Clara felt every muscle in her body tense as the presence of her sponsor drew nearer breaking the personal space bubble around her. Her breathing hitched, lungs momentarily forgetting their function. It wasn’t often that anyone dared to get so close to her demonic form. “Really? Could have fooled me with the sarcastic asshole act. Maybe you should be an actor and drop the whole hero thing.” A soft laugh escaped her parted lips a the notion that anyone in the rehabilitation program wanted to be there. It was very superhero of him. “Because it’s this or prison, and do I honestly look like I’m fit for prison? They would suppress my powers.” The last sentence ended in a whisper, speaking more to herself than to him by that point. “Tell me yours and I’ll tell you mine then.” She crossed his arms over her chest in a self soothing act.
Benji closed his eyes as he brainstormed how to respond. He knew it was a delicate matter and wanted to treat it as such to increase the chances of her opening up. “I wish I could give up my powers to someone that wanted them and take up acting instead. That would be a weight off my shoulders.” The man chuckled at how deep the words just felt coming off his lips. “I would love to have the freedom to do as I wish and be insignificant, but now that I have the powers I do, I don’t want to just waste them when I can do good.” Benji knew these words were very hero like but they were true. He didn’t want to waste the powers gifted at birth when they could do good for humanity.
“I understand why you don’t want to be here and I don’t blame you. I think the concept of the rehabilitation program is a good one, but the execution is all wrong. I believe they should only have young children and people our age that want to change in the program. It’s essentially therapy for people our age. You can’t force someone into it, or it’s counterproductive. And to my point for the kids, if you want to implement good behavior, the best time is early on when they’re excited about school and making friends.” A big smile grew on Benji’s face as he paused and reminisced on childhood memories. It quickly faded though as the memories of losing his mother during those times came flooding in and a tear started to form. “You’re right, they would suppress your powers. I would only think of that as a compliment. Being strong is good, regardless of how you use it.” Benji knew the words were true but he still hated letting them leave his lips. They were letting the door wide open for her to just walk away unchanged.
“As far as my life story, its pretty boring. My parents are Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson. My mom died while I was young.” Benji unintentionally paused and the tear started to run down his cheek. “With my dad being Spiderman, he wasn’t exactly around a lot or awake enough to do much when he was so I learned to do a lot on my own. Other than that, I didn’t really start getting any of my powers until my mid teens. Let me tell you, that was that a time of isolation at the start. I didn’t know what was going on, and I was to afraid to talk about it. Once my dad found out, that’s when he took me under his wing to learn about my powers. It was the most time I ever had with my dad, and they’re honestly some of my fondest memories. But anyways, after that, I finished out high school. I didn’t go to a normal college, so I spent some time working first before coming here. I wanted to fill my time with something useful so I did volunteer work. That about brings us to where we are now, other than my first few years. They were pretty uneventful though. Oh and I’ve never been in a relationship. Not that it matters but its usually a question that gets brought up so I wanted to just get ahead of it.” He blushed at the thought that he really just said this out loud to a woman. Benji couldn’t have been more embarrassed at the moment. It was at that time he finally noticed a tear had run down his cheek due to the cool line on his warm rosy cheeks. “Okay, I did my part. It’s your turn.”
