The Visionary chap. 1

Chapter 1

“…and that’s how I got my name,” Joe said. Joe is sitting around a fire surrounded by some of his friends. All present appear to be teenagers. He turns to his right to talk to the kid sitting next to him, “What about you Brad, any story on your name?”
“Sure, but it’s a long story. I don’t think I have the time to tell it. Besides, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you” Brad responded.
“Sure we would, Brad,” someone said.
“We have plenty of time, Brad, go ahead,” Joe said.
“Alright then, it all begins, as most stories of this type do, with my parents…”
Scott Keller drove along a suburban road on the way to visit his brother. It was Scott’s nephew birthday tomorrow and Scott’s brother Frank was hosting a party for the occasion. Scott was going early ahead of his wife and three children to help his brother setup the new grill he had just bought. Scott had spent most of the afternoon at the park and was still rather irritated by the behavior of his children, as they had been especially difficult today. Ordinarily, since it was a work day Scott would have been at the office, but he liked to work out of the office some days, like today to spend time with his children. Today he had spent the bulk of his time with his nine-year-old twin children Ryan and Tina. His other son Paul, who is three years older than his siblings, had been at baseball practice most of the afternoon. Right now they were Molly’s problem. Truthfully, Scott felt bad about abandoning her like this, but the situation could not be helped. If Scott had not headed over to help his brother there could be bigger problems. Frank had a tendency to take certain “shortcuts” when assembling things. Shortcuts that often reduced the integrity of the product, and since this particular product involved gas and flame Scott was not taking any chances.
As Scott pulled into the driveway of his brother’s Bridgedale home, he reflected on the day’s earlier events. He chuckled when he thought of the twins. For some odd reason their combative behavior just made sense. The feeling had always been with him. In fact, it was what made him choose their names in the first place. Scott could never figure out just what the feeling meant. Most of the time he dismissed the feeling, but even after almost ten years he could not help but feel it had some significance. Scott’s thinking was disrupted by a voice,
“Scott, is that you?” a woman shouted as she walked toward his car. It was his sister-in-law, Ashley Keller. Scott dazedly replied:
“Yeah, Ash it’s me.”
“Thank god. You had better hurry to the backyard before your brother blows up the new grill. I told him to wait for you, but, well, you know your brother.”
“Yeah, I do. I’d better hurry back there,” he says, as he gets out of the car “Nice to see you again Ash,” He said, giving her a quick hug as he passed her.
“Hurry, I don’t want a hole in the back of my house!” she shouted as Scott jogged toward the backyard. When he got there he found his brother struggling with his grill. His frustrated brother shouted,
“God Damn fancy grill! I remember when these things were as easy as turning on the gas and pressing the igniter! Now they’ve turned it into a God Damn twelve step process!” Scott, from behind his brother chuckles and says,
“You know, Frank, you’re lucky mom isn’t here yet. You’d be in real trouble for using that kind of language.”
“Why do you think I called you over to get it started now? I don’t need to use it for another hour or so.”
“Okay, that explains why I’m here early, but why may I ask? Was I greeted on the driveway by your wife in hysterics, claiming you were going to blow up the grill and damage the house!”
“Oh come on Scott! You know how Ash over exaggerates things!”
“Not from where I was standing a few seconds…” He begins to trail off because he hears a faint hissing. Frank reacts to the sudden silence,
“A few seconds what, Scott? Scott?”
“Shh!” Scott says, listening hard and sniffing the air. Then, all of the sudden, he runs over to the grill and reaches under it to do something, stopping the hissing he heard. He finishes his sentence, “As I was saying it didn’t look like your wife was overreacting from what I saw when I first got back here. It appears her suspicions were correct. With all of that tinkering you managed to break the grill.”
“Well, no wonder. These new grills are so complex…”
“Oh stop your whining right there, Frank. I think I can guess your problem. The grill’s computer keeps crashing right before the igniter sparks. Am I right?” he says while examining the grill more closely.
“Yeah! How did you know?”
“Well, in an attempt to idiot proof these things, the manufacturers are required to put in a failsafe that shuts the system down when certain conditions are not met.”
“Oh really. Like what?”
“Oh, a number of things: no spark, wrong temperature, too much moisture, no gas…”
“So, what do you think my problem is?”
“Your problem judging by the hissing I was hearing and the gas smell in the air is that you have a good old fashioned gas leak. I’m going to go out on a limb here and assume that you assembled this?”
“Yes, for your information I did, thank you very much!” he responded proudly.
“Well, your grill is crashing because you hooked up the gas line wrong. Did you by any chance think to test the gas lines before you tried to light it?”
“No, but that’s why you’re here Scott!”
“Yeah, but you could have really damaged the house. Not to mention that if I hadn’t noticed the hissing and smelled the gas; people could have been injured!”
“Yes, but none of that did happen, thanks to you.”
“I saved your ass again Frank. I swear without me you would have died years ago.” As Scott said this, a strange sensation of irony swept over him. He continued, “Let’s get this grill hooked up and ready to go for the party. By the way, it is good to see you again Frank.”
“You too, Bro.”
As they worked on the grill they discussed how neither of them could believe that the youngest of the children was turning eight. Or that Scott’s twins were going to be ten by the end of the month. After some tinkering they finally got the grill working. They then headed into the house to see if Ashley needed any help setting up.
Frank had always been kind of careless and oblivious and was constantly making problems for himself, especially around his older brother, Scott, who is three years older than Frank, and has almost always been his brother’s idol. However, Frank does quite well for himself. Scott is the taller of the two brother but neither is considered short measuring in at 6’6’ and 6’2” respectively. Ashley Keller, who is slightly older than her husband, was also fairly athletic. Ashley was good teacher, but due to her husband’s success and the arrival of their four children she quit her job to raise the kids. She is looking forward to returning to teaching once their youngest, Sean, enters Middle School.
As the party begins the first to arrive are Scott and Frank’s parents, George and Pat Keller. Both are in their late fifties and are doing well as they closing in on retiring. As George and Pat head into the house, Frank’s four children emerge. The oldest, Wendy, is fourteen and is concerned with her image, but is humoring her parents today. Next in line is Jake, who is the same age as Paul. The third child, Sandy, is two years younger than Jake. Finally the birthday boy Sean, is the only one of the three children that looks more like a Keller, as all the others favor their mother’s side.
Since Ashley’s family lives in Texas, they often do not make it to family gatherings. The next to arrive at the party are Fred Young and his family. Fred is an old friend of Scott’s and Frank’s from college. He is practically a brother to Scott and Frank. Fred is an agent with the FBI.
Finally, Molly rolled in with the trio, obviously flustered. Scott walks over and greets his wife with a kiss. “Hi, honey, how was the ride?” Scott asks.
“Don’t get me started. How were things here?” Molly responds.
“Well, your brother-in-law hooked up the gasline on the grill wrong and nearly took a chunk out of the house.”
“WOW! How did Ash take it?”
“She greeted me at car in hysterics about how Frank was going to explode the grill since he had decided to try to light the grill before I got here.”
“You know he was just trying to impress you. He is just trying to show you that he is capable of doing things mechanical.”
“Especially since he can’t win at basketball anymore.”
“Thanks to me, hon. You couldn’t win to save your life before you met me as I recall.” That was true, although Scott did not like to admit it, it was no secret who was the more athletic one of the pair. Scott never made any clims for being the source of his son Paul’s athletic abilities as he knew that Paul definitely had his mother genes to thank for that. Scott had contributed some height to the mix though. By no means did he contribute all of it though Paul was tall because of both of his parents, as his mother’s 5’10” was nothing to sneeze at either.
“Yeah, yeah, the point is that my brother almost blew up the house.”
“Sure, that’s it. Change the subject.”
“Whatever.” The couple heads off and joins the rest of the guests at the party. The party went as usual. His father was still talking about that stupid bread plant that had closed a month or so before. Time at the party passed quickly and soon it was time to go home.
On the way home Scott’s mind shifted to something that his brother reminded him of about Sean. Sean’s birth was the beginning of the end for his strange gift. He had been pondering about that. Then, he was brought back to conscious thinking by Tina’s voice. Tina was riding with him because of the trouble Molly had had earlier> when she drove the kids to the party.
“Daddy, can I ask you a question?”
“Sure you can Tina, what’s up?” he replied. What came out of Tina’s mouth next caught Scott off guard.
“Why are you always so quiet after Sean’s party?” Scott couldn’t answer the question. For two reasons really, the first of which was shock. He was surprised that his actions were so obvious that even his youngest child could recognize the pattern. The second was that he didn’t know himself what the reason was. For anyone else’s birthday he was energetic and talkative. Everyone’s with acceptation of Sean’s. He knew he had to think of an answer for her and fast. So he said the first thing that made sense:
“I don’t know sweetie. Maybe it’s because I realize that you and your brother’s birthday is just around the corner and it makes me wonder where the time has gone.”
“Oh, Okay.” Lucky for him she let it rest there. The rest of the drive was filled with talk of school and the party. Later, as Scott prepared for bed he couldn’t get past Tina’s question. So he brought it up to Molly.
“Molly?”
“Yes, honey?”
“Have you ever noticed that I’m always deep in thought today? On the way back from the party I mean?”
“Yes, why?”
“Well, Tina asked me about it today and I didn’t have an answer.”
“What did you say?”
“I, ahh, told her it had to do with her birthday coming up, but really I’m not sure why?”
“What do you think causes it?”
“I don’t really know. I think it has something to do with what I was pondering just before Tina asked me the question.”
“Let me guess, Frank’s joke about your visions?”
“Yes, how did you know?”
“It’s pretty obvious Scott. Every year he makes that joke and I have yet to see you even chuckle at it. You don’t even smile. I think that’s your problem, You miss your visions and today always reminds you of them.”
“No, that’s ridiculous. I’m over that now; its something else. I just can’t figure out what.”
“I don’t think so, Scott. That was a pretty traumatic time for you dear. I mean with you being wrong and all. Maybe that’s it You were wrong and there was a feeling of disappointment. You let everybody down because you were wrong.”
“Yeah, that could be it. You’re really good, you know that?”
“Well, I was a pretty good psychologist once, remember?”
“Yeah, you still are a good psychologist.”
“I know, how else do you think I keep order here? Sleep on it tonight hon, you’ll feel better in the morning you always do.”
“You’re probably right. Goodnight.”
“’Night,” she said as they lay down to go to sleep.
A good night was not what was in store for Scott. As he fell asleep, his mind churned as he pondered the day’s events. The result was what was to be a very long night for Scott, with a very confusing and ominous dream.