Halloween Mis-Wish

Chapter 1
A Halloween Mis-Wish

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Chapter Description: For Ben, a careless wish on Halloween is just the beginning...

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My name’s Ben.

I answer to Benny, now, when my kid brother enforces the rules, as he enjoys doing at any opportunity.

I look nine years old, but I am in reality a 35-year-old man who did a very foolish thing.

For many reasons, but mainly because my kid brother has forbidden me to tell anyone the truth, I have kept quiet about my incredible story.

I started this secret story, however, to keep a record of the way my life has turned upside-down. Matt doesn’t know about the encrypted file I have managed to hide on his computer.

Well, it was my computer, but like everything else I owned, my possessions belong to Matt now.

If I complain, he reminds me that little kids can’t own property.

??????

The day everything changed started out as a fairly typical one.

Ben, who had sequestered himself inside his apartment on a chilly October morning, sat on the edge of his bed, staring at an unusual amulet held in his hands.

He followed the simple silver chain holding the amulet with one of his fingertips. The 35-year-old man held the amulet higher until the glassy oval glistened in a sunbeam shining through his bedroom window.

Ben contemplated, once again, what he should do, if anything, with his discovery.

He stared so intensely at the yellow-green glass dangling on the silver chain that he became completely lost in thought.

Over the course of days since he purchased the amulet from the odd woman at her weird shop of miscellany, he had considered whether he shouldn’t make an appointment with a psychiatrist.

He held the amulet in his right hand. “It’s just a chunk of polished glass,” he told himself, not for the first time. “It can’t possibly...”

Ben heard a noise outside his bedroom. He got to his feet and walked toward his desk, but before he could slip the amulet into a drawer, the door to his room opened, without so much as an inquiring knock.

Ben dropped the amulet into his desk drawer and slammed the drawer closed before he turned to face his younger brother.

Matt smiled an endearing grin toward his older brother.

Ben, in return, frowned. “Matt, what do you need?”

Matt stared at the desk, curious about whatever his brother had so hurriedly concealed.

He approached Ben, and put a hand on his brother’s shoulder. “It’s like this,” Matt said. “I need $800.”

Noticing how Ben’s frown grew at the mention of money, Matt plunged ahead. “I ran into some problems with my car and I need it fixed..”

“I can’t help you,” Ben said. “I’m tapped out until I get my income tax refund.”

Matt, uninvited, took a seat in the chair in front of his brother’s desk. “What was that you hid in the drawer?”

Ben failed to stop himself from shooting a guilty glance toward the closed desk drawer. “Nothing,” Ben retorted.

Matt reached to open the drawer, but Ben, with a surge of irritation, knocked his brother’s hand aside.

“Keep out of my desk,” Ben said. “In fact, haven’t I told you not to come into my room without being invited.”

“You are so uptight, man,” Matt said. “What’s so secret?”

“Nothing,” Ben insisted. “And that is also what you are getting out of me! Nothing!”

Matt leaped up from his seat. “Come on, dude,” he said. You have the money. I know you do.”

Ben sighed. “Yeah, I have money,” he said in a weary tone. “I have a job. That’s what people do to get money.”

Ben sat down in an armchair and stared at his younger brother.

About 12 years separated the brothers in age. They looked similar, but Ben stood a couple of inches taller than his six-foot, two-inch tall sibling.

“Yeah, well, I have a job too,” Matt announced.

Ben leaned forward. “You do?”

“Yeah, I’ve been waitering,” he explained. “It’s good money, but do you know how many tables I would have to wait on to make enough money to fix my car.”

Ben affected a yawn. “Save your breath, little bro,” he said.

“C’mon, hand it over, Ben.”

Ben sank back into the chair, feeling tired of his brother’s pleading. “No, Matt. I told you last time that you were not going to get bailed out any more by me.”

“C’mon man, my girlfriend is counting on this,” he said. “We have a big romantic weekend planned. I need the car to be running...”

Ben laughed. “Get a room.”

Matt looked slyly at his brother, then muscled past him to attempt again to learn what was in the drawer.

A sudden thought had occured to him that Ben had probably stashed some cash in the drawer.

But, after jerking open the drawer, all he saw was a strange oval that looked like a polished piece of yellow-green glass.

Ben closed in and grabbed the object before Matt could react

“Look, I really needed some time to myself,” Ben said. His fist closed over the object.

“So, if you don’t mind, little bro,” Ben said and motioned to the door.

“No way,” Matt objected. “What the hell is that thing?”

Desperate to be rid of his aggravating sibling, Ben took another approach.

“Give me an hour,” Ben requested. He even shoved a ten dollar bill at Matt. ”Go get something to eat and come back in an hour, ok?”

“An hour?” Matt asked suspiciously. “Why? So you can jack off? A ten?"

“For someone who wants a favor from me, you are starting to piss me off, little bro,” Ben growled impatiently.

“Gimme a $50, and I’ll leave,” Matt offered.

“It’s not a bribe!” Ben exclaimed. ”I am trying to be nice!”

Matt rubbed his chin and then brushed his hand through his light brown hair, as if considering whether to continue to push for more.

“Now,” Ben said, his voice rising, “Get out!”

“Hey, I live here too,” Matt reminded his brother.

“Please, leave,” Ben said.

Matt stormed off to Ben’s former study, which the brothers had converted into a bedroom for Matt after he got evicted from his apartment.”

“Fuckin’ dick,” Matt muttered under his breath.

Ben would have preferred compete privacy with the entire apartment to himself, but he took what he could get.

He locked his bedroom door, collapsed back onto his bed and slipped the amulet from his pocket.

He admired the soft green-yellow glow of the glass until he began to feel more calm.

He remembered the odd woman’s instructions to him after he purchased the amulet.

As he recalled his conversation with the strange woman, his nervousness returned. He had worked up the nerve to try the amulet when Matt interrupted.

Now, all his hopes warred with his rational doubts about trusting in something as patently absurd as a magical amulet.

“It’s probably a piece of junk,” Ben whispered aloud as he let the amulet twist on its silver chain.

But, he could not help but remember how convincing the strange woman had been in revealing the amulet’s amazing power.

Meanwhile, in his own room, Matt messed around, searching for money anywhere. He waded through piles of junk, including empty pop cans, pizza boxes and even used condoms.

“Nothing! Damn it!” Matt swore after finding only a handful of change in a ceramic bowl on the dresser.

He looked at his watch and decided to leave the apartment.

?????

Back in Ben’s room, he remained mesmerized by the amulet, which slowly rotated on its silver chain, glowing brilliant yellow to dull green, depending on the way the light shone through its transparent shell.

“What am I waiting for?” Ben said. He got off the bed and returned to his desk. He removed a scrap sheet of paper and read the old woman’s scrawled notes.

He made the Latin chants that the woman had scribbled on the paper for his benefit.

Ben felt a strange sensation, as if a surge of energy ran from the amulet and through his hand. He dismissed it as his imagination, but as he finished repeating the stange Latin phrases, he felt energy course through him, starting in the hand holding the amulet, running along his arm and then throughout his entire body, leaving him with a bizarre tingling across his skin.

Then, he concentrated for a moment, making sure he had the wording of his wish down.

Matt walked out of his room, still in a huff, heading toward his brother’s bedroom.

The short trek down the hall allowed him to work up even more anger.

Ben gripped the smooth glass.

Although his throat felt dry, he spoke in a clear voice. “I wish I was nine....”

The unexpected and untimely pounding on the door of his room startled him.

Ben cursed as he heard his brother pounding on the door.

“Hey, Ben, what the fuck are you doing in there?” Matt shouted through the door. “We need to have a talk, dude!”

Ben flung open the door. “Yeah, we do,” he agreed. “You can’t even give me 60 minutes.”

“Well, it’s just...” Matt began, rather lamely, only for Ben to cut him off.

“Well, I am glad you have a job, because you need to look for a new place to live,” Ben said with a raised voice.

Then, with Matt looking stunned, Ben slammed the door.

“Asshole!” Matt said. He turned and left the apartment, slamming the door closed behind him.

Ben, once he got his breathing under control, started again with the process the woman had detailed for him.

He clasped the amulet and said his wish for the second time.

“I wish I was 19,” Ben said fervently.

He waited, expecting something, anything, but not really feeling anything.

He tried to imagine what he had expected. Had he anticipated the world would turn back to that time in his life with a massive whirl, everything being as it had been when he had been a young man of 19.

In the stillness of the room, nothing seemed different.

Ben tossed the amulet aside, and it landed on his bed.

“I should have known,” Ben said with a dejected voice. “That was 50 bucks down the drain.”

Sorely disappointed, he can’t help but berate himself for swallowing the old woman’s lies. But she had seemed so genuine.

He is so consumed with buyer’s remorse, that he didn’t notice the slight changes already effecting him.

The first changes are barely noticable to him.

His slight gut began to lessen.

Almost five years worth of the consequences of a decreased metabolism melt away.

Ben glanced at his watch and made the quick decision that he had time for a shower.

Better now, he realized, than to let Matt get back and maybe squander all the hot water as he usually does.

He walked into the bathroom, began to undress, and then leaned into the shower and twisted the faucet.

He looked more like 29 than 35, but failing to glance in the mirror, Ben remained unaware of the changes.

He took some deep breaths, inhaled the steam.

Still feeling ripped off, he is more determined than ever not to keep getting ripped off by Matt.

“It’s time to show him who is the bigger brother,” Ben muttered as he lathered up with a bar of soap.

The seeds of his overall discontent had all started back when he was much younger, and Matt got all he wanted from their parents.

And, no matter how much he tried, Ben never seemed to let go of that fact, even after their parents were gone.

But his sense of duty won out over his feelings of resentment, and he had always been there for Matt.

He had tried helping him for a while, but because of Matt’s reckless irresponsibility, it had grown into an impossible task.

Meanwhile, almost as if being washed away by the jet of warm water, Ben’s body seems to be getting slighter while at the same time his muscle definition looked a little enhanced.

In the course of his time beneath the jet of water, he had probably gotten to about age 23 or 24, an age that placed him even younger than Matt.

He felt invigorated, strangely energized, like he could take on the world. A surge of emotions ran through him.

Ben turned off the water and stepped out of the shower. He noticed he had even gotten semi-hard during his time beneath the water.

He didn’t think much of it as he wrapped a towel around his waist. That’s when he excitedly took note of the absence of his gut.

With a surge of shocked amazement, Ben ripped the towel off again and stare down at his flat stomach and even let his gaze fall even lower.

“It worked!” Ben exclaimed jubilantly.

He looked into the mirror and saw himself as he had looked in his early 20s.

“Unbelievable!” Ben exclaimed.

He toweled off some as he realized he was dripping all over the floor. “It really worked,” he said.

His voice registered his amazement.

He even released a giddy laugh. “And this is just the beginning,” Ben said.

He admired his reflection in the steamy mirror over the sink.

“I don’t even remember being this attractive at the time,” Ben whispered as he rubbed his face.

He chuckled again. “Yeah, I am going to make a whole lot of other changes, beginning with my little brother,” Ben declared.

He could not tear his gaze away from the mirror. “I look as attractive as Matt,” he said. “Hell, even more.”

He curled back an arm to admire a bulging bicep.

Ben flexed his tight abs and watched them ripple on his command. This action caused him to laugh joyfully as he headed to his room to pick out some clothes.

“Should have planned ahead,” Ben admonished himself. “My clothes aren’t going to fit well on my new 19-year-old body.”

He searched for some older garments and was getting dressed as best he could when he heard Matt return.

“Still here, old man?" Matt joked as he entered the apartment.

Ben, still feeling giddy, pulled on a T-shirt.

“Oh, be right with you, little bro,” Ben called out from inside his bedroom.

Ben laughed again as he predicted how much fun he was about to have at his brother’s expense.

Ben left his room and came face-to-face with Matt in the living room, oblivious to the fact that his body continued to slip down ever so slowly.

In fact, he no longer looked 19 years old, but instead looked like a 17-year-old youth.

With a shock of recognition, Matt immediately recognized the body he spent so many years looking up to.

“Ben?” Matt said hesitantly. “What the shit happened to you?”

Ben laughed. “Amazing, isn’t it?” The older brother asked. “Well, I guess I can let you know now.”

Ben told his kid brother the entire story about buying the weird amulet and the woman promising that it could grant its owner a single wish.

“And it worked,” Ben finished. “It freakin’ worked!”

Staring at his amazed brother, Ben laughed at Matt’s open mouth.

“So,” Matt asked slowly, “you, what, wished to be 16?”

“No-oh,” Ben replied.

He felt the looseness of his clothes, which had been tight on his body only a few minutes earlier.

He shook his head, aggravated at Matt’s density. “Not six-TEEN!”

He cleared his throat, surprised by the fact his voice kept cracking.

“Nineteen, moron,” Ben said impatiently.

Matt laughed and noticed that his brother was no longer taller. “Ben, I know what you looked like when you were 19,” Matt said.

Ben felt a shock of fear grip him.

“Go check yourself in a mirror,” Matt suggested. “You look 16, 15 maybe.”

Ben noticed again how ill-fitting his clothes had become.

He headed to the nearest mirror, which happened to be one on the back of his bedroom door.

“No,” Ben gasped as he looked in the mirror.

He stared at a peaked face and gangly body staring back at him.

“I look like I did when I started high school,” Ben said in a shocked, hushed tone.

At the same time, he became aware of a much larger reflection behind him as he looked in the mirror.

His brother’s tone sounded smug. “Looks like your wish didn’t work so well,” Matt said, approaching fast behind the still dwindling form of his older brother.

Ben whirled to face Matt, but in the process he felt his jeans sliding down over his skinny legs

“But...but...” Ben stammered.

Confused, he looked back to the mirror, groaned inwardly as he saw the reflection of a 12-year-old boy in the glass.

Matt let out a low guttoral laugh. “Nice one, big brother,” Matt said in a condescending tone.

Ben felt a chill as he noticed how much larger his younger brother is starting to look.

“Don’t just stare at me,” Ben said, his voice screeching. “Do something to help!”

“Do what to help?” Matt asked. “You want me to go buy you some kid’s clothes?”

Ben turned and started to run back toward his room, but he got tangled up in his jeans and tripped halfway there.

Matt, who enjoyed the turned tables, took a couple of steps toward his brother, leaned down and lifted him by his loose T-shirt.

Matt carried Ben into his room and tossed him toward the bed.

“Wait..whoooah!” Ben gasped.

He landed on the covers and noticed the hunk of glass that caused the mess. The amulet bounced when Ben’s smaller form impacted with the mattress.

The greenish gleam of the amulet also caught Matt’s eye.

Looking lost on the huge bed, Ben stared helplessly at his enormous brother, who watched with his massive arms folded across his chest as Ben’s body literally whithered away inside his own clothes.

Ben felt paralyzed by the sensation of being swallowed in his clothing.

He saw Matt reach for the amulet.

“Hey, that is mine,” Ben protested in a weak, feeble voice.

Matt’s fingers closed around the amulet, provoking Ben to knock it out of his brother’s grasp.

They both stood frozen as they watched the amulet fall to the hardwood floor, shattering into pieces.

Ben felt his stomach drop in dismay at the same time a shudder passed through his small body, signaling the conclusion of his change.

Leaping off the bed, and leaving the heavy jeans behind, Ben kneeled to look at the shards of glass scattered across the floor at his small feet.

“Looks like you are more 9 than 19, Benny,” Matt said with obvious satisfaction in his tone.

“Nine,” Ben cried in dismay.

The number rang in his ears and in his brain.

“Nine,” he repeated softly.

With lurching clarity, he remember the interrupted wish. He even heard the words he had uttered as they echoed in his head.

“I wish I was nine.”

“Matt, you moron! You caused this!”

“I caused this?” Matt reacted indignantly. Then, adopting a devious smile, he asked, “What are you talking about, twerp?”

Ben felt tears squeeze up behind his eyes.

“You interrupted me in the middle of the wish,” Ben said in a rush of words. “All I wanted was sixty minutes!”

He felt emotions wash ove him. Anger. Frustration. Helplessness.

“Shit, I can’t be taking care of a kid,” Matt said, more to himself, as he ignored Ben’s rant.

Hearing the word “kid” used by his brother, Ben stopped and stood there, horrified, as he looked down again at the broken amulet, and suddenly conscious of his little body.

He felt swamped by the oversized T-shirt hiding his boxers, which he had to hold up with one hand.

“I barely can take care of myself,” Matt continued talking aloud. “Ben, you dick! What the fuck did you do?”

Ben tried to retain a grip on his emotions, which seemed out of kilter. “It wasn’t my fault!” left his mouth in a childish wail

“Yeah, right,” Matt snapped. “Well, you can have your fucking hour, and when I come back, you better have fixed this.”

Matt lowered himself and reached into Ben’s jeans and pulled out his brother’s wallet.

He looked defiantly down at his diminished brother. “I’m gonna go drop my car off,” Matt said.

“You can’t have that,” Ben shouted and rush forward to make a grab for the wallet in his b rother’s hand.

“Yes, I can,” Matt said.

With a smirk on his face, he pulled out Ben’s I.D. and held it in front of his brother’s boyish face. “Does this look like you anymore?” Matt taunted.

“No,” Ben said miserably, sniffing back as tears welled from his eyes.

“But Matt, you have got to help me,” Ben begged. “Please.”

He lifted his eyes toward his huge brother. “I can’t be a little kid,” Ben insisted.

“What the hell do you want me to do?” Matt yelled. “You can go find that lady who sold that thing to you. I am out of here.”

Ben tried to race after his brother, but he lost the boxers in the process and still found his little legs unable to keep pace.

“Matt, don’t go,” Ben tried one last time. “I’m sorry, ok?”

Matt put his hand around the door knob.

“Matt, will you just listen?” Ben pleaded.

“Listen to what?” Matt wanted to know. “My kid brother screaming? Fuck that!”

The slammed door reverberated in the silence of the empty apartment once Matt departed.

Still half in shock, Ben trotted slowly over to the sofa. He stopped to pick up his boxer shorts, clinching them in his tiny fist.

He had to crawl and scoot over the cushions before he finally was able to rest his back against the sofa and stare blankly across the room.

More than anything else, Ben felt extremely small. He huddled within his monstrously large T-shirt and drew his knees up beneath his chin.

He sat on the couch until he became thoroughly sick of staring at the wall.

A billion things ran through his mind, but everything became a anxiety-inducing blur.

He edged off the sofa and revisited his bedroom. He stepped close to the glass amulet laying in shards at his small bare feet .

He got onto his knees and tried to gather the splinters of yellow-green glass.

Ben stopped and stared at his smaller hands and fingers as he picked up the large fragments. He opened his desk drawer and deposited the fragments inside it.

He rotated his head, getting a good look at his now enormous room, almost unable to comprehend how much bigger everything appears.

He left his room and entered the bathroom.

With tentative steps, Ben approached the scale on the floor near the sink.

He pushed his tiny toes right up to the edge of the scale.

Taking a deep breath, Ben hopped on to the scale, for the moment more curious than afraid.

He glanced down and saw that the scale barely reached 70 pounds! He had lost almost 120 pounds!

Ben jumped off the scale and felt the cold tiles beneath his feet.

Suddenly, he heard someone behind him.

"Weighing yourself, little bro?" Matt wore a gloating smirk as he looked down at his "little" brother.

"Or shit, I could even call you son now, eh?"

"Shut up Matt!" Ben retorted in a shrill voice that deeply embarrassed him.

His brain continued to reel from the discovery of his pint-sized weight.

"Come on out here," Matt said. "Check out all the shit I bought for you."

When Ben didn’t respond quickly, Matt grabbed him roughly, clamping a huge hand on Ben’s skinny forearm.

Pulled along by his much bigger brother, Ben struggled to pull down the hem of his T-shirt, which reached to about his knees.

He felt hocked at how easily Matt managed to pull him along.

Once in the living room, Matt released his grasp on his brother. Ben found himself surrounded by a forest of shopping bags.

"How did you get all this?" Ben asked as he again climbed, with some effort, onto the sofa.

Matt waved his brother’s credit card in his face. "With this."

"Damn you!"

"Oooohhh, language...."

Ben struggled to seat himself comfortably on the too-large cushions of the sofa.

"Hey, don’t get so glum, I got you some things, too," Matt said.

Ben folded his arms across his chest and tried to look defiant.

Matt, grinning, grabbed a bag from Gap Kids and tossed it onto Ben’s lap.

Ben took the bag as if it might bite.

"Go on, open it, little dude."

Ben put one hand inside the bag.

"Come on, I don’t have all day here," Matt said with a mock smile.

"Hope you like it and I hope I guessed your size right," Matt continued as he watched Ben explore the contents of the shopping bag.

Ben pulled out a pair of kid’s pants and a T-shirt with some cartoon animal emblazoned across the front.

Matt snickered. "Yeah, the salesgirl was telling me it’s what all the kids are wearing now."

Ben looked aghast.

"Hey, dig a little deeper in the bag," Matt said. "There’s some undies, too."

"What?" Ben asked. He felt inside the bag.

Matt watched his brother pull out the impossibly tiny briefs.

"Like ’em?"

Ben swallowed hard.

"How did I do?" Matt asked.

"I don’t want these!" Ben threw the clothes on the sofa next to him.

He looked up at Matt. "I need your help figuring out how to get back to normal," Ben explained.

"Like I fucking know a thing about this magic kind of shit," Matt complained. "Where did you get it again?"

Ben told his brother that he got the amulet at a downtown shop. "Maybe we could go there," he asked hopefully.

"How about I drop your ass off at daycare," Matt suggested instead. "I gotta go see my girlfriend."

He finished up his statement by reaching down to mess up Ben’s hair.

He patted Ben on the back. "Your hair looks a lot lighter now," Matt observed.

"Stop that!"

"Come on, there’s a daycare place down the road," Matt said. "I’ll be driving your car, bud...."

"I am NOT going to daycare," Ben said as stoutly as he could manage. "You can drop me off at that damn store. I will take care of this mess on my own...and then you will be sorry."

"Yeah, right, fucker," Matt said. "I’ll drop you where I want to.

"Besides, you’ll be paying for it anyway, no skin off my back..."

Ben balled his hands into fists. "Just shut up," he yelled. "I can’t think."

He grabbed the clothes. "Just give me time to put these on."

"Fine, I’ll be in my room," Matt said. "I gotta make some phone calls."

Matt walked away and closed the door to his room behind him.

Alone, Ben slipped out of the huge T-shirt.

He felt his heart beating fast. "He’s gotta be pulling my chain" Ben said aloud.

He knew that Matt always did like to get the better of him.

Ben pulled on the little boy briefs. "Oh christ!" Ben said as he surveyed the tight little briefs.

He quickly pulled on the jeans and t-shirt.

He saw his bare feet poking out from the bottom of the jeans.

"Matt! What about shoes?"

"Oh shit, forgot about those!" Matt yelled back from behind his closed door, "But you have a masters degree, figure it out!"

Ben marched down the hall to Matt’s room. He stretched out his hand and turned the door knob. "Matt, I can’t go around in bare feet!"

"Wear some socks then," Matt said nonchalantly, "and get the fuck out of here....I’m busy!"

"What are you doing?" Ben tried to squeeze around his brother.

Matt pushed him back into the hall and slammed the door, locking it this time

"Stay out you little punk!"

Again, Ben balled his little hands into fists.

But, swallowing hard, he accepted the setback. He had little choice.

Besides, he discovered he needed to go to the bathroom rather urgently.

Ben raced down the hall to the bathroom.

He got another shock as he stood in front of the bowl ... it looked so big now.

If he sat on it, he imagined there might be a danger he would fall in.

Ben unzipped quickly because he needed to pee badly.

He felt like he was releasing a gallon into the bowl.

Ben giggled. "Must be the sudden shrinkage."

??????

Ben heard the key in the door and raced across the room. He froze in his tracks when Matt entered, carrying another shopping bag.

"Where did you go?" Ben complained. "When I got back from the bathroom, you had disappeared. How could you leave me alone like this?"

Matt loomed over his reduced brother. "I remembered what day this is, and I rushed out to get you a costume."

Ben looked confused. "A costume?"

Then, he looked past his brother to a calendar on the wall. He saw the date...October 31.

"It’s Halloween!" Matt said impatiently.

"Matt, what is in that bag?" Ben asked timidly.

"Well, I knew you liked Spiderman," Matt said, and he pulled a pint-sized red and blue costume from the bag. "I thought I’d take you trick-or-treating."

"I’m not really a kid!" Ben objected.

Matt shoved the Spiderman outfit into Ben’s hands. Then, he also presented him with a mask. "You’ll wear it, or else!"

Ben sighed and turned to walk toward his room to put on the costume, deciding humoring his overbearing sibling might be the best approach for the situation.

After he pulled on the costume, Ben stared at his reflection in the mirror on the back of his door. "I look so pathetic," he said, heaving a big sigh before leaving the room and looking for his brother.

When he returned, Matt began laughing loudly at the sight of his brother’s in a kid’s Halloween costume. "Where’s your camera, man?" Matt managed to ask. "I want to capture this moment."

"It’s broken," Ben lied.

"Awww, too bad," Matt said, stretching out a hand holding an orange-and-green pumpkin-shaped bag. "Time to get some candy!"

"Matt, what are you doing?" Ben asked. "We should start thinking of a way to change me back."

"Not now," Matt said.

Ben stepped in front of Matt. "Now!" Ben said, ashamed of the shrill quality of his piping voice.

"Well, what do you suggest we do?" Matt asked in a very aggravated tone.

"Well, ummm," Ben began.

The little boy continued to try to form cohesive thoughts.

Matt gave him a strange stare. "Waiting here, bud," he prodded.

"Well, we should..." Ben began to hear the edge of panic in his own voice. Whenever he tried to formulate a plan of action, his thoughts became fuzzy and just slipped away.

"The way I see it, Benny, you broke that magic gizmo-thingy," Matt said with an insufferable smirk on his handsome features. "Face it, man. You’re screwed!"

Ben remembered something about an amulet. He struggled desperately to recall details. Where had he obtained the amulet?

"Oh, I forgot to mention," Matt said. "My girlfriend is coming over later."

"Jessica?" Ben ventured.

Matt snorted in laughter. "I haven’t seen Jessica in more than a year," he said. "No, I mean Mandy."

Ben tried to ransack his brain for associations with Mandy, but he didn’t have any luck.

"And when she does get here, I am going to need you to scram for a while," Matt said.

"But..."

"Save it," Matt said, and he folded his fist around Ben’s little hand. "Let’s get going."

Ben, with little choice, allowed himself to be led out of the apartment.

"What’s wrong with me?" Ben wondered. "Why did my memory get so foggy?"

He finally managed to dredge up the memory of purchasing the amulet from the old woman at a downtown shop, but his mental images remained hazy, reminding him from waking from a dream in the way they tended to melt away before forming a dependable memory in his brain.

Ben managed to summon an image of his brother’s latest girlfriend. He had only met Mandy a few times. Why, he asked himself, would he have thought Matt was still seeing Jessica?

He shuddered as a chilling thought came to him.

His memories, or at least the most recent ones, seemed to be dropping out of his brain.

At the same time, his brain responded to unusual stimuli, such as cartoons meant for little kids.

"What if it is not just my body that is affected?" Ben turned over the possibility in his mind.

He didn’t want to even entertain the thought that he might end up a nine-year-old boy mentally as well as physically.

He fought down the impulse to beg for help from his brother. The playing field had been titled absurdly in Matt’s favor, and trying to persuade his brother to do anything for him would require careful strategy.

"I thought we’d go downtown for our trick-or-treating," Matt announced as he used Ben’s keys to lock the apartment and then used Ben’s car keys to open Ben’s car and then drive them toward the downtown section.

Ben used the little time needed for the trip to devise a plan.

????????

The jangling of bells rang out in the otherwise silent shop as Ben entered. The place looked different than he recalled through his admittedly hazy memories of the day he purchased the amulet.

He walked between the row of tall shelves toward the counter at the back of the cramped, dusty shop. The looming shelves managed to make him feel even smaller and claustrophobic at the same time.

As he got closer to the front counter, the front of the counter loomed up like a wall, driving home his lack of stature.

He stopped at the counter and his gaze darted to the left and right.

"Hello?" Ben said, but his thin voice sounded swallowed in the silence that began to make him feel uneasy. "Anyone here?"

A man emerged from the open door to a room behind the counter. "What do you want, kid?"

Ben found the man staring down at him, an expression of impatience evident on his wizened face. He looked ancient and rather sinister with a hooked nose and brushy eyebrows.

"I’m sorry, but I need to find out about something," Ben managed to push the words out of his mouth.

The man settled onto a stool located behind the counter. "Can’t you read?"

"Pardon me?" Ben asked, trying to stay polite.

"No candy," the old man said. "No trick-or-treaters welcome."

Ben looked down at his Spiderman costume and giggled. "Oh, no," he said. "I am not here for trick-or-treat."

The old man regarded him skeptically. "Look, kid, if you’ve got a school report, go to the library," he said. "I don’t have time for this."

"Wait," Ben cried out. "I’m a customer."

The man leaned forward like a scary vulture from his precarious perch on the stool. "You want to buy something?"

"Yes," Ben stammered. "I mean, no, actually, I already bought something."

The man withdrew most of his body back behind the counter, looking suspicious. "What do you want now?"

"There was a woman..." Ben began.

"Yeah, that was Mathilde," he said uncooperatively.

"Please, I need to see her."

The man’s features pulled tightly into a scowl. "She’s not here," he said.

"It’s important that..." Ben began, but the old man cut him off, starting to cough violently.

When he finished, the old man shook his head. "She left for Europe yesterday," he said. "Come back in a couple of weeks."

Ben felt rising despair in the pit of his stomach. "I don’t know if I can wait," he said.

"Well, you will just have to wait, won’t you?" He said. "That’s the trouble with you kids. No patience for anything..."

"I’m not a kid!" Ben exclaimed.

The old man looked affronted at Ben’s interruption, but not particularly surprised. He cast a disapproving gaze from the top of Ben’s head down to his shoes and gave a little snort. "What are you then?"

"I am a kid, but I am supposed to be a man," Ben said. "Mathilde sold me an amulet..."

"So?" The man pulled back into himself, decidedly hostile. "It worked then, didn’t it?"

"Worked?" Ben mouthed the word aloud. "Are you even listening to me?"

The old man climbed down off the stool. He sighed as he came from behind the counter. He didn’t look much taller than Ben.

"Do you have a receipt?"

"No, I don’t," Ben said, confused. Actually, if he could ever regain his wallet from Matt, he thought he did have one.

"But I don’t want my money back," he tried to explain. "The amulet, it got broken and..."

The old man appeared to freeze in his track. "Broken?" The old man echoed. "I can’t take back broken merchandise."

Ben lost his temper. "Listen to me, you old geezer," he said, his thin boy’s voice rising to a high pitch. "I am supposed to be 35 years old. That fuckin’ amulet turned me into a boy, and you are going to fix this..."

Suddenly, Ben felt a hand grasp the back of his costume. With a surprising display of strength, the old man pushed him ahead of him, his sinewy arm holding the struggling kid out away from his bony form.

"I think you could use some respect for your elders, miserable little whippersnapper," the old man raged.

Ben struggled in the old man’s grasp, but simply could not put up a fight.

"I don’t give refunds, especially not for broken merchandise without so much as a receipt," the old man said furiously. "Now don’t show your snot-nosed little face around this store again."

The door slammed with a rattling of glass and bells.

Ben ran down the street, tears streaming down his face.

He kept running past other kids, all of them dressed in their Halloween costumes, until suddenly he felt a strong hand grab his shoulder.

"Where the hell did you get to, Ben?"

Ben sniffed and looked up at a considerably irritated Matt.

He surprised himself, and his brother, by instinctively throwing his arms around his big brother’s waist. "I think I’m in trouble," he whispered.

"Yeah, I’ll say!" Matt complained. "Where’s the bag with the candy?"

******

Matt, who had been looking forward to using Ben to collect a lot of candy, remained in a foul mood during the drive back to the apartment.

"Just go to your room and leave me alone," he ordered as soon as they entered.

Ben did as he was told. He was still too distressed by the news he had learned from the old man at the weird shop.

He pulled off the costume and stood in front of his mirror in his tight white boy’s briefs.

A frown formed on his pale face. "What have I done?"

He climbed into his bed. "If I am lucky, I will wake up in the morning and it will all have been a dream."

Unfortunately, the next morning, he remained in the body of a nine-year-old boy.

He went to bed the next six nights with no change.

At least, no physical changes.

In his behavior and thinking, subtle changes began to creep into evidence.

Such as this particular morning, when Ben carried a bowl of cereal into the living room, taking careful steps to ensure he didn’t slosh any milk from the bowl.

He wore a pair of powder blue briefs with cartoon Superman figurines emblazoned on them and a T-shirt. His unruly hair looked even more unkempt on the left side where his head had been pressed against his pillow during the night.

He placed his bowl on the coffee table and reached for the remote. The familiar device felt cumbersome in his small hands. He flicked on the television.

He wanted to sit on the sofa and enjoy his cereal, but the coffee table stood too far from him. Instead, he settled his small frame into the space between the sofa and coffee table.

He spooned some cereal into his mouth and stared at the television screen.

A news anchor in a dark suit recited international and national headlines. "News is boring," Ben said and began to zap the remote at the screen, surfing quickly through the channels for something more interesting to watch.

He tried another spoonful of cereal, but the unfrosted flakes tasted bland. He made a mental note to ask Matt to pick him up some cereal at the market. "Maybe something with marshmallows or chocolate," he thought.

As he continued to surf the channels, the screen looked like a blur until the antics of a cartoon ferret attracted his attention. The humor was rather unsophisticated, but the loud noise effects and the splash of bright colors appealed to him. He even began to munch the bland cereal without much complaint as he became absorbed in the misadventures of the ferret and something that resembled a warthog.

One scene ... the ferret tumbling into a large mud puddle ... caused Ben to laugh so hard that milk squirted through his nostrils.He was still choking and laughing when the front door opened.

His brother, dressed in tight jeans and a T-shirt, strode into the living room.

"Well, well," Matt said. "Disney cartoons, little bro?"

The sudden arrival of his brother plunged Ben into feelings of embarrassment. He clicked off the television. "Where have you been?"

"Out," Matt answered.

Ben felt very self-conscious of being in the presence of his huge brother while dressed only in his underpants and a T-shirt.

Matt, having accepted the novelty of his brother’s unprecedented metamorphosis, hardly noticed.

Matt grabbed the unguarded remote, reactivated the television and changed the channel.

The football game on the screen looked almost as boring to Ben as the news broadcast.

He left Matt on the couch and returned to his room to get dressed.

He looked at a calendar on the wall where he had been marking off days. In a few days, he decided, he would ask Matt to take him back to the shop. Maybe the old woman would be back from her trip.

*******

Matt finally relented after a couple of days of relentless pestering from Ben and drove them downtown. As he turned onto the street where the shop was located, they both gazed at the charred skeleton of a building. Yellow police tape blockaded the entire scene.

"No!" Ben exclaimed in his boyish voice.

"Tough break," Matt said.

Ben stared at the burned ruins of the shop. He began to cry so hard that even his indifferent brother was forced to soften his attitude.

"There, there," Matt said, reaching out and putting a hand on Ben’s bony shoulder. "What if I stop and get us ice cream on the way home?"

For some reason, that sounded perfect to Ben’s ears. "Chocolate?"

"Whatever you want," Matt said.

The End

 

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