Super

Hank pushed through the front door of the apartment block, the heavy thing groaning on tired hinges. The air inside was thick, stale, a swirling cocktail of dinners cooked hours ago, their scents blending together into something that wasn’t quite appetising. Frying oil clung to the walls, mingling with the tang of boiled cabbage, the bite of garlic, and the unmistakable saltiness of instant ramen. It was the kind of smell that never really left, no matter how many windows you cracked open.

The hum of televisions drifted from the corridors, overlapping voices speaking in different languages, turning the hallway into a low, droning murmur. Somewhere, a baby cried, sharp and restless. A couple was arguing behind a closed door, their words muffled but their anger clear. Hank exhaled through his nose and started up the stairs, his boots scuffing against the old concrete. His own footsteps followed him in echoes, as though something unseen walked just a few steps behind.

He paused. Looked up.

Then turned and descended instead, down past the ground floor and deeper into the belly of the building.

The air changed the lower he went. Damp crept along the walls. A sharp chemical tang of bleach and mildew clung to the space like a permanent resident. The stairwell narrowed as the basement loomed ahead, the walls closing in as though swallowing him whole. Stacks of old newspapers lined the stairs in precarious towers, some yellowed and curling at the edges. Their headlines were relics of forgotten tragedies and outdated scandals, preserved here like an eerie time capsule.

A cluster of wet floor signs leaned haphazardly beside a mop bucket, the handle of the mop jutting out at an odd angle. A plunger sat nearby, balanced delicately on the lip of an old paint can. Hank turned sideways, his broad frame squeezing through the narrow passage, careful not to knock over the mess. It would be easy to assume some deranged hoarder lived down here.

At the bottom of the stairs, he stopped in front of a door with a frosted glass window. The light behind it was off.

He listened.

No television hum. No radio static. No shuffling of movement beyond the door. Just silence.

He reached up to knock but hesitated, checking his watch. Late. Too late.

With a sigh, he turned back toward the stairs, ready to climb his way out of this place, when his shoulder brushed against the mop handle.

It shifted. Slid along the wall. Ready to fall.

Hank threw out a massive hand and caught it before it could hit the floor. He held his breath. Balanced it back into place with a quiet, deliberate touch.

He continued his crab crawl up the concrete stairs, his leather jacking sliding against the wall behind him as he squeezed past the stacks of piled up newspapers. Then he heard it . . . 

A slow scrape.

His head snapped back around.

The mop shifted again. This time, he was too far away to catch it.

It clattered down the last few steps, knocking into a steel bucket, sending it tumbling with a deafening crash. The sound bounced off the concrete walls, traveling up the stairwell, a chain reaction of noise in a space that had been so quiet just seconds before.

Silence.

Then . . . a light flickered on behind the frosted glass.

The door opened in jerks and jitters. Old pizza menus and junk mail littered the floor beyond the door.

More clutter lined the hall beyond, stacks of toolboxes, a step ladder leaning against the wall, more newspapers that had no business being there. And standing in the doorway, looking like a man rudely yanked from sleep, was the superintendent.

He was small. Shirtless, save for a thick tuft of white chest hair that curled over his sagging frame. His beer gut spilled over the waistband of his striped pajama bottoms. On top of his head, what little hair remained was wild, sticking out like he’d been electrocuted mid-slumber.

“What’s all this racket?” he barked, his voice a hoarse thunderclap. “You know what time it is? Something broken?”

Hank was immediately aware of how the man’s voice reverberated through the stairwell, practically inviting the whole building to tune in.

“Sorry,” Hank rumbled. “Didn’t mean to wake you. I came down…”

“Speak up! Quit mumblin’!”

Hank’s jaw tensed. His gaze flicked over the old man, taking in the soft belly, the wiry arms. Once upon a time, people didn’t talk to him like this. When had that changed? When had he stopped commanding space the way he used to?

The thought sent his temper bubbling up, but he pushed it down, down, down, forced it into the dark where it belonged. He didn’t raise his voice. Instead, he stepped forward, descending the last step, his body looming over the old man until his shadow swallowed him whole.

“I said,” Hank repeated, calm and steady, “I’m sorry for waking you. I saw your light was off, but…”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, what d’ya want? What’s broken?” the super grumbled, his breath thick with stale beer.

“I need a card for the heating,” Hank said. “Ours has run out.”

The old man let out a dry laugh. “How many times I gotta tell you lot t’ buy a new card before it runs out? Stop waitin’ till the last damn minute!” He jabbed a stubby finger at a handwritten sign taped to the wall. The handwriting was erratic, a mix of uppercase and lowercase letters, spelling out a scrawled warning:

‘Water, Elec and Heating cards can be purchased between the hours of 9am-5pm only!!!!!’

The excessive exclamation points stood out. Hank had once read that using three exclamation points in a row was a sign of a deranged mind. This man had used five.

“I’m sorry,” Hank said again, voice even. “I wouldn’t norm…”

“…Speak up, man! Stop mumblin’!”

The words echoed. Hank could almost hear televisions lowering, neighbours pressing ears to doors, hungry for drama.

He waited. Let his breath settle. Then, without warning, his posture changed. He grew . . . not physically, but in presence. The air around him thickened. His shadow stretched wider. The stairwell dimmed. And just as quickly, the moment passed, and he was just a man again.

“I wouldn’t normally ask,” Hank said clearly. “I’m very sorry. But… Mary. It’s her birthday today.”

A pause.

Then something he hadn’t said out loud before. Something that had only lived in his head until now.

“She’s not well.”

He couldn’t take it back. It was real now, spoken into existence. His stomach twisted. Pain flickered across his face, raw and unhidden.

The superintendent grunted. Muttered something indecipherable. Then, louder, “Then you shouldn’t have waited so long. Come back in the morning.”

He turned, squeezed through the mess in his hallway, and slammed the door as hard as he could past the clutter.

Hank stood there a moment. Embarrassment and anger wrestled inside him, each fighting for dominance. He felt like a relic of another world. A man out of place. A man whose only superpower . . . the thing that had once defined him . . . would now only land him in jail if he used it.

He turned, climbing the stairs once more, the smell of dinners past greeting him on every floor. The disinfectant sheen on the walls did little to hide the grime beneath.

By the time he reached his landing, the air smelled cleaner. He kept it that way. For Mary. For himself.

Because once, not long ago, they had a home with a garden. And they had thought it would last forever.

Hank pulled his house key from his pocket, feeling the familiar scrape of metal against his calloused fingers. He pushed it into the lock, careful with the turn, easing the door open without so much as a creak. If Mary was asleep, he didn’t want to wake her.

The moment the door cracked open, the apartment’s cold air hit him . . . a stagnant chill that clung to the walls, seeped into the furniture. He breathed in the familiar smell of his home, the kind of lingering scent that made a place feel lived in . . . even if it wasn’t always comfortable.