My NANO Chapter 1

Hey guys, I'm going to be posting my NaNo up here periodically. It's unedited so any continuity mistakes or trips to the DoRD are completely unintentional. Enjoy!

Chapter 1
With great power comes great responsibility.
-Narration, Spiderman

Today, like most days, I overslept. My alarm clock mysteriously stopped beeping before I fully awoke. All right, I may press snooze repeatedly and then go back to bed, but it wasn’t my fault. I was half-asleep and had no control over my actions.
My alarm clock beep beep beeped, an unholy sound that assaulted my ears and head. I let it ring for a few seconds as revenge on my roommates for partying on a weekday when I was trying to sleep and then indiscriminately pressed buttons until the sound ceased. I turned over and pulled the covers tighter around me. I really should have gone to class…but on the other hand, I was just so tired. Sleep was looking great right now.
And then I remembered that I had a midterm that day. Dammit. The clock showed that I had about ten minutes to get to class. I jumped up and briefly felt a little dizzy at the sudden change in orientation. I grabbed some clothes and dashed to the bathroom. There was no time to shower and I resigned myself to a day of greasy hair. I pulled on my clothes as quickly as I could. As usual, my rat’s nest of curly auburn hair refused to behave when it was most important, and I sighed and pulled it back in a ponytail.
"Good morning!" my roommate, Raina, said as I emerged from the bathroom. She was an overly perky Type-A personality who got up at seven every day to do homework. In other words, the complete antithesis of me. "I made pancakes, if you want some."
Pancakes. Dear God. I glared at her and went to my room. I checked to make sure I had the essentials: pen, pencil, cheat sheets.
I didn’t need the cheat sheets, really. I was perfectly capable of passing any test that I had to take. It was just…I didn’t like studying. There were other things to do. And really, when was I ever going to have to be able to recite details of the Henrician Reformation? It wasn’t like people regularly yelled, "Quick! Is there an amateur historian in the building?"
Yes, I was getting a completely useless degree in history. Useless because you can’t do much with a history degree except get a PhD and teach, neither of which I wanted to do. Why history? I couldn’t tell you. I had to pick a major and that was the one that seemed like the easiest.
"Paige, why won’t you try? I know you can do the work," my mother told me after being informed of another abysmal grade.
"School’s a waste of time," I had muttered. We had had variations of the same conversation a million times. It had gotten to the point where it seemed scripted and we each had our lines. It was such a cliché: I didn’t want to go to school, but Mom refused to let me do nothing with my life, and so made me enrol in a university that I somehow got into, despise a history of poor high school grades.
"You’ll never get anywhere in life unless you pull up those grades," she had told me. |Why don’t you join a club? Your school career will be so much better."
"Uh huh," I said. The fun of joining clubs was just a delusion perpetrated by overachievers like my mother who tried to convince themselves that participating in something was psychologically satisfying.
I had three minutes to get to class, and it was at least a ten minute walk. I broke into a sprint, my legs hating me every time they took a step. I finally arrived at the building and ran to my classroom. I slowly opened the door and looked inside. All 150 students were diligently working to fill in the little dots that decided the course of their lives. I tried to enter as quietly as possible. Of course, you could already hear a pin drop in the room so my arrival was immediately noticed. Most of the heads turned to stare at me, a disconcerting experience. I glared at everyone and walked down the aisle to my professor.
"Hi," I said. She looked up, unamused. "Could I get a test paper?"
"Paige, what did I say when I was talking about the exam last week?" she asked. I had no idea, but I sensed this wasn’t a rhetorical question.
"Um…'Good luck on the exam next week'?" I tried hopefully.
"I said that you wouldn’t be able to write the exam if you came late," she said sternly. "Every other student managed to make it on time. I’m not sure why you couldn’t."
"Death in the family?" I tried.
"Bull," she said. "Go home, Paige. Maybe if you get a 90% on the next exam, you’ll pass this class. But I doubt it. If you can’t take this class seriously, you shouldn’t be here."
"But I’m only ten minutes late," I protested.
"When does this class start?" she asked. I rolled my eyes.
"Nine o’ clock," I said, already knowing where this was going.
"And what time did you get in today?" she asked, as if talking to a five-year-old.
"Nine ten," I said reluctantly.
"That means you’re late," she said. "Go home."
I didn’t say anything, just turned around and left. I stopped at a food stand and bought some doughnut holes. I hadn’t had breakfast, and I felt I deserved some doughnut holes after my crappy morning. I turned away from the stand and almost collided with a green spandex-clad man with a mask and cape. I watched him run by, confused, and briefly had the thought that unless you had a really nice behind, you shouldn’t be wearing skintight clothing. A few seconds after the masked man ran by, two more appeared.
The first I recognized. Hurricane was Arrington’s resident superhero. He was wearing a red spandex suit, filled out nicely by his overly sculpted physique. He had black briefs over his tights, held in place by a gold belt. A black cape fluttered behind him and his red boots clunked on the floor as he ran. His red mask covered half his face, but left everything below his nose uncovered. Arrington had been his territory for about ten years now. He regularly appeared at elementary schools to talk about the dangers of crime, and he was the kind of guy who climbed up to get cats out of trees. He had become less of a novelty than he was - in a time when everyone loved anti-heroes like Batman, he was becoming more and more of a do-gooder cliché. But he was good for tourism and he kept the crime rate down, so he was left alone.
Following him was someone that I didn’t recognize. He was dressed in some kind of black shiny material and big black boots. He had a silver belt, from which hung several pouches. His mask, as well, covered about half his face. I watched as he ran away and noted that he was one person who could pull off tights. He was no David Bowie, but still.
"What’s going on?" I asked the doughnut worker, who shrugged. I ran after them, stoked for some actual excitement in this place.
"Release him, evildoer!" Hurricane thundered. I rolled my eyes. Evildoer? I could see the green-suited man just inside one of the science labs. He had an arm wound tightly around a researcher’s neck. A small crowd was gathering. I pushed my way to the front, ignoring angry looks. Hurricane was trying to placate the man, his companion silent beside him.
Obviously, talking to the guy wasn’t working. Hurricane had super-strength and super-speed, so why wouldn’t he just punch the guy out? But of course, Hurricane wanted to do everything without hurting people. Which I guess wasn’t a bad thing, but it would end this whole thing a lot faster.
"He killed my brother!" the spandex-suited villain said.
"The lab explosion was an accident!" the researcher protested. "I wasn’t even there!"
"You could have been there and stopped it, and maybe he would be alive now!" the villain said. "I have to avenge him!"
Hurricane wasn’t going to take this guy out. But maybe if I distracted the guy, someone else would take him out. I reached into my box of doughnut holes and chucked one at his head. It connected solidly with his forehead and he stopped, looking out at the crowd. I started looking around too, pretending it wasn’t me. The black-clad superhero looked straight at me and I could see his mouth twitching.
"I’ll distract him," I mouthed, using elaborate hand gestures that conveyed exactly nothing. "You take him down!" I glanced at Hurricane, who was still trying to talk him down. The stranger spread out his arms in a gesture of confusion. I took out another doughnut hole and mimed throwing it. I then pointed at him and mimed a punch. The stranger turned back to the villain, and I had to hope that he had understood me. I threw another doughnut hole, which collided with his chest.
"Who’s doing that!" the villain demanded, looking out at the crowd. I tried to look as innocent as possible, but I wasn’t sure if it was working. As the villain scanned the crowd, the stranger ran forward and punched the villain in the face. Hurricane looked shocked and reached forward to stop the stranger. The villain let go of the researcher and back away, holding his nose. Hurricane went to the researcher and led him to the side, away from the action. The two of them easily subdued the overwrought villain. At this point, the police had shown up and two of them led the villain away.
Well, there was my good deed for the day. I turned around to leave, but the stranger was standing in front of me, blocking my exit.
"You owe me some doughnut holes," I said.
"That was a pretty gutsy move," he said in a deep voice. I felt sure that couldn’t be his real voice - it was too Clint Eastwood.
"What, throwing doughnuts at a lame villain?" I said. "It wasn’t that gutsy. Someone had to help that poor dude though - Hurricane sure wasn’t."
"Hurricane would have handled it. Eventually," the stranger said. "He enjoys being irenic."
"Hurricane’s idea of fighting villains is to lecture them about wrongdoing," I said.
"What’s your name?" he suddenly asked, moving in closer. I suddenly wished I had worn makeup that day. "Maybe I’ll see you again." So cheesy and predictable.
"I’m sure," I said derisively. "We’ll go out for dinner! The maitre d’ will ask you to take off your mask but you can’t. Ho ho ho, what a farce. Then we’ll kiss upside down and I’ll be worried about your safety all the time. So not interested in masked guys who think they’re oh-so-mysterious and attractive." I tried to step around him but he moved so that he was blocking my exit again.
"What, did Stan Lee kill your dog or something?" he asked. "I think that was an unnecessarily harsh response."
"How about you tell me who you are?" I asked.
"I’m supposed to remain mysterious and unknown," he said.
"Having a conversation with me is really helping with that," I said.
"Obsidian Boy!" Hurricane called. The stranger looked up, wincing at the ‘Boy’ part. "We have to go." Obsidian Boy turned back to me, sheepish.
"So much for being mysterious," I said. "Bye, Obsidian Boy."
"It’s just Obsidian," he muttered.
"Um, I don’t know, I heard Obsidian Boy," I said.
"Tell me your name," he said.
"Sorry," I said. "I want to remain mysterious." I waved mockingly, and he left to join Hurricane, looking back once at me.
I went home and flopped down on the couch, flipping on the TV to some kind of sci-fi movie of the week.
"Eeeeeeeee! The Hills is on!" my other roommate, Cat, squealed as she ran into the living room. I cringed as her piercing voice threatened my ear drums with perforation.
"Dude, I’m watching Blob Monsters From Outer Space," I said. "Can you keep it down? I’m trying to take in the majesty of this treasured piece of cinema."
"But it’s the season finaleeeee!" she whined. "Pleeeeeeease?"
"Oh, whatever," I grumbled, getting up and retreating to my room. I was laying in bed, staring at the ceiling, when the harsh ring of the phone interrupted my reverie. I turned over and propped myself up on one arm, reaching for the phone.
"Paige, sweetie!" my mom said in an impossibly chipper voice.
"Hi mom," I said. I put the old-style phone on my bed so that I could lay on my bed comfortably.
"How was your midterm?" she asked. I had a flashback to an attempted mother-daughter bonding session in which I mentioned this midterm. I immediately regretted it.
"Um…it was okay," I said, falling back on my default setting with her: lying. I hoped she would forget about it.
"You skipped it, didn’t you?" she asked suddenly, her voice still chipper, only it took on a more indefinable, dangerous quality.
"No! Kind of," I admitted. "I overslept! And I was only ten minutes late, but she wouldn’t let me write it."
"Paige, you need to learn to take responsibility for yourself," she sighed. "You never seem to think that the things you do have consequences, but they do!" Her voice softened. "I just want you to succeed. Look at your sister and brother! Do you think they would be where they are if they didn’t try?"
Both my older siblings had gotten all my mom’s ambition and enthusiasm, leaving none for me. My sister was a prominent photojournalist for the local newspaper, and she had freelanced for several other important magazines and papers. My brother had a PhD in English and was the youngest professor ever hired at the university that I now attended. Both were involved in a copious number of clubs and organizations all throughout high school and university. Both were in the top 10% of their classes.
"But Mom, they like participating. They’re ambitious. That’s just not me."
"Paige, it’s getting to the point where I’m not even sure it’s worth it to fund your education."
"Mom!" I exclaimed. "I can’t pay for this by myself!" I supposed I should have been happy that my mom was basically saying I could quit. But the prospect of going out and actually figuring out my life was too terrifying. I wanted to stay in the comfortable cocoon of school for now. Better the devil you know, right?
"I think it’s time you started taking responsibility," she said. "Dad and I want you to pay part of your expenses."
"I’ll never be able to afford that!" I exclaimed.
"Then I guess you’ll have to get a job," she said. "You can work weekends. It’s not like you’re spending a lot of time on schoolwork anyway."
"Where am I supposed to get a job?" I demanded.
"There are something called the want ads in the paper," she said. "That might be a good start."
"Not appreciating the snark," I muttered.
"Honestly, Paige, what do you expect?" she said. "You can’t expect to go through life putting in zero effort."
"Fine, fine," I said. "I’ll get a job."
"Call me when you find one," she said.
"I’d love to," I said sarcastically.
"Remember, we’re all getting together for dinner tonight. I hope you’ll be there."
I sighed. “Uh huh."
"Bye."
"Bye."
I hung up and pulled my computer toward me, checking the want ads online. Dishwasher…touching other people’s half-eaten food and being on my feet eight hours a day? No thanks. Waitress…definitely not. I would probably kill a customer. Retail clerk…meh.
Wanted: Assistant. High pay. Flexible hours. Females only between the ages of 18-22.
High pay and flexible hours? That sounded great to me. Well, “great” would be not working at all, but this sounded about as good as I could get. What did assistants do, anyway? Fetch coffee, right? And took notes and stuff. The “females only” part was sketchy: what if it was some perverted old dude? Well, there was no harm in calling and finding out.
"Hello?" a man answered.
"Yeah, I’m calling about the job?" I said.
"Are you between the ages of eighteen and twenty-two?" he asked.
"Yes…"
"Name?"
"Paige Parker. Um, I was just wondering-"
"You’ll receive instructions for the interview tomorrow." There was a click as he hung up on me.
"Huh," I said, staring at the phone. "Curiouser and curiouser."

As I stood outside my parents’ house, it suddenly hit home that I really didn’t want to be here. Oh, I loved my family and I believed they wanted what was best for me, but it was still irritating to hear them talk about what was going on in their lives and then pretend to be interested in mine.
"Hello?" I called as I tentatively opened the door. The homey smell of cooking food wafted out at me and I breathed in deeply. I never realized until I came home how much dorm food sucked. It almost - almost - made me excited to see my family.
"Little sister!" my brother exclaimed.
"Ethan!" I shouted. Okay, I kind of lied: I was always happy to see my brother. Well, almost always. He swept me up in a hug that lifted me off the floor.
"How’s school? I hear mom’s not that happy with you. She’s been doing that sighing thing ever since I got here."
"I overslept and missed a midterm," I grumbled. "Not a big deal."
"Missing a midterm is kind of a big deal," he said. "You’ll probably fail the class."
“Tomato tomahto,” I said.
"I don't think that means what you think it means," he said.
"Ah well," I said. "Where’s the rest of the family unit?"
"In the kitchen," he said. “Anna’s leaving on an assignment to some Middle Eastern country or something tomorrow. The parents are very proud."
"Of course," I said. "I’ll probably regret coming home within the next five minutes."
"Probably," he said. "But just come get it over with and in a few hours you can leave."
My brother was the kind of guy who broke hearts. He was tall with styled brown hair, pale skin, and a huge smile. We looked nothing alike, what with my tangle of auburn curls, moderately tanned skin, and short stature. Most people didn’t believe that we were related.
My sister also had curly hair, only hers was darker than mine and she got up two hours early in the morning to obsessively straighten it. She had dark brown eyes and a thin face. She preferred a more classic wardrobe than me: blazers, tailored jeans, button down shirts. I was still in the student uniform of jeans, t-shirts, and hoodies.
"Paige!" my mother exclaimed as Ethan and I walked into the kitchen. "How are you?"
"Fine, mom," I said through a pasted on smile. "Hi, Dad."
"Kiddo!" he said without getting up from his chair. "How are you?"
"Can’t complain," I said. "Hey Anna. I hear you’re going to off somewhere on assignment."
She probably wasn’t trying to be smug, but that was the vibe I got from her.
"One of the other photographers got the flu and she can’t leave the country," she said. "So I get to go!"
"It’s a big deal," my mom said. "If she gets some good shots, other magazines might want to buy them."
"War photos are very lucrative," Anna added. "What’s going on with you, Paige? I hear you skipped a midterm. That’ll get you the scholarships!"
I bristled. "Oh, shut up, Anna," I said, sitting down in a wheeled chair and idly turning in circles. "We can’t all be annoying overachievers."
"Maybe I can get you some kind of gopher job with the magazine," she said. "Mom says she’s not paying for all of your tuition anymore."
Okay, scratch that. She was definitely aspiring to be smug.
"Thanks, but I don’t need your help, Anna," I said. "It just so happens that I have an interview tomorrow."
"An interview?" my dad asked.
"For what?" my mom asked eagerly.
"A job as an assistant," I said.
"What kind of assistant?" Ethan asked.
"I’m…not altogether sure," I said.
"For who?" my dad asked.
"Um…I don’t know," I said.
"What kind of pay?" my mom asked.
"High pay, apparently," I said.
"Nothing more specific?" Anna asked.
"Not at this juncture," I said.
"Paige, are you making this up?" my mom demanded. "I won’t get mad if you aren’t able to find a job immediately, you know."
"No!" I exclaimed. "I found this thing in the newspaper. They haven’t been very forthcoming, but I have an interview tomorrow, so that’s something."
"Do you need any particular skills?" Anna wanted to know.
"Uh…you need to be female. Between the ages of eighteen and twenty-two," I said. I regretted imparting this information immediately. My mother’s eyes widened.
"Paige! Are you sure this isn’t some sort of…of…"
"Way to recruit prostitutes?" Anna finished.
"Don’t talk about prostitutes," my mom admonished. "But still…Paige…are you sure this is…you know. On the up and up?"
"It’s not an ad for a prostitute!" I snapped truculently. "It’s for an assistant."
"That could mean anything," Ethan said. "Magician’s assistant, janitor’s assistant, friggin’ circus ringmaster assistant…"
"I don’t think ringmasters have assistants, Ethan," my mom said mildly.
"I guess we’ll see tomorrow," I said. "Can we talk about something else now?"

I got off at my subway stop and walked the two blocks home in the dark. It wasn’t that late - only about ten - but I still got a little creeped out walking around outside after sunset. I pulled my keys out of my purse and held them in my hand. I didn’t know any self-defense techniques and I didn’t know where to get pepper spray, so my main method if I ever had to protect myself would be to attack an assailant’s eyes with my metal keys. Which would probably be ineffective, because I knew in the event of a fight I would be taken out immediately.
I heard footsteps behind me and glanced back. I sighed as I saw that it was a couple walking behind me. I was just being overly jumpy. I jumped again when I saw something move in the shadows beside me. My heart started beating so loudly that I could hear it. I glanced to the side but saw nothing. I checked both ways before crossing the street to the other side. I clutched my keys tighter in my hand, and the crenulations dug into my palm. I shakily took out my cell phone. If I could just get my mom or someone to talk to me until I got home, I would be okay. My cell phone slipped out of my hands and fell to the cement with a clatter and I cursed myself. I was acting exactly like those stupid blondes who always died in horror movies. I bent down, picked up my phone, and started texting my brother.
"You’re out a little late," someone said from behind me. I started and on reflex from my jumpiness I threw a sucker punch that connected with the stranger’s chin. "Ow!"
It was Obsidian. He held a hand to his chin and smiled ruefully at me.
"Obsidian Boy?" I demanded. "Are you…following me? Way to go all Edward Cullen. Creepy." I put my keys back in my bag.
"It’s just Obsidian," he corrected, falling into step beside me. "And I wasn’t following you. I didn’t even know it was you until just now."
"You still owe me some doughnuts," I said.
"You’re never going to let go of that, are you?" he asked. "I didn’t ask you to throw the doughnut holes."
"But if I didn’t, you would never have gotten that researcher back alive," I said.
"We would have gotten him eventually," Obsidian protested.
"Who are you?" I non sequitured, pretty certain that I wouldn’t be getting a straight answer. Superheroes were tricky. Everyone knew of Hurricane, but nobody really knew him. "Arrington is Hurricane’s turf. So what, you’re pulling a Justice League or something? Teaming up?"
"Something like that," he said vaguely.
"Teaming up for what purpose? To take down small-time revenge-seeking wannabes? Something tells me Hurricane can handle that by himself."
Obsidian was silent.
"Yeah, yeah, you have to be the mysterious superhero," I said. "I get it." I stopped as we reached the walkway to my dorm. “This is me. Um…thanks, for walking me home, I guess?” I wasn’t quite sure what to say to a superhero who had walked me home. The whole thing was a little uncomfortable. I dug into my purse to get my keys and when I looked up, Obsidian was gone.
"Huh," I said. "I wonder how they always manage to do that." I found my keys and walked inside.
Arrington wasn’t any worse for crime than any other place. Hurricane did his thing and the crime rate went down. Hurricane’s rogues gallery wasn’t great - they were mostly small time hoods. Hoods. I was even talking like a comic book character.
Well, I guess the whole "small time hoods" thing wasn’t that accurate. There was also Siege Spinner. She was a big-time thief, sort of a Robin Hood figure. She only stole from banks or very wealthy people. She was a classy type- as far as the media could tell, she refused to kill. Occasionally, charities would get anonymous donations, speculated to be from Siege Spinner. But the fact remained, she did illegal things, and she was a thorn in the side of the police department. Hurricane was constantly trying to bring her to justice, but it never seemed to work. Still, she wasn’t constantly trying to take over the world or anything.
So if Hurricane’s criminals weren’t out of hand or particularly difficult to manage, why was he teaming up with a new superhero? What did they both have to gain? And more importantly, did they know something that we, the inhabitants of Arrington, didn’t?

And that's the end of chapter 1!

Any writer will tell you that you have almost no control over what the characters do. Case in point: In my NaNovel last year, a new MC popped up out of nowhere and wouldn't leave, and my plot turned out way different than planned. I started another novel that was supposed to be like 13 interconnecting short stories, but that didn't happen either. Here's another example. So, there's this high class thief who recruits Paige to be her sidekick. The thief (Claire) has a butler named Wellesley. He was intended to be just a one-dimensional butler character. Apparently he has some kind of crush on Claire, and it seems like they had a thing once, and he's jealous that Paige is taking Claire's attention from him. THAT WASN'T SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN. I think Wellesley is just vying for more page time. Also, he seems to really vehemently dislike Paige. To the point where he might be planning her death or something. WELLESLEY YOU WEREN'T SUPPOSED TO HAVE THIS MANY DIMENSIONS.