Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 01:22:17 -0500 From: Jeff Wilson Subject: W.A.R. Part Five - Chapter 5 W.A.R. Part Five - Secrets Chapter Five -- What Brett Did on his Day Off by Jeff Wilson On Sunday, I managed to get out of going to church by telling mom I was working with dad. She wasn't happy, but it worked. At least until... "Well, let's go boy." "Go where?" I asked, rousing myself from a nice morning nap. "You said you were going to help me, well, let's go." Dad replied. "But I just said that so..." "Well, you'll think of a better excuse next time. Garage, ten minutes." I rolled out of bed and put on some work clothes and my glasses, then I walked out to the garage. Dad was working on a neighbor's snow blower. We worked on it for a while, but it refused to start. Dad sat there staring at the engine for a while. Then he walked over to an old lawn mower, pulled a few parts off of it, and walked back to the snow blower. He told me how to put the parts into the snow blower and wouldn't you know that sucker started right up. We finished fixing the snow blower and took it to our neighbor's house. He started it up and said it was running even better than it had before. He handed dad some money and thanked us for the help. On the slow walk back over to the house, dad handed the money to me. "What's this?" I asked. "You did the work, you get the money." Dad said. "But I just did what you told me to do." I said. Dad stopped and leaned on his cane. "Take it and shut up, boy." He said. "Okay." I said. When we got back to the house, mom still wasn't home, even though it was long after church should have been over. I told dad that I was going to go over to Brett's house, and he said that was fine with him. I showered, changed, and put in my contacts and retainer. I called Brett's house so that I wouldn't waste my time walking over there then headed out. Brett was waiting for me at the back door when I got there. "Come here and look what I got yesterday." He said. I followed him to his living room and said hello to his mom. Brett told me to wait for him and after a quick trip to his room came back with something in his hands. "What the heck is that?" I asked. "It's a cat. I bought him yesterday." Brett said, cuddling the little brown and black animal. It was pretty cute. Dr. Reilly said, "He's always begged me for a pet. But I told him he had to take care of it and pay for it. Then you guys made all that money on driveways and he decided to go shopping." "His name's Bob. Bob Cat." Brett said. "Bob Cat?" I laughed. Brett looked at me crossly. "Shut up, Willy. Bob Cat's a great cat name." I took the cat and held him. He was a cutie. First he tried to scratch me, then he kept trying to nuzzle against me. Brett's mom laughed and then looked at me oddly. "Billy, smile," she said. I smiled for her. "You got your braces off! Brett, you didn't say anything." "I didn't think it was important." Brett said. "Brett, you tell me when Billy combs his hair differently and this wasn't important? When did this happen, Billy?" "Last Thursday." I said. "Well, you look good," she said. Brett and I walked up to his room with Bob Cat. We played on the computer for a while, then we had dinner with his mom. As we were eating, Dr. Reilly noticed that I kept rubbing my eye. "Are you okay, Billy? Your eye is awfully red." "It just itches a little bit." I said, "maybe there's something under my contact." I went to the bathroom and took my contact out. I checked it out, but there didn't seem to be anything wrong with it, so I put it back in. By the time dinner was over, it felt like both of my eyes were burning, so I took the contacts out. Dr. Reilly looked at my contacts and said that they looked fine. She used her own saline solution and lent me a case to take them home. But that didn't explain why my eyes still felt like they were on fire. She checked my eyes and though they were pretty sore and red, there wasn't anything visibly wrong with me. Dr. Reilly decided to drive me home. By the time she did, my throat was also starting to feel sore and my nose was running. I felt like I was getting sick. Dr. Reilly decided to come in with me. She explained to my parents what happened to me while I sat down on the couch, feeling like my head was about to blow up. "You don't have any new flowers or anything like that at the house, do you?" Mom asked. "He's not on his allergy medicine this time of year." "There's nothing that I can think of that..." Dr. Reilly started. Then a look of realization came over her face. "Ohhh... The cat." She said. "What cat?" Mom said. "Brett got a cat over the weekend," Dr. Reilly explained. "Well there you go," mom said. "He's allergic to cats." "I am? Oh... That's right... I completely forgot about that," I said, feeling really stupid.. "And he's allergic to dogs," dad said. "And hamsters, and guinea pigs... You're allergic to just about every kind of animal, boy. That's why we don't have pets. I thought you knew that." "Well I knew about it, but I didn't think it would..." "Well you'll think about it now." Mom said. "Your eyes are so bloodshot from scratching them that you'll probably hurt for a few days. Sorry to trouble you Jen. I swear, Billy would forget his head if it wasn't attached. He's failed his driver test twice already." "Shut up mom!" I said angrily. "Billy..." she said sternly. Then she turned back to Brett's mom. "He's a little touchy about that," she said. So Dr. Reilly went home and I spent the rest of my evening with a warm rag over my eyes, trying desperately to get the itching to go away and cursing Bob Cat. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * This is by far the shortest chapter of W.A.R., but it was so much fun to write. And of course, it introduces Billy's newest nemesis, Bob Cat. This is one of those famous light chapters, which means that coming up soon is some heavy subject matter. Secrets are about to be exposed, and they will affect every character of the story by the time we're done. I know that some of you are holding back on writing until you see where this part is going to go. And I guess that's okay. You know me, I love the email. I hope you'll let me know what you think when we get into some of the upcoming chapters, because this is what I've been writing for for a long time. For those who would like to comment, here are my email addys: vicioussquirrel@hotmail.com or jkwsquirrel@ yahoo.com Also, did you know I have a yahoo group? You did? Then why haven't you joined? http://groups.yahoo.com/group/squirrelwriter That'll do it for this time. Next time: Billy and Brett go to Mike's and all hell breaks loose.