Chapter - 5

P5437/104 Keyboard attached

I suppose I could have taken the time to examine the other items that came in the package, but all I cared about now was the keyboard. Therefore, with a little more care, I lifted the edge of my covers, reached out with my left arm and gently deposited the other things on my night table before retracting my arm back into the warmth.

With the new keyboard already attached, I started typing and wasn't just a little surprised at the fact that I'd not had to do anything other then plug it in to make it work.

"I got to remember to tell dad just how cool this is tomorrow!" I said as I went back to journaling, only this time typing out my thoughts rather then writing them longhand on the screen.

I'd been typing joyfully away when I felt more intense warmth and it took me a second to realize that it was inside my diaper.

"Hey!" I snapped at my diaper-engulfed boyhood. "Stop that! You have to stop doing that! I have to go back to school in a few days and you can't just let go of my pee anytime you darn well feel like it!"

Had anyone been around at that moment and heard me talking to my penis, I would probably have ended up in the loony-farm for sure!

Visualizing, I clamped off the flow of pee and said, "You know better then that! You know you are supposed to do that in the toilet!"

And then thinking about going back out in the cold again I surrendered, "Okay, but this is the last time! Do you hear me?" and I released my muscles and let the stream flow until I was once again empty and comfortable.

I went back to writing, my brain jumping between thinking about what I was writing and relishing in the extra warmth between my legs.

Around 6:30 a.m., when sleep started to take me again, I once more forced myself to venture out into the icy wastelands of my room, leaving behind the warmth of my covers. After putting away my e-journal and before returning to bed I decided to peek out my bedroom window to see if it had stopped snowing sometime in the night. What I saw astounded me and left me in a state of awe.

The world as I knew it no longer excited. It had been blanketed in what looked to be at least a couple feet of snow. Every tree and bush was filled with so much snow that branches seemed to be bowing low under the weight. All the houses across the street had snowdrifts that looked much deeper. "Everyone will have a hard time getting out of their front doors this morning." I said as I noticed that the wind must have been coming from behind our house, because the snow didn't seem to be as deep up close to the front of ours as it was with the houses across the street.

My warm breath against the cold glass caused it to fog and I had to wipe it away with my hand to still be able to see out. The glass was so cold that it felt like tiny fairies were biting at my fingers.

"That's it!" I said. "The end of the world has come and I'm the last remaining soul alive!"

I wiped the glass clear again, "The second ice age has come during the night and encased the planet in snow and ice!" I giggled softly, "The horror! THE HORROR!"

Leaving the glass fogged this time; I quickly found my robe and pulled it on before leaving my room and going to the sliding backdoor to look out. However, when I got there, I could not see. Our back porch was completely filled with snow that was higher then I was tall. Snow had blown all the way up under the back porch roof and was pilled against the back door until only about a foot or so was still able to be viewed out of at the very top. I'd pulled one of the kitchen table's chairs over to the door and was standing on my tiptoes looking out but at that height and angle I couldn't see anything other then the fact that our entire porch was filled with snow.

After getting down from the chair I went to the kitchen window and using a spatula from the drawer so that I could reach, I pulled open the curtain enough to see that, that window was complete blocked with snow too.

"Wow!" I said dropping the spatula on the counter and racing back to tell mom and dad that we were snowed-in.

I knocked softly at first on their bedroom door and when there was no answer I knocked a little harder. Given the time of morning and the fact that it was a weekday I was surprised that neither was up yet.

I lifted my hand to knock on the door once more when there was an explosive sound that came from outside. It sounded like a bomb went off and I jumped in the air and spun around when it occurred.

As the sound reverberated, in that instant the only two sources of light where I was standing, the hallway nightlight and the light coming from my bedroom, both went out. Abruptly in a flurry of fabric, flesh and carpet I found myself lying on the carpeted hallway floor with someone lying beside me growing and moaning.

"Simon is that you?" I heard dad's rough morning voice ask through the total darkness.

"Yeah!" I said and then cried out, "Dad you're crushing my arm!"

I felt the weight of his body lift off my right arm, instantly relieving me of the pain.

"Don't move!" he said and from inside the bedroom I heard mom cry out, "What happened? Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, I just tripped over your son!" dad growled back at her.

"Is he okay?" she cried next.

"I'm fine mom! As long as dad doesn't fall on me again!" I said and then shouted, "Dad that's my hand!" when I felt dad nearly stepping on my fingers.

"Well move it then!" dad barked.

"But you said not to move!" I yelled back.

"Simon, stop arguing with me and tuck your arms and legs in before you make me fall and hurt myself again." Dad yelled.

From back in their room, mom must have heard him because she said, "You did hurt yourself then?"

Sounding angry dad shot back at her, "Honey! Would you please give me a few minutes to find out what is going on?"

There was complete silence after that, except for the sound of dad's muffled footsteps on the carpet. In another place and time, I would have thought it interesting that I could actually hear the sound of the carpet being crushed under dad's feet.

Within minutes, I saw the glow of a light coming from the direction of the kitchen and getting brighter as it got closer.

"You all right?" dad asked as I was getting to my feet and shielding my eyes from the retina burning flashlight.

"Yeah I'm okay, what do you think it was?" I asked and from right behind me mom asked, "Are you alright sweetheart?"

"He's fine." Dad said still sounding quite irritated with her.

I heard mom make a noise that sounded like she was trying to twist a chickens head off.

"Here!" dad said handing me a flashlight, "Go back to your room and stay there until I tell you, you can come out."

I did as he said without question, went to my bedroom window and looked out. Aside from the slight morning sun that was trying to get through the layer of cloud cover, there were no lights at all anywhere. Every house and streetlight looked completely dark, at least as far as I could see form my window.

From elsewhere in the house I heard mom exclaimed, "Oh my goodness!" and I figured she'd just tried to look out either the backdoor or the kitchen window.

Dad's reply to mom's exclamation was, "Just be glad we don't live on the other side of the street, else we'd not be able to get out of the front of our house."

I leaned to the edge of my window and saw the front storm door swing open and then closed again, but no one came out of it. I figured dad was making sure it opened.

"I can't believe it! Not at this time of year!" came mom's voice again.

"Must have kept this up all night!" I heard dad say softer and I figured mom must be closer to him now.

"Oh my goodness gracious!" I heard mom exclaiming again and not able to stand it anymore I went to my door and shouted out. "Can I come out now?"

Mom answered, "If you can find them, put on your slippers first!"

And then dad added, "You'd better get some clothes on too, it's going to get cold in here!"

I quickly found my slippers and raced out to the living room. Both mom and dad were standing by the front door looking up the hill of our street.

"That's what I thought it was. Look up there by the Murphy's house; see the transformer?" dad was saying to mom.

"Oh my, it's all black!" she said and then the two of them came back inside and closed the door.

"What is it?" I asked excitedly, "Did Russia attack? Is it a Martian invasion?"

Dad looked down at me and said, "Where do you come up with these ideas?"

"Television!" Mom answews for me.

"The power transformer blew, probably from all the ice." Dad said. "Looks like we're going to be without power for a while."

"Well we have plenty of candles for light and ..." mom's voice trailed off as she was thinking and then as if someone flicked a match inside her head, she said, "Oh, I could heat water using that fondue pot."

"Actually, I think it's out in the garage." Dad said, "but what do we need hot water for?" he asked.

"Coffee!" mom said, turning to go to the kitchen with a flashlight in her hand.

"Oh yeak! Must have my coffee!" dad said, finally smiling.

"Why didn't you get up for work today?" I asked seeing he was standing before me wearing nothing but a pair of plaid boxer shorts and his bathrobe, which was not tied shut.

"My boss called late last night and said he was closing the office for today since the snow was already nearly 8-inches deep around nine last night." He said while pulling his robe closed and tying the matching plaid belt to keep it closed.

"What's everyone think of Pop Tarts and coffee for breakfast?" mom asked from the kitchen. She then came back around the corner and for the first time I realized she was only wearing a nearly see-through nightgown.

I quickly covered my eyes and shouted, "MOM GO PUT ON SOME CLOTHES! GEEZE!"

I heard dad laugh and mom said, "Oh yeah!" and whooshed past me.

"She's gone!" dad laughed.

"Dang!" I said uncovering my eyes!

"That reminds me!" dad said.

"What?" I said.

"I meant to talk to you last night about the recent decline in your grammar." He said shining the light right in my face, causing me to have to shield my eyes.

"Sorry!" I said suddenly realizing what he was saying.

"Consider this your last warning about it!" he said.

I nodded my head obediently.

"Okay then!" dad said before adding, "Now go get dress ..." but he didn't finish his statement. He had shined his flashlight on the front of my plastic pants which seemed to almost glow like a blue neon light. "Actually, I think we should get you changed first!"

I covered the front of my diaper with my free hand and felt my face get hot with embarrassment.

"You'd think I'd get used to this by now." I thought to myself as he led me back to my room, shining his light ahead of us.

When we reached the point in the hallway where dad had fallen over me, I saw in the small section of wall between mom and dad's room door and the hallway bathroom door that there was a sizable whole in the drywall.

"Whoa, what happened there?" I said shining my light on it.

"That is where my elbow went through the wall." Dad pointed out.

I spun around to shine my light on him, "Are you okay?" I asked with genuine concern.

"I'll live, I `spect." He said, "Drywall board is not as hard as elbows, thankfully!" he said jokingly.

Shining my light on the hole again, "Gee-whiz dad, that would of hurt me!"

Before turning into my room dad called to mom throw their closed bedroom door, "Honey, I'm going to get Simon cleaned up and into a dry diaper!"

"God did he have to say it like that?" I continued thinking.

Back in my room, I used the flashlight dad had handed me to find my own smaller and lighter weight flashlight that I'd placed on my desk. I sat the other on my nightstand after clicking mine on. The beam of light was not only brighter, but sent out a wider beam of light. After I found the edge of my bed, sat down and awaited dad's return from my dresser. I shined my light over in his direction.

"Thank you!" he said trying to gather the things with one hand and hold his light with the other.

"This is kind of fun!" I said.

"I'm glad you think so." He sent back.

"How long you think the power will be out?" I asked as he deposited the diapering supplies on my night table.

"Given the amount of snow out there, it wouldn't surprise me if it was for the better part of the day." He said crossing to my window and opening my curtains wide.

"Is your room always this cold in the mornings?" he asked.

"Pretty much!" I said.

"Going to have to do something about that!" he said as soft light seemed to flow in like a warm spring wind blowing and as long as I didn't look out the window, I could hang on to the idea that it was a warm bright sunshiny day. Unfortunately, I did look out the window from where I sat and could see that it was once again snowing but not quite as hard as it had been when I'd gone to bed last night.

"More snow?" I complained.

"Funny how you pray for snow when you know you have to go to school." He said joking again.

I gave him a half smile as he came back over, clicking his flashlight off, "Don't think we'll need these until later today, better save the batteries.

From outside my window there was an odd sound that I couldn't seem to form into a mental picture.

"You hear that?" I asked.

"Yeah!" dad said going back to my window. "Someone's already out on a snow mobile!"

"Really?" I said getting up and joining him at the window.

"Whoa! That looks like fun!" I said watching as the driver who, from our vantage point, looked to be kind of short. The rider stopped several houses up the hill from ours. It appeared that the driver of the snow mobile was talking to someone in that house, then waved and went to the next house.

"I'll be right back, stay here!" dad said to me and quickly left my room.

A moment later I saw our storm door fly open and dad step out onto the front porch. With my window closed, I could not hear what was being said, but I did finally recognize the person on the snow mobile because he came right up to our house and pulled off his helmet. It was BJ!

I through my robe back around myself and raced to the front door.

"BJ!" I shouted past dad and interrupting whatever it was BJ had been saying.

It wasn't until later that I realized what it was I'd heard him saying as I'd made my way to the door.

"Since they caught the man they said I could come out." Is what I had heard him saying to dad.

"Simon, get back inside!" dad said, "You're going to freeze out here!"

"Hi Simon!" BJ said with a smile.

"I think we're all set here, but thanks for checking on us!" dad said giving BJ a wave, "You want to come in and warm up a bit?" dad asked him.

"No thanks! I've only been out here for a few minutes." BJ said pulling his helmet back on. "I'll stop back by later if that's okay though!" he asked.

"Absolutely and thanks again!" dad said and I added, "Yeah, see ya Beej." which was my nickname for him.

Back in the house again, "Alright, back to your room with you Frosty the Snow Child!" dad said playfully trying to kick me in my diapered backside.

"Dad, I want one of those!" I said and then asked, "What's he doing anyway?"

"He's going door-to-door to check and see if anyone needs anything." Dad said.

"Wow, that's pretty cool!" I said.

"I think so too!" he said as we reentered my room.

Mom came back out of her room fully dressed except she was also wearing her big pink fuzzy slippers.

"Did I hear you say BJ was here?" she asked.

"Yeah, he's going door-to-door on his snow mobile." I answered for dad.

"Oh that's so sweet!" mom said, "Why didn't you invite him in?"

"Dad did!" I answered again, "But he only just started!"

"Oh, alright then. I'm going to go see about making coffee by candle! She said with a funny sort of expression.

When I looked back over at dad he was looking at the spot mom had been standing and was shaking his head.

"What?" I said.

"Nothing, lay down!" he said and the way he said it I could tell he was only playing like he was being mad at me right then.

"Yeah, yeah! I know the procedure!" I joked back.

As I was climbing back on my bed, he gave my backside a swat that made more noise against my plastic pants then anything else.

"Hey!" I complained.

Dad once again pinned me into a double layer of cloth diapers before re-snapping the blue plastic pants over them. However, before he pinned them on he did an extra good job of washing me with the wipes and I figured the extra attention was because I couldn't take a bath. I don't know a lot, but I do know that our water heater runs off electric and if the electric is out, we don't have a lot of hot water except what is in the tank. I learned that last summer when a storm came through and knocked out the power and I had gone and taken a shower and used up all the hot water.

As dad helped me get dressed, I thought about the fact that dad seemed to not mind me being in diapers as much as mom seemed too. I came to that conclusion because dad always seemed to diaper me heavy where as mom seemed to want me diapered light. I on the other hand, wasn't sure how I liked it. Mostly I liked being diapered, what bothered me was the idea of going back to school on Monday.

"Guess what?" mom asked as dad was helping me put on my socks. I turned my head to see her standing in the doorway to my room.

"What's that?" dad asked.

"The phone's not working either." She said.

"Because there's no electric love!" dad said.

"The phone doesn't run on electric!" I said.

"Ours does!" dad said pinching my toe.

"Ouch!" I complained.

Dad looked back over to mom and all she said was, "Oh!" and left again, but dad called after her, "You can use your cell phone!"

There was no answer from her and without thinking; I asked dad, "You and mom fighting about me?"

"Who says we're fighting?" dad asked slipping my right foot into my shoe.

"You are, aren't you?" I asked again.

"Don't you go worrying yourself about it. We'll work things out!" he said sliding the other shoe onto my left foot.

I wanted to tell him that I am not just a little kid and that I am part of the family and when they fight; it hurts me just as much as it does them! Instead, I clammed up and said nothing.

Back in the kitchen, "How's the coffee coming?" dad asked of mom.

Mom turned around and I could see something silver sitting on the counter. It took us both a few seconds to realize that it was the fondue pot.

"Oh you found it!" dad said, almost making it sound like a question.

"It was in the pantry after all!" she said, adding, "I'd say in about a half-hour you'll have your coffee!"

"Wonderful!" dad said. "In the mean time, I think I'll go get dressed myself!"

With dad gone, I thought I'd try my luck at getting some information out of mom. I waddled over to the kitchen table, sat down and asked, "So, are you and dad fighting about something I done?"

Mom didn't answer but shot me a look that told me perfectly clearly that I'd better just shut up and mind my own business.

In due time, dad was back and the three of us ate our Pop Tarts and dad drank his coffee, which I could tell by the face he kept making every time he took a sip, that it wasn't very good coffee. He didn't complain; not even once.

I had a glass of orange juice with my Pop Tart and while I ate, I was doing some thinking, which eventually formed into an idea, which then formed into words.

"Dad, how do Eskimos walk on the snow?" I asked.

"With snowshoes!" he answered.

"Kind of like tennis rackets?" I asked.

"You're not using my tennis rackets to strap to your feet!" mom interrupted.

"No!" I said, "That's not what I meant. I mean, they are like that right?" I asked directing my question back to dad.

"Yeah, I guess they are something like that." He said popping the last bite of his Pop Tart into his mouth.

That was all I had to say to get dad thinking and I could tell he was thinking because he got that faraway look in his eyes and was rubbing his whiskered chin.

After a couple minutes he said, "I think we can fashion a couple pair of snow shoes and venture out to dig ourselves out to the garage and the snow blower."

Mom only rolled her eyes back in her head, got up from the table and took all of our cups to the sink.

Within maybe an hour's time, dad and I had managed to use things from around the house to throw together a couple pair of makeshift snow boots and tied them to our winter snow boots using belts.

Now there was no way mom would have let us open the back door. The snow was sure to just fall right into the house. So instead, we went out the front door and made our way around the house and to the garage.

It was so eerily quiet outside. About he only sound to be heard was the sound of kids out playing in the snow somewhere in the distance.

The way our house and garage sits; the snow had sort of blown between them up onto the back porch and had the walk door to the garage nearly covered. However, only about half of the garage door was blocked and since it went up and down, all dad had to do was click the button and the door opened right up.

Something I found both interesting and funny was, when the garage door opened I expected all the snow that was piled against it to fall into the garage, but it didn't. Instead, it sat there like a great glacier wall.

"That's really cool!" I said.

"Yeah that is kind of neat." Dad said back.

After taking off his makeshift snowshoes he went to the back of the garage and with a lot of shifting of other things, managed to get the snow blower up to the front of the garage. However, getting it started proved to be a bigger challenge. Dad and I worked at it for what seemed like an hour before it finally started. I jumped up and down cheering when it roared to life and dad started plowing into the snow at the lowest point.

He had only made it a few feet when BJ came tooling up on his snow mobile again. Instead of turning off the snow blower, dad only idled it back enough that we could hear BJ talking loudly.

"Hey!" he said extending out a cup of coffee to dad. I seen on the side of the cup that it said, `7-11' and I guessed BJ had gone all the way up to the corner store just to get the coffee!

"BJ you are about the most wonderful boy I know!" dad said with a smile as he gratefully took the coffee!

"Yeah, I remember you drink coffee too! My dad was a serious grump this morning until I got him some!" he had said with a big smile!

"Hey Simon! You want to go for a ride?" BJ asked.

"DAD, CAN I?" I said jumping up and down.

"Take off those snow shoes!" he said.

"Hey, that's a really cool idea!" BJ added as I unfastened them from my boots. I started to climb up the snow to get to BJ but dad stopped me.

"Hang on!" dad said.

He took my snowshoes and using one of the belts strapped it onto my back and buckled the belt over one of my shoulders and under my other arm.

He then lifted me up and helped me to get on the snowmobile behind BJ.

"Be careful and do not get hurt, either of you!" dad yelled over the idling blower.

BJ took it slow at first, until we were well out of site and then really opened it up. We were flying over the snow and jumping the snowdrifts. It was an absolute blast!

"We got to go up to my house for a minute!" BJ yelled back to me.

"Okay!" I yelled back.

A few minutes later we were at his house, his father was also clearing the snow from their driveway with a snow blower.

"Well hello there Simon!" BJ's dad said when he saw me climbing off the back of the snow mobile. "Wow you are looking a lot better then BJ had described!"

"Yeah, I'm doing tons better!" I said brushing the snow from the fronts of my pant legs and remembering that I was, quite amply, diapered. Thankfully, my coat seemed to hide any signs, but to stay safe I didn't do any undue bending or walking around.

BJ got off too, went up to his dad and pulled out a pack of cigarettes.

"They give you any trouble?" BJ's dad asked him.

"Nope, but she did say she was going to ask you about them the next time you stop in." He said before coming back to climb aboard the snow mobile again.

"We're going to go riding for a while if that's okay?" he asked.

"Got enough gas?" his dad asked popping a cigarette into his mouth.

"Yeah, I filled up while I was there!" BJ answered and then said to me, "Hope on!" so I did and held onto him as we took off like a rocket.

We road on up his road, down another and then over to the park where we had to stop and turn back; a tree had fallen right across the entrance to the park and had it blocked. However, that was not the bad part; the bad part was that it had also falling across someone's car.

"Oh that's not good!" BJ said.

"Yeah that's not good at all!" I agreed.

"Mind if we stop to see if they need anything?" he asked.

"Good idea!" answered.

He tooled up to within a couple feet of the front door, their house didn't have a porch and was positioned in basically the same direction as my house was so the snow was only a couple feet deep but was still up against their storm door.

"Go ahead and knock!" he said to me. I reached out and pounded my fist on the door.  A moment later, an old man opened the door and was holding a can of beer.

"Hi-ya mister!" BJ said. "We seen your car and well we are just out seeing if there is anything people need since they can't get out because of the snow."

"What about my car?" The man said and then saw the tree lying across it. "Oh holy ..." and a string of cures words came out of the man's mouth which made both BJ and I flinch.

The old man was shouting and threw his can of beer out into the snow while still cursing.

BJ leaned back, turning his head slightly and said, "Guess he didn't know about the car!"

I couldn't help but giggle at his comment, but I had the common sense enough to know to at least turn my head away so as not to offend the elderly man.

After listening to the man rant and rage for several minutes a younger lady came to the door looking very offended by the mans colorful language. BJ once again explained the reason we had knocked and she thanked us for stopping and letting them know about the car.

A second later we were once again flying across the snow and eventually ended up at the top of Tater's street. From our vantage point, it looked like no one had been out of any of the houses as we sat atop the hill looking down.

"Wanna see how fast we can go down this hill?" BJ asked and I gripped my arms around him tighter and shouted, "Go for it!"

That was all the incentive BJ needed and we were rocketing down the street. Even if someone had been looking out of Tater's house, they never would have known it was us; we would have looked like a blur shooting past.

Going down the hill so fast was a great thrill but it didn't scare me. What did scare the life out of me was the fact that when we got to the bottom of the hill we were going so fast that we shot right across the street. Of course the probability that someone was coming either way was doubtful given that none of our roads had been cleared yet in our plat, but still a snowplow or a 4-Wheel-Drive truck could get through easily enough.

We continued racing around the neighborhoods not really carrying where we went. About the only thing that seemed to effect our direction was when we'd see a particularly good mound of snow to jump.

It wasn't until we'd come to the end of a dead-end street that BJ slowed to a stop. He pulled off his helmet and turned off the engine before saying, "Wanna give it a try?" However, I hadn't heard him because something else had seized my full attention.

"Simon?" BJ called my name, but I still did not answer, "Hey man you alright?" he tried to turn on the seat, but I had a death-hold on him from behind.

He brought his elbow back into my chest, which thankfully my armor protected me from, but it was enough to snap me out of my trance.

"What's up with you?" he asked.

"Th-that house!" I said nodding my head toward what I recognized to be the very same house I had hid in only yesterday.

"What? You mean crazy, old-man Peterson's house?" he said, "Don't tell me you are scared of that old fart?"

"I met him yesterday." I said not knowing what I was saying.

"You what?" he shouted and stood up, dismounting the snow mobile.

I looked up at him. "You saying you talked with him?" he had lowered his voice to a near whisper. "Don't you know who that is?" he asked.

I shook my head.

"That's old man Johnson! They say he killed his whole family and ate their bodies!" BJ was ranting.

"WHAT?" I said realizing the ridiculousness of what he had just said, "That's not true!"

"Simon! I'm telling you! It's 110 percent true! Everyone around here knows it!" he said.

"No way!" I said looking back at the house, but even I wasn't so convinced by my rebuttle.

"What did he say to you?" BJ asked.

"N-nothing, I m-mean well, n-nothing really." I said not wanting to tell BJ about yesterday.

"Man Simon! You got some seriously good luck! I've heard that he's tried to trick people into coming into his house so that he can eat them!" BJ said.

"C-can w-we g-get ou-t-tt of h-here?" I said unable to hide my fear any longer.

Now BJ knows me well and knows that I stutter worse with I'm scared or excited. Normally he's really good about getting me calmed down so that I stop stuttering. But, this time he simply said, "You got it man!" and jumped back on the snow mobile.

We were gone in a flash and didn't stop until we were nearly at the bottom of my street. "This here's where they said on the news that, that guy that was kidnapping all those kids killed himself yesterday.

"D-did they find the kids yet?" I asked.

"Nah, my dad doesn't think they ever will. Least not alive!" BJ said.

"So you want to go home now or you want to go riding some more?" he asked.

"What do you say we go back to my house and warm up a bit?" I suggested.

"Alright, sounds good to me!" he said gunning the engine and aiming the front end up my street.

PART 2 – Thursday, March 05, 2004 – Treasures for the Taking

We made it to just across from Marshall Ave, which is my street, before we finally came to a stop. Putting distance between the old man's house and us made me feel more at ease again. I also found it peculiar that I would get so frightened this time when yesterday the same house seemed to be the only place to find refuge.

"Looks like the plow truck came down Marshall after we crossed it." I said to BJ as the two of us looked down at the now cleared and salted road that lay about three feet below us.

"Ah you're kidding?" BJ playfully ribbed me, "What was your first clue?"

Since I had my arms wrapped firmly around him, I used the opportunity to give him the Heimlich.

"Houwa!" BJ groaned and leaned forward against the handlebars.

After a moment to catch his breath he started laughing and said, "Simon you nearly made me puke!"

Playing the idiot I said, "What? I'm just holding on so that I don't fell off and get lost in the snow."

"Do that again and you can walk home!" BJ threatened but I knew he was only kidding.

"You know what?" I asked.

"What?" he answered still giggling.

"I don't want to go back home now." I said.

"Okay, where you want to go then?" he asked.

"Let's go see if we can find a way into the park." I said.

"Alright, hang on!" and after carefully maneuvering down one side, crossing the street and then back up the other bank of snow, BJ gunned the engine and we raced up my street. As we passed the house, dad was still working to get our driveway cleared. I saw he had Aunt Catharine's car cleared off and dug out, but was still working on the front part of the drive way and hadn't even come close to reaching the sidewalk yet. BJ slowed down a little and we both gave dad a one handed wave while still holding tight with our other, me to BJ, BJ to the snowmobile. Dad waived back as we passed him; whether he was smiling or not, I couldn't tell because he had a scarf wrapped around his face so that only his nose and eyes were exposed.

We were back at the fallen tree moments later and it was only when we stopped that we realized it had stopped snowing again.

"Hey, it stopped snowing!" I said and BJ started to say something but I gave his stomach another tight squeeze, only not as hard as I had with the Heimlich. It was enough to make him laugh; knowing that I already knew what he was going to say.

He slowly moved the snowmobile from one end of the tree to the other, "Well I'll never get this through." BJ said patting the snowmobile with his hand.

"Yeah, too bad you don't have a pair of snow shoes too. We could go play mountain men or something." I said and no sooner was the words out of my mouth then the thought hit me that dad might let us use his makeshift snowshoes.

After sharing my idea with BJ, the two of us sped back to my house where we found dad dumping more gas into the blower. Dad wasn't wearing his snowshoes and after some convincing that neither of us was cold, he let us have them.

We then road back to BJ's house, parked the snowmobile in the garage and were about to strap on the snow shoes when his mom made us come in for some hot cider to warm our insides. However, since we were all bundled up and didn't want to have to take off all our stuff and put it back on again, she surrendered and let us drink it, while standing inside the garage with his dad.

Standing there in the garage, I kind of felt awkward; I felt like the big pink elephant in the room that no one was willing to admit was there. I'm sure it was my imagination in overdrive, but I felt like they both knew I was wearing a diaper and were trying not to let on. In reality, aside from the way I walked, I doubted anyone could notice as long as I kept on my coat. Therefore, I made it a point not to move around, but stand in one spot the entire time. In addition, to try to easy my anxieties, I tried to start some small talk. I looked around the garage and spotted Mr. Otteranski's pool table that occupied one whole side of the garage.

"Mr. Otteranski, I thought you said no one was allowed to put stuff on the pool table?" I asked because there were boxes, an old computer monitor and a baby's car seat setting on it; not to mention the half dozen or so wooden studs that I knew were probably left over from when Mr. Otteranski had remodeled their upstairs bathroom this past summer.

Mr. Otteranski gave me a funny grimace and as he looked over at the table BJ gave me an elbow right in the chest. Not hard and had he been thinking I'm sure he wouldn't have done it but even so, since I was wearing my armor, coat and all them layers of clothes, I hardly felt it, but it was enough to get the message to me that I should drop the subject.

BJ downed his cider quickly and then said, "I'll be right back, got an idea!" and was gone before I could ask him what it was.

Consequently, I was left alone with Mr. Otteranski, which wasn't such a big deal. I mean, I've been alone with one or both of BJ's parents, many times before, but this time felt different. Not just because I was wearing a diaper, but because as I stood there, still sipping at my cider, I felt the warm sensation that told me I'd just flooded my diaper and if that had not been bad enough, I felt my face flush hot as well.

Mr. Otteranski noticed my face turning read and asked, "What's the matter?"

"Huh?" I shot back nervously.

"You all right?" he continued to probe.

"Uh, yeah fine!" I said too fast and again sipped at my mug.

I was so glad Mr. Otteranski didn't push the subject any farther and a few minutes later BJ returned with his school backpack strapped to his back.

"What's in the pack?" I asked curiously.

"You'll see!" he said picking up my dad's pair of homemade snowshoes and started to strap them on to his boots.

Mr. Otteranski was nice enough to help me with mine and though I was nervous about letting him get that close to my diaper, I was confident if I refused his help, he would for sure suspect something.

In no time, the two of us were ready for a winter adventure. I quickly finished the last of my cider as Mr. Otteranski stepped out into the open, pulled out another cigarette and lit it. He was careful, as he always was, not to let the smoke blow my way. He'd seen one of my bad asthma attacks before and knew that cigarette smoke could trigger an attack pretty darn fast.

After telling him where we were going he said, "You two keep out of trouble and if it starts snowing hard again, I want you both back here pronto!"

"Mr. Otteranski can you call my dad's cell phone and let him know where I'm at?" I asked.

"Sure!" he said pulling his own cell phone from his coat pocket. "What's the number again?"

"555-0690." BJ said before I could even open my mouth.

"No, that's my house number!" I said giving BJ a backhanded swat that made a satisfying thumping sound against his heavy winter coat.

BJ laughed, "Oh yeah!"

"It's 555-4993" I told Mr. Otteranski.

"All right, you boys be careful and remember what I said `cause you don't want me to have to come get you!" he warned as we started hiking toward the park.

We both knew, all too well, what Mr. Otteranski was implying. In the early part of last summer, BJ and I had been out playing and lost track of time. We were late getting home by over three hours. Mr. Otteranski had not only given BJ two very hard swats on the back of his pants right there on the front porch for the whole world to see, he'd done the same to me. Let me tell you, I didn't care for that none at all. Moreover, when I got home, Mr. Otteranski had already phoned my parents and they both threaten to whip me again. Both BJ and I ended up being put on restriction for a week. I'm sure BJ has long since forgotten about that spanking, but I will never forget it as long as I live.

"Sure thing!" BJ said giving his dad a wave.

"Yes sir!" I said too while leading the way and trying my best to walk as normal as possible and not let BJ know I was wearing a now, wet diaper.

As we continued to walk, I got lost in my thoughts and it took BJ hitting me with a snowball on the back on the head to snap me out of it.

"Did you hear anything I said?" he asked sounding more then a little annoyed.

"Sorry Beej, I was just thinking about something!" I said reaching the halfway point to the park.

"Yeah, well I have been talking to you since we left my house!" BJ said almost growling.

I stopped and turned around expecting to see him mad but instead he was smiling.

"What?" I asked.

"You were thinking about Maaarrrrryyyy!" he accused.

"I was not! Well, I am now, thank you very much!" I said and pushed him.

However, my slight push had more of an impact then either of us expected. BJ tried to take a step backward but his left snowshoe acted more like an anchor and he started toppling over. Knowing how deep the snow was I tried to grab him so that he wouldn't end up buried but didn't realize that by putting more of my weight toward the front of my snowshoe would cause it to dig into the snow. Before either of us could do anything else we were both laying so deep in the snow that we couldn't see each other though I could hear him suffering from a fit of laughter.

It was so quiet outside that BJ's giggles seemed that much funnier and it made me laugh all the harder. By the time the two of us managed to get some control over our giggles, a good five-minute or more had passed.

From within his snowy grave BJ asked through his giggles, "Oh man that was funny! So, how we supposed to get out of here?"

However, I'd been up to more mischief and had made a snowball that I lobbed up into the air and it came right down into BJ's whole almost as if I'd packed a guidance chip inside it.

"HEY! I'm covered with enough snow thank you very much!" BJ laughingly complained.

Somehow I managed to get myself turned over and my legs tucked under me so that I was able to at least get up to a short kneeling position and that allowed my head to only just come out of the hole my body had made in the snow.

"I'm nearly up!" I announced.

"Up? I can't even move!" BJ complained and then started giggling again.

"Stop laughing! I'm trying to get up and you are not helping!" I made another snowball and was able to send it down into BJ's whole with more force then the first one had.

"Ahhhh!" BJ groaned, "Right in the tenders!"

"Really?" I asked.

"Nah, missed by a mile!" he said and I could tell he was lying now. "You throw another snow ball and you're going to die!"

"I been mostly dead before; it's not all they make it out to be!" I joked stealing a line from some movie I couldn't remember the title of then or now.

"I'm going to have to take off my snowshoes to be able to get out of here." I said and after wiggling around a bit I added, "I think the snow's deeper here then I thought it was!"

"Brother you're three for three today Sherlock!" BJ laughed.

"Keep it up and I'll leave you in there!" I threatened.

"Just remember that I wouldn't be in here if it weren't for someone pushing me!" BJ shouted back, still laughing.

"I wonder who that could have been." I said while trying to get my snowshoes off.

I stopped and popped my head out of the hole again to look where he was and saw that he must have fallen to the left whereas I fell, sort of, to the right and forward. I also figured that I must have somehow turned myself as I fell, because I'd ended up on my back.

"You know what's funny?" I asked.

"Your face?" BJ quickly shot back.

"HEY!" I complained.

"What then?" BJ snorted sounding like someone was down in his hole with him and was tickling him.

"There is a perfect silhouette of our body in the snow, like happens to Wild E. Coyote when he falls off a cliff." I said which sent me into another fit of giggles.

"Okay, okay! Stop! I have a question!" BJ yelled out of his whole.

"NO! I'm not out of my whole yet!" I said.

Through his laughter he said, "No not that, I was going to ask why we were walking over the snow when we could have been walking down the cleared road?"

"Because mountain men don't have roads!" I said and threw another snowball down at him.

"Alright, enough of that and get me out of here!" BJ screamed which split through the cold late morning air.

"You need help there?" a man's voice asked and I had to twist my head around like an owl to be able to see who and where the voice was coming from.

There was a man standing in the street, clad in dirty and tattered overalls, a stocking cap, leather gloves and no coat. Behind him was a not old, but defiantly not new pickup truck. I'd not even heard the truck coming thanks to our laughter.

"Yes please!" I said and added, "I almost got my snow shoes off by my friend is still stuck." and I pointed downward toward the impression in the snow.

The man was trying not to laugh as he reached into the bed of his truck and pulled out a bundle of yellow and black rope.

"You alright in there kid?" he called.

"Oh yeah, just having a grand old time!" BJ sent back out of his snowy grave.

"Beej, be nice! The man is trying to help us!" I scolded him.

"Sorry mister!" BJ sent out next and the man had totally given up trying to hide his amusement at our predicament.

After taking several giant steps from the street and into the snow the man stopped and said, "I'm going to toss you the end of this rope so I can pull you out of there.

A minute or so later BJ was out and the man tossed me the rope next however, when I was nearly out of my whole I put my hand down on the snow and instead of being able to pull myself up I fell back into the snow head first. That was when I remembered that the houses on this side of this street all had driveways that went down to the garage and was about four feet lower then the yards.

From outside the snow I heard the unmistakable sound of BJ laughing his stupid head off!

"Hey kid, you alright?" the man called out.

"DO I LOOK ALRIGHT?" I shouted and tried to stop myself from laughing too.

"Simon! Be nice that man's just trying to help!" BJ said mocking me with my own words.

Finally, after rescuing the two of us we found out that the man lived here and was just coming home from work where he'd got snowed in there last night. His name was Rudolph Nader and he thanked us for the laughs before we thanked him for saving us. It wouldn't be until later that I'd realize that I already knew him, well more accurately, my dad knew him, I only knew of him.

BJ and I used our gloved hands to brush each other free of snow, mostly anyway and we kept busting into giggles every few seconds. When we were back on our hike, down on the road of course, the two of us got to laughing, hard-as-ever, as we talking about the entire ordeal.

"I didn't have any idea you was so deep in the snow!" I said.

"I thought you were in as deep as I was! I couldn't figure out how you were getting those snowballs to hit me every time!" BJ said, "And when you went in head first I thought I was going to pee my pants!"

BJ suddenly stopped and turned around, "Hey, you didn't get hurt did yah? I mean your ribs?"

I looked down at the front of my coat and said with no small amount of surprise, "No, not at all!"

"Well that's something then." BJ commented and started walking toward the park again.

We were making better time down on the street and had eventually made it to the fallen tree again. This time however, there was a police cruiser sitting in front of the house but no officer was in sight.

"Must be inside the house?" I said.

"Yeah." Was all BJ said in return.

"Hang on a second." BJ said as he brushed the snow away from a spot on the tree so that he could lean against it to readjust one of his makeshift snowshoes. We then walked around the fallen tree, having to be careful not to fall in the hole left when the huge root system was ripped from the ground. We then squeezed between the tree branches and the metal pole, which was once the gate into the park, but now looked more like an oversized bent drinking straw.

I wasn't surprised to see that the park looked completely frozen in time. There were no tracks—human, animal, or machine anywhere. It appeared that we were the first persons to enter the park today.

"So, are you going to tell me what's in your pack?" I asked and had to talk a little louder then normal because we were walking about ten feet apart just in case one of us were to go down again, the other could then assistant in his rescue. That had been BJ's idea and I went along with it because it made perfect sense to me.

"Lunch!" BJ called back over his shoulder.

"Lunch?" I asked in surprise.

"Yeah, mom made it for us real fast! Just sandwiches, cookies and stuff." BJ added.

"That was good thinking!" I said after a few steps.

"You getting hungry yet?" he asked.

I stopped walking so that I could concentrate on my stomach for a moment.

"Well maybe a little, but I can wait a while." I said and then added, "How about we go up to those trees, maybe the snow won't be so deep there and we can find a clearing."

"Yeah sounds good!" BJ agreed and redirected his steps to head for the west end of the park.

We'd played near there before, mostly because the running and jogging track went by there, but neither of us had ever gone exploring too deep into the trees. It wasn't because we were scared or anything like that, it just never occurred to us to do so. There is tons of stuff to do at the sports park during the spring and summer so looking for stuff to do isn't really needed.

Five minutes later, we reached the point in the park that we both stopped and BJ said, "I think the track is right under us now."

I looked around and saw the top of one of the exercise signs sticking out of the snow about six inches.

"Snow must be deeper here!" I said still standing at a distance from BJ.

"Yeah, so don't fall!" BJ joked.

Right at the tree line, the snow tapered down to a foot or less deep. We quickly found what must have been a path through the trees and bushes as it was fairly easy to maneuver through.

"Beej?" I said.

"Yeah?" he said stopping and turning.

"Let's go up that way." I said pointing up a hill within the small forest of trees.

"Okay." BJ agreed and then asked, "You want to lead the way for a while?"

"Nah, you're doing great!" I answered.

About half way up the hill I started to feel the pressure within me telling me that I was going to need to poop soon, but I felt I could hold it for a while, least until we got back home. For the briefest of moments, the thought crossed my mind of what happened yesterday, but I soon forgot about it as we continued our ascent. The hill turned out to be steeper and higher then either of us thought at first, but we eventually made it to the top and what we found there excited the adventurer in us both.

"Whoa, look at that!" I exclaimed.

"Yeah man!" BJ concurred.

We'd emerged from the woods into a clearing where the snow again was deep. In the center of the clearing was an old weathered barn that looked to have been there a hundred years or more.

We walked all the way around the barn several times as we explored the property in our snowshoes. I was curious, but there didn't seem to be a way to get in the barn, as well as there didn't seem to be any road or path that lead up to the barn. Deep snowdrifts blocked the doors on the lower level and also those on the end, facing west. On the south-side, facing a denser crop of trees that kept the barn hidden from the soccer fields down in the park below, icicles had formed a glittering curtain, adding a thick glaze to the drifts that blocked that doorway. On the end of the barn, closest to the area we'd emerged from, the huge double doors were snowed completely shut.

We both felt like we just had to get inside the barn and look around. Using my hands, I began to slowly dig the drift away from a smaller entrance to the right of the main doors. After a few more minutes exploring, BJ joined me in digging out the door. Once the snow was cleared, it was easy to enter because the little door swung inward.

The door opened into a room which was about ten-feet-wide and twelve-feet-long. Two small frost covered windows faced the north, each covered with spider webs and each loaded with last summer's harvest of flies, moths and other unfortunate insects. Below the windows, there was a narrow workbench that would have been about waist high on a grown man. Nails driven into the wall around the windows served as hangers for a pair of pliers, a bent screwdriver, a broken claw hammer with black tape on its handle, and some small coils of wire. Some nails and screws and a few old hinges were scattered across the bench. Everything was rusty and covered in spider webs.

On the wall, opposite the bench, was a row of twelve wooden pegs spaced about six inches apart, almost too high for either of us to reach. From one of them, hung some long strips of leather.

"Part of an old harness." I thought aloud noting the fact that they were dark and stiff from the sweat of horses.

While looking at the leather strips, I had remembered what a room like this was called.

"It's a tack room. I read about it in a really good book last summer called, `Cowboy's Don't Cry'." I said to BJ.

"Oh yeah, you told me about that book." He answered as we continued to explore.

Three rusty horseshoes were stacked on another peg. BJ stood on his tiptoes to lift one of them off. He examined it and then handed it to me before reaching up and taking one down for himself. It had a nice feel in my gloved hand, heavy and solid, and seeing BJ pocket his, I too slipped mine into my coat pocket.

However, the best thing we had found was in the corner of the room, next to the crude plank door that opened into the rest of the barn. At first we'd both thought it was a broom handle or a piece of pipe. I went over, picked it up and took it over to the widows for a better look.

"Hey! I have seen one of these before!" BJ said.

Someone had made a didgeridoo from a straight young tree. It was about an inch and a half wide at the top, and widened perfectly to about twice that width at the bottom. A bunch of painstakingly intricate lines and images had been painted on the outside. The top of it had been rounded over and carefully smoothed, and in the light I could see the whittled cuts left by a knife. Six inches below the top end, the end you're supposed to blow into, there was just enough space for a hand to grasp hold—and a series of little ridges had been cut, ringing the tube. I pulled the glove off my right hand to see how the grip felt. It was just right.

"That's about the coolest thing." BJ said.

"Yeah man!" I said flipping it around and putting it up to my eye. "Ah yuck! It's not so nice inside!"

"What? Let me see." BJ said pulling the didgeridoo out of my fingers.

"Hey, don't be so grabby!" I complained.

"Just need to push a long stick through it is all!" BJ said looking down into it and saw that it was packed with spider webs and dead bugs.

"Yeah, got a stick that long?" I said grabbing it back from him.

"Dunno, let's look around for something." BJ said.

Opening the inner door, we stepped out onto the main floor of the barn. A row of small square windowpanes above the wide doors on either end of the bar let in some light, and we could see fine.

Looking up, the first thing that caught my eye was a long rope. It hung from the highest beam in the center of the barn, and a loop had been tied in the end that dangled a foot or so above the floor. BJ and I trotted over, but since my hands were still holding the didgeridoo, BJ jumped up, grabbed hold of the rope and pulled; testing to make sure it would hold his weight.

"Don't get dead!" I said, which was something we jokingly said to one another whenever one of us was about to do something monumentally stupid, dangerous or both.

"What? Me die? Never going to happen!" BJ said tugging on the rope again and giggling. "I don't know about you, but I, for one, plan to live forever, maybe even longer!"

"Famous last words." I said softly and taking another step backward.

"What was that?" BJ said.

"Oh nothing." I said with a fake cough.

BJ tugged again and I for one didn't really doubt its strength, since the rope was almost as thick as the climbing rope in our gym back at school, but I did doubt BJ's ability to hang onto it. Running forward with the loop in one hand, BJ pulled the rope back as far as he could and let it go. It swung out, and when it came back, he was ready. He grabbed hold and ran with it shouting, "To infinity and beyond!" then at the very last second, leaped up and clamped his legs around the big knot above the loop. The momentum swept him forward in a long slow arc, and then back and forth like a pendulum. After a few more swings, he dismounted and we moved on.

"Man that was fun! You should have tired it!" BJ said.

"No way! I'd hurt myself for sure!" I said.

The haylofts were about fifteen feet off the floor on either side of the open central area. To me they looked like enormous shelves built out from the sidewalls. Craning my neck to see better, I thought aloud, "Wonder how you get up there?"

Immediately BJ said, "Right there!"

I looked to where his finger was pointing and saw that the floor of each loft was supported by a row of massive wooden posts that were spaced about every ten six feet, and on several of the posts, boards and crosspieces had been nailed to make simple box ladders.

Twenty seconds after this discovery we were up one of the ladders and walking cautiously in the north hayloft, tapping ahead of us with the didgeridoo to be sure the boards were safe. When I got to the wall at the west end of the barn, I turned around and looked back. The inside of the barn stretched out in front of me, almost like it was a diagram on a huge piece of paper. The angle support beams arched away from me, the roof sloped gracefully from the peak, the horizontal and vertical supports met at perfect intervals—it all looked so solid, so permanent.

In the corner, under the south hayloft, BJ found a small sleigh, and next to it, a stack of wooden carriage wheels. I found the trapdoors that the farmer had used for dropping hay down to the ground level for the cows and horses. We had also explored the maze of stalls and pens on the ground floor, noticing that the smell of the animals was definitely stronger down there.

Each place we explored we found new things and added them to our collection in the tack room. I found a rusty shovel with a carved wooden handle, which I used to jamb down inside the didgeridoo to clean it out. Apparently there was more then just spiders and bugs that used to call it home as what look to at one time been a mouse or rats nest came out of it too. BJ found a pitchfork with a missing tine, which he was pretending was a spear, but stopped when he came within about two feet of running me through with it. We also found a small hatchet, a wooden bucket, an assortment of bottles and jars, a short carved sickle, a coffee can full of square nails, an old-fashioned grinding wheel with a broken foot pedal, a length of iron chain, four long wrenches—one of which the end was broken off it. We continued searching and came up with a kerosene lantern, and the last thing was a foot-shaped anvil that BJ said was used to repair shoes or boots.

"Pretty nice little treasure?" BJ said.

"Yeah!" I answered back as I tried to get the didgeridoo to make its music.

"You sound like a dieing elephant!" BJ kidded.

"Well let's see you try?" I said trusting it at him.

"No way! I'm not putting that thing to my mouth! What if rats peed on it?" he said and just the thought made me want to puke.

BJ laughed, "You're so stupid sometimes you know that?"

"You could have warned me!" I complained wiping my mouth feverishly on my sleeve.

"Nah, then I couldn't laugh at you now!" He said picking up the hatchet and trying to chop one of the posts of the barn.

"Don't do that!" I complained.

"What?" BJ said.

"You'll bring this place down on top of us!" I said.

"Will not!" BJ said but he didn't chop any more.

"You ready to eat yet?" BJ asked.

"Past ready!" I said putting down the didgeridoo.

"Let's go eat up in the hay lofts." BJ said.

"Yeah good idea!" I said.

"Race you up!" he said.

I waited until he was nearly to the top of one of the box ladders before shouting; "First one to the top has to kiss Missy Harpo on the lips!"

BJ froze suddenly as if I'd just shot him with a freeze ray. "Ah man that's just disgusting! I wouldn't kiss that bow-wow with your lips!"

I'd climbed up one of the other ladders attached to one of the other polls and was about even with BJ when I said. "Alright then, last one to the top has to kiss her!" and I'd beat him only by a single second.

I was laughing as BJ stood there looking mean, "You're a dirty cheat!" he said.

"Yeah well least I don't have to kiss Missy Harpo!" I said in a singsong voice.

"Take it back!" BJ said pulling off his backpack.

"BJ loves Missy! BJ loves Missy!" I said dancing in a circle.

"Take it back!" BJ said again reaching down into his pack.

I made kissing sounds in the air.

"Last chance! Take it back or else!" BJ said and in retrospect, I think it would have been wise for me to stop then, but I didn't.

Acting like BJ now I said, "Oh Missy I love you so much! I want to marry you and have hundreds of puppies!"

Before I knew what happened I was hit right in the middle of my face with a snowball.

"Uhhh! Where'd you get a snow ball up here?" I complained trying to wipe the snow from my eyes.

"I had it in my backpack ever since we went down in the snow. I was saving it!" BJ said standing there with a second snowball in his hand and his arm cocked and ready to fire off a second round.

"Take it back!"

"Alright! I surrender! I take it back! I take it all back!" I said shielding my face just incase he decided t