The Less Ordinary Life of Harold: Something Different

                Harold’s room is dark. There’s no lights, no TV, not even the glowing blue power light of his PlayStation. The street lights outside cast a pale amber glow across the floor from the window. It makes the space look sour.

 

 

            The boy who is normally full of whimsical, and yet often profound imaginative qualities looks sullen. He can usually be found doodling or reading comic books, but instead he sits slumped on his bed, staring at nothing, thinking of everything. His cheeks are puffy, red-hot and not quite wet from stale tears.

            After waiting to see if he snaps out of it on his own, Harold’s mom knocks, but opens the already cracked door at the same time.

            “You ready to tell me what happened today?”

            Harold sniffed, a thick snort filled the room. His mother handed him a tissue, and waited.

            “I got beat up.” Harold turned towards the window as he said the words.

            “Really?” his Mom looked him over. “You look fine. Are you okay?”

            Harold shrugged off the hand that inspected his face, “I’m fine Mom, it didn’t hurt,” this he said proudly, as he craned his neck back towards his mother. She could see in his eyes, he meant what he had said. The truth in his words was overwhelming. She wanted to hold him, hug him, but she resisted, knowing that wasn’t what he needed right now.

            “So?” she asked casually.

            Finally, Harold spoke, “Ronnie Danko called me ‘fat boy’ again today.”

            Harold’s Mom nodded.

            “I told him if he ever done it again, I was gonna punch him in the mouth.”

            “So what’d you do?”

            “I punched him in the mouth,” Harold giggled, and his Mom joined him in the laughter.

            “I take it there’s more to the story?”

            Harold nodded, “After I punched him, he didn’t fall. He came at me, knocked me down and kicked me in the stomach a few times before Mr. Rawls broke it up.”

            “Oh honey, I’m so sorry.”

            “The worst part was no one helped me. No one even yelled at him to stop.”

            She held his hand, he let her. Harold’s Mom wanted to cry for her son. She was furious as she imagined the crowd of students staring, mouths agape, fulfilling their role as nothing but spectators. She didn’t say what she was thinking, “What happened after?”

            “I dunno, not much.” Harold’s speech quickened though, “Mr. Rawls carted Ronnie off to the office, Trisha, that student-teacher, took me to the nurse.”

            “And?” the patience in her voice was profound, knowing.

            “When’s it go back to normal?”

            She thought she had been prepared for the question, any question. “Does what go back to normal?”

            “Me?” Harold paused, maybe struggling a bit to find words, which was never a problem for him under normal circumstances. “I feel empty, like he took what made me happy.”

            She could hold back no longer, she hugged Harold, tightly. “Don’t worry it’ll come back in time son, and it will be stronger than ever. You will be stronger than ever.”

            “Thanks Mom.”

            “Thanks for talkin’ to me,” she rose from his bed, and headed for the door.

            “Mom, I thought I had him you know? I just thought I had it figured out, how it would go. Thought, he would fall and not get back up.”

            She paused to look down at her son, “Sounds like you two have something in common. Only difference is he got up and kept going during the fight, you get to do it after.”

            Harold nodded. She hoped he understood as much as he seemed. “Oh by the way, there is one thing I know for sure little man.”

            “Ya, what’s that?”

            “That precise moment when you think you have things figured out, just know you don’t.”

            “So what do you do then?”

            “Something different.”

The Less Ordinary Life of Harold: Full Jelly Alchemist

Harold was sitting idly at the breakfast table. A bare piece of toast lay on the plate before him. It represented everything today would be; bland, flat, coarse.

Today was Harold's first day back to school after the brief respite of summer. Today would be a day of awkward shyness. A day of pecking orders being established between students and faculty, as well as among students and students. Harold stared at his glass of orange juice, this crucial part of today’s balanced breakfast was nearly at its bottom. This visual only served to remind Harold where he fell in his school’s hierarchical rolls.

“Harry, eat something, your going to starve.”

Harold blew a long strand of hair from his face in a huff. He didn’t need to look at his rotund frame to know that statement would be a long time coming, before it came true. “I’m not hungry Mom.”

Mom sighed, making a brief trek to the fridge. When she returned to the table a plastic container of margarine and a glass jar of grape jelly suddenly appeared. “Eat,” Mom commanded.

Harold smiled as Mom turned her back, busying herself with the mundane tasks of an adult. Whispering to himself alone, Harold recited, “Just the ingredient I need for my potion, at my thoughts you’ll heed my every notion…”

Harold’s eyes focused on the jelly jar, and before him a thin tendril of purple began to climb up the inside of the jar. Worm-like it pushed itself up and over the jar’s lip, past those ridges where the cap screws on, and down the outside of the glass.

Harold watched this spectacle unfold, but quickly glanced at his mother. As he did so the thin cylindrical mass of grape jelly became motionless. When Harold was satisfied Mom was still preoccupied with her grown up distractions, the jelly-worm formed a thin concave mouth and a tiny arm, complete with a three-fingered hand. With it, the glob of jelly smiled and tipped an imaginary hat to Harold. Harold returned both the smile and the gesture in kind.

Harold then winked and the grape worm wiggled and swayed, grew and twisted into a baseball player. Though roughly the size of a G.I. Joe, the grape ballplayer was a brute of a man, with a chest like a barrel and a large broad bat. The ballplayer stood, chest heaving as if he were living and breathing there on Harold’s kitchen table.

Harold reached over him, with what by comparison was the hand of a giant. He dunked two fingers inside the jelly jar, retrieving a generous glob of the purple substance. The ballplayer watched as Harold sat the hand that contained the jelly on the surface of the table. Looking at the tiny jelly ballplayer he held his free hand over the jelly-smeared fingers on his opposite hand. He made a balling, rolling motion and the jelly, now molded like clay, did the same. Harold repeated this process a few times over.  A few seconds passed and there sat three miniscule, gelatinous baseballs.

The ballplayer nodded knowingly. He readied his bat, shimmied and lined up his hips, tapping the head of the bat against the tabletop, and against his grape-jelly formed cleats.

With a flick of his fore finger and his thumb, Harold “threw” the first diminutive purple ball towards the matching ballplayer without ever touching it. The ballplayer swung, arching his head upwards to see past the brim of his little hat, and watched intently as the jelly baseball flew across the open air of the table, arched high, and then landed with a splat-pat on top of Harold’s toast. In succession, the following two jelly-balls found their mark as well.

“Thanks,” again, Harold found himself smiling at the little guy.

“Harold,” Mom began to turn around, “have you finished eating yet? That bus is probably barrelin’ around the corner right now.”

Mom turned quickly, but paused just long enough to check the clock. Harold had to act. With a grimace, and a short wave Harold said goodbye to the ballplayer. Instantly, the caricature of an athletic baseball player sunk into an unrecognizable patty shape. And then disappeared, seeming to fall right through, rather than off, the table itself.

The succinct but groaning horn of the bus driver signaled it was time for Harold to leave.

Harold wolfed down the now jelly covered toast. “Love ya Mom,” he hugged her at the waist and trotted out the door. With his backpack slung around him Harold went through the front door. He felt like he was an adventurer preparing for a long expedition.

*

Back in the kitchen, Mom removes Harold’s plate from the table and sits it in the sink. When she returns to retrieve the jelly jar and the butter she sees something beneath the table. She kneels to get a closer look.

Mom’s eyes narrow and she finds herself staring at a blob of grape jelly. Although its perimeter indicates the foodstuff was dropped from quite a height, she thinks she can make out a rough shape in spite of its messiness.

“Hmm, kinda looks like a little guy with a bat, maybe a baseball player...”

The Less Ordinary Life of Harold: Super-Zero

An oblivious young man with his nose glued to a cell phone absently strolls through the park. Passerbys are forced to navigate out of his way. Joggers, senior citizens on walks, and mothers with strollers all side step him at the last minute, clinging to the belief that he couldn’t really be that enthralled by whatever’s on the screen.

This is Harold. Harold, by most accounts has had a shit day.

Sitting down, not because it's the courteous thing to do, but because he wants to, the preteen plops onto a nearby bench. Harold is husky and he seems all-too conscious of this, so as he gets seated comfortably he tugs down his shirt, to make sure no one can see anything they shouldn’t through the green slats that serve as the bench’s backrest.

A few minutes pass and another child sidles up, sitting beside him.
For more than a while, no words are exchanged between the two.

Eventually, the new boy, thin but equally meek-looking breaks the silence, “Sorry-”

“Let me save my game!” Harold holds up a finger. “I am playing versus on Battleblood, and am ranked in the top five for this skirmish.”

The thin child adjusts his glasses higher on the bridge of his nose, realizing even he had little idea what most of that meant.

A few presses and swipes, “Ok, what?” Harold still doesn’t look up from his phone, not entirely, it makes the fat underneath his neck stand out even more.

“I’m sorry for what happened today.”

“Ya, you been hangin’ out with those kids?”

The thin boy nodded, blushing almost imperceptibly.

“They suck Tyler. And...and they are stupid.”

Acknowledging the statement, the Tyler nodded again. He not only agreed, but there was no hesitation in him doing so.

“Asshats,” Harold, “that’s what they are.”

Tyler, confused, “What does that even mean anyway?”

“I dunno,” Harold admits, “I picked it up somewhere, but its bad, real bad.”

“Hey, they aren’t that bad. I, we could always use more friends right?”

“Not those guys.” Harold seemed resolute.

“Maybe I could talk to ‘em, put in a good word for ya?”

Harold looked up from his phone completely.

Tyler leaned in closer, “Tell ‘em your a cool guy, tell ‘em how you have all the newest video games.”

Harold’s brief interest already faded, changed to a spark of anger. “You mean bribe them to not pick on me? Thanks Tyler, but no thanks.”

“C’mon, Harold, I still want to be friends with you...and them.”

“I don’t think it works that way.”

Tyler looked at Harold, in a way that many adults would think a child was not capable of doing. He saw a fat kid, with a red ball-cap, but redder cheeks, dressed in clothes assembled from discount retail stores. He contrasted this against the group of guys he and Harold were conversing about. “Ya, I guess you’re right. Fuck.”

Harold had never heard a kid his age say the “F” word. He had never heard Tyler swear at all. Both boys shook their heads.

“What do we do?” Tyler asked.

“Doesn’t matter- whatever you want.” Harold said, “I got things to take care of anyway.”

“Like what?” the surprise in Tyler’s question was heavy.

“Hero stuff.”

“Psshh, what are you talkin’ about?”

“I’m a superhero. I didn’t want to tell you, because I thought it might be the only reason you were my friend.”

Tyler paused for a moment, trying to gauge if Harold was trying on being crazy, or trying on being funny. When he couldn’t decide, Tyler broke out in heavy laughter. “More like Super-zero!”

Harold took the laughter and the insult from a kid who he had thought of as his best friend for 3 summers and four grades. He took it like Superman takes bullets.

Tyler looked at Harold and couldn’t believe his eyes. Suddenly, before him, the chubby kid that lived 5 houses down the street was gone.

There in front of him was an image; misty, blurry in the way that the blacktop gets from a distance on a summer day. Harold was now a wavering image of strength. His head held back high, his clothes became the bold uniform of a dealer of justice. His red hat was now a crimson mask. His untucked shirttail transformed into a cape. The discount athletic shoes had become leather boots, complemented with tiny H’s embroidered on their sides Harold’s eyes had changed the most, they seemed to dig into him, they were piercing, full of confidence and know-how.

Tyler could’ve sworn he saw a telling I-told-you-so kind of wink, but he wasn’t sure of that at all. In fact, he was no longer sure of anything.

Then right there before Tyler’s eyes, Harold took off with a bang into the air, it was like lightning combined with thunder. In an instant he was gone.

Off to do hero stuff.