HOME | DD

Description
Its glowing radium hands told her it was nearly twenty minutes to five. Another hour had gone by. Mary Walters decided she wasn’t getting back to sleep. She sat the ancient alarm clock down and sat up. Monday. So much was happening. She made her way to the kitchen and turned on the flame under the tea kettle.

Jolene was bringing him today. She’d been waiting for her own for almost two years. Marv left her two million when he died. It wasn’t much, but his will instructed her to spend it on something fun - something just for herself. Something “not un-extravagent” as he would say. So when she saw exactly what she wanted, she didn’t hesitate. Better yet, a good fraction of the fee helped the poor in third world countries and was deductible offsetting some of her gains this year. And most importantly she had saved someone’s life. It is rare when wins.

She took Mary’s checklist to the table and compared it to her handwritten list. A separate list was one of the tricks she had learned so people wouldn’t notice her memory wasn’t what it used to be. She’d noticed how older friends kept the secret for years and she was determined to be independent as long as she lived. Seventy seven really isn’t that old these days and people usually guessed she was in her sixties.

His house. She couldn’t remember if it had arrived. She’d ordered it - maybe it was here. It wasn’t on the table she had set aside and there weren’t any new boxes. Besides, Jolene was going to teach her how to use it and she was certain that hadn’t happened. Back to her version of the list.. There! It was being delivered this morning. She’d paid extra for fast shipping. The kettle was calling now. She turned off the flame and pulled it from the heat.

The new maid was coming on Tuesday. Hopefully this one would work out better. She didn’t trust Lucinda and demanded the agency fire her. This afternoon was patrons meeting at the Met. The food was always wonderful. She wondered what the doll man ate. Would he just take some of her food or would she have to buy special doll man food? She checked her notes to see if Jolene had gone over that. Ah! they eat what people eat. That made it easy. She could put him on the table when she ate. It was good Jolene had been spending so much time with her. There was almost too much to learn. She poured herself some tea and looked out the window. This side was just buildings, but the view at night was beautiful. The sitting room, overlooking the park, was better for the day.

__________ 
He was barely able to stop when it came down on top of him. He was trapped. Some kind of translucent blue material and round like a hemisphere. Then her laughter - Danielle’s laughter. He pushed against the thick plastic wall, but it was solid like it was glued to the road he’d been running on. He looked up. A huge hand held his prison in pace. A giant’s hand. Danielle’s hand.

SuddenlyTaylor woke up completely disoriented and in a cold sweat. This wasn’t a giant plastic bowl It wasn’t his bedroom. Slowly reality crept in. Nothing but nightmares with panic attacks tonight. Or was it morning by now? What was going to happen to him now? It’d been months since he had been free. Now he was a prisoner in his dreams. If he had someone he trusted. Someone to help.

__________

Fernando had replied to her text - he was up. She threw a nightshirt on her way out to the iMac and fired up Messages. His face appeared on the screen.

“Don’t you know it’s ten to six?” she said with a smirk.

“Sometimes you’re having too much fun. We were onto something moving fast with the Ukrainian contact. I told ‘em I could offer euros immediately, if they could sweeten the offer. They dropped the price, so a courier is taking twenty three to the airport right now.”

“My God that’s wonderful!”

“They’re all alive and look healthy - I have some new video. Two could speak English and answered some questions, but you never know if they have a gun to their head. It’s been a few months at least for them At least by their hair. They’re really lucky to be alive.”

“What about that five..”

“The 5C-D?” he saw her nod. “It’s real and these guys went through it.”

“I thought it was just some tinfoil hat rumor!” There was some astonishment in her voice.

“They don’t look like D level - probably C. Good thing they’re going directly to the Swedish place. They’re great with PTSD and have the best medical specialists.”

She was having a hard time wrapping her mind around what a C process would do. She couldn’t remember its magic number be never thought it would be relevant. After the rest downsizing work it was discovered other scales were stable. The current scale was called A. B turned out to be unstable after a few weeks, but the label stuck. Then there were two others, but she thought it was a rumor or theoretical. Everything was complicated now. She’d have to DuckDuckGo it after the call.

“What about the Sudanese?” she asked.

“Still working on it. The government’s got their hand in the till. You know how it goes. We’re budgeted for thirty percent corruption.”

She relied on him as the numbers guy. She was the psych major. They made a good team.

“So when are you going over?” he asked.

“I’ll pick him up around ten and be up there by eleven. I’ve gotta show her how the house works. It’ll be a good introduction for him too.” She paused. er expression told him she had something else on her mind. Finally she continued “think any more about the bat signal”?

“It won’t hurt. Maybe it’s a good idea. Have a suggestion?”

“Well .. it has to be memorable and not in normal speech. I was thinking about a phrase. Try this: “nature is a one call you can’t put on hold”

“Where did you get that?” he laughed

“I’m watching The Tick.”

“I’ll take your word.”

“It’s a show on tv. Here’s another: “savory cheese puffs, made inedible by time and fate.”

He was shaking his head. “You’ve got a warped sense of humor. Pick one and tell him.”

__________

She gave Taylor a lecture on staying safe in the travel seat while Thomas showed him the belts and swung the protective screen in place. She moved the latch in place with her thumb. There would be no way he could get out without a normal human helping. Next she carefully placed it in her purse and securing it with some handkerchiefs. She zipped the purse shut and shouldered it.

“I’m off..” she said to Thomas as she picked up the Portahouse 10’s travel case. Somehow she suspected Mary hadn’t followed through on the house. She should have done that herself.

__________

“Jolene! Did you bring him with you?”

Mary had dressed for the occasion and was sporting a perfume you might imagine being popular in the fifties. Jolene raised her purse with a small smile.

Her eyes were wide open as she stared at the purse. “Oooo! take him out!”

“First things first. I’ll show you how his house works.”

“Something must have gone wrong. They haven’t delivered it.”

“ I can track it down. Do you have the invoice?”

Mary peached through a stack of papers and finally found it. Jolene noticed order hadn’t been placed until Thursday night. It wouldn’t be here for a week.

“Ummm.. I’ll go on line and check” she took out her phone and pretended to type away. “It’s going to be a week. I bought a temporary room along just in case. If you don’t mind I’ll work with the company and see if I can light a fire.”

“You can’t trust these guys.” Mary muttered, relieved that someone else was taking over the work.

The Portahouse went on a table and Jolene plugged in its power supply and switched it on.

“OK .. this is a portable house I rented. We’ll get you one just like it for travel. It has a little bedroom and bathroom along with a wardrobe. It’s not huge, but it’s sort of like a small hotel room.” She raised a cover at the rear and motioned Mary over. “The clear tank’s fresh water and this black one is waste. When you get a red light on a tank it means change it. Usually it’ll go about a week, but I change the fresh water every day.”

She demonstrated taking off and attaching a tank.

“You try it now.”

Mary fumbled at first, but seemed to have it down after a few tries. Jolene moved on to a blue metal canister.

“This is compressed air for water pressure. They last three or four days. I put a few extras in the case. It’s like the water - green light means okay, red tells you to replace it.”

“It’s so complicated” Mary complained.

Taylor could hear the two giant women talking, but couldn’t make out much. One sounded like an old woman. They went on for what seemed like an hour. He has been trying to push the screen cover off, but the latch she set was way to strong. Today wasn’t shaping up well.

Jolene handed her food packets, emergency numbers and other necessities and made comments on the master list. Finally they were ready. She unzipped her purse and took out his seat.

“In there? It’s so little.”

He could see her peering through the screen. A wave of panic swept over him. She had that silver-bluish stiffly-permed hair old women sport and deep wrinkles. She had to be over seventy-five.

Jolene popped the latch and swung the screen open as she set him down on a countertop.

“You can unbuckle now Mr Goodman. I’d like you to meet the person who saved your life .. Miss Walters.”

Mary gave a wave and smiled like a nervous twelve year old schoolgirl.

“You can call me Mary…”

The counter was just above waist level for the giants. He couldn’t run from them. The fall could be fatal They’d just catch him anyway. But everything in his body was screaming FLEE!

“… what can I call you?” she continued.

“Taylor..”

“Oh that’s a nice name. We have a lot to talk about.”

He turned to Jolene. She could see his panic.

“I need to use the…” he told her.

“Oh.. okay.”

She put her hand down and moved him over to the Portahouse.

Jolene turned to Mary.

“Sign these papers and release the remainder from escrow and we’re done.”

Mary called her money guy and told him to move the money. Jolene verified it had showed up in their account and sent a text to Fernando. Jolene tapped the Portahouse’s roof.

“c’mon out. She won’t bite”

Reluctantly he opened the door. If it had to be a giant why couldn’t it be someone his age?

Jolene put her hand down and moved him back to the counter. It’d be easier for Mary that way.

“Okay.. you two get to know each other. I’ll just sit over here and watch for awhile.”

The two of them talked awkwardly for a half hour. Taylor stayed away from asking for a lawyer or a phone - for now. This was exhausting. He’d have to figure out how to get out of here. At least there was the bat signal.

“Okay you guys” Jolene said. shouldering her bag. “I’ve got a ton work back at the office, but call day or night if there’s any problem. I can usually get here in an hour.”

The door closed and Taylor felt his blood pressure go up as the elderly giant moved closer.

“She’s such a nice girl, isn’t she?”

“I guess so.”

“Do you have anyone?”

Trick question. The right thing to say was probably no.

He shook his head. “I was getting married, but we broke up.”

A small smile appeared on Mary’s face.

“It must have been awful when they kidnapped you.”

“I don’t want to remember that.”

“I’m sorry. You look like you keep in shape. Could you take off your shirt so I can see?”

He just stood there. She moved in a bit closer.

“Look hon.. I asked you to take off your shirt. It’ll be a lot easier if you do it, but it’s coming off.”

She poured herself a glass of wine as he unbuttoned it.

“We ordered a lot of clothes in your size.”

He set the shirt on the counter. ‘don’t do it’ he thought hoping Jolene had forgotten something and would be back.

“Don’t be such a ‘fraidy cat. Come closer, I want to get a look at who I rescued.” She knelt for a better look.

He walked towards her staying to the right of the wine bottle. Not that it would give any cover, but…

“You don’t have to stare like that” he said.

It didn’t stop her.

“Your build is like uncle Rosco’s. He almost got into the Olympics you know.”

He watched nervously as she took a sip of wine - probably a good fraction of what he weighed.

“Look” he said with his most imploring tone. “I was kidnapped and held prisoner for months. I was downsized against my will. I’m so grateful you saved my life, but I need to talk to my friends and family. They’re probably hoping I’m still alive.”

She looked like she was considering what he said before speaking.

“That isn’t how it works. You would have been killed. No one else paid the ransom. Just me. The law says I’m your rightful guardian now so I decide what’s best. Besides.. part of the fee saved others.”

It was going to be pointless to argue with the giant right now.

“You’re going to have to use that little house box thing for awhile. They’re taking too long with the house I ordered.” She brought over the Portahouse and set it on the counter. “I have a board meeting soon, so I’m putting it up here for now. Just don’t run away. I think you’re too high up to jump. Do you have food in there?”

He shrugged.

She opened a can of cashews and put some on the counter along with some raisins.

“I think there’s water in there. Just stay here or I’ll have to put you in a cage.”

She spent a few minutes looking for something and came back with her purse. Kneeling down she looked at him.

“My uncle was in the Olympics you know..”

Then she walked out of the room. Either the door automatically locked or she had forgotten. Now what?

__________

The more detailed 2500 pixel final render goes to donors.

Description
Its glowing radium hands told her it was nearly twenty minutes to five. Another hour had gone by. Mary Walters decided she wasn’t getting back to sleep. She sat the ancient alarm clock down and sat up. Monday. So much was happening. She made her way to the kitchen and turned on the flame under the tea kettle.

Jolene was bringing him today. She’d been waiting for her own for almost two years. Marv left her two million when he died. It wasn’t much, but his will instructed her to spend it on something fun - something just for herself. Something “not un-extravagent” as he would say. So when she saw exactly what she wanted, she didn’t hesitate. Better yet, a good fraction of the fee helped the poor in third world countries and was deductible offsetting some of her gains this year. And most importantly she had saved someone’s life. It is rare when wins.

She took Mary’s checklist to the table and compared it to her handwritten list. A separate list was one of the tricks she had learned so people wouldn’t notice her memory wasn’t what it used to be. She’d noticed how older friends kept the secret for years and she was determined to be independent as long as she lived. Seventy seven really isn’t that old these days and people usually guessed she was in her sixties.

His house. She couldn’t remember if it had arrived. She’d ordered it - maybe it was here. It wasn’t on the table she had set aside and there weren’t any new boxes. Besides, Jolene was going to teach her how to use it and she was certain that hadn’t happened. Back to her version of the list.. There! It was being delivered this morning. She’d paid extra for fast shipping. The kettle was calling now. She turned off the flame and pulled it from the heat.

The new maid was coming on Tuesday. Hopefully this one would work out better. She didn’t trust Lucinda and demanded the agency fire her. This afternoon was patrons meeting at the Met. The food was always wonderful. She wondered what the doll man ate. Would he just take some of her food or would she have to buy special doll man food? She checked her notes to see if Jolene had gone over that. Ah! they eat what people eat. That made it easy. She could put him on the table when she ate. It was good Jolene had been spending so much time with her. There was almost too much to learn. She poured herself some tea and looked out the window. This side was just buildings, but the view at night was beautiful. The sitting room, overlooking the park, was better for the day.

__________ 
He was barely able to stop when it came down on top of him. He was trapped. Some kind of translucent blue material and round like a hemisphere. Then her laughter - Danielle’s laughter. He pushed against the thick plastic wall, but it was solid like it was glued to the road he’d been running on. He looked up. A huge hand held his prison in pace. A giant’s hand. Danielle’s hand.

SuddenlyTaylor woke up completely disoriented and in a cold sweat. This wasn’t a giant plastic bowl It wasn’t his bedroom. Slowly reality crept in. Nothing but nightmares with panic attacks tonight. Or was it morning by now? What was going to happen to him now? It’d been months since he had been free. Now he was a prisoner in his dreams. If he had someone he trusted. Someone to help.

__________

Fernando had replied to her text - he was up. She threw a nightshirt on her way out to the iMac and fired up Messages. His face appeared on the screen.

“Don’t you know it’s ten to six?” she said with a smirk.

“Sometimes you’re having too much fun. We were onto something moving fast with the Ukrainian contact. I told ‘em I could offer euros immediately, if they could sweeten the offer. They dropped the price, so a courier is taking twenty three to the airport right now.”

“My God that’s wonderful!”

“They’re all alive and look healthy - I have some new video. Two could speak English and answered some questions, but you never know if they have a gun to their head. It’s been a few months at least for them At least by their hair. They’re really lucky to be alive.”

“What about that five..”

“The 5C-D?” he saw her nod. “It’s real and these guys went through it.”

“I thought it was just some tinfoil hat rumor!” There was some astonishment in her voice.

“They don’t look like D level - probably C. Good thing they’re going directly to the Swedish place. They’re great with PTSD and have the best medical specialists.”

She was having a hard time wrapping her mind around what a C process would do. She couldn’t remember its magic number be never thought it would be relevant. After the rest downsizing work it was discovered other scales were stable. The current scale was called A. B turned out to be unstable after a few weeks, but the label stuck. Then there were two others, but she thought it was a rumor or theoretical. Everything was complicated now. She’d have to DuckDuckGo it after the call.

“What about the Sudanese?” she asked.

“Still working on it. The government’s got their hand in the till. You know how it goes. We’re budgeted for thirty percent corruption.”

She relied on him as the numbers guy. She was the psych major. They made a good team.

“So when are you going over?” he asked.

“I’ll pick him up around ten and be up there by eleven. I’ve gotta show her how the house works. It’ll be a good introduction for him too.” She paused. er expression told him she had something else on her mind. Finally she continued “think any more about the bat signal”?

“It won’t hurt. Maybe it’s a good idea. Have a suggestion?”

“Well .. it has to be memorable and not in normal speech. I was thinking about a phrase. Try this: “nature is a one call you can’t put on hold”

“Where did you get that?” he laughed

“I’m watching The Tick.”

“I’ll take your word.”

“It’s a show on tv. Here’s another: “savory cheese puffs, made inedible by time and fate.”

He was shaking his head. “You’ve got a warped sense of humor. Pick one and tell him.”

__________

She gave Taylor a lecture on staying safe in the travel seat while Thomas showed him the belts and swung the protective screen in place. She moved the latch in place with her thumb. There would be no way he could get out without a normal human helping. Next she carefully placed it in her purse and securing it with some handkerchiefs. She zipped the purse shut and shouldered it.

“I’m off..” she said to Thomas as she picked up the Portahouse 10’s travel case. Somehow she suspected Mary hadn’t followed through on the house. She should have done that herself.

__________

“Jolene! Did you bring him with you?”

Mary had dressed for the occasion and was sporting a perfume you might imagine being popular in the fifties. Jolene raised her purse with a small smile.

Her eyes were wide open as she stared at the purse. “Oooo! take him out!”

“First things first. I’ll show you how his house works.”

“Something must have gone wrong. They haven’t delivered it.”

“ I can track it down. Do you have the invoice?”

Mary peached through a stack of papers and finally found it. Jolene noticed order hadn’t been placed until Thursday night. It wouldn’t be here for a week.

“Ummm.. I’ll go on line and check” she took out her phone and pretended to type away. “It’s going to be a week. I bought a temporary room along just in case. If you don’t mind I’ll work with the company and see if I can light a fire.”

“You can’t trust these guys.” Mary muttered, relieved that someone else was taking over the work.

The Portahouse went on a table and Jolene plugged in its power supply and switched it on.

“OK .. this is a portable house I rented. We’ll get you one just like it for travel. It has a little bedroom and bathroom along with a wardrobe. It’s not huge, but it’s sort of like a small hotel room.” She raised a cover at the rear and motioned Mary over. “The clear tank’s fresh water and this black one is waste. When you get a red light on a tank it means change it. Usually it’ll go about a week, but I change the fresh water every day.”

She demonstrated taking off and attaching a tank.

“You try it now.”

Mary fumbled at first, but seemed to have it down after a few tries. Jolene moved on to a blue metal canister.

“This is compressed air for water pressure. They last three or four days. I put a few extras in the case. It’s like the water - green light means okay, red tells you to replace it.”

“It’s so complicated” Mary complained.

Taylor could hear the two giant women talking, but couldn’t make out much. One sounded like an old woman. They went on for what seemed like an hour. He has been trying to push the screen cover off, but the latch she set was way to strong. Today wasn’t shaping up well.

Jolene handed her food packets, emergency numbers and other necessities and made comments on the master list. Finally they were ready. She unzipped her purse and took out his seat.

“In there? It’s so little.”

He could see her peering through the screen. A wave of panic swept over him. She had that silver-bluish stiffly-permed hair old women sport and deep wrinkles. She had to be over seventy-five.

Jolene popped the latch and swung the screen open as she set him down on a countertop.

“You can unbuckle now Mr Goodman. I’d like you to meet the person who saved your life .. Miss Walters.”

Mary gave a wave and smiled like a nervous twelve year old schoolgirl.

“You can call me Mary…”

The counter was just above waist level for the giants. He couldn’t run from them. The fall could be fatal They’d just catch him anyway. But everything in his body was screaming FLEE!

“… what can I call you?” she continued.

“Taylor..”

“Oh that’s a nice name. We have a lot to talk about.”

He turned to Jolene. She could see his panic.

“I need to use the…” he told her.

“Oh.. okay.”

She put her hand down and moved him over to the Portahouse.

Jolene turned to Mary.

“Sign these papers and release the remainder from escrow and we’re done.”

Mary called her money guy and told him to move the money. Jolene verified it had showed up in their account and sent a text to Fernando. Jolene tapped the Portahouse’s roof.

“c’mon out. She won’t bite”

Reluctantly he opened the door. If it had to be a giant why couldn’t it be someone his age?

Jolene put her hand down and moved him back to the counter. It’d be easier for Mary that way.

“Okay.. you two get to know each other. I’ll just sit over here and watch for awhile.”

The two of them talked awkwardly for a half hour. Taylor stayed away from asking for a lawyer or a phone - for now. This was exhausting. He’d have to figure out how to get out of here. At least there was the bat signal.

“Okay you guys” Jolene said. shouldering her bag. “I’ve got a ton work back at the office, but call day or night if there’s any problem. I can usually get here in an hour.”

The door closed and Taylor felt his blood pressure go up as the elderly giant moved closer.

“She’s such a nice girl, isn’t she?”

“I guess so.”

“Do you have anyone?”

Trick question. The right thing to say was probably no.

He shook his head. “I was getting married, but we broke up.”

A small smile appeared on Mary’s face.

“It must have been awful when they kidnapped you.”

“I don’t want to remember that.”

“I’m sorry. You look like you keep in shape. Could you take off your shirt so I can see?”

He just stood there. She moved in a bit closer.

“Look hon.. I asked you to take off your shirt. It’ll be a lot easier if you do it, but it’s coming off.”

She poured herself a glass of wine as he unbuttoned it.

“We ordered a lot of clothes in your size.”

He set the shirt on the counter. ‘don’t do it’ he thought hoping Jolene had forgotten something and would be back.

“Don’t be such a ‘fraidy cat. Come closer, I want to get a look at who I rescued.” She knelt for a better look.

He walked towards her staying to the right of the wine bottle. Not that it would give any cover, but…

“You don’t have to stare like that” he said.

It didn’t stop her.

“Your build is like uncle Rosco’s. He almost got into the Olympics you know.”

He watched nervously as she took a sip of wine - probably a good fraction of what he weighed.

“Look” he said with his most imploring tone. “I was kidnapped and held prisoner for months. I was downsized against my will. I’m so grateful you saved my life, but I need to talk to my friends and family. They’re probably hoping I’m still alive.”

She looked like she was considering what he said before speaking.

“That isn’t how it works. You would have been killed. No one else paid the ransom. Just me. The law says I’m your rightful guardian now so I decide what’s best. Besides.. part of the fee saved others.”

It was going to be pointless to argue with the giant right now.

“You’re going to have to use that little house box thing for awhile. They’re taking too long with the house I ordered.” She brought over the Portahouse and set it on the counter. “I have a board meeting soon, so I’m putting it up here for now. Just don’t run away. I think you’re too high up to jump. Do you have food in there?”

He shrugged.

She opened a can of cashews and put some on the counter along with some raisins.

“I think there’s water in there. Just stay here or I’ll have to put you in a cage.”

She spent a few minutes looking for something and came back with her purse. Kneeling down she looked at him.

“My uncle was in the Olympics you know..”

Then she walked out of the room. Either the door automatically locked or she had forgotten. Now what?

__________

The more detailed 2500 pixel final render goes to donors.