My superhero girlfriend and other stories by Karl Whitney

'I cannot give you what you want, because you do not know what you want.'

These were the words she said to me, as she stood on the wall of the bridge, looming perilously over the river surging close below, herbatcape flapping in the breeze.

'I however, do know what I want. And it's what I always wanted. As long as you've known me, I wanted it. Even before…'

I knew what was coming next, and buried my head in my hands, shielding my eyes from the low slanting sun of this February afternoon. She wanted to be a superhero.

I said, at first: that's good, you have to have dreams. Then, after acouple of years it got old, and I was saying things like: well, everybody kind of wants to be a superhero in their own way.

But that wasn't good enough for her: she needed the crime fighting, the blood, the honour. She became increasingly convinced that she'd beable to fly, if she really needed.

More years passed, and I regret to say that I became cynical about herself-professed powers. Firstly, I'd never seen them, and had to rely on increasingly garbled secondhand reportage, as she'd lay drunkenly on the sofa and go over her day:

'Then I felled the Beekeeper with a kidney punch, threw him through a couple of walls, got the paper, and came home.'

Hmmmm…

This superhero stuff wasn't paying the bills, I said. I thought you believed in me, she said. I believed in God when I was a kid, I said, but I haven't seen too much of him lately, I said. Maybe it was time for both her and the man upstairs to show their powers. To make a poor sinner believe, I said. After what I said, her mood changed. She folded her arms. She adjusted her face mask. She scowled.

She said that she was thinking of it for awhile, but had put it off,but now I had pushed her too far, and she was going to say what shethought: she wanted to leave. Go out on her own, full time. Costume detective stuff. My attitude was all wrong, she said. I said it felt alright to me, and if that's how she felt, she should use her night vision to find her way to the door.

Weeks passed, then a call from her, saying she had perfected thisflying thing. I was sceptical, but went along for the entertainment. Besides, she still had keys to the flat, and my new flatmate needed them.

She said: I'll show you. I'll fly from the top of a tall building. I said: No, try a low bridge. Better that way. Looks cooler as yousoar into the air.

I dressed it up a little for her. Didn't want to hurt her feelings. Obviously I didn't want her hitting the pavement from 20 storeys. But try telling her that. And now she's telling me I don't know what I want.

'I don't think it's me who doesn't know what they want' I said. 'I'd be perfectly happy with a ground-based non-superhero girlfriend. You know what you want, but it's getting increasingly unachievable.'

'I don't care', she said. 'Watch this backflip.'

And with that, a leap, then a splash, and I dialled the emergency services.