Coming Home
A "Winds of Change" Story
Jon drove his new Toyota through the streets of Carlsbad, and I could tell that he was having a good time. He kept trying all the dials and settings. I'd folded the front passenger seat forward and was laying over it. I was holding the cars owners manual, which I'd used to try and help Jon how to figure out how to program his new stereo.
How did they expect anyone to use a stereo with 56 buttons while driving? The print was so small that I had a hard time reading it! Jon's fingers were so big that he couldn't move the slider bars without taking the faceplate off.
For the moment, we'd given up on that and the conversation had died off. I suddenly found myself lost in thought. I couldn't wait until they figured out how to build a car for people like me. Even though I could sit in a normal chair, it wasn't easy and took a little acrobatics. But a car seat was completely different. I'd virtually have to stand in order to drive comfortably, which meant that I'd practically have to re-learn driving.
In fact, in thinking about it, I hadn't driven since the night before the Change. I'd driven home from school the evening before, stopping off briefly at the supermarket. Twenty four hours later, I'd been too Changed to even fit in the car easily. I'd sold my little white Mazda, the only car I'd ever owned, to help buy my flight computer.
"Something wrong, Brian?"
I'd been silently looking though the front window while I thought about all this. When I do that, I've always tended to look a little unfocused, even now. "Oh, no. Just jealous about you getting a car. It's going to be a while for me."
He glanced over and smiled a little, his ears flapping slightly in the wind, "At least you can fly. Sometimes I wish I'd been able to do that."
I shrugged, my wings opening slightly, "It has it's advantages, I supposed, but it does tend to cut me out of things a little. My body shape changed just enough to make little things tougher. Try sitting with two and a half feet of tail feather and five feet of folded wing on your back. I can't even use a normal drinking glass without opening the top of my beak all the way, and you do not want to see how far I can open this thing!"
Jon smiled wider, "Now you've gone and done it. Now I'm curious."
I shook my head, "Nope. Not while you're driving. Wait until I yawn, which ought to be anytime now. Trust me. I did it once in a restaurant without thinking. Our waitress refused to come anywhere near the table again."
Jon looked thoughtful for a moment and then smiled, "Yea, but you don't have to duck walking though doors." He said pointing a thumb to his antlers.
We looked at each the a minute and started laughing. I think that we were both way too tired and more than a little punchy. I was probably more rested than Jon, but still hadn't slept much while I was at the hospital waiting for him to come out of it. I hated hospitals.
He turned onto a main street and gunned the engine a little. I was always amazed how quiet these fuel cell engines were. Jon started trying to figure out the A/C panel. I was flipping through the manual looking for the page when I saw the flash of red and blue from the sideview mirror. Then I heard the burst of siren.
"Oh, no. Don't tell me I'm getting a ticket after owning a car all of about four hours!"
I twisted my head back to see the Carlsbad police cruiser behind us. "Looks like it, Jon."
He pulled over to the side of the road. As the car came to a stop, he reached over to grab his registration out of the glove compartment. I suddenly reached up and grabbed one of his antlers and pulled his head back a bit.
"Hey! What'd you do that for?"
I let go of the antler, "You almost stuck one of those points through the windshield. You'd better keep an eye on that."
He reached up and touched his left antler. "Maybe I'd better put a cork on these..."
I smiled a little and looked back to the officer getting out of his cruiser. "You know any mountain lions on the force?"
"Oh, yea. That's Dave Stalker. You didn't see him the other night. He's been on vacation. I didn't even know he was back."
The mountain lion came up to the widow and did a slight double take. "Jon? When did you get a car? I thought you had a scooter."
"Just got it today. How was Wyoming?"
He grinned a little. He seemed to have the same problem I did. The more he smiled, the more vicious he looked. Jon seemed able to tune him out pretty well, even if his ears went back a bit. "Wide open. I'd head up that way when I retired but my wife's cold blooded. She'd be pretty miserable in the winter." He looked at me, "I take it that this is Coe?" He stuck a hand through the window.
I reached out to shake it, "How did you know that?"
"Simple. You're picture was on TV and I asked back at the station who you were. You're rather hard to miss."
I smiled, but truthfully didn't like all the attention I seemed to draw, particularly right now. One thing that I learned after the Change was that there had been comparatively few bald eagle morphs, perhaps only a few thousand in the nation. In truth, most morphs were like that, making only a tiny fraction of the total population. But few animals were as widely known in the U.S., and as distinct, as the bald eagle.
It didn't help that I rather strongly resembled the President now, either. Though I tended to get good tables at better restaurants.
The officer seemed to sense my feelings and drew back a little. He looked at Jon a bit more serious. "Well, I was going to give you a ticket. You're going about fifteen miles an hour over the speed limit. But, I'll let it slid this time. Just keep it a little closer to legality."
Jon nodded. "Sorry, Dave. I'll do that. I'll see you when I get back on duty."
He nodded and walked back to the cruiser. Jon handed me his registration to put back in the glove compartment. "One of the fringe benefits of being a cop, I guess.", he said with a smile. Then he stated up the engine again and pulled back into the street.
A few minutes later, Jon turned the sport-ute into the parking lot of his mothers condo complex. "We'll just stop in for a little while. I wanted to make sure she knew that I was okay."
"No problem. I just thought that you were exhausted."
To emphasize that fact, he yawned. "I am. But I need to stop by. We'll only be a few minutes, and I'm sure that my mom would love to meet you."
Copyright 1997, Brian Eirik Coe
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