The Scryer ✔️

~The Tin Man and Turtle Boy~

"Chris! I cannot believe that you made him eighteen!"

"He did that himself, not me," Chris replied as we watched John play with the Lincoln Logs on the carpeted floor from across the length of my hotel room.

"Well, I'm like, way older than him! What will people think?"

John looked up at me. "I can fix that," he said.

"What," I asked. I could feel the scowl on my face.

"I said that I can fix that, Hannah." He leaned over toward Alexander and whispered something. I saw my son nod and return to playing with the building set. I watched him stand with no difficulty to the point that it looked like he appeared to defy gravity.

Alexander looked up at him. "WHOA!"

"Too fast," he asked with a chuckle.

Alexander nodded quickly with widely gaping eyes.

John sighed as he shook his head. "I suppose I'll have to fix that too?" He walked the length of the room with what appeared to be carefully measured steps and took a seat at the table with us and folded his arms across him on the table. "How old would you like me to look, Hannah?"

I shook my head. "I dunno! Look, you're older than me by six...oh my god." I covered my face with my hands. A second later, they were being removed by a pair of strong, but malleable hands.

"Hannah? Look at me please?"

I clenched my eyes tighter and turned my head, than, I sighed and opened them.

"I picked this look from a photograph that sits on Chris' desk," he said.

"And what photograph was that?"

"The first ghost hunt," Chris replied as a faraway smile slowly played across his face.

"You were looking at him. Everyone else, including your husband, was looking at the camera. But you...you were looking at him. They say that a picture tells a thousand words Hannah. That photograph told me only four."

"And?"

"He is her world."

"And you were hoping that I'd look at you like that?"

"Well, I would be lying if I said that the thought had not crossed my mind, such that it is."

"I see."

"We can make him look forty if you want, Hannah," Chris offered.

I rolled my eyes and glared at him. "You're not helping."

"You should understand that I would not age. At least, until such a time as technology can make it so and I do not foresee that happening for a very long time."

I started to speak, but my son finished my words for me: "That means that you can't die, is that right?"

I closed my eyes.

"That is correct Alexander. I cannot die."

I opened my eyes to see my son embracing him, his little arms wound tightly around the android's neck.

John enveloped Alexander in his arms and hoisted him up onto his lap. "And I won't rust either!" He then looked up at me and winked his eye as his grin turned a little cockeyed.

Chris left us with John in tow and the android seemed to be disappointed, but I think it was easy to see that I wasn't ready to have him in my life just yet. I was as completely enthralled with him as Alexander was, but my heart...it still belonged to MY John...