My mom stood by my bed with her arms crossed. My dad sat in my desk chair, studying me. He started to say something, but my mom put out a hand and said, “Let me, Steven.”
Dad nodded.
I coughed. Cough-cough-cough.
“Do you know why I called here?” Before I could answer, she said, “I called here because Mrs. Holler phoned me at work. She wanted to know why you were absent today.”
Mrs. Holler did that when you were absent? I had no idea! I said, “I’m sorry, Mom. I guess I should have called you. But I didn’t want you to have to come home. I’m not throwing up or anything.” Cough-cough-cough.
“She said you hadn’t been at school all day.”
I shrugged.
Dad leaned in a little and said, “So you came home during morning recess?”
I looked from my mom to my dad and back again. Then I said through my nose like I had a monster cold, “I’m sorry, okay? I should have told you!
My dad said, “Nolan, look at me.”
I looked at him, but it was hard.
“My question to you, son, is why didn’t I see you when I came home at around eleven o’clock?”
Uh-oh.
“Where were you at eleven o’clock?”
My mouth opened and closed like a stupid fish.
“No … I don’t believe it!” my mom cried. “Please tell me it isn’t you…!”
“The Tagger!”
I sat straight up. “The Tagger? You think I’m the Tagger?”
My mom was pacing all over my room, throwing her hands up in the air, crying. “The school called the parents of all children who were absent today, trying to figure out who spray-painted Dr. Voss’s car.”
“It wasn’t me, Mom! I swear it wasn’t me!”
The phone rang.
“Then why can’t you tell us where you were at eleven o’clock? Your father stopped by the house, got a soda and a snack, used the bathroom— He says your door was wide open. Did he just not see you? I don’t think so! Nolan, you’ve been acting so strangely lately. Is this… is this why?”
“No! No, it’s not!” I shouted.
I guess I forgot to talk through my nose, because all of a sudden her face squeezed together. “You’re not sick at all, are you?” She pulled away from me and wailed, “Oh, Nolan!”
I couldn’t believe she thought I was the Tagger. And maybe superheroes aren’t supposed to cry, but this one did. And once I started, I couldn’t seem to stop. My breathing got all mixed up, and pretty soon I had the stupid hiccups.
We could hear the answering machine pick up. “You’ve reached Eve ‘n’ Steven’s. Please leave a message at the beep.” Beeeeeep. Dad perked an ear as a voice said, “Steven, this is Sarge—”
Dad got up and whispered, “I’ll be right back.”
Mom sat on the edge of my bed and said, “Nolan? Nolan, please talk to me. You’ve always been an honest child. Now please, tell me the truth.”
I just buried my head under my pillow. How could they think I was the Tagger? It was bad enough that they thought I couldn’t do anything. But how could they think I was a villain?
I was about to choke to death on hiccups when I heard my dad saying, “Sarge says Shredderman’s posted a movie clip. He says it exposes the Tagger.”
“Oh, no!” my mom wailed.
I said, “I’m not—hic—the—hic—Tagger!” Then I sat up and said it louder, “I’m not—hic— the—hic—Tagger!”
Dad was already booting up my computer. Mom got up and stood behind him.
I just sat there, hiccuping.
When they saw the clip, my dad’s jaw dropped.
My mom gasped, “Ryan Voss? And he sprayed his own mother’s car?”
My dad leaned back and rubbed his chin. “Well, I’ll be.”
They both turned to face me. “So… so you’re really not the Tagger?” Mom asked.
I scowled at her and hiccuped. “Of course not!”
“But… but then where were you at eleven o’clock? Why did you leave school?”
Hic.
Slowly my dad’s forehead crept back. His jaw eased open. His eyes bulged.
Hic.
He scoured my desk and spotted my yearbook sticking out of my scanner. He yanked it out and saw Dr. Voss’s face. “You’re…” He was blinking like crazy at me. “You’re…” He snatched up my digital camera and found the movie clip. Then he looked at my mother and whispered, “Eve, our son is… a superhero!”
“What?”
“Look!” He showed her the clip. “He’s not the Tagger, he’s Shredderman!”
“What?” she said again, and now she was blinking like crazy.
“Shredderman!” my dad said with a grin. “Definitely the coolest superhero to hit this town!”
My mom covered her mouth. “You built that site? All by yourself?”
I nodded. Hic.
“But how? How did you know how to do… all of this?” She was back at the computer, clicking around like mad. “This is amazing! Look at this graphic! Honey, I program computers, and I don’t know how to do half of this stuff!” She turned to face me. “Where did you … how did you …?”
I shrugged. “It’s not hard.”
“Ha!” she laughed.
Dad scooted way close to me. “Nolan, you’ve got to tell me how you managed to get that clip of Ryan Voss tagging his mother’s car. How in the world did you do that?”
So I told him all about it. Every detail, clear through my getaway in the gardener’s truck. And while my dad was grinning bigger and bigger, my mom’s face was turning whiter and whiter. “You…you jumped out up by Route 7?” she gasped.
“Uh-huh.” The hiccups were gone.
“That’s miles away! You could’ve gotten lost! Or been kidnapped! What if you’d been hit by a car? What if—”
“Mo’Om! Superheroes don’t get lost or kidnapped. Well, if they do get kidnapped, they always find a way out of it, right? I’m fine!”
“But… you could’ve suffocated!”
“I had air holes! A snorkel! I’m fine! And don’t worry—I took a shower. And washed my clothes.”
She checked me over. “In the washer and dryer?”
“No,” I said, rolling my eyes, “in the shower.”
“In the shower.”
Dad said, “He’s kidding, Eve. You know, a joke?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Maybe someday I’ll even figure out how to toast waffles.”
She looked at me, blinking away. Then she threw her arms around me and started bawling. “My baby!”
“Mo-om!” I rolled my eyes at my dad.
He grinned and winked at me.
So I hugged her back, and the truth is, I was glad they’d found out.
Super glad.
