The SuperHealer

Submitted into Contest #48 in response to: Write about someone who has a superpower.... view prompt

1 comment

Fantasy

Craig Miller was walking home from work one day, when he heard someone cough from across the road. Now, Craig had heard many people cough before, though this time it made him feel different. He did not feel uneasy because of the cough, or have any worries of himself getting sick, it was more of an inspired feeling. He felt tingles up his back that kind of tickled, his ears perked up, and his hands began to shake, but not in a bad way. Initially, Craig had no idea what was going on, and could not figure out why his body was acting this way. Even though he and the person who coughed were still walking along the footpath on opposite sides of the road, Craig could not take his eyes of this person. He decided to cross the road to go see them. Once across the road, he saw this little lady, probably in her mid-20’s, dressed in a black blazer with a matching black pencil skirt and a deep blue button up business shirt underneath, he also noticed that she was wearing bright green runners on her feet, so he assumed that she too, was walking home from work. This little lady saw Craig getting closer and closer to her, so she stopped. She looked him up and down, she saw his old brown runners, baggy jeans, grey t-shirt, and bright red cap which read ‘Dog Trainer’. Craig figured that he should say something but didn’t know what since he didn’t even understand why he felt so compelled to come over to her when she coughed. The little lady coughed again, and Craig felt his body take even larger steps towards her, meaning that he was practically walking by her side, it must have appeared really strange to other people who were also probably walking home from work. “What do you want?” she asked with a stern yet unsettled tone. “H…h…h……hi” was the only thing that came nervously squeaking out of Craig’s mouth. “Ugh, what! Do you like me or something?” she asked with great frustration, she must be really run down, Craig thought. Craig took a mental breath and tried to focused his words on his strange feeling. “Are you okay?” Craig tried to ask in a concerned tone, though it still sounded squeaky. The woman paused as if confused, but then answered with “y…yeah, I just have a cough, I think one of my co-workers were sick last week and now they’ve given it to me”, they were both silent for about 10 seconds. Suddenly, Craig felt as though he lost control of his entire body, it was as though someone else was there controlling his every move, word, and breath. “Let me fix that for you!” Craig confidently stated, with no sign of a squeak in his voice. “Umm, sure, if you can tell me what I should take for this to make it a little easier to breath at night until it goes away, I guess that would be great, thanks” said the little lady, very confused. Meanwhile Craig was so unsure of what just came out of his mouth and of how on earth he was going to fix this little lady’s cough. Though once again Craig lost control of himself, he faced the little lady, said “I’m not telling you how to fix it…III’m going to fix it” and just like that he put his arms straight out in front of him, opened his hands, then pointed to the sky, making the little lady look up, Craig then grabbed her gently, placing one hand in the centre of her chest, and the other in the top-middle of her back, and before she could even act offended, he squeezed her once, just quickly and not too tight, then he let go and proudly said “done”. Craig regained control of himself, and the little lady was stunned. After a few moments of confused silence, the little lady said, “oh my goodness, you were right, my cough is gone, I’m not sick anymore, you did fix me!” sounding so overwhelmingly stunned. Craig still didn’t know what to say, but “yeah, I did, told you I would” squeaked out of his mouth. “Who are you?” asked the lady in admiration. “My name is Craig, I’m 32 and I work at ‘Train My Doggie Please’, the one on the corner of Smith’s Street and Island Avenue”, “who are you?” he asked in return. “Oh, my name is Georgia, I’m 23, and I work in real estate.” There was yet another long pause. “Thank you, by the way” Georgia said, now with a squeak in her voice. “No worries” said Craig, still confused at what he’d just done, “well, best be on my way now, my dogs are waiting for me at home”. “Nice to meet you Craig, bye” Georgia said, and they went their separate ways.

Over the next week Craig stayed home, trying to comprehend what had happened back there, trying to understand how he had just ‘fixed’ that little lady’s cough, and why he felt as though he’d lost control while doing so. Meanwhile, Georgia was taking this from a whole different perspective. She went to her computer, and wrote a letter detailing what had happened. She posted it on all of her social media platforms, sent it to all her friends, and everyone at work, she sent it into the newspaper, and informed major TV News delivering companies, even contacting journalists asking them to interview her and Craig on this event.

Two days passed and Craig went back to work. Around lunchtime, a woman dressed in a tight purple dress in with a microphone in her hand and two cameramen dressed in all black rushed in and power walked over to Craig. “Are you Craig?” they asked, “…yes” Craig responded, again confused. “Is it alright if we ask you a few questions about what Georgie Findley has said about you?” they asked with a strong, yet fake, positive tone. Craig paused for a minute and thought about their question, then it hit him that Findley must be the last name of Georgia, the one who had the cough. With great hesitation, Craig responded with “yeah sure”. The woman was so excited that she just began rambling on about everything Georgia had told her about what he had done that day, then she asked him many questions, all at once. “So, my name is Naomi and I would like to know…how did you fix that woman’s cough? How did you know how to fix it? Why did you choose to fix it? Is this some new type of remedy? Or are you like a superhero or something?” then she took a breath. Craig, trying to remember all the questions she had just asked said “Hi Naomi. Well look, the best I can tell you is this…” he paused and took a deep breath and continued with “I heard her cough, and when she did I just felt so compelled to go over to her, so I did, and when she coughed again, I fixed it, I had no idea what I was doing, it’s like something just came over me and I couldn’t control myself, it happened on it’s own, but, I mean I’m glad I could help” Craig said, a little less squeaky than normal. Naomi was intrigued and said “ohhhhhhhh so you’re one of them are you, you do such great things for people but don’t wanna take the credit so you just say you don’t know how you did it, ha!, cute!”. Craig said in a slow tone “no, I’m serious, I honestly don’t know what happened or how it happened, it just did”. Naomi paused as she realised how silly she looked just then, and instead chose to say “well, I wanna test this little power of yours, come with me” and Craig, who noticed it happened to be time for his lunch break, followed her. They walked down the road to the health clinic and walked into the waiting room. Naomi announced to all the sick people around her that she has something magical for them. So many people were sniffing, sneezing, making noises like they were in pain, limping, and looking so drained. Nothing happened for a minute or two, but then someone coughed. Craig got that feeling again, he lost control, he ran over to a small child, a young boy around 7 or 8, in his blue dressing gown and green slippers, Craig gently held the child’s chin, felt the sides of his throat, then rubbed his chest rather quickly, the child’s mother became increasingly concerned. Then, within 30 seconds, the boy appeared as though he was no longer sick. He sat up, smiled, looked at him mother and said “mummy, I feel all better now, that man fixed me!”. The mother checked her son and hugged him in relief, a doctor was sent out to check the boy, and it was true, he was not sick. Everyone looked at Craig in shock, he too was shocked at himself. They all wanted to be fixed, but Craig didn’t have that feeling. Craig thought hard for a minute about the two people he’d helped, then he said, “can someone cough please?” A few people coughed, but one old woman in particular, coughed 3 times. Craig got that feeling again and rushed over to her, this time placing one hand on her stomach, and the other on her head, and holding still for 10 seconds. He released his hands and the woman stood straight, as he was forced into a hunch before. Her long flowing pink skirt became level to her shoes, she adjusted her baby blue shirt, looked at Craig and said “I had a massive pain in my stomach caused by an ulcer, but now my pain is not there” everyone paused in shock. The doctors look her in for scans and tests, everyone sat and waited, about half an hour passed, during which Craig rang his boss and said he’s at the doctors and cannot return to work for the rest of the day, then the doctors returned. They said the old woman, who’s name was Dottie, no longer had any ulcers, and that Craig was a miracle worker. The boy who coughed previously yelled from across the room “NO, HE’S A SUPERHERO!” Everyone cheered and lined up to cough 3 times for Craig’s powers to kick in and he could fix them.

Craig went home that day after 6 hours of healing 129 different people of all ages with many different types of illnesses and diseases. The next day, Craig felt inspired, so he rang his boss and apologetically quit his job, as he has found a new profession. Craig then took a bus to the city, stood outside the train station, placed a sign on the ground in front of him which read ‘Are you sick? Give me $15, stand in front of me and cough 3 times, and I’ll fix it!’ At first many people read it and walked past, but then a group of young men all dressed in baggy jeans and loosely fitted striped shirts walked by and asked “Hey, are you they one on the news that fixed the health of over 100 people in the clinic off Island Avenue?” Craig simply smiled and nodded. The guys got their money out, lined up and took turns coughing 3 times. Each time, Craig’s instinct, or power, took over, and he fixed them. People started to notice, and within an hour Craig had a long line of people waiting to be fixed. Craig did this for a week before he was approached by someone who said “if I were you, I’d make a serious business out of this, publicise it, get people to pay for you to come to them, hold like events and stuff where everyone is invited and have to pay for you to treat them with that crazy power of yours.” Craig thought hard about this and said “you know what, I think that’s a great idea, but I just have one issue”, the man immediately answered with “oh yeah, what’s that?” and Craig said “I don’t know what to call myself, if I were to give myself some sort of stage name, I don’t know what it should be.” There was a paused, then suddenly a small boy, probably around 12 appeared from behind the man, and said in voice that showed he was very proud of his idea “The SuperHealer”, there was a paused and Craig thought about this, so the boy continued with “because it’s like you have a super power, and everyone thinks you’re a hero for fixing them, and your power is to heal, so that makes you a SuperHealer.” Craig smiled in realisation that this boy was right, “you know, I think I’m gonna use that, here, take half of what I earned today” and Craig handed them $1600.

A year has passed, and The SuperHealer is now world famous. Craig Miller has learnt that he can treat literally all kinds of illnesses, disorders, infections and diseases. He has been to most countries in the world, going to festivals, hospitals, and areas where people are less fortunate and unable to afford medical care. He had healed people from small things like a cold, to major things like tumours, dementia and cancer. Craig has also learnt that his power is not only for humans, but he can health animals too, so he spends a lot of time at vets and training facilities helping to heal dogs and other animals who have been injured, abused and who are unwell.

Craig Miller still does not understand how or why he has this super healing power, or why it only switches on when someone coughs 3 times, but he is glad he has it, he loves his life, and he is so happy to be able to heal everyone and relieve them of their health based struggles, and make sure people can live a truly healthy life.

June 27, 2020 01:49

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1 comment

Zan Lexus
14:30 Jul 04, 2020

Great power. I wish Craig was real. One nit-picky question, how does he heal animals if they don't cough? :)

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