Chapter Two

Sunday June 8th: 8:00

The sound of a wailing guitar riff playing from the surround sound speakers in the room roused Theodore from his sleep. He moved his hand from under the cover, groping around to find the control panel on the bedside table. He stabbed his finger on the spot of the touchpad, relieved to find that it silenced the alarm. Theodore sat up,still groggy, as he looked at the control panel displaying ‘0800’. He let out a deep groan

Smart home my ass Theodore thought. He knew full well he certainly hadn't set the alarm to go off, and his suspicions were now resting on his Uncle Rob - who delighted in every opportunity to show off some aspect of his tech innovations. Still, the smart home technologies produced by his Uncle's company had been how the man had accrued his impressive wealth. The house was a veritable fun house of high tech convenience.

Theodore furrowed his brow in thought. He had recognized the song from some lame emo band he had listened to a lot in middle school, and he did have some memory of having chosen that song as his personalized wake up tone, but that had been years ago. Then again, it's not like Theodore had been around much after middle school. Not after what his Mom had done.

He willed himself up out of the bed, still half asleep, picking up a pair of sweatpants and a hoodie from his suitcase as he pulled them on - barely opening his still heavy eyelids. He trudged his way towards the door, tripping a little as he did. Theodore opened his eyes about halfway to see that he had tripped over a stuffed fox on the ground. He recognized it as something that once belonged to him - that was until it had been handed down to Charlie. Theodore let out a grunt as he kicked it to the side, remembering their conversation from last night. Just who did Charlie think he was going around telling people to act their age when he still slept with stuffed animals?

Walking into the kitchen and taking a seat at the kitchen table across from his mother, Theodore could hear the chattering of his cousins and little brother in the other room. He groaned, his head pounding.

“Good morning sunshine,” mom said in an overly cheery voice, smirking at his still half asleep demeanor. Theodore let out another grunt, still not having opened his eyes fully as he sat with his face in his hands.

“What can I get ya, slugger? Uncle Rob asked, coming up behind Theodore and giving a rather rough slap on the back. Theodore rolled his shoulders a little, none too pleased with his Uncle's jovial nature - especially this early in the morning.

“Coffee,” Theodore croaked, chalking the headache up to his well established caffeine addiction.

“Oh, big man on campus wants some coffee now does he?” Uncle Rob said. Theodore looked up at his Uncle with some annoyance. “What do you think Mom? Is that okay?”

“He can try it if he wants to.” Mom said with a shrug of her shoulders. Theodore looked over to his Mom with a confused look. Why in the world were they talking like he didn't regularly drink coffee? What's more, why were they acting as if he needed permission to do so?

“I drink coffee every day,” Theodore said

“There is no reason to lie Theo, I already said you could try it,” Mom said, shooting a serious look at her son that almost seemed to suggest she was considering withdrawing her permission.

“Hey!” Theo shouted, offended at the insinuation that he needed her permission for anything - but interrupted as he heard his voice crack up an entire octave. He cringed in embarrassment, yet his Mother and Uncle seemingly gave no notice. Theodore brought his hands up to his throat. He then looked at his hands. They didn't look all that much different, but something did seem subtly off about them - almost as if they were suddenly smaller.

“Something wrong?” Mom asked, noticing the bewildered look of alarm that had come to Theodore's face.

Theodore gave no answer as he got up from the table, walking out into the living room past where his younger cousins were hanging out watching TV alongside Charlie on the couch. Theodore gave them no notice as he walked over to the bathroom door, going to open it but finding that the handle would not turn. Theodore jostled it in frustration but to no avail.

“You have to use your finger,” Ewan, Theodore's twelve year old cousin said from the couch as he flipped the long half of his half buzzed half long punk rock haircut out of his eyes.

“What?” Theodore said as he continued to jostle the knob. Ewan, ever eager to impress Theodore, got up from the couch and walked over to the door.

“It's the lock, you have to use your finger,” Ewan said, placing his finger onto a pad underneath the lock. A red led light on the pad turned green as Theodore heard a click before Ewan opened the door. “Don't you remember?”

“Yeah sure,” Theodore said as he hurried through the door - despite not having a single memory of such a thing. He vaguely remembered his mom mentioning something about smart locks last night, however he didn't have time to dwell on thoughts of the previous night.

As Theodore got in front of the mirror, he was shocked to see what stared back at him. His curly brown hair was a little longer than it had been - and much more unkempt. The angles of his face had become less defined, leaving him looking more waifish than usual. As strange as it seemed, his entire face gave off the look that he was no more than some kid that had barely started puberty - with the telltale sign of a pimple on his cheek. In fact, that's just what it was. The face staring back at Theodore was not at all unfamiliar to him, he looked just as he had at fourteen.

Theodore stumbled out of the bathroom, not sure where to go before he dashed back up to the room he had stayed in last night. He went over to his suitcase and began to dig through the clothes. They were not that much different than his current wardrobe, except for the few graphic tees denoting designs that would have been appealing to a middle schooler rather than a high school graduate - yet the point still persisted that these were indeed not the clothes Theo had packed yesterday.

He looked down and noticed that the hoodie he had pulled on that morning was also not something he ever remembered owning. Theodore tore it off, chucking it across the room as if it were diseased. Theodore then looked down at his chest. He had never been ripped, but he had at least gained some muscle mass and definition in his chest in his later teenage years. That was now completely gone,replaced by a scrawny frame.

“Looking for something to wear?” Theodore spun around to see his cousin Jessica standing in the doorway. Her long brown hair with the blond highlights had been curled. She was wearing a green sparkly cocktail dress, and she was currently putting some dangly earrings on. She looked like she was headed somewhere fancy.

“Jessica,” Theodore said breathlessly. “Something's wrong.” He held his arms out in a panic. He then noticed his armpits. “Look at this,” he said, showing his armpit that now boasted one or two scraggly hairs - a far cry from the full bush that had been there yesterday.

Jessica smirked a little. “I would have thought that your Mom would have given you the talk already,” She walked up and put a hand on Theodore's shoulder. “Your body is going through changes.”

“I'm not talking about that,” Theodore exclaimed, shaking his head as he scrambled for words to somehow get across his point. “Yesterday we graduated, right?”

“Well I graduated yesterday,” Jessica said with a befuddled look on her face. “You're graduating today - or well the ceremony is today.”

“We go to the same school,” Theodore sputtered out.

“I don't think just being enrolled in the same high school I went to really counts,” Jessica said with a laugh. “I mean, as of yesterday I'm no longer a student there - and you haven't even started yet!”

“Buh-” Theodore protested, but couldn’t find the words.

“ I guess I did make quite the reputation for myself there.” Jessica interrupted in a teasing tone. “So try not to mess that up.”

With that, Jessica left the room leaving Theodore alone - still unsure of what in the world had even happened.

***
10:06

Shuffling into the middle school hall, Theo had never felt more embarrassed. After he’d spent a little too long sorting indecisively through his new wardrobe - finding each individual article not so different from his usual clothes, but of course bearing the immature zippers, tags, or elastic waistbands which marked them out as children’s clothes - Mom had made an executive decision, making her own choice of his outfit for the special day. In the end, the boy had found himself in a light blue striped seersucker shirt paired with a set of navy chino shorts. Theo could barely stand to look at his freshly minted definition-less slender legs and awkward knobbly knees himself, let alone tolerate parading them around in public, but Mom had decreed that the raggedy pair of jeans he’d located in a ball at the bottom of his suitcase “weren’t appropriate” for the occasion - and that was that.

If it was any comfort, none of the other gawking 8th graders milling gormlessly around the space looked any more comfortable. Trussed up in poorly tied ties, plain uninspired summer dresses, and ill fitting creased shirts the crowd of young teens looked as if they would rather be doing literally anything else with their Sunday morning. Theo avoided meeting anyone’s gaze, a couple of faint glances of recognition from the other students seeming to confirm that he was, somehow, also a member of the same graduating middle school class.

“And here’s our budding violin prodigy.” Mrs Somerton smiled. Of course, Mom had made a beeline directly for the music teacher. Theo was a little surprised to find she was still teaching. He’d thought she must have been a million years old when he graduated the first time around! “Don’t you look smart today.” she praised, giving him an expectant look.

“Urgh…yeah.” Theo grumbled adolescently, if only to break the silence. The boy groaned internally. If Mom planned on showing him off to all his old middle school teachers, the morning would be even longer than he’d anticipated. “Um, I gotta go to the toilet. Be right back.” He mumbled, though he had no intention of returning - at least not before the ceremony began. Not waiting for anyone’s permission, he quickly detached himself from the family group, diving with relief into the welcome anonymity of the crowd.

Struggling through the mass of bodies, Theo eventually reached a side door, pushing it open just a crack and slinking out into the back hall beyond. He shut it firmly behind him, locking out the hubbub of squawking teenaged tenors and altos. He let out a weary sigh, relieved to finally have a moment to contemplate the utterly insane situation he had found himself in. It seemed he really had gotten younger, and it wasn’t just this body that had changed. The entire world seemed convinced he was fourteen again! The boy felt his stomach twist in horrified anticipation, Jessica’s words echoing in his head. If he couldn’t figure out why, and if he couldn’t fix it, it wouldn’t be long now until he was checking back into Holyoke for another torturous four year stint.

Theodore’s brief reprieve from his new middle school reality would not last long. Two large broad shoulders boys, one with a close ginger buzzcut and the other with a disheveled mess of disgusting greasy black hair, suddenly burst through the double doors at the end of the corridor - chatting and laughing boisterously with one another. Theo ignored them at first, lost in thought, but it seemed he could not so easily escape the would-be bullies.

“If it isn’t the Teddy Bear!” the ginger boy snorted, grinding to a halt in front of Theo and prodding his meaty forefinger, adorned with a jagged dirt encrusted finger nail, into the smaller boy’s shoulder.

Theo recoiled in surprise and disgust, an automatic sneer coming across his face as he stared up hatefully at the unfamiliar pair of juvenile giants. “What do you want?”

The boys laughed. “Just to play.” the ginger boy continued. “Don’t you wanna play with us Teddy Bear?”

Theodore rolled his eyes dismissively and turned around, intending to disengage himself civilly from the childish confrontation, but before he could even take two steps the greasy haired boy grabbed the tail end of his shirt - yanking him sharply back towards them.

“Aww, is the little Teddy Bear scared?” the ginger boy mocked. “Running back to Mommy already?”

The boy with the greasy hair let out a bizarre deep honking laugh. “Little Teddy Bear’s scared.” he repeated gormlessly.

“Get off me!” Theo insisted, trying in vain to pry the bigger boy’s hand off, but it was no use, the kid holding on tight to his shirt like a hunter clutching a freshly caught bunny rabbit by its fluffy white tail. “I said get off!”

“Or what?.” The ginger boy dismissed, again prodding his disgusting finger into Theo’s side. “What are you gonna do about it?”

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