Inside Straight

The wasp high on the wall edged down, keeping its green carapace hidden behind the fake antlers and 1950s outhouse humor. Jonathan tried to make out what the body language was saying; Fortune with his hands on the table, a little slumped over, Curveball sitting forward too, leaning on her elbows. Listening, but not flirty. She had her hair down. It was the first time Jonathan had seen her without her ponytail.

“And then, when I drew an ace… when I thought, you know, it was an ace. I don’t know. It was wild. Everyone was calling me the savior, or else the antichrist. And the thing with my dad. The thing with Fortunato.”

Fortunato dying to save me, he didn’t say. Now that Fortune laid it out like that, Jonathan could see how there’d be a certain amount of couch time called for.

“Intense,” Curveball said.

“Yeah. Yeah, intense. And now,” Fortune shrugged, “it’s all over. You know? I used to have guards around me all the time. And then I was one of the most important aces in the world. And now I’m Captain Cruller.”

Curveball shook her head, shifting her hand from the opposite elbow to the beer bottle in front of her. Dos Equis. Jonathan would have thought she was a wine cooler girl. “That’s Drummer Boy,” Curveball said. “Blow him off. He’s a dick.”

And dicking away, even as we speak, Jonathan thought.

“He’s not wrong, though,” Fortune said. “I mean it’s weird being ordinary, you know? Not being anyone in particular.”

“Maybe you should get on a TV show,” Curveball said.

The wasp was in a pretty good position to see Fortune’s face while that sunk in.

“Shit, I’m sorry, Kate. I didn’t mean anything about you guys. I wasn’t… I didn’t mean to slag on you.”

“No, it’s okay. I mean, apology accepted, but it’s not what I was thinking.”

“What was?” Fortune asked.

She looked up, half-smiling a question.

“What were you thinking?” Fortune asked.

Curveball frowned, picked up the beer bottle, drank a little, and put it down with a thud. Fortune let the silence stretch. If it had been a manipulation, it would have been a good one. The poor bastard was sincere, so it was even better.

“I’m thinking about the reasons we all came to this thing,” she said. “Drummer Boy, Earth Witch. Me. It’s been fun, and I’ve met a lot of people who are really great. And some that aren’t so great. But the thing that… the thing that’s weird in me? I want to win. I came here and I thought, whatever. I’ll try and we’ll see what happens, but I’m around everyone, and it’s like it’s important. I want it. I want to be the American Hero.”

“And what do you think about that?”

“That maybe we can never be special enough to be happy,” she said.

Ooh, deep, Jonathan thought. But Fortune was nodding and smiling.

“Can I tell you something? You have to promise not to pass it on,” Fortune said.

Curveball raised her eyebrows.

“I tried to get my power back. After… after what happened. I thought maybe I could get it back and control it. Since my dad … since Fortunato fixed me.”

Curveball shook her head. Someone at the bar shrieked with laughter that sounded as fake as the ambiance. Curveball’s hands were on the table now. There were probably six or eight inches between Fortune’s hands and hers—flirting distance, maybe. Or maybe not. Jonathan was having a hard time getting a good read off the interaction.

“I tried everything,” Fortune said. “Meditation, hypnosis, acupuncture. Rolfing.”

“You’re kidding,” Curveball said with a laugh that managed to be warm and sympathetic.

“Seems kind of stupid now,” Fortune said into his drink. Jonathan couldn’t be sure, but he thought the guy was blushing.

“Maybe,” Curveball said. “I get it, though.”

“I don’t care if John fucking Fortune gets his powers back!”

On the couch at Losers Central, Jonathan felt a wave of vertigo, suddenly uncertain of where he was. Someone was talking about Fortune. And she sounded pissed off.

He stood up, tucking the hand with the missing thumb into his pocket.

“No!” the voice said again. A woman’s voice. “No, I’m not. They voted me off the show, Mom. I’m off. I’m stuck with all the other losers.”

Jonathan walked to his doorway. Across the hall, Simoon’s door was ajar. He could just make out her sand-colored skin and black hair as she paced.

“Yes, he’s here sometimes. But it’s not like…”

A faint treble yammer, a voice on the other end of a telephone connection, buzzed like a mosquito. Jonathan came closer to the door.

“I’m American, Mama. I was born in America. I’ve never been to Egypt. Egypt isn’t my problem. John Fortune isn’t my problem. I got kicked off the show, and now I’m rooming with the most annoying guy in the world, a Mexican wrestler with a fake accent, a guy who turns into bugs, and a girl who thinks roller derby never went out of style. My career is over. Peregrine already thinks I suck, I’m not going to try to get her son to—”