METAMORPHOSIS

This is a story about a young person coming to terms with who he is, and the essential nature of motherly love.

METAMORPHOSIS

The black and white Plymouth police patrol car smoothly turned into Ethel Street. Officer Maggie O'Brien half turned in her seat to look at the nine year old sitting in the back seat. Kurt Olsen, tall and thin for his age was red haired, but instead of the pale complexion of most redheads, he was dark skinned and had green eyes. The boy was dressed for school from where he had absconded after the lunch break. He was clutching his school satchel but not at all apprehensive or scared about being escorted home by the police.

"OK Kurt," said Officer O'Brien. "We're coming up to your house now. I'm sure your parents will have something to say about you running off like that - yet again."

The boy who had been silent and contrite throughout the journey just nodded mutely. He knew for sure he was going to be grounded for at least a month for his behaviour. He couldn't even explain to himself why he did what he did, let alone explain it to adults. It was as if momentarily he had become a different person, a person who didn't belong in the Olsen family. He sometimes couldn't fight the feeling he belonged to some completely different set of parents.

The police car turned into the driveway of house number 306 and pulled up behind the parked red Cadillac. Once her partner, Officer Jerry Fisher turned off the ignition, Maggie O'Brien unbuckled and got out to help the youngster disembark. Together the two police officers solemnly escorted the boy to his front door.

When she opened the door Betty Olsen looked anxious and afraid but as soon as she caught sight of her son, a smile flared across her face.

"Kurt! Thank God you're safe."

"He's fine Mrs. Olsen. We found him a couple of miles from his school," explained Officer O'Brien. "Apart from being a bit hungry and tired, I expect he's none the worse for wear."

"Thank you for finding him and bringing him home safe," commented Betty Olsen to the police officers, as she pulled her son gently by the arm towards her.

"That's now the third time this month he's tried to run away, Mrs. Olsen," said Officer Fisher sternly.

Clutching her son to her side, Betty Olsen nodded in acknowledgement.

She saw the policeman wink conspiratorially at her before saying, "I told Kurt if he does it again he'll be sent to juvie hall."

"Did you hear what Officer Fisher said, Kurt?" asked Betty Olsen looking down at her son.

"Yes, Mom."

"We'll inform the school authorities he's been safely returned home. That about wraps it up apart from the paperwork. We'll be taking our leave now, Ma'am." Maggie turned to her partner and in an aside, said, "Come on, Jerry, let's get back on patrol."

As Kurt watched the police walk back to their squad car, without looking at his mother, asked, "You're not going to tell Dad about this are you, Mom?"

"Too late, mister. I phoned him at the university as soon as the school reported you missing," she said closing the front door and herding the boy towards the kitchen.

Jim Olsen her husband had moved two years ago from Boston to take up the position of Associate Professor in Humanities at Plymouth University. At first the family had missed the hustle and bustle of Boston and all the shopping and restaurants but they had quickly settled in and grown to love this small town with its rural feel and friendly neighbours. The county's scenery was beautiful with its mountains and countless lakes. Her husband had once joked that if you threw a stone in any direction, it was bound to hit a lake. Kurt who loved swimming was in his element with all that water around. He particularly liked Lake Sunapee with its little harbour next to which was an inviting ice-cream parlour. A short distance away, in the village of Sunapee itself, there was a Greek owned restaurant that made the most delicious eggplant pizza. All the open spaces and fresh air was good for de-stressing her husband after a hard week of teaching and her own job at the bank down on Main Street. While Boston was a bike friendly city with specially marked lanes, it was still safer bicycling in and around Plymouth New Hampshire. It was not uncommon for her husband and son to bicycle the seven miles or so to Silver Lake. They often relaxed there or had a swim before returning home.

"I'm going to call your father now, to let him know you're home safe. While I'm doing that, I suggest you go make yourself a sandwich or something."

"Can I then go and play on my X-Box?"

"You forgotten that you're only permitted one hour a day on the X-Box?"

"You mean account of the last time I ran away?"

"Yup. And after today's episode, I expect he's going to ground you for months."

"But, Mom," the youngster groaned.

"No buts. I'm with your father on this one."

"But Mom, that's cruel and unusual punishment!"

His mother stopped. She held her son by his bony shoulders and looked down at him, directly into this eyes. "Kurt, you can't keep running away like that and causing so much trouble for everyone. You had your father and me worried sick when you went AWOL like that. You're a very bright boy but you appear slow in learning this lesson about not running away." She paused and her voice softened before she asked, "Kurt, are you not happy at home? Have your father and I done something to upset you?"

"Of course not, Mom."

"Is there something at school upsetting you but you're not letting on about?"

"No, Mom."

"Well why d'you keep running away?" his mother asked finding it difficult to totally keep the exasperation out of her voice.

"I don't know...it's as if I'm someone else when it happens."

"What on earth does that mean?"

"Mom, if I could explain it I would, but I can't. Honest."

Betty decided her son sounded genuine and decided not to push the matter any further for the moment. She decided to let Kurt grab a bite to eat while she phoned her husband.

While mother and child had their discussion, outside on the driveway, Officer Fisher had just finished radioing in to HQ. He was about to fire up the car to reverse out onto the street, when his rookie partner, Maggie asked, "Don't you think you should've mentioned what Kurt said when I asked him why he'd run away from home so often?"

The experienced policeman sighed with frustration. "Maggie don't start that again."

"But he clearly said he ran away from home because the Olsens weren't his real parents."

"And two minutes later, when I asked him about it, he denied it. It was as if a switch in his head had flipped and he was back to normal."

"Why did he say it in the first place is what I want to know?"

"He's got a wild imagination like lots of kids his age - Besides he was trying to justify why he's been picked up so often for running away."

"But Jerry, what if what he said is true?"

"So let me get this straight. What you're saying Maggie is that his parents have been replaced by some sort of imperfect duplicates, like outa some sci-fi movie?"

"No I'm not saying that!"

"Then what are you saying?"

For a moment Maggie was flustered and wasn't sure of her own thoughts on the matter. "I don't know...Maybe his parents are mistreating him in some way..?"

"Maggie, Kurt's father teaches my niece at the university. You couldn't find a nicer guy if you tried. And his wife Betty is a friend of my wife's. This is a small town and most people know each other's business. So I just don't buy it."

"So how d'you explain what the boy said?"

"Maggie, I'm a cop not a shrink. Maybe the kid's a bit cuckoo in the head," commented Jerry with a shrug of his shoulders. "Besides, d'you know how many nut-jobs claim to have been abducted and experimented on by aliens?"

"Jerry, don't start on that again," Maggie pleaded in exasperation. Once Jerry started on this theme of alien abductions and the gullible public, he was difficult to stop.

"OK but all I'm saying is in this job you come across lots of wierdoes. You gotta use some judgement about what you do or don't report officially."

Officer Springer started up the car and reversed out of the driveway. He had just begun to ease forward down the broad street when his colleague drew his attention to a stationary vehicle a short distance ahead.

"Jerry, that black Cherokee Jeep up ahead looks awfully like the one that was tailing us a little while back."

"You claimed a Cherokee Jeep was following us - I didn't see it," her partner pointed out. "Besides, why would anyone want to tail a police car?" As the police vehicle passed the black Jeep, Jerry Fisher couldn't help adding, "You do realise don't you that there's millions of Cherokee Jeeps on the road? Without a licence plate number to go on, there's no way to know if it is the same car you thought you saw."

Maureen knew Jerry was a tough mentor so decided not to argue.

"I expect you're right, Jerry. In any case, it was already parked twenty yards from the Olsen house when we drove up. Couldn't have got here before us. I mean it's not as if the owner knew where we were headed."

"I'm glad we got that sorted," quipped Jerry Fisher with a wide grin of satisfaction.

**********************************************************************************************

The Education Board had referred Kurt Olsen to Sylvia Platt several weeks ago because of concerns about the child's behaviour. Fifty-five year old Sylvia originally trained and earned a living as a psychiatrist or therapist'. She was currently working as a psychologist with Family Services. Social Services has made inquiries about possible child abuse under the regulations relating to child protection. While the investigation had distressed Jim and Betty Olsen, no evidence of child abuse had been found.

Sylvia had conducted a range of well-established personality tests and observed the youngster in his social interactions with his peers and family. Sylvia had also spoken at length with the parents to learn about Kurt's upbringing. Presently she was in the process of completing her official report on the troubled youngster.

She was comfortable with her current approach to her patients. Her disillusionment with the traditional psychiatric slash therapist methodology some fifteen years earlier had persuaded her into studying pure psychology and neuroscience. She felt that was where the solutions to most of the problems people manifested lay. Her cynicism and suspicion of psychiatry had begun early on in her life, even before she became qualified in the discipline. Sylvia had been fifteen years old when she knew for certain that she was physically attracted to people of her own gender. The stance of the psychiatric profession on certain types of relationships impacted upon Sylvia personally.

In 1973, the American Psychiatric Association somewhat belatedly declassified homosexuality as a mental disorder. Throughout most of the 20th century, homosexuality had been viewed in terms of pathological models. Freud had alluded to homosexuality numerous times in his writings, and had concluded that paranoia and homosexuality were inseparable. Other psychiatrists wrote copiously on the subject, and homosexuality was "treated" on a wide basis. There was little or no suggestion within the psychiatric community that homosexuality might be anything other than a mental illness that needed to be treated. Throughout human history and across many cultures homosexuality was either common or even considered the norm. The Romans ruled a large empire for centuries and yet they regarded true love to be between two men. Women were for mere procreation. It was difficult to write off Greek and Roman civilisations as perversion. However such inconvenient facts had not deterred her old profession. Psychiatrist stood to benefit financially by treating gay people. Unfortunately even in the last two decades of the twenty-first century there were still people, especially many fundamentalist Christians and Muslims who not only believed homosexuality to be a sin but also falsely claimed that gay people could be converted' to heterosexuality through therapy.

On discovering her sexuality, Sylvia resented this whole attitude of psychiatry to different forms of sexual interaction. As a young woman she had had several lovers, just as heterosexuals do. For the last fifteen years she had been living with her partner Jenna and if the laws of the land had permitted it, they would have solemnised their loving relationship by entering into marriage.

This matter of sexual orientation was only one reason among many for her more recent suspicion of the profession and its ethics. The cause of her disillusionment with psychiatry was essentially rooted in what she considered to be an exploitative relationship with clients that often was also power coercive. The psychiatric/therapist profession was still largely male dominated and the number of instances of therapists having sexual liaisons with patients was both alarming and morally repugnant to Sylvia.

Other behaviours of the profession that had outraged her was the extent to which it had problematized every day or normal human behaviour, like grieving over the loss of a loved one or routine disappointments in everyday life. The public was molly-coddled and never learned to become resilient. Sylvia had often joked that it was almost de rigueur to have a therapist and run to him even when one broke a fingernail. When she had first began work as a therapist she had quickly become cynical when she observed many of her colleagues jumping on the bandwagon of whatever the prevalent fad was. Children were increasingly and almost routinely being diagnosed as suffering from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). ADHD, its diagnosis, and treatment had been controversial since the 1970s. The controversies involved clinicians, teachers, policymakers, parents, and the media. Controversy revolved around ADHD's causes and the use of stimulant medications in its treatment. Very young children were being prescribed powerful chemical agents to treat what Sylvia considered in most cases to be poor behaviour resulting from bad parenting. It was easier to stigmatise a child than question the lack of consistent standards of discipline and behaviour exercised by parents. It also helped that a simple label like ADHD could be applied to a complex set of poor behaviours on the part of the child. Of course big pharma was pleased that its drive to medicalise routine conditions and behaviours was paying large dividends to its shareholders.

If that had not been enough many therapists were happy to treat' people who thought they had been sexually abused by their parents. Many families had been destroyed because an adult had been helped by therapists to recall' instances of being sexually abused by their parents when there really was no evidence to support such accusations. The same approach of recovering alleged memories of previous reincarnations was feeding the media and popular culture with stories about individuals who claimed to have lived in the past as earlier human incarnations. Not surprisingly when some individuals began to claim they had been abducted and experimented upon by aliens, therapists had bought into this too. Now thanks to the hypnotherapy, suppressed memories of their abduction and maltreatment at the hands of aliens, could be recovered. Sylvia was not distrustful of the scientific community's contention that alien life did exist elsewhere in the universe. She just found it hard to believe that intellectually and technologically superior alien beings found it necessary to abduct tens of thousands of humans, if the claims were taken at face value, in order to learn about human beings. Sylvia had a problem comprehending the alleged alien obsession with anal probing and sexual acts perpetrated upon the abductees. Neither could she get her head round the idea that the aliens seemed more interested in abducting and experimenting upon Americans who only made up a small proportion of the world's population.

Her initial disquiet about therapists and psychiatrists' acceptance of the patients' claims of alien abductions and past lives based upon retrieved memories had been bolstered by her discovery of Professor Carl Sagan's books debunking pseudo-science. Sagan had been an astronomer and astrophysicist as well as a vociferous proponent of the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence. He had been instrumental in the decision to ensure that each of the two Voyager spacecraft carried a gold-plated audio-visual disc in the event that the spacecraft is ever found by intelligent life forms from other planetary systems. Despite this, with regard to the claim that aliens had visited Earth and experimented upon humans, Sagan had famously said: Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence'. Sylvia had been so taken by that sensible axiom, she had it framed and it currently had pride of place alongside a copy of her university degree and professional qualifications.

When Carl Sagan had begun to write and speak about such issues the scientific establishment frowned upon it - not because they believed the claims of alien abductions or thought reincarnation stories to be true, but because it was considered unseemly for respected scientists to become involved in such public discussions. Although Sagan had met with fierce criticism from therapists whose livelihood was being threatened, the scientist's explanations of conditions like sleep paralysis and implanting of false memories through hypnotherapy eventually became the accepted wisdom among scientists. Sagan was a science communicator par excellence, who in 1994 was presented with the highest award of the US National Academy of Sciences, the Public Welfare Medal.

For all those reasons Sylvia was suspicious of psychiatry and some of its methodology and she preferred to rely on more proven techniques or approaches. Having completed her tests and discussions with the patient and other relevant parties, she was now putting the finishing touches to her report on Kurt Olsen. On her desk top computer screen she scrolled through the pages double-checking for inadvertent errors or omission. She re-read key passages of her report.

Kurt Olsen was found on the steps of the Boston Home, an orphanage in the city of Boston. Nothing is known about his biological parents. It was estimated that he was three months old when discovered. He was adopted by the Jim and Betty Olsen when he was six months old. Kurt was raised by loving middle class parents who had high expectations of their child. His emotional and physical needs were well catered for by his parents. In 2012 the Olsen's moved from Boston to Plymouth, NH. The family settled into the local community without any difficulties and established healthy and friendly relationships with the local population.

Kurt leans towards introversion rather than extroversion but this is not uncommon among children with no siblings. As an only child Kurt finds it more difficult to form multiple friendships and he prefers the company of adults with whom he converses very easily and naturally. By the time he started school, Kurt demonstrated above average ability in problem solving, mathematics and science. His current IQ is 170 on the Stanford-Binet test. This places him in the top 0.1% percentile of the US population. In other respects he is similar in his attitudes and interests as other nine year olds. He is interested in sports/physical activities, enjoys construction kits, reading comic books and playing computer games.'

Sylvia paused at this point because she recalled the instance she had administered the well-established ink-blot test. Kurt had been shown a piece of paper which had an ink-blot and asked what image he saw in the ink. He had immediately said that the image was that of a star cruiser. To Sylvia its shape was too irregular to be a spacecraft. When she prompted Kurt by saying that it didn't look at all streamlined for a spacecraft, the boy had sounded superior when he pointed out that interplanetary or interstellar craft didn't require to be streamlined since they travelled in the vacuum of space. While she had initially been surprised by the boy's response she had eventually put it down to his knowledge of science and immersion in sci-fi comics. Children of his age, particularly boys often developed an interest in astronomy and space. They generally grew out it. Besides, Kurt had spoken fondly of camping trips with his parents, sleeping in the open with the stars as a canopy, particularly since they had moved to the Plymouth area which was blessed with lots of scenic woodland.

There had been some slightly puzzling or anomalous aspects about the boy's behaviour that just couldn't be included in her official report. He at times displayed a different personality. Once or twice, he claimed that the Olsen's were not his real parents. The odd aspect of this particular claim by Kurt was that he was unaware that he had been adopted. His biological parents were unknown to the authorities. However, the other persona that the boy manifested, was fleeting - lasting only a minute or two before it disappeared as if a switch had been flicked. He didn't retain any memory of his other persona or what it had done or said. When asked about what was said by the other persona, most often Kurt denied saying it or just dismissed the matter with a shrug of the shoulders. Sylvia couldn't explain or diagnose such behaviour on part of the boy.

As a psychologist, she was aware that in absence seizures, also calledpetit mal seizures, a person loses awareness of their surroundings for up to 20 seconds. During an absence seizure, a child suddenly stops what they are doing and appears to stare into space. Absence seizures were part of a group of epilepsy symptoms and mostly affected children. The child recovers fully with no lingering confusion or other ill effects. In children, absence seizures are often misinterpreted as inattention. Because absence seizures are usually quite brief with a tendency to strike during times of inactivity, and closely resembled daydreaming or "being off in one's own world", they often passed unnoticed and went undiagnosed. The vast majority of children, however, outgrew them but their true cause was unknown. What was known was that the electrical signals of the brain's neurons become abnormal during seizures. Other than that neuroscientists were unsure of the underlying reasons for absence seizures. Some recent research suggested that genetics may play a role, but the identities of Kurt's biological parents were unknown. Besides that, Sylvia couldn't say with any certainty that Kurt was suffering from absence seizures because the behaviour he manifested was so untypical.

Sylvia Platt finished the minor corrections to her official report. Satisfied that there was nothing further to add, she clicked the save' icon on her computer. As soon as she did that the screen instantly went blank and then showed snow - random signal noise.

Immediately she began saying, "No, no, no!" in heart-stopping panic. She couldn't face losing the file after all the effort she had put into writing the report. "Sh*t!" she exclaimed in frustration.

The computer was barely six months old and had no cause to behave this way, she reminded herself. Sylvia instinctively slapped the side of the monitor screen. The snow blizzard on the monitor persisted. She sighed in weary acceptance of the computer glitch that had swallowed her report. Sylvia was just beginning to wonder whether there was specialised software that could retrieve lost or damaged files when the monitor screen blanked. Just as suddenly as the report had first disappeared from view, it reappeared. She whooped with jubilation and relief. To avoid a repeat of the scary prospect of losing the file, she quickly set about making a backup copy of the file and saved it onto her flash drive which she then placed in the top drawer of her desk.

Now the melodrama and panic was over, she decided to call it a day and close up her office. As Sylvia left the building and headed to her car she was too busy looking forward to having dinner and glass or two of red wine with Jenna her partner that she failed to notice a black Cherokee Jeep switch on its sidelights and smoothly ease into the flow of traffic.

********************************************************************************************

Betty Olsen was in the kitchen preparing lunch but she was distracted. For a few months now she and her husband had been very concerned about their son and the inexplicable changes he had been undergoing. In the last three months alone Kurt seemed to have shot up in height so that he towered above his peers. He was teased by his classmates by being referred to as Stretch'. Recently his red hair had thinned so much the boy felt self-conscious and had taken to wearing a baseball hat. That had only given his classmates another reason to tease and upset him. Currently Kurt was not a happy boy. Perhaps that explained why he had taken to sleep-walking. A few times his father had found him aimlessly wandering around the kitchen, or in the den building spacecraft with his Mecanno set but with no recollection of how he came to be there. Alarmingly, on one occasion he had wandered out of the house onto the street in his pyjamas. One of neighbours had discovered him standing stock still staring up into the star studded, clear autumn sky.

The Olsens were concerned that their son's appetite had grown markedly. Jim and Betty had experience of his earlier growth spurts, as most parents do with their children, but this recent change was unprecedented. He was consuming huge amounts of food typical of teenagers with their metaphorical hollow legs. If that wasn't difficult enough, Kurt's palate had also changed significantly. Cooking for him or even going out for a meal at the local diner or a fancy restaurant was now much more complicated. Betty could understand children growing out of their likes for certain foods and acquiring more adult tastes, but Kurt had begun to develop an allergic reaction to red meat and milk. Both those foods led to severe vomiting. Inexplicably, he could tolerate other dairy products. Chocolate brought about a skin rash and fizzy drinks induced biliousness in her son. The Olsens had been concerned enough to consult their family physician.

They had initially been told that Kurt was entering puberty early. That condition was not altogether uncommon, they were told. They were referred to a specialist. The endocrinologist Dr Kaplinski had essentially endorsed what they had been told by their family physician.

The specialist was intrigued by some of the other symptoms of Kurt Olsen's condition. Those had not only fired his imagination, but played to his idea of self-importance. Kaplinksi was certain Kurt's case merited a scientific paper. The very idea of publishing a scientific paper about such a unique condition stoked Kaplinski's enormous ego. The extra funding that such a paper drew in would help to finance some of his pet projects. While the doctor had immediately taken a blood sample and sent it off to the hospital lab to check hormonal levels, he had not banked on receiving the negative test results. Instead of the expected elevated Growth Hormone and testosterone levels associated with puberty, the results showed that the hormone levels were normal for a youngster of Kurt's age. Dr Kaplinski's hopes had been dashed and he had no explanation for the boy's condition. Of course he could never admit that to the boy's parents. One potential but far-fetched explanation crossed the specialists mind, but he knew it was difficult to prove. While Kurt's hormone levels might be normal, what if the sensitivity of his cells had increased? Even taking a biopsy to test cells for sensitivity to various hormones would not help since there was no way of checking how sensitive Kurt's cells had been prior to the physical changes he was currently undergoing. It was puzzling. Dr Kaplinski disliked not knowing the answer to questions because it chipped away at his self-image of being an expert in his field.

While Betty and Jim Olsen accepted that not infrequently children did begin puberty early they had been sceptical about that diagnosis applying to their son. None of the other changes associated with puberty had been manifested by Kurt. There was no acne, although his skin did now appear to be rougher than before. There was no marked body odour or the development of armpit hair or hair around the groin. While pubescent males did shed lots of hair, new hair growth far out-stripped the hair loss. Furthermore, Kurt was still distinctly uninterested in girls. His voice rather than deepen had if anything become higher pitched. All the changes going on with Kurt had made him very self-conscious and he increasingly spent lots of time on his own.

Betty's train of thought was interrupted by a shout from her son. She dashed into the sitting room to investigate.

A piercing high pitch sound had assaulted Kurt's eardrums, causing him to double over in pain. When Betty saw him he had his hands clamped over his ears in an attempt to muffle the sound. He kept shouting, "Mom, make it stop! The sound hurts my ears! Make it stop!"

This puzzled his mother since she heard nothing but the sound of the television. She reached for the remote control and turned the television off but her son continued to writhe in pain.

"The TV is off now, Sweetie," his mother reassured him attempting to hug her son who twisted one way or another as if to escape the sound.

"The noise is still there, Mom!"

"I can't hear anything, Kurt."

"I'm telling you it's still there!" he shouted in anger.

Not sure what to do, Betty went to the window and looked out. Perhaps it was something outside.

It was January and the snow was deep at this time of year in Plymouth. The road had been cleared by snowploughs and thoughtful householders had cleared a path for walking along the sidewalk. She saw Alf Bennett from two houses down, swaddled in warm clothing, standing at the end of her driveway. He was red-faced and blowing hard on some kind of whistle. However, Betty couldn't heard any sound. Suddenly she realised Alf was using a dog-whistle. Probably trying to locate his golden Labrador, Kandi.

Betty was aware that young people could hear higher pitched sounds than adults. Some US municipalities had use that difference to scare away troublesome youths who congregated in certain localities. This often reduced the incidence of youth crime but penalised all youths, including the innocent bystanders. Despite this, she was certain in her own mind that Kurt was incapable of hearing the frequency generated by a dog-whistle. Surely such a frequency was well outside the human hearing range, she told herself. Nevertheless the continual moaning of her son spurred her to open the window and shout to Alf Bennett. She knew she had no sensible reason why she wanted him to desist from using the whistle, but engaged him in conversation nevertheless.

As soon as she did, from behind her she heard "Mom, the noise has stopped!"

Momentarily she looked back and saw her son get up from his prone position on the sitting room floor. She blinked in surprise and kept telling herself that humans can't hear dog-whistles. Yet as soon as Alf had stopped using one, Kurt had recovered. Betty quickly but politely brought her conversation with Alf to an end. She returned to her son's side and helped him up off the floor.

"Sweetie, why don't you go upstairs and lie down for a little while," she suggested.

The boy readily agreed.

Kurt decided to visit the bathroom and perhaps splash his face with water before taking a nap. While he washed his face he tried to avoid looking at the mirror above the sink. Lately he had taken a dislike to looking in mirrors. He never knew what new aspect he would discover about himself. However, in drying his face on the towel he couldn't stop himself reflexively glancing at his face in the mirror. He could have sworn his ears were rounder and bigger looking. His mother had told him it was just his imagination working overtime. Already his thick red hair had thinned enough for glimpses of his scalp to be visible. As he combed his fingers through his hair he was alarmed to discover clumps of hair coming away in his hand. An unsightly bald patch reflected back at him. Panicked he gently checked out the remainder of his hair by gently pulling on it. More hair came away in his hand. More patches of skin appeared on his head. Kurt let loose a loud and piercing scream of extreme fear and confusion. Instinctively his mother charged upstairs in response to her son's cry.

Betty hugged Kurt and tried her best to comfort him. Between sobs he explained what had happened. It wasn't really necessary since the state of his head was obvious to see. She tried to mask her own surprise and anguish at his appearance. However it was not just the loss of hair that weighed on Kurt's mind. All the other symptoms scared him too.

"Mom, what's wrong with me?" wailed Kurt.

"There's nothing wrong with you, Sweetie."

"But look at me! What's happening to my body?"

"I don't know, Sweetie, but the doctors are doing their best to find out."

"I'm turning into some sort of freak show!"

Betty tightly clasped her son to her bosom trying to banish all her own anxieties about his health and said what she could to calm him.

"You're no freak, Sweetie. Your Dad and I love you more than you can imagine. And I promise, with our support you're going to get through this - whatever it is."

Betty spoke with the fierce protectiveness of a mother. Kurt might not be of her flesh, but he was a central part of her life. This child of hers was special because she and her husband had specifically chosen him to nurture.

****************************************************************************************

The Boston Home had been part of the Massachusetts landscape for more than 200 years. It had both a long and complex history. Back in 1799, the Boston Women's Asylum was established as an orphanage. It was the first of its kind in the area. Subsequently it had undergone various changes and amalgamations with other organizations. In 1849 The Children's Mission to the Children of the Destitute of the City of Boston was formed by a visionary Unitarian minister. By 1865 Union Mission & Home for Little Children was formed by ten wealthy Boston businessmen to care for children orphaned by the Civil War. In that same year, the agency began sending children out west for adoption on "Orphan Trains". By 1883 Boston Children's Friend Society, an adoption agency, was formed. Since then these forerunners had morphed into the current Boston Home, a multi-agency organisation providing an expanded range of services besides adoption. The Boston Home was affectionately known by the locals as the Home' and it had helped many children find foster parents or adoptive parents.

Children under five, particularly babies were in greatest demand for adoption. However, the declining social stigma associated with young women giving birth out of wedlock, was mirrored in the decline in the availability of babies for adoption. This had led to the ever rising trend of American couples adopting babies from abroad, particularly from developing countries. Families comprised of diverse racial or ethnic groups were now common and not only because of the rising frequency of interracial marriages. Due to the shortage of babies for adoption, some couples even sought surrogate mothers in countries like India. Given this state of affairs, any baby or very young child taken in by the Home, was guaranteed to be adopted within a matter of a month or two - just enough time for background checks and the completion of the bureaucratic paperwork.

In the dead of night, close to the orphanage arm of the Boston Home, a few minutes earlier, a vehicle had drawn up and parked. A precious bundle had been gently placed outside the front door of the orphanage. The anonymous figure leaned over the baby sleeping in the basinet. The child's complexion was brown as a berry and her hair a shock of flaming red.

"Be brave, my little one," said the adult in a soothing tone. "Never forget you are loved. We may be apart, but I will always be watching over you. You have a wondrous life ahead of you. When the time is right, we will be reunited. I promise. Then you will be ready to fulfil your destiny."

The thin hooded figure rose to its full height of six and a half feet, and headed towards the car parked a few strides away. A moment later the car's headlights switched on and the engine purred to life. With one last glance at the abandoned child, the driver eased the car into the night traffic. Soon the Cherokee Jeep was lost amongst all the other cars in Boston.

************************************************************************************

A shrill sound awoke Kurt Olsen from a deep slumber. He sat up in bed and continued to listen to the monotone call. No one else in the house stirred. A few moments later, the sound re-modulated, incorporating complex harmonics. At a primal level, the boy understood the inherent message in the harmonics. Kurt exited his bedroom and headed down the unlighted stairs.

Betty Olsen was moaning occasionally, troubled by a vivid but disturbing dream. Of late, all her dreams had centred on her son and the changes he was experiencing. It distressed her as a mother that she couldn't allay his anxieties and fears. Even prior to the illness' that seemed to be besetting him, Kurt had sometimes been marked out for ridicule. Now with the changes in his physiology there were more excuses for him to be singled out by his peers. Despite the repeated reassurances, the doctors didn't really know what was wrong with her son. This caused her to feel both unhappy and guilty as a mother.

The sound of footsteps on the stairs roused Betty Olsen's protective maternal instincts just enough to drag her mind to the edge of consciousness. She hovered between wakefulness and unconsciousness for a moment but sleep inexorably tugged her back into its embrace. Oblivious, Jim Olsen lying next to her continued his gentle snoring.

Kurt still barefoot and in his pyjamas, opened the front door and wandered out into the chilly spring night. He headed for a vehicle parked across the bottom of the driveway. When he was a few feet from the car he spoke only one word, uttered with certainty. To the boy's mind it symbolised affection, belonging and safety. That word was "mother".

There was no reply.

The car's front passenger door yawned open onto the sidewalk. Unhesitatingly the boy climbed into the car. As soon as the door of the car closed, the engine sprung to life and the headlights switched on. The Black Cherokee Jeep moved off down the wide and silent street and soon was lost in the darkness of night.

(The End)

Originally posted by: Mnp279

Res