HAVE YOU EVER WONDERED WHAT WOULD HAPPEN...

by Barry Eysman
illustrations by Randy Garrett

Have you ever wondered what would happen if Superboy got mad at Union City Elementary School? They wouldn't like it very much. Not very much indeed. No one of course knew I was the Boy of Steel. I had my Super costume under my school clothes. I was always on the look out for trouble. I wore glasses so no one would connect me with him. The one the girls swooned over. The one all the boys wanted to be their pal.

I was still adapting to Earth. Ma and Pa Kent had told me only dribs and drabs of how they found me in that rocket ship. But my super memory told me everything they did not. I also was able to cast my mind back in time and see what Krypton was like, and see my parents, and how they got me into the rocket. I am an orphan. Pieces of my home planet can kill me if I get to close to them. That seems especially unfair. Home, my real home, can kill me.

But now I am mild mannered. Something of a feeb and a dweeb rolled into one. I pretend not to be athletic. But I can kick a football I don’t know how far, endlessly far, I would imagine. I am a slow learner. And reader. Though really I can plow through a book in mere seconds when I’m alone. Just can’t turn the pages fast enough for me. But I don’t need to turn the pages at all. My X-ray vision can take care of reading a book without the need of turning pages.

I know of course the rumors. I know what the newspaper printed today. The Memphis Press-Scimitar at least. But they got the whole thing wrong. Not like the Planet. They never get the news wrong. And they would never print such a ridiculous story like the Memphis paper did. Though I have to admit Jim was wrong about the Superboy suit. It really is the suit that gives you the power, the strength, the ability to fly with the birds and travel to space, to other planets, to my Fortress of Solitude. I can shrink to get inside Kandor. I can travel back in time and battle dinosaurs if I want to. I can make a certain little imp vanish back to his home dimension by making him say his name backwards.

OK. Math. I’m not too good at math. Math is like Kryptonite to me. Math can kill me. It fuddles my brain powers. It confuses me on who I am. I will not be confused on that. Especially not today. Today is when I need all my Super Strength with me. Today of all days is the one that will make or break the Man of Steel. For really I am a man. Not in fourth grade. Not a kid no one talks to, except for teachers who talk down to me. Not ugly or shirmpish or silly or clumsy. No, not me. Not anymore. I am taking no one’s place you see. I am me. And that makes everything all right again.

But even a Superman, not Superboy, even a Superman can’t help thinking about this morning. Ma Kent calling me to breakfast while I’m in the bathroom, putting on my Superman suit, real cloth too, made by Ma Kent from the bed clothing and blankets Jor-el and Lara put me in before they sent me off on the little rocket to Earth, while Krypton exploded into a zillion pieces; and then, putting my school clothes over my suit. Then my socks and shoes. And my Clark Kent glasses which I do not need.

And in the kitchen, on the breakfast table, was the worst newspaper in the world, The Memphis Press-Scimitar, and that big bold headline that stunned me like I had been shot with two million kryptonite bullets, really made me feel like I was collapsing as I fell into my wooden chair and felt the blood rush down from my face to my chest. I didn’t let my eyes stray to the headline. I didn’t want them to. I tried not to. I really did. But I did. And I read it. And I was off in the Phantom Zone. I was at the Fortress of Solitude. I was at the Planet, as Clark Kent, mild mannered reporter. And Lois and Jimmy and Mr. White were comforting me. And I was at Smallville High, and Lana and even Lex, and my best friend, Pete Ross, were telling me it was okay; that that was a lie; no one could believe it.

Ma Kent told me to eat up and that things happen and she was sorry. I held back tears. Downed a tiny bit of milk. Ate some bacon that sat like granite in my stomach and started dazed my trek to school.

And Lana and Pete, walked with me, and told me I had the suit, didn’t I? I felt my powers increase. Felt my body growing so much muscular and stronger. I was invincible. That was the important thing. And it was Tuesday, wasn’t it? And not that far from five in the afternoon, wasn’t it? And I had to admit they were right. Lana held me and told me when five p.m. rolled around today, I would see it would be okay. And they gave me courage. I wish Mom and Dad were here. The Kents are awfully nice people, but they’re old, and farm life is boring, and I have to keep all these secrets from everybody. I have to guard against revealing myself, all the time. You would not believe how I have to think four of five times before I do the simplest thing, say the simplest thing, so I won’t give my super powers away and secret identity away..

All the kids today--they seem sad. Like me. I’m pretty much always sad. Except when my eyes bugged out as they went like ray gun beams straight to the magic boxes that held my Super Powers at Goldsmith’s three weeks before Christmas and I almost had a heart attack and a purple fit and a screaming match with my mom and my grandmother, so bad, so hurt, I WANT IT I WANT IT I WANT IT--well, I was a punk panty waist then -- no steel in my voice or in my eyes, like now, no clear mind and compassion and wanting to help out the poor and needy, the way I am now, with no greed anymore on my part, no me first again -- but that day, as Mr. Bingle looked on and the other kids lined up for Santa, as on all sides of the aisle to Santa’s workshop were stacked boxes of my Super Powers -- as my grandmother had to, embarrassed as she could be, pull me, while I was in a sitting position, trying to pull back on her, to get to the ultimate GIFT OF ALL TIME -- past the laughing kids, the Christmas trees, the decorations, the clerks, the shoppers, all of that down that long first floor and out to the car and tossing me into it, my fists beating on her and on everything they could find -- well, I was just a sight -- SCREAMING, I was so mad. CRYING, like my best friend had died. Didn’t ANYONE IN THE WORLD KNOW HOW IMPORTANT THIS WAS?????

-- not like now. I’m not crying. I am not. I do believe in what can’t be believed in by adults. I know George Reeves is an actor. I know I am not George Reeves. I know he plays Superman on TV. I’ve seen him in other movies, such as The Good Humor Man. I do not know the Superman series I’ve been watching in syndication has been rerunning all this time, having gone out of production some years before. I do not know what pain George Reeves was in. I do not believe what the paper says has happened to him. The paper said SUPERMAN KILLS SELF. This is a lie. George Reeves is an actor. He is not Superman. He did not kill himself. See how screwed up the whole thing is? They’ve got absolutely everything wrong.

And at five this afternoon, the Adventures of Superman will be on as usual, and George Reeves will not be dead and things will be okay again. And all the sad kids all round me who believed the lies in the paper will see it's all so untrue. And that I am Superman. And that I am Superman for one day. Till five this afternoon when George Reeves will take over again. Union City has to be protected and I have to help the children not be sad. I’ve never seen them like this. They are like what I would later learn would be called zombies. They seemed asleep and like shot with stun rays and baffled and like they are suddenly on another planet.

There is so much silence in this school today. I’ve never heard so much silence here before. I try to tell them it’s all a lie. That Lex Luthor planted the whole thing in the paper, that the Planet would not fall for it; that Lex is still mad at me because I made him bald when I saved his life from a chemical fire. That the Superman comic books will still be published. The annuals too. That death cannot happen. Not to someone we love. Not to someone who makes us feel good and feel safe and feel hope and feel like there is at least one adult out there who understands us, and through the character of Superman, is sending us little love letters, that we can trust him, that we can believe in somebody, in this world where adults are mean or stern or dictators or passers out of failing grades, and always, always know it alls, while we know they don’t know it all, and figure that out more and more every day.

And at three fifteen, they always kept us in prison till the very last second they could, I, very hot, very sweaty in my school clothes with my Superman suit underneath -- the suit that they sold at Goldsmith’s, the suit my mom bought as soon as I was, kicking and screaming, quite literally, out of the store -- beautiful suit, cloth and the right colors and perfect, except on the back of the cape there is a drawing of Superman and his name, but except for that, it’s the real thing, and when that bell rings, I run, fast as I can out of the building, not walking politely like usual, not even taking my books off my desk, and home for homework, just ran the mile and a half, pain not in my right side, as was usual when I ran, but not today because I was Superman for one day, and I tore into the front yard, where my Boston bulldog Krypto, which was his real name, his cover name was Ricky, ran to me and hopped in my arms and licked my face and I held his trembling little body and felt him all squrimy and alive and wonderful and he was telling me it was okay, and that Superman would still let me wear the costume and I could be Superman for Union City as long as I wanted, just as long as I knew he was the one and only real Superman.

So I carried Ricky in the house, fed and watered him, and turned on the TV. I tried to play some with Ricky, but was too distracted, too scared. So he lay by my chair and I rubbed his head. I sat in the big overstuffed chair in front of the Admiral set and watched KFVS-TV in Cape Girardeau, Mo. Some guy was doing a fifteen minute painting show. Then there were some cartoons. I was paying no attention to any of them. Waiting for five p.m. and the Adventures of Superman. Oh please be there. We love you. Don’t have died. Don’t be sad. Don’t be hurt. We never got a chance to thank you. We never got a chance to tell you how much you mean to us. We want to help you. We want to be your friends. You can talk things over with us. You don’t have to kill yourself. How can such a great guy do such a thing? Don’t leave us alone. Don’t leave us with nothing to believe in. You can believe in us. Please. We won’t let you down. We won’t go away. We won’t forget. Even if we’re just in the fourth grade, we know what it’s like to be let down, or gone away from, or forgotten. You never have to worry about that. You’re a star. You’re our friend. Friends help friends. Let us --

And five p.m. and no Superman. Ads. Cartoons continuing. Me, feeling like I’m dying. Feeling like I’m dead. Weeping. Ricky hops in my lap and I hold him and scratch his head. Remembering getting that Superman suit Christmas Day. Having prayed all the time till Christmas that it be under the Christmas tree. Santa heard. The first box I went to. My mom made my picture in the suit. I was knocking down my Bozo the clown doll with the sand in the base of it. I was so happy. It was the greatest day of my life. It snowed that day. It was perfect.

And the local news. And I kept watching and watching. My eyes stinging. My chest hurting. Holding Ricky too tightly, till he barked a little and I let him to the floor..

We loved you. And we still do. And always will. I wore my costume periodically at home. Never at school again. And soon I grew a bit taller, so the suit didn’t fit, and by then it didn’t matter. I read DC comic books still and for lots of years to come. I finally read enough about George Reeves, and how sad and harmed his life was during and after the series, and the terrible way he died. I finally stopped watching the series. It hurt because I knew how he was hurting and what was up ahead for him.