The Kids Grow Up - Trish Hanan (i want to read a book TXT) 📗

swore they would never leave each other and stay together forever.
Harry woke up in the afternoon and felt like crap wondering how he got to bed and then remembered Adam putting him there. He felt foolish and swore that would be the last time he would fall apart and let one of his kids see him like that. He went out to the living room and put the damned statue in the dining room on top of the sideboard and covered it with a cloth so he wouldn’t have to look at it. Then he hung up his tux and cleaned the house, that always made him feel better, to have a clean environment. Then he sat down and took stock of his life and tried to figure out what his next step should be.
All of the stores were empty and there was no way he was going to fill them, he had only about four hundred stores left and if he filled everyone’s stores it would take up most of those and the Alterians would have all of the human’s goods. That wouldn’t be good if they had to abandon Eden for Sherwood at any time, they would have nothing for themselves. Harry couldn’t risk that so he had to keep all of the remaining four hundred and nineteen stores plus the fifteen factories that he had. It was going to hard enough moving the Coke Plant and the other factories when the time came and they had to have the Coke Plant, there was no way they were going to go without sodas.
Of course, Harry still had a thousand personal bins and six hundred houses left and he could play around with those. The houses needed to be saved, they would need houses over in Sherwood but he could play with some of the personal bins. He thought about it for a while and came up with what he thought of as the perfect solution. He would build four giant mall-type warehouse stores out of petrified wood like giant log barns that could be moved to Sherwood when they needed to be and put the stuff from the personal bins in them. One would be filled with clothing, men’s, women’s, children’s and infants. A second with appliances, small ones like hair rollers and crap like that, make up, jewelry, shoes. Then a third could hold all the games, puzzles and bikes and stuff like that, camping equipment while a fourth could hold washers, dyers and stuff like that. They’d even have food in them and he could put that in the second one and people would eat that up and he could keep all the good stuff for them like he had before. And of course all the gold he’d keep and do something special that he’d always wanted to do, he’d make himself a gold toilet seat.
“This sounds perfect Bo, Gertie, what do you think?” he asked and they both grinned so he knew they thought he was very clever. He brought out the architect’s computer and designed one that would be the design for all of them
That night the two cats got frisky and tore up the living room while they mated and Harry lied in bed and giggled because he got rock hard and masturbated for the first time in years and felt dirty because he did it to cats mating. But then what the hell, why look a gift horse in the mouth, he slept like a lamb. The next morning he was smiling as he milked his cow. Adam was came in to milk Kelly was surprised to see his dad grinning.
“You look better this morning,” he observed. Harry laughed.
“You should see my living room, those damned cats tore it up mating last night, it’s all wrecked,” he told him. Adam nodded as if he were crazy. Harry giggled.
“I guess you had to be there, thanks for picking me up yesterday, don’t worry, you won’t be doing that again,” he told him. Adam shrugged.
“I understand, Dad, its okay,” he said. Harry nodded.
“Why don’t you kids come and see me later, bring your honeys, I’ve got a proposition for you,” he told him. Adam grinned.
“Okay, sounds good and its not like we’ve got anything to do,” he said. They said goodbye and Harry went in for breakfast and to straighten up his house.
“These is the design for my new store, actually my new stores, I want to build four of these log building all in a row in that big field out back,” Harry told the ten men and two women who had gathered in his living room later that day. They all had copies of his building design and all looked impressed by the size and layout of it.
“Four of these, Harry these are really enormous stores,” DJ remarked. Harry grinned.
“I plan to put a lot of shit in them,” he informed them.
“Why?” Emma asked. He shrugged.
“Why not?” Harry asked. They all laughed. He continued.
“Contrary to popular belief, we’re not going to be able to live among the Alterians forever. In fact, we’re not going to be able to live here in Eden for not much longer. I’d say within the next five or ten years or sooner, we’re all going to have to make the move to Sherwood and it just might be a sudden move,” he told them. They all looked shocked.
“Why do you say that, Dad?” Jackson asked. Harry shook his head.
“Good-old Dr. George, Blake and Dennis really screwed the pooch when they told that alterian Dr. Bentley that humans have a lifespan of five hundred years, they really shouldn’t have done that,” he said firmly. They all looked confused.
“Now Dr. Bentley was about thirty when they arrived and Dr. George was thirty-seven and it was fine the two of them working side-by-side,” Harry explained. “Then Dr. Bentley turned forty and things were still okay, but then Dr. Bentley turned fifty and suddenly Dr. George’s thirty-seven is looking really good and it’s unfair to the alterian that this human is still in his thirties and he’s getting old. Now look at him, he’s sixty and old age is creeping up on him and good-old Dr. George and his fellow humans are still young men. That’s gotta piss Dr. Bentley off to no end. He’s got to think that’s pretty damned unfair. And seventy is coming in ten years and after that death and he knows that and its got to be worrying him and his fellow alterians who flew down with him.”
“My God, Harry, you’re right,” DJ said and stood up. Everyone looked shocked.
“What are we going to do, Dad?” Emma asked, her face looking scared. Harry shrugged.
“What we need to do is call a meeting of the town and find out from the good old doctors exactly what the alterians have asked for and when and then we can decide on what action we need to take if any,” he said firmly. “If they haven’t asked for any blood or tissue samples then we’re panicking for nothing, but if they have, then we need to find out what they want to know and then we need to decide if we want to stick around and wait for them to make the first move or if we just want to high-tail it out of Dodge.” DJ grinned.
“I bet you have a plan for that, don’t you?” he said and Harry nodded.
“Of course,” he said and they all laughed. He pulled up a map of Sherwood and showed them the four valleys and the four cities he had made up and how he had divided everyone. They looked surprised to find that he didn’t have them all in one big town like Edenville.
“You’re splitting us up?” Cassie asked. Harry nodded.
“We’re going to be in Sherwood for the rest of our lives maybe and I’m not spending the next thirty thousand years listening to Max and them calling me that ‘little fishy freak fagola’ and your granddad calling you kids ‘fishy freaks’. I’m putting all of those people in their own town where they can be miserable together and I won’t have to bother with them,” he explained and they all grinned. He continued.
“Carl and them have been okay but they’ve hardly been supportive through the years,” Harry told them. “Not one of them from Farm Two or Three called me or sent me an email thanking me for filling their damned stores three times so they can have their own town and build their own crap. Let them be rude together.” Cassie giggled.
“Sounds like you’re getting even with everyone in one swoop,” she said. Harry shook his head.
“Not getting even, just that I’m only letting nice happy people live in Talbertville, the rest can live in Rudeville and Miserabletown, only we’ll call them Glory and Prescott,” he declared and they all laughed.
“Now all the kids aren’t going to want to live with their parents so I’m putting them here in St. Ives,” Harry said and pointed out the town. “It’s a nice town and I’m sure they’ll be happy.” Everyone agreed that sounded nice. Then he showed them all the folks he was letting live with him in his town Talbertville and they were all relieved to find their names on the list.
“I see grandmom’s on the list,” Ryan observed. Harry laughed.
“Yeah, well I was going to put her in Miserbletown but Jan, Joy and Barb deserved to live with us so we’re stuck with her,” he informed them and they all laughed.
“Oh, Dad, you’re so mean,” Emma declared and he giggled.
“Well, Emma, I’m sorry you feel that way, I was going to start giving you kids flying lessons on the Elizabeth but if you think I’m mean, maybe you don’t want them,” he teased. All the kids looked shocked. The two girls got up and attacked him, hugging and kissing him.
“Flying lessons on the Elizabeth, oh, my God, do you mean it, Daddy?” Cassie squealed and Harry nodded. The boys cheered. Harry stood up and pointed to his eldest son.
“You’re first, Jackson, let’s go chop down some trees,” he declared and Jackson grinned.
“Let’s do that,” he said and they walked out to the ship.
“Why does he go first, because he’s the oldest, that’s a crap reason,” Sean declared. Adam stuck his tongue out.
The first thing Harry told his kids about flying the Engineering ship was to ignore the pilot’s Eject button.
“If you hit the button going two thousand miles an hour, you’re dead,” he informed them. “Instantly, the minute your body hits the atmosphere, you’re dead, it’s a glorified suicide button. And if you hit it when you’re flying slower, you lose your ship and you’ll never get it back. So don’t ever hit it, it’s better to burn up with the ship or go out the door, at least that way you have a chance of survival.” He didn’t tell them that he had disconnected it a hundred years ago and it didn’t work.
By the time Danny and Martin returned from their honeymoon all of the kids could fly and chop down trees and were loving it. None of the boyfriends were allowed to fly and were told, “If you marry my kid, I’ll give you flying lessons too, until then, shut up and sit in the