man in an unzipped grey hoodie and Santa hat does pushups next to the giant thimble at Spadina and Richmond.

“Yes yes yes!” he shouts. The zippered edges swing against his muscular bare chest. He seems more likely to be a superhero than me. His face is all sharp angles and he’s got that wicked movie villain goatee. Furthermore, he’s got the alpha male swagger, like Dylan Gomi, First-Class Asshole. Even Brandon, being an alpha douchebag, would be a likelier candidate than me.

Me, I’m all sandy hair and soft edges, nondescript and inoffensive, like a Doug should be. When we first started dating, Chelsea used to say I was cute in a boy-next-door way.

But now that I’m twenty-three I’m no longer a boy. I don’t know what I am.

Or maybe I’m still that boy.

It all seemed easier when I was a kid. Being a grownup seemed easy. Adulthood was going to be your secret identity, the time in your life when you would finally shine and that kid who used to rough you up behind the portables would be sorry.

I thought was going to be a cop or a firefighter or mechanic, because I thought that’s what men did. Fixed things. Saved things. Made things better for people. Instead I majored in Marketing and Business Communications at a second-rate university in a small Ontario town. Which qualifies me to steam milk and tell customers that it’s venti, not large, and would you like whipped cream with that?

Night has fallen. Someone’s shouting in the parkette down the street from the condo. I can make out two figures: one large, one thin. The larger one, of course, is doing the shouting. The thin one just stands there, still and small, as if he or she is trying to make themselves as invisible as possible. A small dog, like a Jack Russell, dances around their feet. Between its yaps I catch words like worthless and stupid.

The shouter raises his fist. I should do something. I should step forward and say something like—what do men say in situations like this? You oughta pick on somebody your own size!

Something like that. In a John Wayne voice.

I bet Chelsea’s boyfriend-in-waiting, Tyler, would know what to say.

I bet the Grey Hoodie would know what to say.

I count to ten, expecting him to descend like an avenging angel. He’ll step in. I know he will. I’ve been him in my dreams.

Nothing.

At least call the police, I tell myself. My hand curls around the phone in my hoodie’s pocket, but the shouting man scoops up the Jack Russell terrier and slips into the shadows. The smaller figure scurries after them.

It’s too late. At least I tried. I breathe a sigh of relief and disappointment and continue on my way home.

Then I remember, as Dylan Gomi, Motherf*cking CEO, had said, trying hard isn’t enough to win a prize in the real world.

The flying man in grey isn’t flying tonight.

He dashes faster than a cheetah through a warren of hallways, honing in on the noise with his super hearing.

There. A torrent of angry words floods from the penthouse unit. You useless, no-good little bitch. You’re nothing without me. Do that again and I will kill you, Robin. I mean it.

The door splinters under the force of the Grey Hoodie’s body. A thin young man bends backward over a rather nice mahogany dining table. It looks like a black eye is about to surface on his face. A larger man has his hands around his throat. A Jack Russell terrier circles them in a frenzy of barking, but whether it’s protesting or egging the aggressor on, the Grey Hoodie can’t tell.

With a flick of his wrist, the Grey Hoodie throws the large man across the room. He crashes into the kitchen island. Copper pots tumble off the granite countertop and clang on the floor. The thin young man, presumably Robin, screams.

“So you like to bully the weak,” the Grey Hoodie snarls. The large man groans. The Grey Hoodie grabs him by his shirt collar and hauls him into a sitting position. “Just remember, there is someone stronger than—”

The large man looks up then, and his eyes widen.

“You!” the Grey Hoodie says.

“You!” Dylan Gomi says.

The Grey Hoodie lifts Dylan Gomi, Motherf*cking CEO, into the air above his head, ready to throw him across the room a second time. Robin yells, “Don’t hurt him!” and suddenly he’s clawing at the Grey Hoodie like a cat on fire. His attack is but a mere tickle to the Grey Hoodie, but it surprises him enough to drop Dylan back on the floor.

Dylan’s foot shoots out and the Grey Hoodie trips and lands on top of him, the Jack Russell snapping at his arm, Robin whirling with clenched fists. The sleeve of his hoodie tears between the dog’s teeth.

“Enough!” the Grey Hoodie booms, springing into the air. The two men and the dog fall off of him onto the floor. He hovers above them, boring holes into Dylan with his eyes, regretfully without his heat-ray vision.

“It’s okay,” Robin whimpers, clinging to Dylan’s arm. “Don’t hurt my husband. It’s okay. I deserved it.”

In the distance, the Grey Hoodie hears approaching police sirens. They’ll sort this out. They’ll take one look at Robin and haul Dylan off to jail.

The Grey Hoodie turns and soars out the ragged man-shaped hole he made in their door.

He hears Robin ask Dylan if he’s all right.

Some people, the Grey Hoodie thinks sadly, just don’t want to be saved.

The cold teeth of the sleeping bag bite into my cheek. I flip over on my back, squinting at the morning sunlight.

Something’s not right.

It’s quiet.

I yawn, shed the sleeping bag, and plod inside to the bedroom. The shower is running. I remember Chelsea’s complaints about the smell so I grab a clean T-shirt from the dresser and peel off my sweatshirt. There’s a tear in the right sleeve, about the perfect size for a yappy little canine mouth.

The shower turns off. I toss the hoodie onto the bed and quickly exchange my dirty T-shirt for the fresh one.

Chelsea emerges from the bathroom, towel wound around her head. “You missed all the drama last night,” she says. “You know the noise and shouting we always hear? Guy upstairs got taken away by the cops for domestic abuse. Turns out he was beating up his partner.”

A thin, forlorn face with a bruised eye flashes in my head. “Poor guy,” I say. “I hope he’s okay.”

“What? How can you sympathize with the abuser?”

“No, no—I meant his partner.”

“How did you know his partner’s male?” she asks.

“I’ve seen them around,” I say, truthfully. “They have a Jack Russell.”

“I got in just as the asshole was being pushed into the back of a police car,” she says. “He looked a mess. Apparently the Grey Hoodie got to him.”

Her eyes flash with excitement. I sit up a little straighter, hold my head up a little higher. “Really.”

“Uh huh. I can’t believe you slept through it. There were police cars and news trucks and everything. Turns out the guy’s some well-known local entrepreneur—”

“Dylan Gomi, Motherfucking CEO,” I mutter.

Chelsea looks at me, startled. “That’s the guy.”

“Yeah,” I say. “I interviewed at his startup last month. He’s a dick.”

“Good thing you didn’t get hired then.” Her mouth twists, and she turns away. She cocks her head to one side, towel-drying her hair in front of the mirror. I pick my hoodie off the bed and straighten out the sleeve. I didn’t imagine it. The tear is there, as plain as day.

“Did Dylan Gomi say anything?” I ask.

“Other than Get those fucking cameras outta my face?”

“Did he say anything about the Grey Hoodie’s identity?” I repeat, turning the sleeve over in my hands, pulse pounding in my ears. “Maybe he saw his face.”

“Nope. If he had, I’m sure it would’ve been all over the internet this morning.”

I glance up at her. She’s still tousling her head. She doesn’t notice me looking at her in the mirror. With her hair damp and pulled away from her makeup-free face, she looks like the girl who’d sat next to me in Marketing 101 when we were frosh, the archetypal faithful girl next door. Emphasis on the word faithful.

I don’t think she’s that girl any longer, even though I’m still that boy.

“Chels,” I say.

She turns around, head still cocked. I put on the hoodie, zip it all the way to the top, flip the hood over my head—and look at her like Christopher Reeve taking off his glasses in front of Margot Kidder.

I’m Doug Wolochuk, Superhero. Motherfucking Superhero.

“What?” she says, and the moment is lost. I jab both my thumbs toward my chest and raise an eyebrow.

She frowns. “I don’t understand.”

“The Grey Hoodie!” I say, exasperatedly. “I’m the Grey Hoodie!”

She lowers the towel from her hair. “Doug, seriously?”

I show her my sleeve. “This is where Dylan’s dog bit him—I mean, me!”

She rolls her eyes. “Doug—”

“I beat up Dylan Gomi. I saved his husband. Yes, they’re married. Now, how would I know that?”

“Doug—” she says again, and there’s something in her voice that isn’t laughter, or contempt, or a protest. It’s anger. “Doug, just stop. Stop it. You’re being stupid.”

“It’s not stupid!” I protest. “I can fly! I have heat-ray vision and super hearing! I fight crime!”

She flings the towel down on the floor. “Grow up, Doug. I’m so tired of your mid-twenties crisis shit. I’m tired of waiting for you to man the fuck up and figure out what you want to do with your life.”

How can I man up when I don’t know what it means to be a man?

“You know,” she continues, “I thought things were getting better when you went for that last interview, but then you regress into this fantasy—”

“It’s not a fantasy! Look at my sleeve! That little dog—”

“Doug. You are not the Grey Hoodie. You just want to be him because you’re—” She suddenly bites her lip.

“Because I’m what?” I say. “Because I’m what, Chelsea?”

Because you’re a loser. She shakes her head angrily, but I know she’s thinking it.

“Is Tyler man enough to be the Grey Hoodie?” I demand.

Her eyes blaze.

Then, to my surprise, the fire goes out in her face, leaving only sadness. She shakes her head again.

“The Grey Hoodie can’t save you from yourself,” she says, and she leaves the room.

My name is Doug, and I haven’t been sleeping well lately.

When I do sleep, I dream of a man in grey who can fly. I dream he saves the city a hundred times over. I dream that he’s happy.

Not like me.

Chelsea’s late again coming home from work, but this time she hasn’t bothered to text me. She must still be mad. Or she doesn’t care. Or she’s simply forgotten. Or she’s in a passionate clinch with Tyler in a locked boardroom. It doesn’t matter. Not anymore.

It’s easier than I thought to hop up on the balcony ledge, almost as easy as it is in my dreams.

I push the chaise longue over and clamber up onto the cushions. Beads of light speckle the street below. Traffic on Wellington hums softly and steadily. The air smells crisp and clean, like spring, like quiet. The night sky is as black as Brandon’s thick hipster glasses, sucking in all the light save for a tiny sliver of moon.

I pull the grey hood over my head. Instant anonymity. Another jaded twentysomething male who thought he was going to grow up to be someone with his sweetheart by his side.

Just one more step, one more leap, and I will slice through the air like an arrow. Will the Grey Hoodie save me, or will I save myself?

Only one way to find out.

__________

E.L. Chen was born, raised, and now works and lives in Toronto (AKA The Freakin’ Centre of the Known Universe) with a very nice husband and their young son. Her superpowers include selling the occasional short story and sleeping on the subway without missing her stop.