{"id":8705,"date":"2015-01-09T12:00:27","date_gmt":"2015-01-09T17:00:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gadflyonline.com\/home\/?p=8705"},"modified":"2015-01-21T10:15:15","modified_gmt":"2015-01-21T15:15:15","slug":"vestigial-steel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/vestigial-steel\/","title":{"rendered":"Vestigial Steel"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Steel_585x585\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Superman stole my jelly roll.<\/p>\n

He took it right out of my lunch bag then sat next to me.<\/p>\n

\u201cSuperman, that\u2019s mine,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSorry, toots,\u201d he said. He halved my jelly roll then pulled a pack of Decade Red out of his sleeve, lazer-visioned a cherry onto on of the cigarettes, and then he killed it in a single breath.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t smoke in the lunchroom, Superman.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of your lunch broads gonna stop me?\u201d<\/p>\n

I wasn\u2019t sure. He pinched his lips to the side and blew out a storm cloud.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want my jelly roll back,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHey,\u201d he said. \u201cRemember that time Johnny Pukowski pulled your ponytail then kicked you in the gut?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHow\u2019d that situation end?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou came and-\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI swooped down and punted that motherfucker halfway to the moon. Didn\u2019t I?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah. They didn\u2019t find the body for months. Now what did you give ol\u2019 Supes for saving your sorry ass? Do you remember?\u201d<\/p>\n

I shook my head, but I knew.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018Gee, Superman,\u2019 you said. \u2018Thanks.\u2019 I got a thanks. A big, expensive thanks. Did you send me a card for my birthday?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA Christmas present?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEaster basket?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThanks for the jelly roll.\u201d<\/p>\n

He stuck the rest of my jelly roll in his mouth, closed his eyes, and made an \u2018mmm\u2019 noise while he chewed and rubbed his stomach.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy mom made that,\u201d I told him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know she did. I also know your pops works days, huh?\u201d<\/p>\n

I crossed my arms and pouted my bottom lip.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want my jelly roll.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYour jelly roll. You\u2019re not worried about fair, huh?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was mine. That\u2019s what\u2019s fair.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo I can take the bad away and its okey-fuckin-dokey, but I grab some good for myself and that\u2019s just not fair. That\u2019s how it goes, anyway. Guess you\u2019re right.\u201d<\/p>\n

The way he looked at me, his top lip stretching up like a parade float, his eyebrows hanging down like his swollen chest muscles, I started crying. Of course I did, I was a child.<\/p>\n

Superman grabbed my lunch bag, squeezed it between his swollen knuckles.<\/p>\n

\u201cHush yourself, kid\u201d<\/p>\n

He took a deep breath and then lurched forward, ruffled his naked chin into the bag and burped, belched a wet belch.<\/p>\n

I had my jelly roll back.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

Adrian Fort is a writer from Kansas City, Missouri. He has a degree in English Literature from Missouri Western State University, a Masters degree from Lindenwood University and no real career. Follow him on twitter @adriananyway\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Superman stole my jelly roll.<\/p>\n

He took it right out of my lunch bag then sat next to me.<\/p>\n

\u201cSuperman, that\u2019s mine,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSorry, toots,\u201d he said. He halved my jelly roll then pulled a pack of Decade Red out of his sleeve, lazer-visioned a cherry onto on of the cigarettes, and then he killed it in a single breath.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t smoke in the lunchroom, Superman.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ MORE.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":238,"featured_media":8706,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,200,219,217],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8705"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/238"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8705"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8705\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8710,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8705\/revisions\/8710"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8706"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}