Well Wishes

Chapter 3
Major Shifts

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Chapter Description: A lack of dimes causes an unexpected complication in Shane's bid to get back to normal.

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Shane headed outside, pulling the door closed and locking it behind him. He turned and almost smacked into his next-door teenage neighbor.

"Whoa! What’s your hurry, little guy?" Jon asked.

Shane found the 17-year-old’s strong hands clamped on his shoulders. Jon, his teenage neighbor, had grabbed him to prevent a collision.

"Crap," Shane thought. He had forgotten that Jon mowed his yard every two weeks.

He’s about 5’11" and a very fit 17-year-old. For a teenager, he was also surprisingly observant.

"Who are you?" Jon asked, letting go of him.

At first, Shane didn’t quite recognize the older boy. He’s so much... bigger!

Then, he realized Jon was still waiting for him to answer. "Oh, hi Jon," Shane said, blinking a little.  

"Uh...hi," Jon answered. "Do I know you?"

Shane felt antsy, like he had to pee a little.

Seeing and interacting with a giant-sized house is one thing - but seeing giant people...

He shuffled his feet, looking down. He tried to think of an excuse that would fool Jon.

"Uh...mmm -no.  I mean, my uncle Shane said you’d be comin’ over today." Shane looked up at him. For years, he had thought of Jon as a nice kid - but a kid. Now, he looked all grown up, tall and cool.

"Oh, that’s why I am here," Jon said. "I can’t mow the yard today. Is he inside so I can tell him?"

"Uh -he’s in the shower," Shane lied. "He told me I could go to the park ’cuz...

Jon gave him a strange look, having noticed how he kept dancing from foot to foot. "You OK, kid?"

"Cuz I couldn’t play in the yard ’cuz you were coming over," Shane said with a grin, proud that he could think up such an amazingly convincing story.

"Oh, that wouldn’t bother me," Jon said. He winked at Shane. "I’ll put you to work pulling weeds."

Shane felt less nervous now. It’s weird, but he enjoyed talking with Jon.

"Oh yeah?" Shane asked.

He laughed. "Just kidding."

"Oh..." Shane sounded disappointed. "I would help, though."

Jon reached down and, as older boys have from time immemorial, he messed up Shane’s already messed-up hair. "What would your uncle think if I put you to work. He’d kick my butt."

Shane squirmed a little, feeling something bubbling up inside him - something between laughter and burgeoning hero worship.

"Nah - he’d be cool with it," Shane insisted.

"Well, I am meeting some friends this evening. But maybe you can give me a hand tomorrow, buddy."

"I’d like that!" Shane exclaimed, perhaps a little too enthusiastically.

Jon laughed again. "Tell your uncle I will be sure to do an extra-good job tomorrow, K?"

"I mean, if I’m still here, I’d be glad to help."

Jon smiled at the kid. "You planning a trip?"

Shane giggled. "No," he said. "I’ll be sure he knows you’ll be here tomorrow."

"It’s funny that I never have seen you visit before," Jon said. "Where do you live?"

"Uhhh. no.  My...dad is coming back from a trip to North Dakota soon."

Shane gave him the name of his brother’s home town, right down to the address.

While listening, Jon raised his T-shirt and absently scratched his stomach, showing a hint of firm abs.

"That’s nice. You having fun visiting your Uncle Shane?"

For a second, Shane had trouble concentrating on anything but the flash of Jon’s bare abs, which were just below his level of sight.

"It’s pretty cool. He doesn’t have any good toys or anything."

Jon looked sympathetic. "You come over my place tomorrow," the teenager offered. "My mom never throws anything out. You can look through some of my old games and toys. I still have a huge collection of dinosaurs."

A goofy grin popped onto Shane’s face. "Dinosaurs?"

"Yeah, like T-Rex and Triceratops..."

"Cool!" Shane exclaimed. "So, where are you going? Why can’t you do the lawn today?"

"My friends are going to the lake for a party."

Shane looked across the street at Jon’s place. "Cool, I will come over tomorrow," he said, excitement crackling in his eyes.

"Well, I will have to do my yard work here first," Jon said. "Your uncle will getting kick my butt if I put this off another day."

Shane laughed at "kick my butt."

Jon turned and started to walk off, but stopped and looked back. "Oh, kid, I forgot... what’s your name?"

Shane can’t seem to contain the excitement he is feeling - it’s like he is a can of soda pop that has been well shaken.

"Uh...Sha...." He stopped. He couldn’t just claim the same name as his so-called uncle. "I mean, uh, I am Seamus."

Jon looked confused. "Seamus?"

Shane could tell Jon was fighting the urge to laugh.

"Yeah," he said, blushing furiously.

"Well, see you tomorrow, little man."

"Except everyone calls me Jack - like my dad," Shane called after him.

Jon turned around yet again. "Ok.. that’s better...Jack." Then, he made it across the street, back to his house.

Shane grinned again, feeling dumb and embarrassed that Jon was laughing at him like he was some dumb little kid.

"Like I care what a teenager thinks of me," Shane said aloud, but with very little conviction.

He had felt really felt pleased that Jon even took the time to ask his name.

He was so nice, and Shane felt raised hopes that Jon will be his friend.

He remained on the porch watching him - trying to think of an excuse to go over to his house....or to the lake!  

"That would be awesome," he whispered and was on the verge of walking over and asking if he could tag along.

But then he remembered... "I have got to find Robbie." Beside, why would Jon want a little kid tagging along with him and his friends?

Besides, he told himself that he and Robbie could have fun at the park. Robbie might not be cool like Jon...

Shane froze. "What the hell am I doing?"

He shook his head to try to clear his thoughts. He knew the importance of keeping in mind why he really wanted to see Robbie. Nowhere in the equation is there room for Jon. To his acute embarrassment, he realized he has a huge bro-crush going for his next-door high school neighbor!

He screwed his eyes closed, but the image replayed of Jon lifting his shirt and showing off a glimpse of his abs.

Shane shuffled his feet again, struggling with all the feelings bubbling up - working hard but failing to contain them.

He started walking toward the park, but then had a distressed thought. If he finds Robbie, and they wish him back to normal, he won’t be able to pull weeds with Jon tomorrow.

He stopped again. "Man, how could think that?"

Why did it seem like a major disappointment? "I’m not some little school boy!" Shane said aloud. "I have got to find Robbie, and make him change me back into an adult."

Convinced, he walked faster, although he could not help but slow his pace as he walked past Jon’s house Of course, once he got past Jon’s home, he could see the park, which persuaded him to pick up his pace.

He headed with no hesitation toward the play area. After all the innovative thinking it had taken him to even get to the park, it all now seemed almost too easy. He saw Robbie hanging on the monkey-bars.

But, gone was the little kid from last evening. Robbie now ranked as an equal, at least in size and appearance.

At first, he had broken into a run across the playground, and in his excitement, he shouted out Robbie’s name.

The kid on the monkey-bars released his grip and landed on his feet, turning at the call of his name.

"Hey Robbie!" Shane blurted out - it was not what he had meant to say - he’d thought it all through, compiling a long explanation about how they will always be friends and he will help him and and stuff but that this was all a major mistake and that....

Instead, all that came out was an overly eager, "Hey Robbie!" His juvenile excitement caused Shane’s cheeks to redden brightly.

"Hi...who are you?"

That was an unexpected reaction. "Robbie, it’s me! Shane!"

He took a step closer, starting to feel awkward at finding that Robbie was of virtually equal height.

"I don’t know anyone named Shane." He walked off, toward the slide.

"Wait!" Shane exclaimed and chased after Robbie.

He grabbed the boy’s right wrist. "You remember? I was here last night..." Shane looked around the playground before he plunged ahead. "I didn’t look like this though..."

He had Robbie’s attention now. The boy leaned closer to catch every word.

Shane’s voice, lowered to a whisper, continued with the explanation. "I was all bigger...and stuff." In his head, Shane mentally cringed at the jumble of words.

"Damn, why can’t I talk right?" The transformed man wondered to himself.

Robbie’s eyes grew as wide as a kid’s in Japanese anime. "It worked?" The boy barely dared to express the hope.

Then, as truth sank in, his enthusiasm burst out. "Oh, wow, it worked! Fantastic!"

Shane felt the contagion of Robbie’s excitement. "Yeah, it was awesome!"

"Have you been having fun?"

Shane started to answer, but found he didn’t have a ready answer. Earlier, he had wanted only to find Robbie, to get the boy to help put things right. Now...

"On the way home, I started getting all energized and stuff and I didn’t know it at first, but I was getting littler," Shane explained, probably giving far too much unnecessary detail to a boy who only cared that their magical wish had been granted.

Robbie gave a little cheer, then walked a few steps toward the slide. "C’mon. The slide is my favorite thing."

Shane followed his new friend. His hands were on the rungs of the ladder to the top of the slide before he realized better.

He shook his head. "No, Robbie, I mean, yes, this is fun and all, but you gotta help me turn back - we gotta make a wish to undo this."

"Later," Robbie promised. With a crooked grin, he turned away and started climbing to the top of the slide, putting himself about seven feet off the ground.

Shane followed him to the top - struggling a little with the height of each step - his brain not fully calibrated to his new shorter legs.

"Wait up, Robbie," he whined.

"I’m waiting, slow-poke."

"I’m not a slow-poke!" Shane took offense and climbed faster.

At the top, Robbie waited for his new friend to get positioned behind him. "Let’s slide down together, OK?"

Shane felt amazement at how easily Robbie has accepted this. That was definitely curious, but he had other things on his mind, finding himself seven feet off the ground. The top of the slide seems really tall.

He looked around, embarrassed that someone would see him acting like a little boy.

"Ready, Shane?" Robbie’s question jarred him from his mixed emotions.

"Sure," Shane said, sliding closer behind Robbie.

"One...two...three!"

Robbie launched himself down the slide, taking Shane with him. They slid forward, and Shane couldn’t help looking down - it was not that high off the ground he told himself, but enough to give his stomach a lurch...

And then they were sliding. That bubbling feeling erupted again, and Shane joined Robbie in riotous laughing as they reached the bottom of the slide.

"That was COOL!" Shane exclaimed.

Robbie squealed in shared delight. "Yeah! It was!"

"Let’s go again!" Shane suggested.

"Race you!"

Shane found himself running around the slide. They arrived at the base of the ladder at the same time and began battling to climb the ladder.

Shane found himself less bothered by some of the changes. The equality in their height seemed less of an issue and concerns that he would be seen acting childish faded.

"I got here first!" Shane bumped into Robbie.

Robbie surprised him by pushing back, and Shane felt a jolt of surprise when the shove threatened his balance. While still reeling from the unfamiliar sensation, Robbie wrapped his arms around him and started pulling him onto the wood chips covering the ground around the playground equipment.

Shane called on his high school and college knowledge of wrestling, but none of his moves seemed to work. He just couldn’t get his coordination to cooperate.

In no time, he found himself on the ground with Robbie on top of him. He flailed wildly, trying to push Robbie away. He felt a little fearful at discovering his weakness.

"Ooff!" Shane grunted when one of Robbie’s elbows accidentally poked against his ribs. "Hey - lemme up!"

Robbie grinned and took time to deliberately read the words on Shane’s T-shirt. "Keep on truckin’. What does that mean?"

"I don’t know," Shane whined, uncomfortable on the ground with Robbie keeping him pinned. He also didn’t really like the look that he saw in Robbie’s eyes as he gazed up at the boy’s face.

Robbie looked like he wasn’t used to winning at wrestling, but he also appeared to like the new sensation.

Robbie had more recent experience of wrestling, but not of having the advantage. He imitated his older brother as he responded to Shane’s childish whining.

"Say ’uncle’ and I’ll let you go."

Somewhere in Shane’s thoughts, he remembered telling almost the exact same thing to his kid brother.

"No way!" He squirmed, and only succeeded in producing another strategy.

Robbie tickled his ribs. The tickling grew in intensity until Shane could not even get out words because of his laughter.

Laughing and screaming at the same time, squirming like a maniac, Shane tried again to push off his adversary.

It was no good.

"Say it and I’ll let you up!" Robbie tickled him some more."

"Please," he begged urgently. "I’m - gonna pee!"

Robbie refused to stop tickling him. "Like a little baby?"

"No," Shane said, feeling a helpless mix of anger and weakness. He tried to concentrate on controlling his bladder.

"C’mon Shane," he said. "Say it. Say UNCLE!"

He felt a squirt of dampness in his borrowed shorts.

"Unnn...cle. OK. UNCLE. Lemme go!"

Robbie giggled, but Shane felt the other boy easing up. The tickling ceased.

Shane danced back and forth from one foot to the other. He tried to remember the layout of the park.

"Oh man, Robbie - I gotta pee for real!" He glanced around for the restroom before he remembered it was located near the duck pond.

"Man, that’s like, a million miles away!" He didn’t waste any more time in conversation, but instead burst into a run - as best he could with his full bladder.

As he ran, he jostled the full bladder so much he felt for sure he would also lose this race.

"Wait up!" Robbie yelled.

"Catch me, slow poke!" Shane yelled over his shoulder.

Robbie, running, too, shouted at Shane as he rapidly pulled away. "I’ll go with you.."

Running at full speed Shane found himself loving the feeling of runing, feeling the grass under his feet. At the same time, he felt very relieved when the huge brick structure came into view. He looked over his shoulder, but Robbie was still a good ways back and he didn’t think he dared wait for him.

He paused for only half a second, reluctant about going into the bathroom in bare feet.

"But I really gotta pee!" Shane muttered. He darted inside and fumbled with his shorts, at least having no underpants in the way.

He found himself standing in front of a metal urinal that seemed positioned far too high on the wall. Last week when he had made use of the facilities, it was definitely lower on the wall.

But then he realized that wasn’t exactly true. The urinal hadn’t changed position at all.

"I just got littler," he said aloud while he tried to stand on the balls of his feet, as if that helped avoid the grimy floor.

It felt good to relieve the pressure. "I thought I was gonna bust," he said aloud.

He was almost finished when Robbie burst into the restroom. "Wow, you run fast, Shane." He hung back over at the sink.

Laughing, Shane agreed. "I know!"

He finished up and walked over, still on the balls of his feet.

"What are you doing?" Robbie asked, taking note of the unusual gait.

"It’s kinda gross in here," Shane explained. "I don’t want my feet to touch the floor."

Robbie just shrugged, not seemingly bothered by the environment.

"I couldn’t find any shoes that fit," Shane offered lamely as he turned on the water and splashed his hands under the flow.

"No underpants either." Robbie laughed.

Shane realized Robbie must have noticed that lack of attire when he had turned around and buttoned up. He blushed. "All the clothes in my house are all big and for grown ups," he explained.

"My brother does that some times," Robbie said. "He calls it...uh ... going commander."

Shane laughed at that phrase.

A grin suddenly formed on Robbie’s face. "I have an idea!"

"What?" Shane asked as he finished and dried his hands on the front of his shorts.

"Come home with me. You can borrow some of my stuff."

The invitation took him by surprise. Shane had been about to ask him about going to the wishing well and fixing this very big problem.

"If I was big again, I could wear my own clothes," he told Robbie.

"But we are having fun!"

Shane found that he couldn’t disagree. Running and sliding and just seeing the world from this wild new perspective was undeniably fun...and surprisingly seductive.

"Yeah, I know, but I’m supposed to be big and stuff," he tried to explain, but he kept losing the strings of his argument. "I gotta go to work on Monday."

Robbie looked as if the arguments were causing him to waver, but then he shrugged as he followed Shane out of the restroom.

With the sun setting overhead, he made an unexpected announcement. "It doesn’t matter. I don’t have any dimes."

"Dimes?" Then, the original wish came back to him. They had spoken their intended wishes and tossed their dimes into the well.

"Oh no!" Shane gasped. "I don’t have any dimes, either."

"So, let’s go to my home," Robbie said. "Hey, you could even spend the night!"

Shane wasn’t listening closely. "I can’t believe I forgot to bring dimes!"

"We can have a sleepover!" Robbie plowed ahead, largely indifferent to Shane’s sudden dismay.

The spark of Robbie’s infectious good spirits ignited somewhere in Shane’s mind. "Cool. I mean...OK. I can go home with you, but tomorrow we gotta get some dimes, come back here and wish this back, OK?

"Well, if you still want to..." Robbie agreed. "But, what if you have so much fun you want to be my friend and stay my size?"

Again, Shane felt dismayed by the oddly seductive appeal of Robbie’s proposal. He struggled against Robbie’s obvious hope.

"But I can’t do that, Robbie," he said. "I gotta get big again, and go back to work and stuff."

"Why?"

That stumped him for a minute. Why shouldn’t he simply enjoy this?

"I don’t have a mom and dad to take care of me like you," he offered.

"Oh, I don’t live with my mom," Robbie said. "It’s just me, my dad and my brother."

"Yeah?"

"My parents don’t like each other, so she moved away," Robbie said. "I still see her some times."

"That’s too bad," Shane said.

"Well, yeah, but she always makes sure she takes me on great trips," he said. "Last Christmas, we went to Disney!"

"Cool!  I went there once - when I was a kid..."

Then, his circumstances crashed down on him. "You know, when I really was a kid."

Robbie laughed. "I like my dad, but he just complains about work all the time."

"I wish we both could go to Disney together now," Robbie said. "That would be so much fun!"

"Yeah, that would be so cool."

Long shadows began stretching from the trees at the edge of the park.

"Well, let’s get home," Shane’s new friend suggested. "Are you hungry?"

Right on cue, Shane’s stomach rumbled.

"I’m starving!"

Robbie took Shane’s hand and they walked out of the park toward the street.

A woman pushing a baby in a stroller passed them. "Oh, aren’t you two so sweet?"

Her drawing attention to them made them both self-conscious and Shane let go of Robbie’s hand. He felt embarrassed and a little sad.

"My house is not far."

Shane’s concentration circled around the thought that maybe growing up isn’t all its cracked up to be. He remained quiet on the walk to his new friend’s house.

He noticed a really cool car in the driveway.

"Nice car!" Shane exclaimed. Then, he stared at the house. "This is where you live?"

"Yeah. Car’s my dad’s. He loves that car."

Shane’s nose smelled something good, but he didn’t recognize it as quickly as Robbie. "Yah! It’s burger night!"

Shane’s mouth starts watering as he followed Robbie into the house, weird to enter sometone else’s place - walking through the big door, seeing everything from my new persepctive.  it all makes him feel that much smaller as he looked around.

Robbie took the lead through the living room, then through the kitchen and out the back door onto the deck. Shane saw a big man at a gas grill.

"Dad, can my friend have dinner with us?" Robbie asked in his most polite tones.

The big man turned, and Shane got a shock. He knew the man!

"Oh crap!" Shane thought. "It’s Steve from my work."

He could not believe he knew Robbie’s dad. He saw the big man almost every day because of Steve’s position as a security guard.

Steve didn’t look happy, but when he turned and looked, his mind must have changed instantly when he saw how the little boy in his son’s company looked pathetic in outdated clothes and no shoes.

"I guess I can grill one more burger," he agreed in a gruff tone.

Shane, his mouth open in awe, stared up at huge Steve.

"He’s so huge!" The man in a boy’s body thought to himself.

 

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