Thor's Child ©
by K Pelle
Chapter 3
Tor gritted his teeth and clenched his hands into fists in frustration. He knew he was back on a new version of the same wild bandwagon, able to do something so strange that it was completely abnormal, but unable to control it. This time he was shielded from the rain by a protective shield of some sort, but what good was that to him if he was unable to control either how it worked or what it protected him from? He didn't even know if he dared to try to turn it off. What if he turned it off and couldn't turn it back on, but at the same time he knew he didn't want it turned on every time it rained. If people were near him when that happened they'd definitely notice it. Somehow he had to learn to handle this and all the things which were happening to him, but he didn't know how to go about it.
Wait a minute, what had Mr. McDonald, his grade eight science teacher taught him last year about strange or uncommon happenings or effects? Thinking back, he could remember his words as if he was standing there; "If you happen to run into a phenomenon that you don't understand, investigate it, study it, learn to understand what it does and if possible, how it works. Then perhaps you can benefit from the phenomenon, perhaps you can learn to control it, perhaps you can learn to use it to further your own wants and needs, or perhaps you can use the results to help others."
So, he was standing inside a space that was protected from falling water. What effect did it have on standing water? He found a puddle and discovered that it had no effect on standing water, because his boots got wet. Yet, if he stepped into the tiny stream overflowing from the puddle, it stopped flowing, so the cone of protection stopped moving water. Wait a minute, he was wrong, because the water wasn't backing up, instead the running water seemed to approach him, then disappear. The cone was making the water disappear, but at first he couldn't understand where it was going. Then he realized the water was disappearing on the upstream side of his foot and reappearing downstream, but how was it being transferred? That transferral simply didn't make sense to him because he couldn't see it, but then the effect didn't make sense either, so trying to solve that mystery wasn't getting him anywhere.
Instead of wasting time on that, what else could he find out about his new invisible umbrella.
Hold on, if he extended his hand above the little stream the water wasn't disappearing any further away from his foot than it had been before. Instead of being inside a protective cone, he must be inside a shield that extended out from his body. That would mean the effect surrounding his arm wouldn't reach as far down as the tiny stream of water. Since he was looking at the shield from inside, he couldn't be certain what shape it was, it might not be conical at all, it might be any shape. Well the water running off the roof of the barn was running in a constant stream, he could use that to check the shape of the shield. All he had to do was move his hand back and forth under that falling water while watching where the water disappeared and reappeared. In seconds he had proved that he was definitely inside a protective shield, one that stood several inches away from his body. Falling water disappeared a few inches above his hand, but reappeared about the same distance below it.
Okay, time to make some mental notes, just what had he found out about his new 'umbrella,' or whatever it was?
#1. He was surrounded by a completely invisible barrier to falling rain.
#2. Falling rain or moving water couldn't reach him through the shield,
but his feet still got wet when he stood in still water.
#3. Rain disappeared when it hit the shield, then reappeared on the
opposite side of the shield, exiting in the same direction it had been moving when it entered.
#4. The shield was effective for a short distance away from his body in
all directions.
#5. Since there was no shielding effect on standing water, motion had
to be the key to how it worked.
After thinking for a moment he couldn't decide on any other tests to try, but he thought he'd make use of it while doing his chores, at least he wouldn't get wet. Then his foot slipped in the mud as he turned and he lost his balance. He fell toward the wall of the barn, but he seemed to be falling into sponge rubber and he was able to recover his balance before he fell down. Wait a minute! When he fell, his body was the moving object heading toward a solid object, however when he wanted to reach out and touch the wall in order to steady himself, he could do it easily. Whoa, he'd found another usable effect; during accidental motion – it acted like sponge rubber, but for intentional motion – it offered no interference. That meant the shield was protection against solid moving objects or falls as well. Even more than that, it definitely had to be under his control in some way, because it differentiated between accidental motion and intentional movement.
He had more information to add to his mental list;
#6. The shield gave some protection against injury from falls - how much was
questionable.
#7. It had differentiated between accidental and intentional contact,
which showed he was managing some form of control - even if it was unintentional!
He wasn't about to check any further right then though. He had work to do and further probing of the characteristics of his umbrella or rain shield would have to wait. As he was working, he was thinking though and he decided that he really needed to gain full control of this effect. For instance, if he wanted to wash his hands or take a shower he didn't want the shield to keep him from getting wet! He didn't want the effect to happen automatically either, if anyone saw him walking in the pouring rain, but not getting wet, they'd certainly want to know how he did it. So once the chores were done, he planned to study this new found talent much further. After all, it was raining and he had nothing on his list of jobs that absolutely had to be done, which meant he had time to play and investigate.
Since he was in a thoughtful mood, he was noticing things that he might have seen before, but hadn't really thought much about. For instance, he paid attention to how all the animals behaved differently because of the change in the weather. As soon as the cattle were fed, they headed back to their protective shelter. They seemed to know it was going to rain for longer, and he wondered about that – how did they know? The goats never even left their shed when he checked them, so they must have a built-in weather sense as well. Even the chickens were less active than normal, but then he didn't bother letting them out into their yard either. They could spend the day in the coop, because if they didn't get wet there was less chance that they'd pick up some stupid disease.
Once his chores were done and he was headed back toward the house, he made a decision to try to 'turn off' the rain shield. It worked too, even if he didn't know how he had done it. Zap - it was gone and he was getting wet - for about two seconds, then a big raindrop hit his nose and surprised him, instantly the shield was back in place. Well, he had partial control and he broke into a chuckle, but then frowned, he didn't really know what he had done to turn it off or turn it on. It was almost as if he made a wish and it was granted, but there had to be more to controlling the effect than that. It was time for him to do some more thinking. He seemed to be developing several strange abilities and he needed to have complete control of every one. He needed to come up with a definite form of control that was less dependent on his unconscious wishes or surprise reactions. He could just imagine what people would do or say if he was in a crowd and it started to rain, but he was the only person who remained dry.
Once he was inside, he made some breakfast since he'd slept in and hadn't eaten before going out to do the chores. For some reason he was extremely hungry and ate a huge breakfast. After eating, he drank a cup of coffee and spent some time just thinking about all the strange things he had gone through since moving out to BC. He needed to understand any commonality between the advent of each strange activity he'd gone through, trying to think of any wishes or desires he had experienced. There had to be some reason for what he was doing and there had to be a trigger for what had happened, especially if it was different in each case. He was positive that more strange abilities were going to appear and he was going to need to manage them in some way. Otherwise he was going to end up being a research project for some nutty professor, a mad doctor or even more terrifying, the subject of a military enquiry.
When he considered the strange abilities he was developing, he could understand why he'd had a shield today and the reason was very simple, he hated to get cold and wet from the rain. He didn't know why, but that was one of his pet peeves and was the reason he had an excellent set of rain gear at home in Saskatchewan. Only he'd forgotten it at home, so it was more than a thousand miles away and wasn't doing him one bit of good while he was out in BC. When he stepped outside this morning and saw the rain falling, he had probably wished that either the rain would go away or he had some way to stay dry. He doubt if his 'ability' was strong enough to change the weather, so it had worked out an alternative. He knew he hadn't really thought about it, not until he was almost at the barn and discovered that he wasn't getting wet.
He supposed that almost the same thing could be said about 'listening in' on Uncle Nils and Aunt Hanna. He disliked being out of the loop when it came to things concerning his health. He recalled being in the field one moment and back in the house, lying in bed the next minute, so he'd probably 'listened in' to understand what had happened. The fact that he'd been 'listening' to their thoughts was something he didn't understand and wasn't something he planned on trying to do again. He felt a person's thoughts should be private, so he wanted to leave that ability completely alone. He couldn't explain how he'd done it, but then he didn't really want to know. Telepathy wasn't a visible physical effect like the rain shield had been though, so he didn't have an urgent need to understand why or how he'd done it. After all it wasn't something people could actually see or feel.
When he thought back over the situation and considered his emotions, the first of his weird abilities to appear was the easiest to explain. Somehow he had realized that Uncle Nils and he were in danger of being killed, so he had been terrified. There was no physical way to move both of them out of danger in time. As a result when he sensed that the chain had snapped, he'd somehow been able to teleport both of them out of danger. Since the chain was twenty feet long, that was how far he had moved them – just beyond the furthest point the chain could reach.
However the x-ray vision session was something else and at first he couldn't understand why he would have any use for that. Then he got to thinking about the tractor sitting at an idle after everything settled down. He wouldn't have wanted it to go careening down the slope and running into the trees at the bottom of the grassy hillside. Instead he would have wanted to make it stop. Perhaps he was only able to affect objects if he could see them, or perhaps while he was sailing through the air he couldn't control both the clutch and throttle. Perhaps his ability could only move objects a short distance, so he needed to find a specific place in the linkage to do that. Okay, so none of that made any sense, but there had to be a reason for his sudden ability to see through solid iron. The only related need or desire he could think of right then would have been to stop the tractor from running away.
In reality though, he knew he was grabbing at straws and didn't really understand why that 'x-ray vision' stuff had cropped up. There had to be a reason for it, but he'd have to be a lot more familiar with an old John Deere tractor to tell what that reason could be. Now that he had time to consider it, he decided it would have been simpler just to shut off the engine. After all that just require the flipping of a switch, at least that was what he thought. He didn't know for sure, but he wasn't all that much of a mechanic and didn't want to become one.
After consideration, he didn't think he wanted to train as a doctor either. If that brief accidental look inside Uncle Nils' skull was enough to make him pass out, just imagine what other possible views into the human body would do. Actually the whole idea made him shudder in distaste, so he knew he simply wasn't into blood and guts.
Just thinking about that whole 'x-ray vision' episode was giving him a headache since it really didn't make much sense to him. Wait a minute, why was he getting a headache? He very seldom had headaches. Yet when he thought back to the day of his first incident, he recalled that he'd developed a bad headache when he'd been staring at the tractor. Come to think of it that headache might have been one of the reasons he'd blacked out, but he hadn't remembered it until now.
Whoa, was this headache related to that one and was it happening because he was thinking about what he had done that day? He concentrated on the pain, trying to localize where it was. He could feel something like pressure, right across the top of his skull and just above his ears, but somewhere between them. Hmm, that was a weird place for a headache to hit, did that mean anything? He know some doctors had said something about brains being divided up into areas of function or something like that, because he'd seen it on television, but . . .
Aw nuts, he didn't know anything about the brain and he didn't know how to check on it. He doubted if having a map of his brain would help him anyway. All he wanted to do was find a way to use whatever he could do when he needed it, yet be able to hide it when it would make him look 'different' than others. Let's face it, he wouldn't want to be around anyone who could read his thoughts, so why would others want to be around him if they knew he could read theirs. He certainly wouldn't want to be ostracized for an accidental display of some strange talent. He definitely wanted control over whatever strange abilities he had and in about two weeks his family was going to arrive. That wasn't very long and since he had shown a new ability that morning, he'd better start working on that control now.
Only on second thought, he decided he'd wait until the headache was gone before he tried to control anything. It was time to take a break, so he stood up and walked out to the front porch, then stood under the overhanging roof, taking a deep breath of rain freshened air. It was quite cool and even if it was raining, the view down to the road was enjoyable. Then he chuckled. It seemed he had an excellent sense of timing, because Aunt Hanna's car was just turning into the driveway.
As the car approached he could see she wasn't the only person in the car though, in fact as it got even closer he could see that her passenger had dark hair – long, curly, black hair. Aunt Hanna had brought Sami Clemens with her, which meant she was trying to reestablish some sort of peaceful relations between the two of them. Somehow he doubted that they'd ever be best friends, but he wasn't about to start a feud or anything of that sort. He'd heard that Sami had spoken to a lot of people about stretching the truth concerning Sunny and him, so he'd give her the benefit of the doubt that she was trying to stop her rumour, at least for now.
When Aunt Hanna stepped out of the car, he greeted her before she could say anything.
"Hi there, Aunt Hanna. Since it's raining, I haven't been doing much today, so if you want to come on inside we've got time for a chat. I'll even put on a pot of coffee. You might as well bring Sami inside too, I promise I won't throttle her," he announced, then walked inside to set up the coffee pot.
When Aunt Hanna and Sami came inside, he saw that Sami was soaked, absolutely dripping wet.
"Sami, what the blazes happened to you?" he asked in astonishment.
"The silly kid was standing just outside the grocery store in town and stopping shoppers to check to see if they'd heard the rumour she started. If they had, she was trying to explain to each one that she was the one who started the rumour and that it was just a story she'd created. Then she'd tell them how good friends your folks and Enrights were and that you and Sunny were just good friends, but nothing more," Aunt Hanna snapped. "I saw she was wet and shivering, so I grabbed her and hustled her into the car, but we stopped here because she didn't want to go home right away."
"Sami, there is such a thing as a telephone, you know. You could have traced the rumour through that from the start, then just called everyone who had heard."
"Unh uh, Daddy wouldn't let me do things the easy way. He said I had to talk to people face to face so they could see I was really sorry about what I did," Sami shivered. "That's why I don't want to go home right now. He'll be angry at me if I do."
"You're freezing and if you're not careful, you're going to end up catching a chill," he frowned at her. "Look, I don't think I have any clothes that will fit you, but there's lots of hot water for a shower or a bath, so you can get warm. As well as that I do have a washer and drier that are working, so we can wash and dry your clothes while you're in the bath. The Armstrongs left a whole bunch of towels behind in the bathroom down here and there are even some old bathrobes, along with a bunch of woman's soap and stuff. I'm sure Aunt Hanna can help set up things so you can get warmed up in the tub and she can check my clothes to see if anything I have will fit you. I've even got some hot chocolate and can make that for you while you're in the tub."
Aunt Hanna smiled and winked at him as she steered Sami down the hall toward the main floor bathroom.
"Make Sami a pot of hot tea, but don't make it very strong," she called over her shoulder.
So he filled the teakettle with water and set it to boil, then dug out an old teapot and tea bags. He'd hardly done that when Aunt Hanna came out of the bathroom, carrying Sami's clothes.
"Did you really get that old washer and drier working? I thought the Armstrongs said they were on their last legs?"
"The drier didn't work because it was on a double circuit breaker and one side was popped halfway, so it the machine was only getting half the voltage it should. That meant the lights lit up and the motor worked, because those run on one-ten, but the heater elements are on two-twenty, so they didn't come on," he snorted. "I'll admit the washer is old, so it sounds like it's on its last legs and the seals on the tub leak some, but it works, just as long as you're willing to mop the floor when you're done the washing. In this case, I'll even offer to mop up afterward though."
"What are you kid, some sort of mechanical genius, fixing dead machines?" Aunt Hanna called as she went into the utility room.
"Naw, just a farm kid who has watched his family fix things using common sense and bailing wire," he laughed, then rinsed out the tea pot with boiling water. "You'd better come and keep an eye on this tea. I don't drink tea at all, so I don't know how long to let the tea bags drown."
"Well, I finally found something you can't do," she chortled. "Just hold off on that and I'll be there in a minute."
"Oh, I can make tea alright, but Mom says my tea makes good rust remover, so that might be just a little strong for present purposes."
"Yes, I'd say it would be," Aunt Hanna came into the kitchen and elbowed him away from the stove. "Go sit down and have your coffee. I'll take care of Sami's needs right now."
He decided Aunt Hanna actually enjoyed looking after Sami and pampering her, since she had raised two sons, but no daughters. That morning she was given the chance to coddle a teenage girl who was growing to be a young woman.
He was very careful not to laugh when Sami finally came out to the kitchen. She was wearing one of his old sweatshirts and a pair of his sweat pants which were both pinned up tightly so they wouldn't fall off. Her long hair was wrapped in a towel, so it looked like she was wearing a turban and it didn't match well with his old clothes.
"Feeling better?" he asked, trying not to look at the enticing wobble under the tight sweatshirt.
"Much better," Sami sighed, flopping on a chair, which did amazing things for the view he was trying to ignore. "Daddy is going to be so pissed though . . ."
"You just leave your father to me, young lady!" Aunt Hanna snapped. "I intend to give him a piece of my mind and as Tor said the other day, 'Han har inte sett en arg svensk,' which means; He hasn't seen an angry Swede. He deserves a few words of wisdom for sending his daughter to stand in the rain and debase herself before her neighbours and I'll quote Tor again, 'there is such a thing as a telephone.' Someone needs to educate your father on the way to treat his family. I don't care how annoyed he was, you do not put your family in danger and I feel he did. I intend to tell him just what I think of him dropping you off and leaving you there all day."
"Well, it wasn't raining when he dropped me off and I started out inside the store, until that grouchy weekend manager chased me outside. He said I was disturbing his customers."
"I know. I had a little talk to him as well. I own shares in that darn store, enough shares that he just cost himself his job, unless he'll accept a transfer to the feed store and a demotion to stock boy. That's a job that might suit the stupid imbecile!" Aunt Hanna barked.
"You own that many shares in the co-op store?" Sami squeaked.
"I was one of the original shareholders. In fact I was on the executive until a couple of years ago," Aunt Hanna snarled. "That grouchy moron even tried to give me the bum's rush today, until the assistant manager straightened him out, Then when he realized he'd screwed up, the idiot tried kowtowing to me. Neither action makes me happy. He knew damn well he was going against policy when he kicked you out, but I might have gone along with that if he had a real reason and had been man enough to back up his decision. He's just a rabbit pretending to be a wolf, so I sent him packing and put his assistant in charge. That's what took so long for me to come back out to the car. I had to phone the regular manager and tell him what I wanted done."
"Good lord, how many shares do you own in that store, if you can dictate policy?" Tor frowned.
"Nils and I own about 11% of the shares, but my sister, Elsa, and her husband, Mike, own another 12%. I vote the proxies for the Armstrongs for now, until your folks and the Enrights officially take control of them, which is another 17% of the total shares. Then Kai and Arne both own some shares, I'm not sure how many. On top of that we have friends and neighbours who usually see things our way, so that guy is gone!" She paused, then sighed softly. "Don't worry, Sami, you didn't cost that idiot his job. I've been looking for a reason to have him fired for a few weeks because he's a slob, a jerk and a bully to the staff. I've been just waiting for a good excuse to make it happen."
"Then how did he get the job in the first place?" Tor wondered.
"Nepotism! The present president of the executive is his brother-in-law and he brought this twit in from Vancouver, then gave him the job without asking for the backing of the board. No one was really happy about it, but no one bothered to fight it either. Then a few weeks ago Kai was talking to one of the clerks about buying something, but he heard later that after he left, the jerk took the clerk into the office and tore a strip off the poor kid. According to the idiotic former manager she was wasting the store's money by engaging too many customers in conversation. He put the kid on probation and a week later he found an excuse to sack her. The store used to have a reputation for being friendly until he started there, so he'd have been gone at the first review of his work anyway. He just gave me a good excuse to have the satisfaction of personally sacking his ass and kicking him out of the store today. Next month at the annual meeting of the co-op there's going to be a change of executive too. I guarantee that the idiot who gave him a job will be out of work too."
"Now I know what Tor meant when he said Daddy hadn't seen an angry Swede," Sami grinned and winked at him.
"Yeah," Tor snorted, then turned to Aunt Hanna. "I didn't realize Dad had bought shares in the co-op. I thought he'd just bought the farm from the Armstrongs."
"Your folks made out quite well when they sold the farm in Saskatchewan and so did the Enrights," she smiled. "They both had the mineral rights on most of the property they farmed and the potash mining company bought both farms just to get those rights. Since the Armstrongs and Duprés were selling out, your dad and Charlie Enright picked up their shares, because they both like to invest in the local community. You know what they're both like, they prefer to see where their money is working and they like to help out others at the same time. But just like you, don't cross them, because they'll make you suffer."
"Yeah," Sami sighed. "Tor told me not to say anything stupid and I didn't listen. I sure won't cross anyone else in the Eklund or Enright families."
"Well, Sami, I'd say you've paid your dues for now. Unfortunately I imagine there'll be another dividend coming, which will fall due in September," Tor said quietly.
"What do you mean?"
"Well, if this school is like the one I went to back home there are always people at school who keep track of rumours and try to use them to tease or bully people. I'm almost positive that Sunny and I are going to be teased or ridiculed by several idiots, but I've already worked out my response. I'm just going to tell them that you were named after a famous author from the US and you were trying your hand at writing fiction to see if you could live up to your namesake. Unfortunately someone turned your fiction into a rumour."
"As if that would work," Sami snorted. "How many people know that Mark Twain's real name was Samuel Clemens?"
"A large percentage of the general population, I'd wager, and those that don't, you can educate."
"And what about all the time I spent madly running around, trying to stop the rumour from spreading?"
"You can tell them you were doing just that, trying to stop the rumour, and you were doing just about anything you could to do it too. In other words your past actions do not need an explanation, after all they're over and done with. You're starting on new footing, but hopefully you've learned from past mistakes."
She just stared at him for the longest time, then she shook her head and smiled. "You really are something else! You raise absolute hell, but after I worked my butt off to correct what I'd done, you seem to be willing to totally forgive and forget."
"Why harp on the past? Just learn from your mistakes and after you've done your best to correct them, move on. It ain't healthy to hold a grudge," then he grinned. "Besides, Sunny thought your story was kinda cute and if she's willing to forgive you, how can I possibly argue?"
"Well, that's another good thing that happened today," Aunt Hanna smiled.
"Oh? What was the first?"
"Firing that twerp down at the store," she grinned.
"But what if Daddy doesn't believe you've forgiven me."
"Then send him over to talk to me and I'll give him a second dose of Swedish anger," he laughed.
"A second dose?"
"Yes, I still plan on talking to that man today," Aunt Hanna nodded, wearing an evil looking grin.
"But, you aren't angry any longer," Sami frowned.
"Sami, I still have to take you home, which means driving up that rotten mess your father calls a driveway. I don't like all those ruts, or the big rocks in the road and neither does my car, so I can guarantee that by the time I get up to your house, your father will get the reaming out he deserves."
Tor laughed at that and might have said something, but just then the drier dinged, signalling that the load of washing was dry. That got instant action and ten minutes later the two of them were ready to leave even though Sami's hair was still quite wet. Tor was surprised to get a hug from both of them before they left.
When Aunt Hanna stepped back from the hug, she looked him in the eye and frowned. "I'll swear you've grown taller every time I see you. Your mother isn't going to recognise you."
"Naw, she's already raised two boys, so she knows how fast guys can grow at my age. She even made sure that the clothes I brought along were a bit large on me, so I could grow into them," he winked.
Sami never said anything, she just smiled and waved goodbye.
Tor sighed as he watched them drive away. At least this time Sami didn't leave the farm in tears. That young woman had presented a problem which had been playing on his mind, but that was now taken care of, hopefully for the last time.
He was still stuck with the problem of controlling his 'rogue' talents, but that evening when he went out to look after the animals he found he could turn his 'rain shield' on and off at will. That was a wonderful relief and gave him a real feeling of satisfaction. He experimented with that shield, extending it further from his body, then bringing it closer, but just being able to shut it off and turn it back on again gave him the greatest thrill. He soon learned how it 'felt' to control at least one ability which was mentally driven.
Each time he activated or deactivated that 'shield' he sensed a weird 'tightening' deep inside his skull. It wasn't a sensation that he'd ever noticed before, so he had to assume that feeling was the signal which heralded the imminent activation of one of his 'abilities.' At least he was hopeful that it was. In fact he had hopes that he could use the sensation as a warning to prevent any possible future accidents or disclosures of 'freaky talents,' instead of being caught by surprise.
He was hoping to gain more than that, but it wasn't to be, at least not then. That wasn't for lack of trying though. He tried to 'teleport' from one end of the barn to the other, but failed. He didn't try just once either. He wasted almost half an hour trying to 'teleport,' but thought his problem might have been describing what he wanted in a way his brain could comprehend. He tried to wish himself down the length of the barn. He tried demanding. He tried commanding. He tried asking. He tried wheedling. He even tried begging. After a while he decided he might be trying to move too far, so he selected a spot only ten feet away from where he was standing. Then he went through all the same methods of trying to 'teleport' at that distance, but still failed. He only gave up when he felt another headache developing.
Finally he went back to the house, made another large meal and ate it, then sat down in front of the idiot box and relaxed for a while, and for him that was the ultimate sign that he was giving up. Let's face it, he abhorred television – unless there is a hockey game on the tube, and there certainly weren't any hockey games on TV in midsummer. He wasn't really watching the boob tube anyway. Instead he was using it as background noise while leaning back, cudgelling his brain over his problem of control. Eventually he even gave that up, got to his feet, hit the switch on the TV, hunted up a couple of aspirins for his headache and went up to bed.
He was so tired that he'd taken his clothes off and slid into bed, then realized he'd left the ceiling light turned on. With a deep sigh he flipped back the covers, rolled onto his side and swung his feet to the floor as he sat up, then paused. He stared at the light switch, tried to imagine it flipping to the off position and mentally commanded 'Off' – and the light went out!
He tried to remain calm. He didn't shout. He didn't leap out of bed. He didn't even move for a moment. He just relished the thought that he had succeeded in something else he had tried. Instead he lay back, pulled up the sheets, then looked over in the direction of the light switch. He imagined flipping it the other direction. 'On' and then 'Off' and 'On' and 'Off,' repeating it for perhaps a dozen times, but finding that it seemed to be harder to throw that simple switch each time. He finally switched the light off one last time, then rolled over, sighed in satisfaction and fell asleep almost instantly.
He awoke the next morning understanding exactly why he'd blacked out after he had 'teleported' Uncle Nils and himself to safety, then stopped the tractor from running away. He probably passed out from sheer exhaustion. He'd discovered the night before that it took far more energy to operate a light switch by using his mental abilities than it would take to get out of bed, walk over, flip the switch, walk back and get back into bed. He had actually grown tired after only flipping that light switch on and off a dozen or so times. Of course he'd been fiddling with that stupid 'shield' earlier and he had even attempted to teleport several times before coming inside for the evening. It was no wonder he had grown tired while flipping that light on and off, he'd been doing it when he was already suffering an energy deficiency.
Afterward he had slept the sleep of exhaustion and now he was very hungry – no, he felt as though he was starving. He cooked a huge breakfast and polished it off in no time. It was still raining, but he hurriedly cared for all the animals, then tried teleporting almost the full length of the barn. He managed to do it, but just once, and even then he felt his legs quiver when he landed. Well, it seemed that teleportation wasn't going to be a substitute for learning to drive a car, that's for sure. Every muscle in his body felt weak, but then he guessed the energy to move his body had to come from somewhere. This mental crap was a lot harder on a person than he'd ever imagined it would be. He could see that he was going to have to build up his body if he was going to be able to do much.
He slowly slogged back to the house in the pouring rain, but he wasn't even trying to use his 'rain shield' because he was so tired. Once he was in the house he changed into dry clothes, then gobbled a couple of peanut butter and honey sandwiches, washing them down with two large glasses of milk. An hour after eating his snack he ate a large lunch, and even then he felt he could have eaten more. That afternoon he went out to the old implement shed and started to clean it up, lifting, carrying, sweeping, doing anything physical, just as long as he was working as energetically as he possibly could. He was bound and determined that he was going to build muscle, so as he worked he considered what he knew about the diet of people who exercised heavily.
He knew body builders emphasized eating a balanced diet and they worked out by using different exercises to improve muscles all through their bodies. Heck, farm work did the same thing and there was a lot to do on this old place. He was fairly certain body builders ate a lot of protein, carbohydrates, vitamins, and minerals, but he could do that. To start with he had a freezer half full of meat that the Armstrongs had left behind. He had a small garden full of vegetables loaded with vitamins and minerals. He could bake bread, which was loaded with carbohydrates. He was getting short of milk, which was a good source of calcium, but there was a dairy just down the road a few miles. He was certain he could buy milk there and riding his bike back and forth was great exercise, but then he could run that distance too, only it would take more time, so biking was his first choice.
That evening he was so tired from the work he'd done during the afternoon that he almost had to drag himself around to look after the animals. Back in the house he cooked and ate another big meal, then after relaxing a while, he used masking tape to mark two spots on his bedroom floor and 'teleported' back and forth several times. He managed three full trips back and forth before he couldn't do it again, then he went to bed. Even though he felt bushed, he forced himself to flip the light switch on and off a few times, until he was almost completely exhausted and could hardly keep his eyes open. He certainly fell asleep easily.
He ached all over the next morning, but instead of slowing down, he had a shower, did some stretching exercises, had breakfast, then went right back to work. For the next twelve days his routine varied day by day, but he worked hard each and every day, going to bed completely exhausted each night and waking exceptionally hungry each morning. He knew he was growing and putting on muscle though. His pants were getting shorter on his legs and his biggest shirts were almost splitting at the seams, even his shoes felt too tight for his feet.
He not only worked around the farm yard and buildings, but every evening he did some cleanup in the house, tackling one job or one room at a time and carrying it through to completion. Eventually he cleaned the whole house from top to bottom. He swept and vacuumed the attic and the basement, especially the floors. He washed the ceilings, walls, floors and counters in the kitchen, the utility room and both bathrooms. He cleaned the appliances in the kitchen and utility room, both inside and out. He washed the windows and mirrors all through the house. He found some floor polish and polished the hardwood floors in the dining room and living room. He washed any painted walls and lino floors in the bedrooms, but not the walls which were papered, since he didn't know what his mom would want to do with them. He dusted all through the house, then washed and cleaned all the woodwork and doors. He even straightened up all the food containers still left in the cupboards.
By working steadily every day, he'd soon cleaned up the barn and the equipment shed, then repaired all the fences and corrals. He had even started the old Fordson tractor and hitched up the mower to mow along the driveway and around the buildings. While he'd been mowing, he'd discovered a drag hidden in the long grass, so he used the little tractor to tow the drag up and down the driveway to get rid of any ruts. He cleaned up almost all the small piles of trash and worn out implements around the yard, pilling the junk out of sight behind one shed, but close enough that it was still handy to load when his family decided to dispose of it. He even lined up all the farm equipment along one fence so it looked neat and orderly. Since he'd found that walking to the upper pasture each day to train Uncle Nils' horses was a waste of time, he moved the mares down to the little pasture between the house and the road. Even as busy as he was, he still made sure to spend time with each of those mares every day, continuing their training, just because he'd agreed to the job and he felt his word was his bond.
The day before his folks were supposed to leave Saskatchewan he phoned Aunt Hanna and asked her if they could go to town because he needed a few clothes.
"What's wrong with the clothes you have?"
"Aunt Hanna, I'm a growing boy and I'd like to look decent when everyone gets here from the prairies," he laughed. "And before you suggest it, I don't want to buy anything fancy to wear to impress Sunny. I just want a couple pairs of blue jeans and a few bigger work shirts. Oh and I want some new shoes too. The ones I'm wearing are too tight."
So she agreed to come over and drive him to Eagles Bluff. He was sitting down on the rocker on the front porch when she drove up, but when he stood up, she stared at him.
"What happened to you?"
"Like I said on the phone, I think I grew a little," he laughed.
He had been just slightly taller than her when he'd come out to BC a month before, but now he was more than half a head taller than she was. The shirt he was wearing was the largest one he had brought with him and it was threatening to split. She just shook her head in wonder.
"I have never seen anyone grow so much so fast," she whispered. "Your mother is going to have a fit when she sees you."
"I'm just going to have to tell her that you fed me on those growth hormones meant for cattle," he teased.
"Don't you dare," she laughed. "If you keep on growing like this you're going to make your father and your uncle look short, and both of them are almost six and a half feet tall. Poor Sunny is going to seem short when you stand near her and little Sami is going to look like a midget."
"Oh, it won't be that bad. Sunny was almost as tall as I was when I came out here, but my growth is going to be a surprise for her too."
"Oh, it certainly is, and you're right, we'd better get to town and buy you a few clothes. Then since it's early in the day, I thought I'd come back here and talk you into helping me clean up the house. If we start today, we can have most of it clean by the time your folks arrive."
"Well, I tried to clean up a bit already," he grinned and opened the door to let her go inside. "Have a look and you can tell me what we need to do over."
He thought the condition of the house impressed her even more than the amount he had grown. She was completely flabbergasted and walked around shaking her head, repeatedly asking him, "Are you sure you didn't have some woman help you clean this house?"
He just laughed and shook his head. Finally after wandering both upstairs and down Aunt Hanna just shook her head and motioned toward the door.
"Let's go to town, and before you say anything about cleaning up the house, I don't want to hear how long it took you. It's well done, but your Mom will still find things she wants to have cleaned better."
"Oh, I already knew that Mom would never be fully satisfied," he chuckled. "In fact when she finds out I only took about ten or twelve hours to do the place from attic to basement she'll probably do everything all over again."
"I'm not going to comment on that. Your mother is not only my sister-in-law, but a good friend, so there's no way I want to take sides," she smiled and glanced over at him. "If I were you though, I'd tell her you spent days working on that house."
"Well, since I only worked in the evenings after working outside all day long, I did take days, but I only worked on it for a little more than an hour each day. It was really very easy to do, because there's so little furniture in the house. The barn, the sheds and the yard were much harder to clean up because there was junk all over the place."
"I see," she nodded.
Then for some reason she changed the subject back to his recent growth and from that to his health.
"By the way while we're in town I'm going to see if the doctor has time to see you. I'm not sure if it's healthy to grow so fast and I want him to check you to see if you don't have excess growth hormones or something."
"Oh, okay, I guess. I feel fine though, so I don't think there's anything to worry about. I've been working quite hard and eating a lot. I didn't think much about how much I'd grown until my pants started getting too darn short and my shirts got too darn tight. I just figured it was natural to grow some at this time of my life."
"Yes, I know you're racing through puberty, but your growth rate is still exceptional."
"Well, on the first of June I was five-foot-two and weighed about a hundred and twelve pounds, but I think I must have grown a few inches in the last two months. I don't have any idea how much weight I've added, but I've been working a lot, so it's muscle, not fat."
"Well, you looked like a toothpick when you first came out here, so most of that muscle has been built while you were on the new farm. Now I'm not accusing you of using drugs or anything, but your growth has been astounding."
"It's all natural. Of course all I've done for the last month is work and eat. There was lots of food in the house and I ate whenever I got hungry, but I will admit I was hungry a lot of the time. I ate fresh eggs from the chickens, fresh vegetables from the garden and when I ran short of milk I'd peddle down the road a couple of miles to the Craigmillers and buy a jug of milk from them."
"Oh, I thought the Armstrongs left some cows on the farm, so I was sure you'd have lots of milk."
"They left some old Jersey cows there, but they're all dry," he laughed. "It was no problem to get milk from the neighbours though. I rode down on the bike, then traded them fresh eggs for fresh milk."
Now he was fairly certain that the abilities he'd been developing had increased his growth, but he was also certain that it wasn't caused by any excess hormones or anything of that sort. He really couldn't see any problem with visiting a doctor, besides he was positive that she wouldn't be able to get an appointment to see a local doctor in the next two days. His folks would be around by that time and they'd make the final decision of whether he'd be seeing a doctor or not.
She was still talking about his growth when they got to town. He had to interrupt her monologue to point to the MacLeods Store, which was the same chain of stores where he'd usually gone to buy his work clothes in Saskatchewan.
"I'd like to go to MacLeods, please," Tor said quietly. "I know they've always got the clothes I like to wear when I'm working and I can buy pants, shirts, shoes and boots, all in one stop. Besides, I have a charge card for the MacLeods store."
"You have a charge card, at thirteen years old?" Aunt Hanna stared at him as if he'd just developed horns.
"Yeah, I always buy my own clothes. Once I started doing chores regularly Dad set me up with an account at MacLeods. He pays the bill once a month and deducts that from my pay. I don't get an allowance, so if I don't do any work, I don't get paid, but I think my paycheck this month is going to be a doozey. I've done a lot of work, so I think I can afford to buy a few clothes," Tor grinned as he watched her jaw drop.
As soon as the car was fully parked, he headed inside. He started by checking out the denim blue jeans the store had on sale, but they were all seconds, so he moved on to the better brands, soon finding a pair he wanted to try on. Then he moved over to the T-shirts and grabbed a sample from that pile. After that he went to the western-style, long-sleeved shirts, with snaps, not buttons. Once he had a few samples of all the clothes he wanted to buy he headed for the change rooms, but made sure to catch the eye of a saleslady.
"As you can see from my shirt and britches, I've grown a little this summer," he posed for a second, showing how tight the shirt was and how short his pant legs were. "I need to find what size fits me now that I've grown a bit. Is it okay to use a change room?"
"Certainly young man, fill your boots," the saleslady smiled back at him.
"Ah, boots come later and I may need a hand with those," Tor grinned and winked. "I'll try on these clothes first though."
"Well, that's why I'm here. Just let me know if you need anything," she called as he slipped into the first booth.
Selecting the right size clothing was no problem. MacLeods sold their long-sleeved shirts and T-shirts in four sizes; small, medium, large and extra large. In April he'd been wearing small men's shirts, but when he'd come out to BC he had brought along three medium shirts. He thought he had shrunk those medium shirts in the wash, but it seemed he hadn't, instead he must have grown. Now he was going to have to wear large size, because his chest had expanded and he'd added an inch or two in height from his waist to his shoulders, even his arms were longer. When it came to pants, his waist and hips were almost the same size as before, but his legs were three inches longer. Holy crow! The fact that he'd grown as much as he had really surprised him.
Once he had the sizes worked out, he went back to the displays. There he chose another three western-style long-sleeved shirts, added four more T-shirts and two more pairs of the blue jeans, then at the last minute he grabbed a package of work socks and one of undershorts. At the checkout counter he set aside the clothes that wouldn't fit so they could be refolded, then asked the sales lady to help him choose some runners, gum boots and work boots.
"You should grow more often, you're going to provide me with a good sale from the clothing section today," she teased as she measured his foot.
"Yeah, I grew a little this summer, but don't count on me buying this much every time I visit the store," he grinned at her. "Some malady called puberty came along and bit my butt. That must have infected me with a growth syndrome of some sort."
"I see," she chuckled. "I'd say you've grown right out of those runners you were wearing."
Since he'd worn out the toes of his runners, there was a lot of truth in that, so he just laughed. "I want boots and running shoes that are tough, not fancy, and I don't want to pay an arm and a leg for them, because I wear them out or outgrow them in only months."
"I can see that," she laughed selecting a set of runners for him to try on.
"He's been working hard this summer. His folks just bought the old Armstrong farm up the valley and he's been looking after it while his folks are selling out and packing up to move here from Saskatchewan."
"Oh, are you the young man that . . ."
She'd heard Sami's rumour, so he retold the version he wanted people to hear, meanwhile she was helping him find work boots, gum boots and running shoes. Then her eyes got a bit big when he handed her his charge card.
"I'll have to phone Vancouver to check this card," she looked at him apologetically.
"Here, instead of calling Vancouver and having to waste time while your call is redirected to the head office in Winnipeg, use this number. It's the direct number to the credit office in Winnipeg. Dad warned me that I might need to give it to you. You have my card number, and here is the main family account number, under the name Ollie Eklund, Gopher Creek, Saskatchewan."
"Oh! I recognise that name, just a moment." She opened the til and took out the cash drawer, then pulled out a letter from underneath and referred to it for a moment. "I forgot this. Your father was in here about a month ago and left this letter for us, warning us that someone might be in for farm supplies or clothing. The number of your card is already pre-approved and written down here. I'm sorry, I had forgotten all about your father's letter until you mentioned his name and calling Winnipeg. I'll just ring up your charges. There will be no problem at all."
In a moment the saleslady was bagging up his clothing, but for some reason she kept glancing up at him. Finally she got up her nerve to speak though. "I'm sorry, but the rumour that I heard indicated that you were only thirteen years old, but you're so tall. You're really older than that, aren't you?"
"Well, I'm older than thirteen, by about three months," he grinned. "Kids grow big in Saskatchewan though. There's potash in the soil back there, which makes everything grow tall and strong, including people. Actually, there was so much potash in the soil under our farm that a big fertilizer manufacturer bought out my family so they could mine the potash, refine it and sell it to other farmers. That's why we moved out here, before we all became giants."
He thought Aunt Hanna was going to choke, since she was trying so hard not to laugh. Of course once they were in the car and had started to drive she broke into laughter.
"'Potash makes everything grow tall and strong.' he says," she snorted. "That poor woman is going to remember you forever."
"Well, between the potash that was already in my body when I came out here, the pure BC water, the attack of puberty and finally those growth hormones you fed me, I was bound to grow a bit."
"I DID NOT FEED YOU GROWTH HORMONES!" she almost shouted, but she was laughing when she said it. "Don't you dare try to blame me for your wild growth spurt."
"Well, I have to blame someone, and you happen to be handy."
The two of them kidded each other all the way home and he hoped she had completely forgotten about arranging for that doctor's appointment. He didn't mind the idea of going to see a doctor, but he wanted his parents to make the choice of which doctor he would see, not his Aunt Hanna. He really don't know why, but he was leery of her choice of doctors for some unknown reason.
Of course once they got back to the farm, his aunt had to see what his new clothes looked like on him, so while she made coffee and some lunch, he had to go put them on. Now anyone who has bought clothing at MacLeods knows that they have about twenty-seven straight pins in each shirt and at least twenty-one tags on each pair of pants. By the time he had removed all the crud from one shirt and one pair of pants, then put them on, Aunt Hanna had lunch ready. She'd also phoned home and talked to Uncle Nils, bragging about all the work Tor had done in the house and around the farm, then she'd suggested he come over and join them for lunch. As Tor came downstairs, she was making sandwiches.
"Where did you get homemade bread?" she asked.
"I baked it in the oven of the stove," he laughed. "That's some of my sourdough bread."
"Well, I know it's sourdough bread, but I didn't know you could bake bread from scratch."
"I even started the 'mother' for the sourdough," he snorted. "I think I was about eight or nine when I had my first lesson in baking bread and I happen to like sourdough rye bread."
"You are full of surprises. Did you cook the meatloaf too?"
"Yep, I did. In fact I've done all my cooking since I was here, well except for the few dishes the neighbours brought around when I first came. Mostly I've been using meat and vegetables that the Armstrongs left behind in the freezer. I did trade a couple of dozen eggs for a small piece of home-cured bacon from the Craigmillers though and I told you before that I got my milk from them too."
They chatted about cooking while they were waiting for Uncle Nils to come, then when he arrived, they all sat down to eat. After they'd eaten, Aunt Hanna was bragging about how clean the house was and how hard Tor must have worked on it.
"Vhen Aye drove in Aye noticed da yard looks goodt too," Uncle Nils nodded at Tor. "You haf done a lot of vork sinct you come here, hey?"
"Yeah, I worked with your horses a lot too. They've come a long way."
"Really?" he looked at Tor askance.
"Yeah, want to go down and see how they're doing?" Tor asked, since he was proud of what he'd done with those two mares.
Aunt Hanna begged off, wanting to get home, but Uncle Nils agreed to spend a short time in order to see what Tor had done with the mares. So he led the way down to the pasture where he had the horses now and paused at the gate. He whistled a short signal, just one low note, followed by a high note and both mares lifted their heads and looked his direction. He repeated the signal and Flicka started ambling their direction. Then he whistled a three-note signal, one high note, a low note and another high note, and Lillan started trotting their direction too.
"Vel, Aye'll be darnedt," Uncle Nils said quietly.
"Oh, there's more," Tor bragged. "Flicka would already let you ride her bareback and she'd neck-rein when she came, but the young mare was a little less cooperative, wasn't she?"
"Yaw. Ya could say dat for shure!" Uncle Nils chuckled. "She likedt to dump Arne on his butt vhen he tried to ride on her."
"Well, let's see if she'll behave a little better today," Tor said, then slipped through the gate and walked over to Lillan.
He brushed his hand gently along her nose, then walked to her side and flipped on her back – no saddle, no bridle, not even a halter. He winked at Uncle Nils then and neck-reined Lillan with his knees so she was walking parallel to the fence, but after a second he leaned forward a bit and tightened his heels slightly. She sped up and began to prance, something like the pace you see some dressage horses do, when the front feet lift straight up, swing forward, then settle straight down. That pace is slightly faster than a normal walk and it looks really good if the horse holds its head high and the rider sits very straight. Then he turned her away from the fence, leaned much further forward and tightened his heels again. That was her signal to start quickly, which she did, and she was a purebred Quarter Horse, so she went from dead slow to almost flat out in about three bounds.
Which was what he wanted to show her doing, but he hadn't counted on her scaring up a jackrabbit. Now, she was a Quarter Horse and they seem to have an instinct to herd animals. Tor could only suppose she thought he wanted her to herd that darn jackrabbit.
There were three problems with that:
First problem; jackrabbits do not run straight. They're used to outrunning coyotes, wolves, bobcats and other predators, so they run a short distance, then turn on a dime, bounce a few paces and turn again, then do it again and again, all at high speed.
Second problem; Quarter Horses can turn almost as fast as a jackrabbit, even at a full gallop and Lillan set out to prove she was a great example of the breed.
Third problem; he was sitting on her back without a saddle or a bridle, so he only remained on her back through two turns. He was left behind on the third turn, in fact he was ejected like a jet pilot from a disabled fighter plane, but unlike the pilot, Tor had no parachute.
He had time to realize he was falling and that it was going to hurt, then the ground came up to meet him.
Only it didn't – not really.
Remember that 'rain shield' and Tor's fall against the barn wall? It seemed the 'shield' worked for falls from horses too, but it wasn't perfect, it only reduced the impact of the fall, not cancelling it. He hit on his side and rolled, actually he felt as if he bounced, then rolled, but even then he had his breath knocked out of him for a moment or two. When he got his breath back he wiggled his fingers, then his toes, shifted his head from side to side, then sat up. By that time Uncle Nils was leaning over him, asking if he was all right, then telling him not to move, and wondering if he'd need an ambulance.
He just heaved a sigh and looked over at Uncle Nils. "Next time I try to show off, tell me to be careful and warn me to use a saddle and bridle would you?"
"Are yew okay? Dat vas some spill yew took."
"Yeah, but I've fallen harder than that before. Didn't you see me roll and flop around like a wet blanket? I learned to land loose and limber, like a drunk does, then you don't usually break anything."
"Vell I haf never seed nuttin like dat before," Uncle Nils shook his head, then grinned. "You bouncedt, like a rubber ball vot got trowed down in da playgroundt."
"Yeah, and I was going to be so careful not to let anyone see any of my strange abilities, so what do I do? I show off one of those abilities to the one person in my family that already has a reason to be suspicious of me," he thought to himself. "Dumb, just plain dumb, that's me!"