Last Friday, as I was riding home on a BAT bus from shopping, I contemplated what to do that weekend. Saturday was my mom’s 50th birthday. I had to do something special (other than flowers), especially since a guy with flaming hands invaded our home the weekend before and I ended up almost choking him to death. He lived (just barely).

Okay -- rewind. Last summer, I discovered that I had the power to choke people to death without actually touching them. I saved a boy and his young mother from a pair of angry metal hounds by somehow telekinetically strangling their necks, cutting their electrical currents from their “brains.” Because I was wearing a polo shirt that day (I often wear one), the little boy called me “Polo Shirt Boy.” The name stuck. Now, just about everybody except my mom and some close friends call me Polo Shirt Boy.

I attract a lot of odd characters, probably (definitely) because I have a power, like them. I can’t tell you just how many people and things attacked me during the last school season, but it was a lot. The media fancied up headlines like “POLO SHIRT BOY SAVES CROWD FROM GIANT SEAL” (giant walrus) or “POLO SHIRT BOY FIGHTS OFF SEXY WOMAN, SAVING THOUSANDS” (she was so hot), but, I admit, I was only struggling to save my own hide. Those things were after me, not mere humans.

Did I say “mere humans?” Well, I can’t be “human,” can I?

The bus finally reached the grocery store, where I always get off. From there it was only a ten-minute walk to the small apartment that my mom and I shared. (I don’t earn money by being a superhero.)

Mom works as an accountant at the Walk-In Care Center in downtown until five PM. Usually I get home around four, so I’m at the door to greet her. However, with all my fruitless shopping for a suitable birthday gift, I got home at six. I kicked my shoes off upon entering the flat, completely quiet but for the constant, mechanical murmur of the refrigerator.

It was too silent.

“Mom?” I called, entering the kitchen. “Sorry I’m late, I went shopping…”

There was something on the table -- something that I had never before seen in my life.

It was a small black key, glossy as if it were glass. I touched it. It was.

There was a folded note weighted down by the key. Hastily, I slipped the folded paper out from underneath the key. It read, in scrawly letters:

YMCA 12 AM
want your mommy back?

I folded the note back up. This time, it wasn’t just me in danger, but my mom also was in trouble.

I didn’t take a nap before midnight. I couldn’t. My mom could be in a state of torture, while I was sleeping. I couldn’t face that.

I left the flat early and walked around the parking lot in front of the Y for an hour. There wasn’t anybody around.

I checked my watch. It was time.

The doors opened without a sound, then clicked shut behind me. There was a security guard at the desk. His skin looked bloated and blue, and his eyes were distant.

“Uh, excuse me?” I said carefully. “I need to, uh, find--”

Suddenly, he turned to me. “No swimming.”

“Okay, the pool? The pool -- thanks dude. Now--”

His hand flopped in the air. I realized he was beckoning me to come closer. I leaned across the front desk.

“Be careful,” he warned. He reeked of death, I noticed.

“Sure dude.”

“No. No swimming, no swimming in the pool…” He started coughing.

Then I realized that he was dead, just alive temporarily, as a zombie or something.

I backed away slowly. My mom could end up like this. The security guard could’ve been a previous victim.

As he doubled over, falling over his chair, I started running. I threw aside doors. I ran past the climbing wall. I ran to the doors leading to the pool. I could see the pool. I could see into the pool. It was empty, with a cage at the bottom. Right away, I knew what was going to happen.

“It’s Mom,” I gasped. “Mom!! MOM!!!” I banged and pulled at the doors. They were locked.

Suddenly, with a big blast of white light that filled my vision, I was knocked off my feet and across the room, into the welcoming arms of an exercise machine. I groaned and pulled myself to my feet. I managed a few steps before collapsing.

“Mom…” She was in danger. I knew I had to save her, but how?

“Hello, Polo Shirt Boy.”

I looked up. The lights had turned on (when did that happen?) and a little girl was standing between me and the pool doors, hands on her hips.

She smiled sweetly. “Goodbye now.” She snapped her fingers. The sound vibrated my brain.

As my world reeled and turned black, I screamed. “BUT NO!!! MOM!!! MOOOOOOOOOOMMMM!!!!!!!!!”