The Cape

I had a strong identification with Clark Kent. 
I mean sure, Superman had a bright blue unitard and could fly at the speed of sound, but he was far too secure with his masculinity. 
He could fight.  He got the girl. 
Honestly, I don’t think I ever really wanted the girl. 
Girls’ smelled weird, especially my sister’s best friend, Amy Fox.  My sister said it was because she had red hair.  I totally believed her because of the fact that Amy’s freckled sisters all had red hair and when I had to ride in the Volvo with the entire fire squad, in route to the local roller skating rink, I usually asked my mother to let me hang my head out the car window, mirroring our cocker spaniel during his frequent trips to the vet. Frankly, the Fox clan had a smell very similar to the infected ear of Peaches, our family dog. 
Yuck.
Girls are gross. Superman could keep Lois Lane.   Clark Kent was more my speed.  He was nervous around the girls and was always stammering.  I had perfected the nervous stammer as a kid.  Actually my stammer was more of a lisp.  Very Cindy Brady.  The highlight of my elementary school years was heading after school to the speech therapist to relearn every word in Standard American English.
     “Turtle,” the therapist would soothingly say, urging me to repeat.
     “Thurtle,” I would sheepishly answer back. 
     Too bad I couldn’t articulate to her to also remove the super gay cadence from my vocal stylings. My first suicide attempt occurred moments after I heard my voice on our family answering machine.  I swear to God, I went mute for six months.
     Superman did have something that my little heart desired.  His bright red cape. 
This cape allowed him to fly to far away places.  God, I always wanted to escape.  I used to ride my bike around the neighborhood and stare directly into the sun, my vision being blinded by the fireball in the sky.  The wind blew across my body and I imagined lifting off my little red bike and taking off into space like Elliot in ET: The Extra Terrestrial, without a cape.
I never went very far.  Usually my fantasies just led to countless bike riding accidents, with me skidding across the pavement, feeling quite powerless; the exact opposite of a super hero.
     But this all changed when I found the magic box. 
The box lived in our attic.  It had Halloween scribbled in black magic marker on the side.  There were many fun and fabulous articles within that box that offered endless hours of boyhood excitement.  There was a brown, matted wig that my sister used every Halloween when she was a witch, although I felt she never really needed a costume for that persona.  I could barely get my mom’s black brush through the polyester blend mixed with rayon strands.  It smelled of mildew, but I still managed to sit in the heat of the dark attic wearing it for hours, brushing and teasing and flipping.   I loved the way the itchy wig felt cascading down my shoulders and back. 
It was during one of those afternoons high up in attic that I finally found the source of my super powers.  Deep within the box of old costumes, was a little red satin cape.  When I found it, I gasped, my little hand snatching it from the box.  I flung the stinky wig from my head and held the shiny fabric in my arms.  Delicately, I laid it over my shoulders.  It felt cool against my skin.  The cape had two little antique clasps, which I locked in place.  I stood up, letting it fall down my back, hitting just above my little knees. 
I needed a mirror.
I practically slid down the retractable stairs of the attic, landing on the concrete of the garage with a slap.  Soon enough I knew I would be able to really fly.  I made my way through the quiet house, heading toward my mom’s master bath.  Mother’s have the best mirrors because mothers need to see that they are beautiful. I felt like a rebel standing in front of my mother’s bathroom mirror, staring at my caped reflection.  I imagined myself not as Christopher Reeve, but as my true hero, Helen Slater as Super Girl.
***
Super Girl was much more my speed. 
First of all, Faye Dunaway played the villain.  I remember the first time I saw Mommie Dearest. My mother and the real Joan Crawford had so much in common.  I mean, I think if shower massages had been invented in the 1950’s Joan would have totally beat her adopted children with one.  Sometimes I had fantasies of my mom and Joan sitting at our breakfast table exchanging notes on childhood torture.
As my mom would sip her coffee she’d smile and say, “A cutting board is really easy to handle, you can get a great grip…”
Joan would smile and nod, whipping out leather restraints from her purse as my mom squealed with excitement.
I wished me and her adopted daughter Christina could have been friends.  I imagined us being sent to the same summer camp and bonding over our bruises and scrapes.  Sadly, I never got to meet Christina, except for in my childhood fantasies.  My mother had these yellow dishtowels that she kept in a drawer by the sink.  The yellow matched Christina Crawford’s hair perfectly.  So I would take one corner of the towel, tuck it into my palm and twist the rest around my hand, the yellow cotton fabric becoming flowing blond locks.  It was my own version of a Hollywood kid puppet.  Christina and I would talk for hours late into the night before she retired for a night of peaceful slumber, almost suffocating to death underneath my down pillow.     
My private puppet show had to prematurely closed as I could not take the stress of hearing my mom screaming, “Why the hell are my yellow towels all over the fucking house Bobby!?” 
God, I left incriminating evidence everywhere!
Powerless.
***
After finding the cape in the attic, it became a permanent fixture to my wardrobe from that moment on.  I wore it everywhere that summer.  I slept in it.  I brushed my teeth in it.  One day I even showered and used the cape to dry off. 
This cape gave me super powers. 
Ultimately, I didn’t know what these super powers were, but I felt braver. I felt powerful enough to wear the cape to dinner with my father, the most feared man in the entire neighborhood. I guess I should have been nervous wearing my cape to the table that night at dinner.  I mean, picture it: my father sitting at the head of the table in his perfectly starched Air Force uniform, his face holding its traditional scowl, and sitting to his immediate left, his firstborn son, with lisp, flapping wrists, swathed in a shiny satin cape.  I wonder if this is how my dad pictured my evolution when he chose to give me his namesake?  There sat my father, in his starched military uniform, looking dapper, and polished and hyper masculine.
“Pass the salt Bob.”
My little arm protruded through the slit of the cape; it draped across the table as I gripped the saltshaker and passed it to my old man.  He took it, and very briefly looked at me. 
And then he did it. He winked.  I breathed a sigh of relief. He got it.  I had super powers now. 
Fuck Superman.  Who needs him? I am my own super hero now, just like the kid from The Boy Who Could Fly! No one could hurt me, right?
There is one lone picture of me in my mother’s photo album from my summer with the cape.  I am draped across the lap of my Uncle Chuck, my red cape cascading down my back, my tanned legs crossed, mirroring the girls from the Nair commercials… we wear short shorts…  I am smiling from ear to ear.  I seem so free, like nothing could hurt me. 
I don’t know what happened to that cape.  I don’t remember when I stopped wearing it or why.  Sometimes, when I’m lying in bed at night, alone in the dark, I wish I still had it.  Sometimes when it’s pitch black, I feel like I still need super powers. 
Sometimes, when I find myself staring at the brightest spot of the sun, I still wish that I could fly.