Ryan, My "Little" Brother (Rewrite) - Part 3

[tekuno]

This is a rewrite of BigBearMan94's original concept, done with his permission.

Original Story
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 4.5 | Part 5

This story is now complete. (Thanks for reading!) Each section ends with a link to the next section, but here are links to all the parts of the rewrite for handy navigation

Rewrite
One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Six | Seven | Eight | Nine | Ten | Eleven | Twelve | Thirteen | Epilogue

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Okay, now the story is getting somewhere, at long last. Sorry for the delay; oddly enough there ARE other things I do beyond writing muscle growth stories, and for once I actually had other things to do -- and, of course, I goofed up and had to do a substantial rewrite. This installment is longer than the first two, to make up for the wait.

(Oh, and the comic referred to is "Questionable Content", which is funny and you should read it. From the beginning, but be forewarned that Jeff Jacques' art style has gotten dramatically better over time, so the first strips look goofy compared to the recent ones.)

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Ryan, My "Little" Brother
A Rewrite of BigBearMan94's Original Story (With Permission)
Part 3

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After he got out of the shower, Ryan insisted that I go and measure his height. Our family did the whole "draw lines on the wall as the kids grow" thing, or at least on a column in the basement, so we headed downstairs.

Ryan had insisted on being measured on my birthday, too, so even though he stood ramrod-straight against the column, the line came in millimeters away from the previous one, if that. Four feet, three inches. Just a little on the short side, but since both Dad and I were nice and tall, that was probably just a pre-puberty blip.

Given that he was now obviously on a "grow up quick" kick, I expected annoyance, or maybe even tears, but Ryan just nodded his head like it was what he expected. Which actually annoyed me a bit; why waste the time to do the measurement in the first place, then?

The next morning, Ryan was almost too stiff to move. I had warned him about it that night, but he hadn't really paid attention. Fortunately, I had a cure for 11-year-olds who don't want to move:

"Rise and shine, Champ, I'm making pancakes!"

"Oooo! Pancakes! Ow! I'll be right there! Aah, god!"

Ryan hobbled into the kitchen and eased into a chair. Every movement was an obvious effort, and obvious agony.

"Ryan, are you okay?"

"Everything HURTS! How do you stand it, Alex?"

"Well, once you're used to the exercises, everything doesn't hurt afterwards. Or at least not as much. How much stretching did you do?"

"Stretching?"

"Oh, Ryan, I'm so sorry! If you stretch before you exercise it makes a huge difference! I'm so used to dealing with people who have been working out for a long time that I forgot entirely, and just assumed you had already done it because you were already lifting weights."

"Oh." Ryan was quiet for a moment. "Can you show me some stretches, later, too?"

"Sure, Champ! First, let me get you some ibuprofen, which will help with the aches for a while, then you can have some pancakes, then take a hot shower which may help a bit, and then I'll show you some stretches. If you'd like I'll also show you how to massage your arms and legs, which may help too."

"Thanks, Alex!"

"But don't get dependent on ibuprofen. It's not a good idea to get dependent on pills."

I thought I saw Alex look a little guilty, but his face was switching expressions so quickly -- mostly between grimaces as different parts of his body sent in complaints -- that I couldn't be sure.

I spent most of the morning helping Ryan get over his pain. Then I sat down to deal with some of the paperwork which had piled up during the week, and then it was time for lunch. Ryan had apparently made a full recovery -- ah, to be 11 again! -- and insisted on going out to play basketball.

To some people, that might be normal, but I honestly got a little worried when Ryan made that announcement. The previous summer, Dad and I had to kick Ryan out of the house almost every day; he left voluntarily three times: when the local theater got the new Batman movie, when the local theater got the latest Pokemon movie, and when a new Pokemon game came out. (He actually woke up at 5 A.M. and spent the next four hours begging me to drive him to the mall that day.) And, of course, basketball is a strange choice for a 4' 3" kid, but it was better to have him out and active rather than sitting around moping. Besides, I wanted to hit the gym. So I told him dinner would be at 6, and off he went.

The gym workout was everything I had hoped it would be. I had been having trouble with my plan -- to get up early and hit the gym before work -- and settling for workouts at home instead. Not that you can't get a good workout in a home gym, but I'd rather spend two hours lifting, rather than an hour lifting and an hour rearranging equipment because I need to use the same bench for every exercise. And besides, there are movements which you just can't do properly without special equipment.

After my nice long workout, I went for a quick jog on the track, and then came home. After getting cleaned up, I spent some time on the other major location of Dad-related worry, which was his "office" in the basement. (Really, it was a desk, bookshelves, and some filing cabinets in the finished part, away from the laundry and exercise equipment and hot water heater and things, rather than its own separate room. When Dad wanted to work, Ryan and I had to go upstairs -- which was a pain in the summertime, when the AC only really kept the basement comfortable. But on the other hand, in the winter we were glad to let Dad take over the basement while we stayed upstairs where it was warmer.)

In one way, Dad's office wasn't a major worry. All the important professional stuff had been in the offices he shared with his co-workers, and they had long since sifted all the important stuff out and sent home his personal things.

On the other hand, unlike his bedroom, I had no way of knowing what was and wasn't important. In the bedroom, anything which didn't have family associations could be tossed. Down here, there was no way of knowing whether any random document might have been related to someone who he was dealing with professionally -- and the old journals might have been his own property, but might have been officially the property of his office. The only way to find out what was what was to look through it all, and box up anything which someone might demand later. I could put the boxes in a corner and throw them out in a few years if nobody asked.

Not that it wasn't fascinating. I was -- and still am -- a bodybuilder. Nutrition is a huge part of my life. And it touches on so many other parts of medicine, too -- cholesterol, protein, sodium, whatever; you name it, and there's probably either a disease from not getting enough or from getting too much, or often both. In fact, if Dad hadn't died, I probably would have gotten a degree and followed in his footsteps.

Anyway, I set up boxes for different categories of stuff which I was likely to find, plus a couple of magazine boxes for the journals, and set to work. I had just finished clearing the stuff off the desktop when Ryan came home. I came up to see him after a few minutes, and found him drinking a glass of water, with the remains of a protein shake in the sink.

"It's okay if you want to start drinking protein shakes, Champ, but please ask me first. And clean up after yourself."

Ryan nodded as he chugged down the rest of the water, then gasped for breath as he put the glass down, and walked over and gave me a sweaty hug.

"Sorry, Alex. I'll try to remember."

I was so distracted by the fact that he walked right out of the kitchen without cleaning up the blender parts that I only barely noticed that his hug was noticeably tighter than it had been before.

Sunday went by fairly quickly, in a low-key way. Ryan and I both slept in, after lunch I did the grocery shopping and went for a jog. Ryan was playing video games when I came back, and waved at me from the couch. Of course, I knew he had had a protein shake while I was gone because he once again left a mess in the sink. We had a fairly simple dinner, and I worked on Dad's office some more and went to bed.

The next week I was preoccupied with work. My boss had altered my position to one which was technically permanent, if awful. I once read a comic where some guy's official position was "office bitch", and he even had it on his business cards. That wasn't my title -- I'm not even sure if I had a title at all, really -- but that was effectively my position. Any task too menial to be put in the hands of skilled employees (and under this heading even the janitorial staff were considered "skilled employees") went to me.

So: Monday I assembled flat-packed cardboard boxes. I think nearly every single woman who worked for the company except my boss and the CEO's secretary stopped by to watch, and all of them made almost the exact same comment about inserting tab A into slot B, dur hur hur. I once read somewhere that flirting used to be witty and entertaining; what happened?

It was flattering, I admit. People don't go out of their way to flirt if they think you're bad-looking. But as a matter of fact I don't swing that way, so it was kind of a waste. But then, the staffing at that company always seemed to specialize in heterosexual disappointment. The two best-looking women on the staff -- and the conversations around the water cooler confirmed my uninformed judgement on this -- were unquestionably my boss, who was and is a lesbian (and who has a belt rating in karate and runs marathons), and the the CEO's secretary, who looks like she's a Miss America contestant in a business suit, but who apparently was sexually nothing at all, either way. If the CEO hired her with hopes of office romance, he was disappointed -- but since she had an Ivy-league MBA, some kind of super-high-level business accounting certification, and apparently could type at about four thousand words per minute, she was certainly qualified for the position, so nobody ever knew for sure.

On the male side, there was, well, me, apparently. The only other guy on the staff I would have given a second thought to, as far as appearances go, was a guy up in the IT department. I didn't say anything to blow his cover, if he had one, but I recognized him from the one time I had sneaked off to a gay bar the previous summer. If he hadn't been about 70 pounds too light for his height, at least according to my tastes, I might have made some advances.

So, yeah, apparently the HR department had some kind of scheme to torture the straight employees by only hiring attractive people if they were unobtainable. Or maybe they just had really bad luck. I never found out.

Anyway, after a day of wrangling cardboard and faking patient smiles at horny women, I came home hungry and ready to make dinner, to find that Ryan was out. A note on the kitchen table said he was at a friend's house playing basketball and would be home by 7.

I made dinner -- tuna casserole, since Ryan wasn't there to object -- and just as I was setting the table, Ryan walked in the door.

He was sweaty and exhausted. He grinned at me and sat down at the table. It seemed like there was something different about him, but I put it down to him being so energetic and happy, at least until he found out we were having tuna casserole. To my surprise, he ate a lot of casserole -- so much that, for once, there were no leftovers.

Ryan didn't talk much while he ate, and he left the table and went into his bedroom, slamming the door behind him. I admit I was hurt -- after a long hard day filled with papercuts, I had kind of hoped for some human contact from my only immediate family member. But boys will be boys.

I went for a short jog, just to work out the kinks, paid the bills, watched some TV, and turned in.

That morning I got up very early. I'm not an early riser, given the choice, but as mentioned, I wanted to compete that summer, and I was working a full-time job, so the choice was to get up early and hit the weights before work, or wait until after work when I was all tired out. I preferred the former, so I was awake at 5:30, at the gym when they opened at 6, home at 8, showered, shaved, and ready to go by 8:20 to be in the office at 9.

On the way out, I tapped at Ryan's door.

"Ryan? You awake?"

There was a grunt.

"I'm off to work. Burgers for dinner tonight."

"Okay. See you tonight, Alex."

"So long, Champ. I love you."

"I love you too. Except when you wake me up."

I laughed my way out the door.

Other than the slight exhaustion from having had a workout already, Tuesday was largely a repeat of Monday. Instead of assembling boxes, I was packing boxes with promotional flyers. Once again, there was a conspicuous parade of women who somehow found something to do in my general vicinity, and I got to hear the same lame jokes over and over again.

When I got home, Ryan was nowhere to be found, but the sink told me he had once again had some protein, and the various preteen mess left around the house suggested he had been around not too long before I got home. I made burgers and eventually ate, but Ryan didn't come home until it was getting dark. When he slouched in, he was once again sweaty and exhausted. Which was hardly surprising, because he was wearing a sweatshirt and sweatpants -- in early July!

"Where have you been?"

"I went running, and got lost. And I lost track of time, too."

"And you didn't think to call?"

He looked embarrassed. "Sorry, Alex. I didn't bring my phone with me. No pockets in this thing."

"We're paying good money for you to have a cell phone, Champ, get a lanyard and wear it around your neck if you have to."

"Okay, okay. Can I have some food now?"

"Go right ahead. I put your burger patties in the fridge; you can heat them up in the microwave before putting them on a bun."

Ryan slouched into the kitchen and called back at me to complain. "You only made me two!"

"Them's the breaks, Champ. If you aren't here when I make dinner, you get whatever I make for you. If you're still hungry, have some yummy cut-up vegetables."

The next half-hour was filled with grumbling from the kitchen, and then Ryan came out, headed for the shower, and then went into his bedroom for the rest of the evening.

While Ryan sat in his bedroom playing Capture The Pikatchu, or whatever it is which kept him so fascinated by the game, I continued to sort out Dad's office. After I finished with his desk, I called it a night -- if you get up at 5:30, you need to go to bed around 9:30 to compensate, so I did.

Wednesday was almost a repeat of Tuesday, except that I stuffed envelopes at work (jokes of the day involved stuffing and licking) and Ryan left me a note this time to say he would be out until 8, in addition to the usual mess in the sink. Once again, he missed dinnertime, ate quickly, and spent the evening holed up in his room.

Thursday I slept in and didn't go to the gym, but I had errands to run after work (more box-folding, same old joke), and I got caught in traffic, so I couldn't tell whether Ryan would have been late to dinner, which ended up being Chinese takeout. Ryan took his out -- of the kitchen, and ate in his room. If I hadn't been so preoccupied and tensed up, I might have noticed. As it was, I went for a quick jog, and then vegetated in front of the TV until bedtime.

Friday I once again hit the gym in the morning, and spent the day doing errands and fetching coffee. This was also the day that I found out that people in offices actually really DO pinch your butt as you pass if they think they can get away with it. Fortunately, I was carrying coffee at the time, and the offender swiftly learned that I make uncontrollable involuntary movements with my hands when I'm startled. When I got home, I was dead tired. I made a salad and a bunch of grilled chicken breasts -- just dumped them out on the grill and let them cook -- and watched TV (with a brief break for food) until it was nearly bedtime. Only when I got up to head for the bedroom did I realize that Ryan had basically avoided me all evening.

Saturday I once again slept in, hours and hours later than I had intended, actually, but woke up feeling energized. I also felt like spending some quality time with my little brother -- who was nowhere to be found. I cleaned up the usual mess in the sink, had lunch, read Ryan's note explaining that he would be gone all day, and went for a jog. Then it dawned on me that my high school friends were still around, so I called some of them up and spent the afternoon playing touch football.

Ryan returned even later than I did, wearing his now-familiar (and increasingly smelly) sweaty sweats. He slouched into the house, sat down at the table (where he also slouched), and avoided meeting my gaze as I tried to start a conversation.

Eventually I gave up, and we ate in silence. I reflected on how he took after Mom, at least as far as I could remember her and how she looked in pictures, where I took after Dad; Dad may have been a big healthy guy, but it was Mom who had the theatrically good looks that Ryan was starting to show. Then he left the table and went into his bedroom.

I sighed, cleaned up the kitchen, watched some TV, and went off to bed.

On Sunday, several important things happened.

Once again, Ryan got up before I did and left the house filled with messes for me to clean up. I discovered that my current tub of protein powder had run out, and opened the next one only to find that it was already nearly empty already. Ryan had been using a lot more than I thought, obviously -- enough that I was seriously worried about his health.

I decided to have a workout in the basement, for once, so I could be around when he showed up. When I entered the weight area, I saw immediately that Ryan had been here, too. Every plate we owned had been used at some point, and not put back properly, the bench was still loaded up -- with 200 pounds! And the adjustable dumbbells were set up with 50 pounds each!

This was puzzling. Had Ryan been trying to leave the weights set up for me? If so, he was off by quite a bit, and in any case I generally didn't bench very much weight at home because of the lack of a spotter. 200 pounds wasn't very much for me, but more than I like to have hovering over me with nobody in the house who could pry it off in case of an accident.

I put in my workout, cleaned myself up, and then sat down in the kitchen. I was trying to decide how to kill the remaining hour or so before it would be time to start working on dinner when I realized I hadn't been keeping up with the incoming mail that week. I went and got it, and started going through the heap.

Halfway through, I came to an envelope addressed to Dad which had been sent from some town in Sweden of which I had never heard, and which was marked "urgent". I sighed -- there was something depressing about having to notify people of Dad's death this long after the fact -- and opened it up to see what this person had to say.

The letter was brief:

"Dear Dr. Wrightman:

"Once again thanking you I am for your kind assistance in testing my discoveries. Occurring to me it is that warning I did not give. Please to not be permitting an overdose of the pills in your test subject. Of side effects I am still unsure, but certain it is that these there will be. Aging effects of the pills gradually should be applied, to ensure proper growth and strength. No more than one dose in three days I am recommending, and each dose should being no greater than one pill per twenty-five Kilograms of bodyweight of the test subject.

"Looking forward I am to your results.

"Dr. V. Franskasten
"Director, Svensk F?ryngring Stiftelse"

Having been though all of Dad's correspondance, I was quite sure that he had not received any pills, nor had he been involved with anyone who was being a test subject for "aging effects". And even if he had been involved in something like that, it would have been done through his work address, not his home address.

Just then, I looked out the window. Ryan was walking up to the house, sweaty as usual, but without the slouch he had been exhibiting around the house lately. He paused on the sidewalk and lifted his shirt to wipe his face. Underneath was a chiseled six-pack and surprisingly developed pecs. And when he let the shirt back down, even from this distance I could see that there were the beginnings of a mustache on his upper lip.

Uh-oh.

Part 4

[nnnrg]

Ah, BUSTED. I'm going to have to go over these stories and the originals to see how they're different

[tekuno]

Originally Posted by nnnrg

Ah, BUSTED. I'm going to have to go over these stories and the originals to see how they're different

I'm not going to say anything, because the first two things that come to mind give away stuff which is going to happen later.

[cohzaku]

I love that you took the time to really set up the characters. It makes things interesting, and I've already gotten to like the characters.