Chapter 58: Siblings and Neighbors

Authors Note:

My thanks to Dr Mark for his help and advice.
Also thanks to TheSwiss for his help and work on the discord.
PM
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I woke the next morning with Marcia snuggled into my side. The twins were snuggled with Melanie, while Jules and Ness were on my other side. The bed was starting to feel a little full.

After our ‘talk’ yesterday afternoon, Marcia had stayed to eat dinner with us and ended up staying the night, although we didn’t get up to anything more than had already happened.

For the first part of the evening, she couldn’t look me in the eye. Every time I looked in her direction, she dropped her gaze. After I’d cleared away the dishes from dinner, and was sitting out on the deck, she came and sat beside me.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“I thought we already dealt with that,” I remarked. She smiled.

“I guess,” she answered, “but I wanted to tell you again. Amanda and I had a long talk. Like you, I was brought up in a house where the rules were very different than they appear to be for people with powers. I judged you against those rules, even though I knew that I’d been lied to.”

“It’s something I can’t criticize,” I said. “I was brought up a norm and am having to really re-evaluate everything I was taught. Sharing was a big problem for me. Not me sharing, although that was an issue at first, but the thought of any of my girls with someone else, especially another man, really tied me up in knots. It’s taken me some time, but I’ve learned what’s important in a relationship and what is not.

“But as an example, and this is not meant as a criticism at all, why did you get upset when you saw me with Melanie?”

“Because you introduced her as your sister,” she said instantly, “and I was brought up to believe that it was wrong.”

“But,” I said, “you were happy enough to take the twins to bed?”

She opened her mouth, and then closed it again.

“So, I’m a hypocrite as well,” she said sighing. “Great!”

I laughed. “Like I said,” I said, “I’m not criticizing. I had exactly the same conversation with myself. When I first realized Melanie was interested, my thought was ‘she’s my sister’. But then I thought about the twins, and Jules and Ness, and realized that her being my sibling wasn’t the most important factor.”

“What was?” asked Marcia.

“Whether I had that kind of love for her,” I said, “and if she did for me.”

Marcia sat and thought about that for a minute.

“So, do you have to love everyone you sleep with?” she asked.

I shook my head, “You know that’s not the case,” I said. “We’ve already talked about sharing. I wouldn’t sleep with someone I had no feelings toward at all or actively didn’t like. But love – no.”

“And what about me?” she asked.

“Are you asking if I love you?” I asked, smiling.

She chuckled. “I guess not,” she said. “But you confused me. You made me feel so ... so wanted, so safe, even when you were dominating me. There was no fear, just the knowledge that I was bound to do as you instructed. And yet I could have stopped at any time, I just didn’t want to.”

“A lot of people don’t understand what it is to be truly submissive,” I said. “In many ways, you are the one in control of the whole relationship. You are placing a huge amount of trust and faith in the person you are submitting to, forcing them to understand your need and how to give you pleasure while controlling you.

“You tried that once with a guy and he let you down badly. Perhaps you should be looking for a submissive male?”

She wrinkled her nose. “I don’t know if it’s my upbringing, or what,” she said, “but my father was a very domineering person and, before you get any ideas, no, we never ‘shared.’ My grandfather was also a very strong personality. I guess that’s where I get it from, but I could never accept a submissive male. I just, I don’t know, wouldn’t respect them. I can and do like submissive girls, in fact Amanda is the first girl strong enough to flip me.”

I smiled at her.

“You know all about sharing now,” I said, “and Mary and Amanda, and I would be happy to share with you again, if you wish. I don’t know about Jules and Ness, you’d have to ask them. Your sharing with Mary and Amanda doesn’t necessarily need to include me.”

Marcia smiled. “I’ve got about another week’s work here,” she said, “then I’ll be moving out of your lives, probably to never meet again, unless you want some more work doing.”

“Well, that depends,” I said. She looked at me, an eyebrow raised.

“On whether you do a good job this time. If not...”

She laughed, punching me gently in the shoulder.

I reminisced about our conversations as I did push-ups on the deck. I could comfortably do seventy to eighty push-ups before having to pause even once, and now wasn’t pushing for more reps, but was making sure my technique was perfect - that I was in perfect alignment, and I was going to the required depth. I figured I could push harder on the test day. I knew that as long as I could get them right, I could do enough to easily pass that portion of the fitness test.

The same thing with sit-ups. I could again comfortably do fifty to fifty-five in the minute, but I was slowing down again now to ensure that my technique was perfect. My hands on my shoulders, my elbows hitting mid-thigh exactly as it showed on the video. Once more I resolved to ask Marcia about fitting a pull-up bar on the deck somewhere.

I did that over breakfast.

“A pull-up bar?” she asked puzzled for a moment, but her eyes cleared when I explained.

“Mounting the bar wouldn’t be too difficult,” she said. “I’ve put up a few in my time. You can buy specific ones on fitness websites, and I’ll fix it to the exterior wall on the deck. It’ll take me an hour at the most. If you order one and can get it delivered this week, then I can do it while I’m here.

“Perfect,” I said. “I’ll take a look today and get one ordered up.” She smiled at me.

“What’s your plan for today?” Melanie asked me.

“I have to go to school,” I said. “I have Ethics, and then a couple of hypnotherapy sessions after lunch. I’ll be back around four.”

Melanie pulled her face.

“What am I going to do?” she asked.

“You could help Marcia,” I said, “or you could do some reading?”

She looked at Marcia. “Do you need help?” she asked.

“I’m going to be laying the floor in the middle bedroom,” said Marcia. “I’ll never turn down an extra pair of hands.”

Melanie grinned. “Okay then,” she said.

We all went our separate ways, and Dana and I arrived at ethics class together.

Our normal professor was back, but he looked terrible. He looked like he’d lost about thirty pounds, his skin and clothes hung from him, he had a sallow complexion, and his eyes were sunken.

I ‘looked’ at him and saw he had stomach cancer. The main tumour was quite large and he had metastases in his lymph nodes.

As we sat down, Dana looked at me. She raised her eyebrows.

“Good morning,” said the professor. “First, allow me to apologise for not being here for the last couple of weeks. I have, as you might have noticed, been unwell. I hope that you know me well enough to know that I’m not someone who adopts platitudes or sugar coats things. I believe that as adults, you should be told the truth about matters and that is the reason that I am back this week.

“I was recently diagnosed with cancer of the stomach. Sadly, it was caught too late for any of the treatments to be effective. I’d had some discomfort but, as one tends to do, I put off going to see my doctor until it was too late. So if there is one lesson I can teach you, something you can take away from my class, is to not do what I did. If you feel there is something wrong, go and get checked.

“My doctors tell me that I have about three months left, and so it is my intention to spend the rest of this week and next catching up with all my current students and preparing them so the next professor will be able to pick up where I left off. I apologise that I will not be able to see you through to graduation as I’d hoped, but sometimes life throws us curveballs and we just have to accept them and do the best we can.”

Dana put her hand up.

“Miss Reid?”

“This may seem like really bad taste,” she said “but I just had a question from an earlier debate we had. I thought given your current situation, you’d be uniquely placed to answer the question we posed back then, or rather something I thought about afterward.”

“Go ahead,” he said looking intrigued.

“We were talking about the ethics of being a superhero,” she said. “After the lesson Caleb and I were discussing it further and he gave me a scenario which I answered, but from my perspective at that time. I wondered if, given your circumstances now, you support his argument rather than mine.”

There was a murmur around the class. I could feel tension building. People were unhappy with this line of questioning, but the professor was actually smiling.

“Wait,” he said, quieting the class. “Might I come back to that in a second Dana?” That was the first time I’d ever heard him use anyone’s first name in the group setting.

“Most of you won’t understand why I’m so happy right now,” he said. “All my life I’ve been a teacher. It’s what I love to do. To nurture and mold young minds to make them think, make them reason, and give them the tools necessary to go and find the answers for themselves. Today, I came to class to say goodbye. I never dreamed that I’d have the opportunity once more to answer a question, to use my condition to teach, for perhaps the last time. So please don’t be uncomfortable with the discussion or hold Miss Reid’s question, whatever it is, against her. Just know that I’m grateful to her for one last opportunity to do what it is that I’ve loved to do my entire life.”

He looked at Dana, whose eyes were wet with tears, but she soldiered on.

“Caleb gave the scenario – that someone had the power to heal but they couldn’t reveal that power as they had to keep their identity secret. He asked ‘would it be right for that person to heal someone, without their consent, to maintain their own anonymity? Or would that be an abuse of power?’ So, I guess my question, Professor, is if there were someone who had the power to heal you, now, would you want them to, even without asking for your consent?”

“You realize,” he responded, “that I can only answer for myself. I can’t tell you how someone else, even someone in exactly the same position, would respond to that question. But, for myself, I would have to say ‘yes, I would want to be healed’, even if they couldn’t ask for my consent. I would consider it a gift rather than a violation of my rights.”

I went to work.

“Does that answer your question?” he said smiling at her.

She nodded, unable to speak.

It took almost everything I had but, by the end of the lesson, the professor was completely cancer free. It would take a couple of days for him to feel the effect.

Dana slipped her arm around my waist as we left the class, helping to steady me.

“Let’s go eat,” she said. It wasn’t lunchtime yet, but the cafeteria was open all day and not just set times.

She watched me as I waded through the mound of food I’d loaded onto my tray.

“Is that enough?” she asked. “I could get you some more.”

I looked at her.

“I think I’ll be fine with this,” I said. “Did you think I wasn’t going to help him?”

She shrugged. “I didn’t know,” she said. “But I figured that since we had the opportunity to get his consent then...”

“And don’t you think it will arouse his suspicions when he suddenly is in remission after that question?”

“Maybe,” she said, “but it will be directed at me, not you.”

I shook my head, “You are a wonderful person,” I said. “Did you know that? I can see why Gracie loves you.”

She blushed. “I didn’t do anything,” she said. “It’s you that...”

“Yes,” I said. “You did. Thank you.”

“Could you help him?” she asked. I knew she’d been putting off that question.

I nodded. “You think I’m this hungry for no reason?” I grinned at her. “He’ll start to feel it maybe Friday. By Monday he’ll feel loads better and by next lesson, he’ll be back to his normal self.”

She smiled at me. “Thank you,” she said.

“Why are you thanking me?” I asked.

“Because someone should,” she said, “and it’s unlikely anyone else will.”

After a very long lunch I went to my hypnotherapy appointments, both of which were repeat sessions. This basically meant I had nothing to do since I was up to date with my other schoolwork. Neither of my clients had anything interesting I could learn from them. I was flicking through my emails when I noticed one from Dianna. It was the contact details for my two other siblings.

For a while I stared at the email wondering what to do. I spent a lot of time in the second session composing the e-mail that I finally sent, individually, to both of them.

I read it though several times, wanted to change it, scrap it, start again, or not send it. In the end, I sent it out, mentally crossing my fingers for a positive reaction.

For the rest of the session, I kept checking my phone to see if either had responded. It was dumb. They were both at school so probably wouldn’t check their personal emails until later tonight, but I still kept checking.

After I’d finished with my hypnotherapy clients, I headed home and found Melanie and Marcia hard at work laying the last of the floor. It looked good. I was almost wishing that we’d put new flooring in all three of the rooms, but I knew that there was really no need the other floors were fine. As was my habit I made coffee and took it in to them. They were both glad for the break but Melanie looked bone tired.

“You should stop,” I said.

“I told her that an hour ago,” said Marica. “But she’s too stubborn. She wants to get finished.”

“We’re nearly done,” Melanie said. “Only another two or three pieces and then it’s finished.”

Marcia looked at me and I shrugged.

“I’ve given up arguing with the women in my life,” I said. She grinned.

“Good choice,” she said.

In the end it took them less than twenty minutes to put the final pieces down and the floor was finished. Melanie was so tired she could barely stand. Marcia stood, but stiffly; her back seemed to be aching. She stretched it out.

“Come on,” I said to them. “I have just the thing for the pair of you.”

Marcia looked at me quizzically. I handed her a robe. “Go shower, then put that on.” She raised an eyebrow, but took the robe, and went to the main bathroom.

“Come on you,” I said, leading a weary Melanie into the ensuite in our room. I gently undressed her, and took her into the shower. I washed her hair and cleaned her of all the dust and dirt from working on the floor. Then I helped her into a robe and redressed having stripped to go into the shower with her.

When we came out of the bedroom, Marcia was in sitting in the kitchen wearing the robe.

I led them both out to the deck and pointed at the hot tub.

“In there,” I said, “both of you. Give it an hour and you’ll feel like new women.”

Marcia’s eyes lit up and she dropped the robe, paying no heed to her nakedness. We were way past that. She climbed into the hot tub and sighed in bliss as she settled into the warm water.

I helped Melanie into the tub and got her seated to one side. Once she was settled, I turned on the jets and they both sighed, the warm water and bubbles massaged their bodies and took away their aches and pains.

The girls arrived home about twenty minutes later and wasted no time joining them in the hot tub. Dana too jumped in. All the girls, including Marcia, knew that Dana was trans and simply accepted her for who she was. I caught a glimpse of her as she undressed.

Her breasts were progressing nicely, she was almost a full B cup now, and I thought that they looked good on her. I didn’t think she should go any bigger, but I’d ask her in a week or so how she felt about it. It was her body after all – if she wanted to go all the way to HH, I’d facilitate it for her. It was about what she wanted not about what I, or anyone else, wanted for her.

Dana caught me looking at her, and she stood straighter placing her hands on her hips, on display.

“Well?” she asked.

“You really are beautiful,” I said. “Gracie is such a lucky woman,”

“And don’t I know it,” said Gracie from behind me. I hadn’t heard her come in.

She came up and stood alongside me, admiring her girlfriend, who was stiffening under the attention.

“Why don’t you join them in the tub,” I said to Gracie. “I’ll make dinner.”

Gracie wasted no time, stripping right then and there on the deck, leaving her clothes on a chair and jumping in the tub.

Josh and Louise arrived home and, despite Josh’s objections that it was ‘girl time’, both were persuaded to join them too.

I gave them a ten-minute warning of dinner being ready and they all got out looking relaxed and refreshed.

They sat around the table in various robes and forms of undress. Louise, unsurprisingly, was naked and yet nobody turned a hair. In fact, the only one fully dressed at the table was me and I felt out of place.

After dinner, Marcia dressed and went home. She was invited to stay over once more but she graciously declined and, to be fair, I wasn’t overly disappointed. I liked Marcia well enough but was happier to limit our bed to just us for tonight.

I checked my phone several times throughout the evening and still saw that there were no replies. I was starting to think that I wouldn’t get any and that they wanted nothing to do with a freshly discovered half-brother and a long-lost half-sister. I was saddened by that because I would have liked to have met them at least, but that was their choice.

I was getting ready for bed, when I remembered that I hadn’t tormented our neighbour at all that day and so, after taking a look out of the window and once more disabling his video camera which was sitting blinking on his window ledge, I pulled all the valves out of his tires. I decided to up the ante by removing the drain plug on his oil pan. I left the plug on the window ledge under where his camera was pointing.

I was making breakfast the next morning, when there was a knock on the front door. I opened it to find a man and a woman, both wearing dark suits, standing on the doorstep.

“Hello?” I said.

“Good morning,” said the man. “I’m Donald Raffertey from the City Housing department. We’ve had a report about an illegal hostel being run from this property.”

“From Mr. Tom Pritchard,” I said, “I presume.”

“We’re not at liberty to disclose that” he said, but his mind screamed out the name. “May we come inside?”

“No,” I said, “you may not.”

“We need to...”

“You need to get off my property,” I said, “or come back with a warrant. As of now you are trespassing and if you do not leave you will be arrested.”

Both of their eyes widened.

“We are not...”

“Gracie?” I shouted through the door. She came and joined me.

“I’ve asked these two people to leave the property and they are refusing to leave.”

“Ma’am,” said the woman, “we’re from the Department of Housing.”

“And do you have a warrant?” asked Gracie.

“No, but we’ve had a report,” said Rafferty.

“And have you been asked to leave the property?” asked Gracie.

“Ma’am you don’t...” started the woman.

Gracie pulled out her own credentials. “Special Agent Gracie Jordan, FBI” she said. “Unless you have a warrant, you have been asked to leave the property. If you fail to do so, I will place you under arrest for trespass. Am I clear?”

“But...” said the male housing agent.

Gracie reached behind her and pulled out her cuffs.

They backed off the property.

“We’ll be seeking a warrant,” the man said. “We’ll be back.”

They got into their car.

“They will apply for a warrant,” said Gracie. I grinned at her.

“I know.” I said pulling out my wallet. “Let’s see if Judge Roder remembers the favour she owes me.”

Rather than call the judge directly, I decided to be a little more circumspect. I called Melissa Wragge.

“Melissa,” I said when she answered the call. “I wonder if I might beg a favor?”

“After what you did for my father,” she said. “I owe you, anything up to, and possibly including, bearing your first child.”

I laughed. “I’ll keep that in mind,” I said. “I was hoping you might have a quiet word with Judge Roder for me.” I explained the situation, from start to finish about the HOA, the blackmail, and his several and various reports to agencies trying to cause trouble. “And now he’s got the housing department claiming we’re running an illegal hostel, and about to get a warrant to force entry to our property.”

“Leave it with me,” she said. “Are you around this morning?”

“I am,” I said, “Why?”

“Well, the circuit judge that issues the warrants may be amenable to hearing your side of things when they call for the warrant – if you are around?”

“That sounds perfect,” I said.

I was just clearing the breakfast things away when my phone rang. Melissa.

“Hi, Caleb.” she said. “There’s a hearing set for 10am this morning. If you want to quash that warrant, you need to be there. Bring what evidence you can.”

Jules missed her first class while downloading various clips from the security system onto my laptop. She wasn’t too concerned about it, but she wouldn’t want to do it too often.

Melanie came with me to the courthouse.

I went to the main reception and from there was directed to wait outside one of the courts.

Just after ten, we were called into the court. There was a judge, a stenographer, a clerk, and the two people form the housing office.

They looked surprised to see us there.

“Your Honor,” said one of the housing office agents, “We are asking for a warrant to enter the premises as listed. We had a report of an illegal hostel, and when we attended the property this morning we were denied entry.”

“And I presume you, Mr...” the judge looked at his papers. “Stott. Are the owner of said property?”

“I am your Honor,” I said, “and I strenuously object to the invasion of privacy based on what has been a prolonged and targeted campaign of harassment by our neighbor, the latest evidence of which is this report of an illegal hostel.”

“Harassment?” he said.

“Yes, your Honor,” I said. “I can demonstrate several incidents and I have footage from my home security system as evidence.”

“First,” the judge said, “was this report made by the neighbor in question?”

“We’re not permitted to divulge...”

“Without a court order,” interrupted the judge. “So ordered.”

“The report was made by a Mr. Pritchard,” the female housing officer said. “I believe he lives across the street and so would be ideally placed to notice such an illegal hostel being run.”

The judge looked at me. I smiled.

I then told my story. I showed clips of my refusing to join the HOA, the attempt by Tom Pritchard to blackmail me, and the quashing of the HOA by Judge Roder. I also showed his placing illegal no parking signs up on our street at 2am, various visits from the police where our conversations had been recorded, his reporting us to the Department of Housing for working without permits, and even accusing me of vandalizing his car. The judge received the whole story.

I finished by looking across at the housing agents.

“I apologize to you,” I said, “for my actions this morning. I am just so sick of being harassed by this man that I’d had enough. As you saw from the footage, I co-operated fully with every other agency each time they came, but this was the final straw.”

“Who lives in your house Mr Stott?” asked the judge.

“The house,” I said, “is a six bed, five and a half bath, house. We are students. I live there along with my fiancée and her sister, my sister, another pair of sisters, and another two couples who are co-habiting. In total, ten people, all of whom are students studying at PSU with the exception of Gracie Jordan who is an agent with the FBI. She lives there with her girlfriend; they are one of the other couples I mentioned. Oh, my sister isn’t a student. We recently found her after she was snatched as a baby from the hospital. She’s staying with us too.

“That doesn’t sound like overcrowding to me,” said the judge to the housing officers. “It’s not unusual for students to share housing. And it sounds to me like there are more than enough bedrooms to cope with the number of occupants.

He looked at the housing officers.

“I’m also very concerned about this campaign of harassment,” said the judge, “to which you appear to be pandering. Therefore, I’m rejecting your application for a warrant.” He banged his gavel.

“Also,” he added, “might I ask why you haven’t sought a restraining order against Mr. Pritchard?”

“I honestly didn’t see the point, your Honor,” I said. “I figured that he’d just start reporting anonymously so it wouldn’t really make any difference. I was, we were, just trying to live our lives quietly. We get on well with our other neighbours in as much as we interact with them at all. He is the only one who has a problem with us. I am certain that it is all because of his attempts to force us to join his illegal HOA and its subsequent disbanding which, I’ll admit, I did have a hand in.

“You know Judge Roder?” he asked.

“Yes, your Honor,” I replied. “I am a consultant with the FBI and have had occasion to do some work with her in the past.”

He nodded.

“I’m drafting out an interim restraining order,” he said. “Any further occasions of harassment, or reports to agencies, will result in charges being brought. He is also to stay one hundred feet from your house. I have no doubt that he will appeal it, but if you can leave me copies of your evidence, when he does, he will have a lot of explaining to do before it is rescinded.”

“Thank you, your Honor,” I said.

“There will be a service fee for the court to serve the documents to him,” he said. I grinned.

“That’s no problem,” I said.

He banged his gavel again. “The clerk will take you to pay the service charge.”

The clerk stood and showed us out.

As we made it outside, I once again went to the housing officers.

“I am sorry,” I said again. “Like I said, it was just a culmination of a prolonged campaign of harassment.”

The woman actually smiled at me. “Thank you,” she said. “We are doing what we can to make sure people are safe and illegal hostels can be death traps. I understand your frustration though and, after seeing what that guy has been doing to you, I can see why you got mad. I think I would have too.

“I’m going to put a note on our system that if we get any calls, named or anonymous, about your address, we will treat them as malicious calls. We can’t legally completely ignore them, but we’ll treat them with a much higher degree of scepticism.”

“Thanks,” I said. “Maybe next time drop by for coffee?”

They both smiled at that.

The clerk who had been waiting patiently took us to a payment counter where I handed over my card and paid the service fee for the restraining order. I wondered what would happen when he received it. I had some idea though.

“This will be served sometime tomorrow,” said the payment clerk.

“Thank you,” I said.

I left with a copy of the restraining order, grinning like a maniac.

When I got home. Tom Pritchard was standing on my porch with a couple of police officers.

“There he is,” he yelled at the police. “Arrest him!!”

I sighed and opened my front door. Melanie went inside. I invited the officers in.

“Mr. Pritchard,” I said, “please get off my property. You are trespassing. Now please leave.”

“I’m going nowhere until...”

I closed the door in his face.

“How can I help?” I asked the officers.

“Mr. Pritchard says you vandalized his car,” one said. “He says that you pulled out all his tire valves, for what is now the sixth time, and then removed his oil drain plug causing all of his engine oil to drain out onto his driveway.”