Chapter 300: I Get a Girlfriend

Monday, May 1, 2006

Monday mid-afternoon saw me walking along the long, flat Corvallis-Lebanon Highway, toward Corvallis, on the side of the road that Julia, Carol and Donna rode their bikes on to get home from school. Julia had gotten her license six and a half months ago so had been legally allowed to drive Carol and Donna to school for the last two weeks. Before I'd been taken by the DHS, I'd learned why Julia had not been as eager to get her license as other 16-year olds, and why I'd had to push her to get it: she had poor time-and-distance judgment, which made her scared of driving. I wasn't surprised to see them biking today, since the bike ride to school was very easy and the weather was nice. I expected them to ride every day that it wasn't raining. That was convenient for me, but I could easily have adapted my plan to Julia's car if I'd needed to.

Seeing them come toward me, and while they were still a couple of hundred yards away, I first memorized my planned footsteps for the next several yards, to make sure I wasn't in danger of walking into traffic. To look natural, I kept walking while I had my eyes shut so I could use a sight blob to see the back wheel of Carol's bike (I WISH I could leave my eyes open when I used sight blobs! Hopefully one day soon). I lightly squeezed the rim of her wheel between two opposing fingertips, braking it in the same way as bike brakes work. Carol's bike started slowing down, so she pushed her pedals a little harder. I applied more braking, making Carol try even harder.

Carol had to call to Julia to stop, while Carol got off her bike to check what the problem was, giving me a chance to open my eyes and walk normally, something I was very thankful to do as walking alongside a busy highway with your eyes shut is scary, even when you can proximity sense people 24 feet away.

Donna isn't the sort of girl to worry about what's behind her, so she passed me unaware that the other two girls had stopped. That made things a little easier for me, but wasn't essential to my plan.

I continued to walk toward "My Girls" - who weren't aware of that designation yet - while Carol tried to see what the problem was. She'd felt that it was the rear wheel, something that she confirmed when she lifted that end of the bike off the ground and tried to spin the wheel (I was invisibly NP-braking it again). Carol was puzzled why the wheel wasn't revolving freely. Playing with the brakes didn't help, and neither did remounting and trying to ride again. Julia couldn't see anything wrong either.

By the time I was getting close both girls were frustrated by their inability to identify the problem. I called ahead, "Are you having trouble with your brakes? I'm a mechanic, so maybe I can help?"

I was dressed quite nicely and doing my best to seem like a nice, trustworthy, young man. Julia hesitated, but Carol wanted the damned bike fixed so she immediately answered, "Yes please. The rear wheel won't spin, but the brakes are open so I don't understand."

I stood non-threateningly on the other side of the bike from the girls and said, "Let me have a look."

I picked up the rear end, tried to spin the wheel, and it didn't move. "Hmm, you're right." I bent down to look at the brakes, poking them with my hand, saying, "They're open. There doesn't appear to be any mechanical reason for your problem."

"Exactly!" agreed Carol. "It's very strange."

"I'll hold the rear end up while you ring the bell please."

"Huh? Why?"

"I have a theory. Just try it, and we'll quickly see if I'm right."

They were both giving me funny looks, but Carol reached forward and rang the bell. I spun the rear wheel, and it spun very nicely.

Carol exclaimed, "How did you do that?"

"It was destiny."

"Huh?"

"I realize that sounds strange. Before I explain, first let me introduce myself. My name is Ronald Fisher; Ron to my friends. You'll be calling me Ron, because not only are we going to be friends, we're going to get married."

Carol thought not! "What! I DON'T think so! Thanks for your help, but we've got to get going."

Julia clearly agreed that the marriage wasn't going to happen; both girls looked a little worried about the mad guy and were eager to leave.

I took a step back to be less threatening to them, saying, "Allow me to prove it." I used NP to hold Carol's lips together. Her eyes FLEW OPEN!

With my eye that Carol could see but Julia couldn't, I gave Carol a heavy wink, then motioned that eyeball toward Julia while still looking at Carol with the other eye. Carol knew that I - Mark Anderson - had independent eyeball control. I used more NP to lightly stroke Carol's cheek, seeing the hope blossom on her face. So there was no doubt, I also NP-stroked the two front-most points of her blouse.

That took only a couple of seconds, but long enough for Julia to start worrying why Carol wasn't leaving quickly.

I winked at Carol again, held her lips together noticeably firmer, and used several more NP-points to push back and down on her shoulders to let her know to stay where she was. She was still too confused to react, but I wanted to hold her back from publicly showing me more affection than normal to a stranger who'd just mended her bike.

I said to Carol, "Now that you know my name, there are just two more things you need to know about me before we get married: I'm VERY greedy and VERY lazy. I want TWO wives, but I can't be bothered searching around. Would your little friend be any good as my second wife?"

I gave Carol two NP-taps on the top of her head, as well as another wink and a big smile. I relaxed my grip on her lips, hoping she'd play along with my tease; my intended bell-and-destiny joke having fallen apart as I'd been too emotional to word it properly. Carol could only breathlessly and very disbelievingly ask, "Mark?"

Julia had started looking strange when the two wives issue came up, but not half as strange as she looked after Carol asked that question.

I answered, "You need to get used to calling me Ron, but you're right. It's a pretty good disguise, isn't it? It's REALLY good to be back, girls. I've missed you both VERY much."

Carol tried to launch herself at me, but I had PLENTY of force to hold her firmly rooted to where she was, even quickly pushing her arms back down.

Julia hadn't had the benefit of feeling my NP, so she was confused by Carol's leaping to the conclusion that I could be Mark, and by my confirming it. Looking past Julia, I could see Donna heading back to see what the problem was, so it'd be easier to make this go quickly. I said, "Yes, I'm Mark. I was forced to disguise myself. Donna's coming back and I don't want to discuss this in public. Let's push Carol's bike back as if it had a problem. That'll give me an excuse to keep walking with you."

^-- I repeated the lip-closing, cheek-rubbing and nipple-tweaking reminders on Julia, and then had to also use NP to hold her down so she didn't rush at me. I added, "PLEASE do NOT make a scene in public. I've had to kill over two hundred people to get back, and I don't want your reactions to make anyone suspicious about who I am." That sobered my girls VERY effectively.

^-- While they were pausing, I reiterated, "Please remember that I'm just Ron Fisher who's helping you push your bike home. Don't even tell Donna yet. Let's just walk along normally. We'll talk when we get home."

I picked up the rear wheel of Carol's bike a couple of inches and started walking it forward, as if the rear brakes had jammed. That can happen on bikes if you don't oil the brake cable for a long time, so any watching CIA agents wouldn't be suspicious. I used NP to hold the brake pads closed on the wheel, so it looked even more authentic.

I gave the girls a push with NP, to get them moving, adding, "Come on, darlings. You can do this. I'm just a very good looking Black guy who's helping you get home..."

"Not as good looking as you used to be," corrected Julia.

"I'll look better in my bright yellow Speedos with this skin, even if my butt isn't so cute anymore. Shh, here comes Donna." I pushed them again, and they started moving.

Donna braked to a halt in front of us, to say, "What happened? Who are you?"

I answered, "I'm Ron Fisher. The brakes have jammed so I'm helping your pretty sister get it home."

"My sister doesn't want a boyfriend," stated Donna with certainty.

"But she does need a hand getting her bike home, so that's what I'm doing. I noticed the way you were riding when you went past me. I bet you've got a horse, don't you?"

"Yeah? How did you know?"

"The way you sat on the bike and moved your legs. I've ridden a few times before myself. What sort of horse have you got? You can tell me while we walk. Carol, I'll hold up the back and push; will you steer please?"

We walked, making conversation about Patch and other getting-to-know-you topics. Carol and Julia both grabbing chances to quietly whisper to me, "Is it REALLY you?"

I lightly NP-patted their asses; I'll grab any excuse to grab those.

As we approached the property's front gate, I asked, "Does your father have a workshop where we can take the bike so I can fix it for you?"

Donna was first to answer, stating, "Dad can fix it later."

Carol said, "It's all right, Donna. We're letting him in."

"But Mom said we shouldn't let strangers in."

"It's okay this time," reassured Julia.

Donna didn't think so, and she was even less impressed when Julia opened Dad's workshop door - I immediately used NP to turn off the power supply to the intercom - and Carol and Julia went inside it with me. Donna's being less-than-impressed turned into amazement when both girls dropped their bikes, double checked, "It's REALLY you?" then leaped into my arms at my nod.

Both girls hesitated to kiss me though, so I broke the impasse by kissing Carol myself. After a couple of second Carol pulled back to say, "You kiss the same, although your lips are bigger."

"What's going on?" demanded Donna, from outside the workshop.

"My turn," decided Julia, putting her lips where her mouth was. (In case you're confused, it's a play on "why don't you put your money where your mouth is.") Julia had her sample, then declared, "You pass the kissing test."

Carol had reconsidered her previous opinion that I passed her kissing test, and thought it needed to be re-tested.

Donna REALLY thought someone should explain, "RIGHT NOW!"

I told her, "Come inside, Donna, and I'll explain it to you."

I'd spent some time thinking about whether to keep Donna in the dark about who I was, because of her proven history of being thoughtless about secrets. It seemed safer to keep her unaware, but I'd decided that I had to tell her. There were three main reasons: First, she has a history of blabbing too much, but that happens when she wants something for herself, which didn't apply this time. Second, when we did eventually tell her, she'd be extremely pissed off that we kept it from her. Third, Donna was going to be amazed at how fast Ron moved into her family's life, and into Carol and Julia's bed. That could cause her to think badly about Carol and Julia, to ask lots of questions, to snoop around, and who knows what else. It could end up more dangerous in the long run, especially if she felt bitter that she was left out of the loop. I really didn't have much choice except to tell her, scary as it was.

"I don't know who you are."

"Carol and Julia do though, and they obviously trust me. So come inside and I'll tell you."

"Tell me now."

Both Julia and Carol urged Donna to come inside. Donna hesitated, so Carol went to get her, pulling her in from the doorway.

I requested, "Turns the lights on and shut the door please, Carol." I could've done both with NP easily, but I was using that as little as possible when it would produce visible effects.

I was standing next to Dad's pride and joy, so I sat on one of the wheels, lowering me and making me less threatening to Donna. I said, "Donna, remember how Mark's body looked pathetic a couple of years ago, but three months ago it looked awesome. All your Ducklings thought he looked wonderful, didn't they?"

Very hesitantly, and from several yards away, "Yeah?"

"But Mark never exercised, apart from going on a couple of runs with you. So how did his body improve so much?"

"I don't know," answered Donna, half the time looking at Carol for an explanation for why this complete stranger was talking about Mark. Donna got no answer from her sister because Carol and Julia were focused on me.

I told her, "It was because Mark was such a genius that his mind was powerful enough to tell his body to get fitter and stronger." Donna didn't know what to think of that, so she just shrugged. I continued, "It turns out that being fitter and stronger aren't the only changes I can make. Given a few weeks, I can change my height, skin color and even hair type. I know I don't look it, Donna, but I'm your brother Mark." I'd been worried whether my hair would grow out Negroid or Caucasian. I could've gone for the shaved-head look if necessary, but it was wonderfully consistent with my apparent race.

Donna was extremely skeptical about that, even when Carol and Julia backed me up, so I offered, "Ask me any questions you want, that only Mark would know the answers to. You too, Carol and Julia. It's especially important that you two don't have any doubts."

Julia started with, "What's your favorite meal?"

"Boy, I haven't had that for a LONG time: 'Roast chicken dinner with all the trimmings and lots of gravy.' Yummy. I don't suppose there's any leftovers in the fridge now, is there?"

"'Fraid not. No one has wanted to have that dinner since you disappeared."

"I didn't disappear, I was kidnapped by the DHS and CIA, but let's not get into that now. More questions to prove who I am first."

Carol asked, "What happened to your finger?"

I held up my left hand with the newly regenerated finger extended. "The original one was cut off by the illegal kidnappers - as opposed to the legal kidnappers. A guy I nicknamed 'Goon' cut it off to..."

#3: <DON'T say "get my ring"; that was only in 3B-land. Oops, saying 3B-land is ambiguous because the new guys had different 3B-lands of their own. We never thought about that when we designed our system.>

#10: <Obviously the next guys to arrive should have their 3A and 3B renamed to 3C and 3D, but let's not worry about that boring issue. We just spent a month regenerating that finger, so why did 3A lose it, if not for the ring?>

[[To avoid confusing you, most of my subsequent references to 3A, 3B, 3A-land, etc., will be to those that you have already read about. The consequences of all the 4B and 5B minds having different 3A- and 3B-lands will be omitted as you understand those issues well enough by now.]]

#3: <Goon still cut it off as a lesson to us, but we didn't have a ring on it. We thought the ring was just a bonus for him. We didn't hook up with Carol until after our third merge, and then only because 3B told us to. Did all you new guys marry Julia and Carol before your third merge?>

All The New Guys: <Yep.>

#3: <So of all of us, it was just the current #1 through to #4 who were slow off the mark and onto the Carol. I wonder if there's someone in charge of dimensions that we can complain to.>

" ... make a point. I've spent the last month or so getting it to grow again because if Ron came back with the same finger missing, it'd be too coincidental not to be suspicious."

I was expecting the girls to ask me the obvious questions about what would happen if my hand was cut off, or my leg, or my head, but they showed no interest in those fascinating, logical extensions; asking about family history stuff instead.

Carol and Julia accepted me quickly, other than making the occasional comments about it being so weird and hard to get used to. Things like Carol saying, "When I kiss you, I feel like I'm cheating on you, because you don't look like you."

Donna increasingly called me Mark, or doing the equivalent. For example, after about twenty minutes, Donna tried, "What were those things that came to your wedding?" (The "your wedding" being another sign of acceptance.)

I replied, "Mom told you not to talk about that. Has she changed her mind while I was away?"

Donna thought about it for a while, but decided she wouldn't be able to get away with it, so she regretfully admitted, "No."

"Just because my body has changed shape doesn't mean Mom's orders can be ignored. Am I correct in thinking that all of you believe I'm Mark now?"

"Yes," immediately from Carol and Julia. They better believe it, because they were sitting on my legs with my arms around them in our usual, much missed, fashion.

"I 'spose so," unconvincingly admitted Donna.

I asked, "Who's the smartest between you and Patch, Donna?" I knew her riding club stressed this issue, otherwise the horse wouldn't get trained properly.

"Me of course. Why?"

"I bet you $5 that Patch recognizes me right away; much faster than you did."

"Mom said I'm not allowed to bet."

"Ha! Chicken." To them all I said, "I've gone to an ENORMOUS amount of trouble and it's taken me many weeks to change my body this much, so I could risk coming back to you again. I'm sure the CIA is very curious about Mark Anderson and they could be tapping our phones, bugging our house, and things like that. It's VERY important that none of you EVER call me Mark. I'm Ron Fisher, a guy who helped Carol with a bike problem and who will soon become a close family friend.

^-- "The CIA believes Mark is dead, and that's the way it must remain forever. If they overhear any of you talking and learn Mark is Ron, then they'll recapture me and kill me with their experiments. Last time, even before they knew how special I was, they strapped me to a table, drilled a hole in my skull and were pulling chunks of my brain out to look at."

"Eww, GROSS!" declared Donna, as I knew she would. That story would have much more impact on Donna than my general requests to be cautions.

"It's MUCH worse than that, Donna. If I hadn't escaped, they would've taken all my brain. I'd be dead by now. And when they ran out of my brain, they might've become curious to compare it to YOUR brain, so they'd kidnap you, open your head and take your brain out. They are VERY bad people. You HAVE to keep who I am TOP SECRET!"

[I didn't mention earlier, but I certainly didn't forget to repair the hole in my skull when I was changing my body. Proximity works in all directions, so I was constantly 'seeing' the hole in my skull, and I STRONGLY wanted to repair it. It quickly sealed at the inside end of the hole, allowing me to take the plug out so the outside end could seal.]

"I will, Mark."

"WRONG! From now on, I am NOT Mark. Call me Ron. It shouldn't be hard to remember; you've only got to look at me. Say 'Yes Ron, ' Donna."

"Yes Ron. {Giggle}, this is WEIRD!"

Carol asked, "What about Mom and Dad. You're going to tell them, aren't you?"

"Absolutely. And Prof and Vanessa too. Everyone in this house, including Patch. I've been back in Corvallis for a week but I didn't contact you before because I was VERY carefully searching all around this house. All the grounds, the neighbors places close to ours, I spent several hours looking through this room last night to make sure it was okay to talk here today.

^-- "I'll leave shortly because a guy you just met on the road shouldn't stay so long. You can't call Mom and Dad to tell them to rush home. That'd be an unnatural reaction to meeting Ron Fisher. But when our parents get home, tell them you've invited a guy who helped with your bike to dinner. I'll come back at 6 o'clock. As soon as we can, we'll come down here and I'll tell them who I really am.

^-- "But until then, you don't say ANYTHING. Don't even look happier than normal, and the word 'Mark' NEVER crosses your lips. If you say I'm back just once, then we could have DHS and CIA agents charging in from all directions. They wouldn't hesitate to kill every one of you to get hold of me.

^-- "Donna, do you want to see Mom and Dad be shot full of bullets and die in front of your eyes?" I treated that as a rhetorical question, giving her a second to understand what I'd said, then continued, "You MUST NEVER call me Mark, tell anyone Mark's back, or ANYTHING like that. I am Ron Fisher. You haven't seen Mark for three months and you're very worried about him. Say 'Yes Ron, ' Donna."

"Would they really shoot Mom and Dad?"

"And you, Carol and Julia. They wouldn't think twice about it. They'd probably prefer it, so there'd be no one left alive to ask them hard questions. They're VERY bad people. They kidnapped me, drilled a hole in my head and pulled some of my brain out. They weren't going to release me after doing that. They've got so much power they don't care about the law and they do whatever they want. If Mom or Dad got in their way, they wouldn't even blink before shooting them. So it's VERY important you call me Ron and treat me like you've never met me before. We'll be safe if you do that. Okay?"

"I should be able to. You don't look ANYTHING like you used to."

"Good. All of you should try to say 'Ron' in every sentence you say to me, to get into the habit of saying it."

"Okay Ron," agreed Julia. "What's your plan for now on, Ron?"

"Meet our parents at dinner and bring them down here to explain. Then over the next few weeks, Ron will get friendlier and friendlier with all of you. I've got a job as a mechanic, but only in the mornings so I can start doing some unskilled landscaping work around this house in the afternoons. I saw that Vanessa still has a lot to do, so that could keep me busy and around the place for a long time.

^-- "Then as we seem to become friendlier, I thought that I could start to woo Carol. Meet her after school with flowers and things like that. It wouldn't be believable that you would get a new boyfriend so soon, Julia, and that'd look too much like I was stepping into Mark's shoes, so I'll chase Carol. A while after that I'll get sick of living in a tent and start to look for a room to rent somewhere. It just so happens that there's a spare bedroom in the main house here so I'll take that, but after a while I'll move to Mark's Wing. I'll be Carol's new live-in boyfriend, but because Carol's a backsliding lesbian, she'll retain her relationship with Julia, so the three of us will end up together again.

^-- "What I do with my life after that I haven't worried about yet. Obviously I can't go back to studying at OSU, or playing soccer, or any of the other things that Mark stood out at. What I'll do is a long-term decision that there's no hurry to make. Ron Fisher is nineteen so legally allowed to leave home. He was a mechanic in his previous job, and I know enough to be able to keep doing that..."

Julia interrupted, "You're talking as if Ron Fisher was a real person; not a fake ID?"

"A fake would be far too easy for the CIA to see through. The short explanation is that I walked through an LA ghetto in the late evening a couple of months ago. Ron Fisher and some other guys chased me into an alley and tried to rob me. I killed them and hid their bodies, changing mine to look like Ron Fisher's so I could use his ID."

Carol couldn't help herself, "Oh no!"

"Yeah. It's serious stuff. The CIA would LOVE to get their hands on me, so I have to be extremely careful. When Ron Fisher attacked me I actually took him prisoner and spent a month asking him all about his life. He was a petty criminal in LA, with some minor convictions for stealing, assault and drug possession, starting from when he was a minor. I would've preferred to become someone squeaky clean, but I had to kill the guy at the end so I chose a guy who was well on the road to becoming bad news. Maybe in a few years we might find someone more suitable for me to change into, but I like that Ron Fisher is about as opposite from Mark Anderson as it's possible to be."

"You can say that again!" agreed Carol. "People are going to be amazed when you become my boyfriend. That's going to be funny."

"Yeah, I'm looking forward to it myself. I'm already telling everyone that I got sick of all the violence and crime in LA, and that I've come north looking for a nice, safe town to settle down in. I've turned over a new leaf, and I like the look of Corvallis. That'll be especially true now that I've met such a lovely girl when her bike had trouble. It should fit together quite nicely. Changing the subject, how are Ava and her parents?"

Julia answered, "Oh, not good. Katie and Carson are in the hospital in Salem. They're still getting treatments, trying to hang on until Ava graduates. Carson seems safe to make it that long. He's allowed to go home between treatments if he wants to, but he's staying with Katie. She's not going to come out again, unless she wants to die at home or in a hospice. She's not talking about that until Ava's exams are finished. Katie's done better than the doctors expected, so they're saying she's got a reasonable chance of lasting until graduation. We're planning to set up a webcam and broadcast graduation live to a big screen in their room, hopefully."

"I'll never forgive the assholes that made me miss being around to help Ava. I'm seriously tempted to reveal myself to Ava right away. I'll think about that between now and dinner, and we'll talk about it then. It'd be best to make sure Ava's not at the dinner tonight, Julia, or is that too cruel?"

"It's okay. She doesn't come here every dinner. I'll tell her we've got a family friend coming."

"I don't want to, but we've already spent too long in here in case anyone is watching, so let's stop now. I'll walk out wiping my hands with a rag as if I'd been working on Carol's bike. I'll need to borrow it actually, so I can get to my tent and back here in time for dinner, but that'll look like I was taking it for a test ride."

"Okay," agreed Carol.

Donna insisted, "Before you go, I want to see if Patch recognizes you."

"What, no $5 bet? Okay, I'll do it on the cheap. When we get outside, you MUST all behave as if I'm Ron Fisher. No farewell tears or kisses, no calling me Mark, no asking questions that you don't want the CIA to overhear. I'm just a guy you met on the road a few minutes ago. Okay?"

They agreed.

We walked out of the workshop with me wiping my hands with a rag and Carol wheeling her bike.

I told her, "Give it a test ride to see how it goes now, Carol."

Carol rode around for half a minute, then declared, "You've fixed it. Thank you so much."

"Always happy to help a pretty girl. Donna, didn't you say you wanted me to meet your horse? What's its name again?"

"HIS name is Patch. Over here."

For Donna's benefit, I used NP and EKP to make sure Patch seemed to recognize me. Nothing dramatic, he just came when I called and we hugged faces. To avoid the risk of Donna saying "recognize" I talked during Patch's approach, calling him a friendly horse, making time-wasting comments like, "I think he likes me because I'm closest to his color. I hope he doesn't think I'm a female horse."

"He's gelded, silly. And he's VERY smart; he rec..."

"I've got to be going. Oops, sorry Donna. I didn't mean to stand on your foot. Sorry, I'm clumsy sometimes. Thanks for the dinner invite, Carol and Julia. I'll be back at six. Is that when you want me to come?"

"Make it 6:15," suggested Julia, into the act of not appearing eager.

"Okay. Thanks. This'll be the second time I've been invited to have dinner with someone since I've been here. Corvallis is a friendly town. I think I'm going to like it here." [The owners of the RV park had taken pity on me one wet evening, inviting me to share their dinner.]

I gave Carol's and Julia's lips a last NP-squeeze to remind them not to talk about me after I left, hoping they'd control Donna, then I rode off on Carol's bike.

I left my tent and started riding back to 'my home', pausing when close enough to sight blob the workshop to make sure there was no sign of bugs having been hurriedly installed. It looked identical to when I'd left it. I also quickly checked my favorite room of the main house, and saw that dinner preparations were well in hand, and everything seemed natural. My families weren't hostage to thirty CIA agents lying in ambush for me, and there wasn't a "Welcome Home Mark" banner over the front door.

I'd arrived just before dinner. Going straight to the workshop wouldn't look natural, so we sat down to eat first. Dinner was amusing. I could tell that even before I'd arrived the parents had picked up from the girls that something odd was going on, but they had no idea what, so they asked me lots of questions trying to find out.

I stayed in my persona, telling them the truth about my (well, Ron's) life in LA. I was totally open and honest (sort of), telling them about my convictions, the knife fight, and other low-points of my life. It was quite convenient for me, as it'd save me having to explain that side of things in the workshop.