True Awareness

“Thank you, doctor, for agreeing to see me on such short notice.”
        “Well, it’s not often a real superhero ends up as a client, Captain --”
        “Please, no names.”
        “What can I do for you?”
        “It’s - I’m super strong, I can fly, I’m invulnerable -- but you know that. It’s on all the press releases, even the business cards. They all think it means I can’t be hurt, but inside there are wounds that can never heal.”
        “What do you mean?”
        “D---- has been asking if I have super speed now, because of the bedroom.”
        “That’s, ah, not an uncommon problem in men. Not that I’d know personally, you understand.”
        “But that’s just it. It’s ME. I’m impotent. I can’t do anything that really matters.”
        “We’ve been through this before, Captain. There are always things we can’t do, no matter who we are.”
        “I came across The Man today. Earlier, on patrol. He’s the one with the power to make women obey him: I hadn’t seen him in over a year, since that Macy’s fiasco. But this time he was using his powers differently, to make sure women didn’t put on makeup while driving their cars, to make sure they wouldn’t drive under the influence, to get them to clean up litter they dropped ...”
        “And?”
        “And I let him go. He’s doing more good now than I ever will.”
        “Captain --!”
        “It’s true! Look at me! D---- is openly flirting with her old boyfriend, calling me names all the name, mocking me every chance she gets. She’s always comparing me to Superman, even Batman, and putting me down. I became a superhero to help people, thought cosmic awareness would enlighten me -- but this, this hadn’t got me in touch with my feminine side, it’s castrated me!
        “I saved her from R----. I’ll never regret that, I’m no monster. But who never saved R----? Who made him into a monster? I read the court transcripts, what his mother did to him. It doesn’t justify what he did -- nothing does that! -- but nothing justifies what she did to him either.
        “We don’t have a monopoly on being monsters, doctor. Not as many women rape men, but those who do -- we never heard about it, do we? Nor about all the emotional abuse, the verbal barbs -- how could cosmic awareness leave me blind to that?!”
        “Captain, you may be overstating the case somewhat, don’t you think?”
        “I know, I know, but all I’m saying is men have no monopoly on assault, nor on rape, not on leaving wounds that never show. And all I can do is punch things, fly, not be hurt -- I’m every man’s wet dream, but I can't do anything that really matters.”
        “You’ve saved people, Captain. You inspire people. That sort of thing can’t be measured.”
        “Want to bet? T-shirt sales, lunch boxes, action figures -- I have them all, and they don’t sell that well at all. Even the Hairpiece Commandos sell better.”
        “Perhaps they do, but when we measure ourselves against others we always fall short. You’re not R----. You’re just you, and you’re the Captain, and only you can decide what that means.”
        “D---, she says --”
        “Captain, all you’re doing is repeating the cycle from our last meeting. You need to stand up for yourself, warts and all. Men aren’t perfect. Women aren’t perfect. You need to decide what you need, more than anything else, to regain your own happiness.”
        “I. I. I need a divorce.”:
        “Progress! Houston, we have progress! Listen to me, Captain: being a man doesn’t make you a monster. Being a woman doesn’t make her a saint.”
        “Thank you. I feel - liberated. Actualized! I want to yell! When’s the last time a man could yell? I want to --”
        “Perhaps you could just sit in the corner and have a good cry?”
        “I could do that, too! I can be me! I can be happy being the kind of man I want to be! Thank you, Doctor Shado --.”
        “No names, you said. But this is excellent progress, Captain. Same time next week?”
        “Maybe not. You never know. Maybe not.”