Chapter 63: Is It Better To Be Lucky or Good?

Tim Murphy and the nanites in his body had already written the two reports – one for his English class and the other for his US History class. It was just a matter of typing and formatting the report in the proper sets. All in all, the two assignments only took a few minutes to type, save, and email to their respective teachers.

When he sent his English paper, he had a flash of remembrance of his short relationship with his English teacher, Julianne Holmes, considered one of the hot teachers at Roosevelt High School. The thrill of meeting up with his teacher and stealthily visiting her apartment; the unknown mysteries of décor and subtle touches of personality throughout her apartment; the sight of her voluptuous body.

Dressing down and using little to no makeup was the number one defense against the always-hunting, predatory prowl of a sexually frustrated teenage boy. Julianne always made it a point to hide her sexuality from the student body, but she knew that many a teenage boy and quite a few older male members of the faculty and staff would fantasize about her. That thought always gave her a small, unmentionable thrill.

Tim admitted to himself the idea of continuing the relationship certainly had its positives. Tim’s teenaged male fantasies focused on her chest’s two more prominent attributes, fueling many a masturbatory fantasy ever since. Of course, with his perfect recollection of his life, the so-called ‘spank bank’ would always be filled and ready for a withdrawal whenever deemed necessary. Luckily, Tim’s larger head regained control, and he understood a forbidden relationship with his teacher was far too dangerous for them both. Remembering is what he would need to do.

Laying in bed, Tim flirted with the idea that maybe he could convince Julianne to move when he goes to college, and perhaps they could get an apartment together. He quickly shook those thoughts out of his head, though, and stared at his room ceiling. Tim knew it was best to leave those thoughts alone and find a girl around his age. Then he silently fell asleep.

What seemed like a few moments after falling asleep, noises from outside woke him. In his periphery, Tim heard what sounded like a significant movement just outside his window. Moments later, bits and pieces of conversations between several women and what sounded like someone moving something heavy got Tim’s focus. He looked to the LED on the cable box just below his TV, and the time was just after nine in the morning.

Tim promptly got ahold of his surroundings and remembered sitting up late last night looking at the college brochures and athletic department overviews from all over the country. He had giggled when he realized he had information from every football team in the top fifty football programs from across the country. The Ivy Leagues supplied much information on their smaller schools and the importance of an Ivy League education for the rest of your life. He piled those off to the side since the idea of an Ivy League-level education was appealing.

Not only were the large football powerhouses sending information and “personalized” letters from the head coaches of each school, pretty much each letter was a coach cheering Tim’s play so far this first season. Most schools made it known they were not able to offer scholarships to him as of yet. Still, they did want to know if he was serious about improving as a defensive lineman, so they could get him enrolled in one of their many personalized football camps during the upcoming spring and summer.

Each camp would offer him the opportunity to face up against the other great athletes across the country. Each school tried to point out their football camps were the best for him to enroll, and if he were interested in signing up for those, they would be happy to send him the information. Maybe they could even get him a waiver for any fees to enroll in the camps. It was a mini-thrill for Tim to see how many different ways each school and their corresponding football camp invites not only promoted themselves above their competition but how they showed the inadequacies of all the other camps.

The different schools made him aware of their camps and their affiliation with various athletic apparel companies. Most of the more prominent companies and successful football schools partnered together and hosted traveling football camps across the country. The University of Michigan athletic department highlighted their recent football camps in Europe. Why have football camps in countries that don’t play the game? It was basically an opportunity to do something the other schools wouldn’t do, which is why Michigan is the place for you. Don’t forget! They use Nike equipment, so your wardrobe will be featuring their ever-popular swoosh logo plastered on pretty much everything you wear. The logo is also seen on every wall you pass.

“These schools definitely spent some money on all these handwriting fonts to make them look authentic,” Tim remembered saying aloud last night to no one else in the room, “but some of these actually got someone to sign the bottoms -- either the coaches or the coaching assistants. It’s a nice touch.” He proved it to himself by wetting his finger then smudging the ink from the bottom signature. You couldn’t know if the signee was the named person or someone else signed at the bottom of the page.

“Watch out with that one! Try not to let it touch the walls. It might scuff the paint or leave a mark,” an annoyed woman’s voice complained loudly just outside the window.

Tim stood by his window and opened the blinds by twisting the wand slightly. He saw two hulking movers carrying a massive bed headboard into the backyard of the next-door home. Behind the two movers and the heavy headboard was a beautiful blond in stylish, painted-on blue jeans and a gray t-shirt blazoned with the UCLA logo across her ample chest. Luckily, she didn’t notice his gawking at her through the window, and he quickly twisted the wand again to close the blinds. Then he sat back down on the bed and readied to go back to bed. Saturdays were the one day of the week he liked staying in bed as long as possible. It was a tried-and-proper high school rite of passage.

Tim had just pulled the covers back up to his head when he heard a knock on his door. “Tim, wake up, son!” Tim’s father, Raymond, announced after knocking on Tim’s bedroom door. Being so close to going back to sleep, Tim got a little aggravated, but he knew if he didn’t answer ... well, Tim understood he needed to answer.

“Sure thing, dad. Just a minute.”

“Come on out front when you can. I need a hand with the lawnmower.” Raymond felt that a running gag was just as hilarious as the first time he ever said it. The help Tim’s father needed was for Tim to use the lawnmower while Raymond supervised his son. Tim had decided years earlier to accept his fate and complete whatever house jobs his dad deemed necessary.

Back when he was out of shape, the idea of physical labor chores around the house was like eating vegetables as a kid – you avoided it as much as possible. After his transformation, his inner attitude also changed. He no longer minded doing the work since his body craved movement and action rather than hours-on-hours of monotonous television-watching or sleep. With that thought, Tim realized he didn’t even watch as much TV as he used to watch, and he didn’t miss it. The time watching TV was changed to doing things on the computer.

He dressed in his favorite weekend uniform – some below-the-knee basketball shorts, socks with his older tennis shoes, and an older t-shirt.

He still found it funny that his shoe size never changed, even after all the nanites’ changes to his body,. Previously, instead of wearing shoes sized for his feet, Tim bought larger-sized shoes rather than wider ones. Now his feet fit perfectly in the size shoes he had always worn.

Tim was sliding on a red t-shirt with “Mad Rider” in white across the chest. The “Mad Rider” was a special award given by coaches to a player who either excelled in a game, excelled during the week of practices, or bested his top numbers while lifting weights. Tim had several of the shirts and had also gifted a couple to his family.

A quick stomach grumble reminded Tim that he had not eaten breakfast, so he made a quick dash to the kitchen and found his mother had set aside some chorizo and eggs – Mexican seasoned pork sausage and eggs in a small bowl. He placed the bowl in the microwave, covered it with a napkin to protect against splatter, and turned it on for a minute. He then grabbed a couple of homemade tortillas from the stack his mother had made for breakfast that morning. He reheated the tortillas over the gas flame of the stove. When the microwave finished, Tim had just finished reheating the third tortilla, so he opened the microwave and poured the hot chorizo and egg filling onto a plate. Finally, with a spoon, he filled three tortillas and folded them over for easy handling.

“Oh good, I was going to see if you were up yet. Your father has been yelling for you,” Juanita, Tim’s mother, said when entering the kitchen. She noticed Tim eating his quick combo breakfast/lunch over the kitchen sink. “Good, you found the leftovers I left for you. You weren’t up too late looking at all that college stuff, were you?” Tim shook his head no while his mouth was full. “Do you know already where you’re going to go to college?”

From the happy tone of her voice, Tim knew from experience that she was kidding with him. “Nah, not yet. I mean, I need to visit them all to see if I want to spend a couple of years there, ya know. All that stuff was just really basic information. Majority of that stuff was searchable on their websites. They probably spend millions in printing and mail costs for stuff on the web already, but they do get a chance to show you what you will look like in their uniforms and whatnot,” Tim answered between bites of his tacos.

“What are you talking about?” she asked.

Tim smiled and finished the final bite of his first taco. He pointed to his mother to let her know to wait a moment. Then he returned to his bedroom where, on his desk, he had some of the materials for a few different colleges. Each college had a graphic designer put his face on a picture of a player dressed in the home uniforms of the school. He brought the short stack back to the kitchen and showed them to his mother. While she looked through the many different informational pamphlets, Tim continued with his tacos. There was now a glass of orange juice set beside his bowl.

“Wow, these are great! It’s like you actually posed for these pictures and everything.” Tim agreed and continued with his breakfast while his mother continued flipping through pages. “Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you last night. We met the new next-door neighbors last night. You might have heard them this morning. They’ve got movers busy all over the place.”

“Are they good people? Are we going to like them?”

“Well, I only met Mr. and Mrs. Matthews. They seemed fine to me for the few minutes we talked when they took down the Realtor sign out front before we left for the game last night, but the kids showed up with a couple of moving trucks this morning and been going steady for a couple hours now.”

“Yeah, I think I saw the mom this morning through my window. Good-looking bottle blonde in way-too-tight blue jeans.”

“Yeah, that’s her,” his mom answered with a smirk as she cleaned the small bowl Tim used to reheat his taco fillings.

“Well then, with all that going on, why in the world does dad want to mow the lawn today? It wasn’t even that tall. It could’ve waited until next week at the earliest.”

On cue, Raymond stepped into the kitchen, stood behind his wife, and gave her a small kiss on the cheek. He then looked into the empty dining room and through to the living room. Carmen, Tim’s little sister, was there laughing along with some children’s show on the TV. “What? Is the big football hero too tired after having to try a little bit harder during a game?”

“Ha. Ha. Very funny, dad” Tim smiled and finished his final bites of taco. “Seriously, I didn’t even notice if the lawn was getting too high since we cut it a couple of weeks ago,” Tim smirked.

The same Cheshire grin he had seen in the mirror so often stared back at him, “You, my dear boy, are such a very lucky young man.” Raymond answered. Tim was a bit confused and stood motionless for a moment. “You better hurry up so we can finish up the front yard, and maybe we can even get started with the back.”

Tim groaned to himself, ready to enjoy the fruits of being a high school football star and begin his reward of setting new records for grass height in the neighborhood. He went back to his room, grabbed his phone and ear pods, put in the pods, and dialed up some music for the yard work coming up.

Once out front, Tim saw his father talking to a rather ordinary-looking guy in a t-shirt and blue jeans. “Oh, here he is now. Martin, this is my son, Timothy.” The two shook hands.

“Wow, he certainly is a sight,” Mr. Matthews used his open hand to cover the two hands shaking and doubled up the shaking, almost to the point of becoming a little uncomfortable. “Good grief, son, you must have colleges coming out of the woodwork for you to play some football for them.” Mr. Matthews let go of Tim’s hand and leaned in a little. “You are playing football, right?”

“Oh yeah. I play at Roosevelt, and we just had a game last night.”

“Y’all won, right?”

“Oh, most definitely,” Tim answered while fidgeting with his ear pods.

“Well then, what the hell are you doing mowing the lawn? Geez, win a big game, and your reward is to mow the lawn! ‘Awww, come on, dad!’” Mr. Matthews mimicked a complaining teenager. Mr. Matthews had a laid-back and friendly demeanor about him, and it was effortless to like him almost immediately.

Tim just pointed to his dad and said, “Ask him why we are doing it today.”

Raymond was laughing right along with the other men. Raymond mimicked surveying his estate and decided, “Well, I guess you’re right. It can wait another week or so, but you know this stuff,” he said, pointing to his well-manicured lawn, “it grows like it’s on steroids or something.”

Raymond passed the lawnmower over to his son, “Go ahead and take it back to the garage. We’ll tackle this stuff next weekend. I didn’t really want to do it either.”

After a pat on the back, Tim maneuvered the lawnmower back to the garage with a practiced hand, thinking he had just escaped having to do hard work on his laid-back Saturday.

When Tim returned to the front lawn, the two men he had left were no longer alone. One of the moving men, the older of the three men, studiously removed box after box from the two different moving vans and took them into the new home. “Sir, how do I say this politely?” the man complained. “Your daughters are driving me and my guys up the wall, and I think you need to reign them in a little bit, or my guys are gonna up and leave.”

“Oh geez, what’s going on?”

“Well, sir, we understand a move it a little to the left, no a little to the right but usually once or maybe twice, and it is set down. Your girls are generally contradicting themselves with every single box we bring in the house. In reality, we should have been done getting everything into your house by now, but we still got a couple of hours to go because they can’t seem to agree on where your stuff goes. Can you help us out, sir, please?”

Mr. Matthews had a deep, resonating belly laugh that sounded like it should have come from a much bigger belly. You could see it was a problem he was used to dealing with often. He said his goodbyes, and with a pat on the moving truck driver’s shoulder, the two returned to the organized chaos of moving into a new house.

Raymond could not help himself; he loved volunteering for his son to help. “Well, Martin, could you use another hand? Since Tim isn’t gonna be doing the lawn, he’s got nothing but time on his hands. He probably can’t reign in your girls, but he can certainly lift anything you need lifting. Besides, we’re neighbors.” Raymond beamed with pride at his idea and patted his son on the shoulder with just enough force to move him towards the two men.

“If you’re serious, I’ll take you up on that,” Mr. Matthews gushed. “I’ll introduce you to my better half and the three banes of my existence.”

To Tim’s credit, he didn’t even flinch when he was volunteered. Tim quickly jogged up to the two as they entered through the open garage door. The door was available because the garage nearly overflowed with boxes already removed from the two moving vans. There were boxes-upon-boxes piled high atop each other, but a small, thin path cut between them.

“Wait here, lemme find ‘em.”

“Kid, you are either the luckiest high school kid in the world or the unluckiest,” the truck driver said with a smile.

“Whattaya mean?”

However, before the driver could answer, Mr. Matthews and the bottle blonde Tim had seen earlier through the window came out to the garage from the house. She was now wearing an apron and had tied a handkerchief over her hair.

“Oh, Mr. Dennings, there you are. I’m sorry about the girls, but we’ll get them under wraps at some point in the future, I hope,” she apologized to the truck driver with a sincere smile.

“No problem, ma’am, we all understand. We each have girls of our own, but there is a limit.”

“Oh, absolutely, I could not agree more,” she affirmed and then turned her attention to Tim. “And who is this handsome gentleman?”

“This is our next-door neighbor, Tim Murphy. I’m guessing we woke him up with all our shenanigans this morning. He plays football at Roosevelt,” Mr. Matthews gave as an introduction, “and I’m ashamed to admit, I didn’t get what year you’re in there, son.”

“No problem. I’m a freshman.”

“Oh, snap! You’re that Mayhem my boys have been talking about. I got a couple of kids going to Taft, and they play football. They are constantly talking about you and how well you are doing in football. I swear, if they had to play against you and your teammates, they’d drop deuces in their drawers in fright,” the delivery driver, Mr. Dennings, exclaimed. “Can I get a quick picture, and I’ll send it to the guys. They’ll flip out!” Tim agreed, and Mr. Matthews was giggling over to the side.

“Do you get that often, Tim?” Mr. Matthews asked. Tim just smiled and shook his head no.

“Oh well, good heavens. This perfect neighborhood just keeps getting better and better. Tim, it is a pleasure to meet you.” The sincerity in Mrs. Matthews’ voice was perfectly disarming. “I’ll just have to introduce you to the girls before they freak out at the young stud moving boxes into their new house. I assume you’ve come to give us a hand.”

“Definitely. How can I help?”

“I’ve got an idea for that,” Mr. Matthews offered while Mrs. Matthews went back through the small path of cardboard boxes into the house and yelled for the girls to come outside.

There was a combination of responses. One yelled, asking if they had to because they were putting away their clothes. Another announced she was on the phone and would be right out. A third voice told them she would be right there.

“Mr. Dennings and your guys can concentrate on getting the stuff off the trucks and bringing them into the garage or at least underneath this carport until we get to the bigger stuff. Me and Tim here will move the stuff into the different rooms, letting everyone else fix their rooms how they want it. Then, all of us will move the bigger stuff where it needs to go. Sound good?” The movers and Tim all nodded their heads, agreeing to the new plan of attack.

“Okay, Tim, let’s get these boxes into the girls’ rooms so they can figure out their rooms however they like and to keep them outta our hair for as long as possible,” Mr. Matthews explained.

The majority of these boxes were much heavier than they appeared. Tim had picked up a large box marked kitchen and perched the large container on his shoulder so he could open the door without any help. Mrs. Matthews saw the box he was carrying and immediately worried, “Tim, just a second, let me get you some help. It took two of those guys to move that box off the truck and into the garage.”

“Oh, that’s okay, can you just point me to where you want it so I can put it down? It’s heavy, but I’ve got it.” Once placed on the kitchen counter, Tim could read “kitchen” on the side closest to him, and the other side had “China” decorated in red and “Fragile” just below in large printing. Tim realized why she was so nervous about him picking up the box.

Mrs. Matthews began emptying the box of heavy and expensive-looking china. She was expeditiously arranging their placement in a massive china cabinet positioned in the back of the kitchen but marking the entrance into the dining room. Tim felt it would have looked better as a significant eye-catcher in the dining room itself but didn’t say anything. He did see the ornate and well-built dining table had a much larger space without the china cabinet nearby. Before he could go back to the garage, the first of whom he assumed was one of the Matthews girls made their appearance.

Another bottle blonde like her mother, she bounced into the kitchen wearing painted-on blue jeans and a see-thru t-shirt covering a Texas flag bikini top underneath. She also stopped between breaths and took a moment before realizing everyone else in the room was looking at her.

“Sorry, mom, I was putting away some of my personal stuff,” she then noticed her mother was not alone. “Oh, who is this?” The look she gave Tim made him think of a lion hunting on the prairie, and she had just cornered her prey away from the safety of the pack.

“This is Tim. He lives next door,” Mrs. Matthews said while putting away a gravy boat. “Tim, this is Marcia. She is the youngest of the three girls, born a full eight minutes after the middle child and fifteen after the oldest.” Mrs. Matthews pronounced it “Mar-Cee-Yah.”