Lit.

Silently in a caring way, he was thankful. Daniel received the news that his cousin Cindi’s husband Andy had died. The man never had a job, was narcissistic, controlling, and taught his daughter that going to school was not important. Actually, Daniel agreed with him to an extent about school systems, but there would need to be supplementation with home schooling – which Andy would not provide. He did appreciate the time Andy helped him replace a transmission in his truck, so held that memory in focus. Daniel had swapped out a few parts, but without having any experience, that job seemed too intimidating to take on alone. He prayed for Andy to know his appreciation for his help.

Daniel helped move Cindi out from upstairs of their buddy Tony's house to a better living environment. He felt it opened a door of opportunity for someone without children to be a dad to hers if he could. It had been several years since seeing them, it was nice. After the apartment was set up, Daniel put his effort into setting them up with bicycles, imagining them being that happy commercial kind of family, riding on the sidewalks around town smiling.

Then Daniel started trying to talk to Cindi about having more healthy foods coming in, and a quick comment about quitting smoking. One day he went to the store and got things that he ate for them to try, including his favorite brand of Stevia for her coffee. He wished she didn't drink coffee all of the time, so Daniel grabbed a couple of the same flavors of decaffeinated tea that one would find on his stove top. Although he knew her money was low right now, he did not get her any cigarettes.

Cindi's oldest daughter Dana, a 7th grader, had never had a can of tuna in olive oil, but she tried it and really liked it which made Daniel feel happy. He wanted to bond with each of the kids on some level. Cindi had mentioned how she had done yoga with her before. This was something Daniel was into, so even this low level of shared likes was enough for him at this point. They hadn’t discussed the yoga yet, but he imagined being a good dad figure and encourage her with things.

Cindi's oldest son Andrew Junior is a very cool and sweet young autistic man about to graduate high school. AJ eats cookies, and drinks chocolate Ovaltine and McDonald’s shakes. That’s it, and it bothered Daniel a lot, or more. He read the nutrition facts and saw that it was a supplement for some vitamins and minerals, but not much protein without the milk, so brought them vanilla almond milk, like he used to drink when first trying alternative's from cow’s milk. He brought his blender over to them and got a couple of canisters of protein powder at a nutrition store down the street. This made Daniel feel better that AJ was going to get a higher amount of protein every day. He was a person now, not a child like when he last saw him. Daniel's father died when he was eight and tried talking to him about Andy passing, but disappointingly without his response it wasn’t a conversation.

Daniel is one of the people who think that the music and games kids are playing could have a great influence on behavior, and planting seeds for future violent stories to be focused on the television news and in the newspaper. When AJ gets a chance, he plays Grand Theft Auto to his ability, which is just driving a car around and running over people, or just watches it play by itself like a violent movie or TV show. His father is the one who had the game, and now it is his. Daniel wished he didn’t have it, but he does. The worst part of this reunion was when Daniel went to bond and hug him, it was met with by a person who doesn’t seem to feel or show emotion. He didn’t push Daniel away or block him from giving a bro hug, but AJ wasn't able to reciprocate the feelings, and it created a feeling of emptiness. Daniel understood the situation, but it was still unfulfilling.

The youngest child Kirk was in 1st grade. He and Daniel hit it off well too, with bonding hugs and playfulness when Daniel gets there. They did get to talk about his father, so that was nice. As soon as he walks in the door from school though, he goes straight for the Xbox to play Fortnite. Mostly Daniel saw a character running around with a pick axe or sword killing people, and it bothered him. Daniel would ask about his homework, and if they could do some school work together, but Kirk thought he didn’t have any. It shows later that he is behind or didn’t do a lot of things that he could have. Daniel want to be his dad and help him with his school work, anything to get him off of the Xbox.

Cindi's daughter Hannah is a sweet autistic 3rd grade girl who likes to draw, and is good at it too. Daniel was surprised the year before while was working as a substitute teacher when she walked in the classroom and sat down at a table. He didn’t think about the fact that they were living in the upstairs of Tony’s house, which was across the street from the school. Daniel didn't know if she remembered who he was so introduced himself quietly and told her he was her cousin, that they were family, which brought a grin to her face.

Daniel had a problem accepting when young kids were allowed to play games depicting violence. The game Hannah likes, will stream like a movie or TV show by itself when an actual game isn't being played and includes dialogue between two angry adults about a step parent smacking one of the child characters in the face, and other kind of dramas. He had another acquaintance that let his grandson who was in kindergarten play a game that when after shooting someone, the graphics of the blood and flesh were incredibly real. Daniel literally started thinking about talking to the police first, then stealing the game so they wouldn't have it to play.

A week after moving into their apartment, it was revealed that Cindi had COVID. She didn’t ask Daniel to, but he went over there to help with Hannah because now she had to stay home from school for ten days. Although Daniel would wear a mask if required somewhere and not make a big deal about it, he was not one who normally wore a mask or was worried about getting it. A part of him wanted to be exposed to someone with the virus, and see if he would get it. No one had masks on, including the person who had it. Cindi was definitely ill, but all of the kids appeared to be fine. Because they were exposed to someone with the virus, they were told that they would have to be quarantined from school for ten days.

It became part of Daniel's routine to go over to their apartment every day. He was compassionate that Cindi was nursing herself back to normal, but it was also getting on his nerves that the garbage bag was overflowing every day. He stopped for a minute and realized that two of the children were autistic, and didn't realize. Andy never helped Cindi or taught his children to help out with chores, so the other two hadn't had a good example set for them to learn from. Daniel called Dana in and asked her to help him take the trash out to the dumpster, and gave her $20 when they were outside. He gave her the money, but explained to her that he was trying to teach her to be responsible and giving it to her as an earned allowance, asking her to help out and take the trash out every night. Dana agreed. However as days past, when Daniel would come over there were always several half cans of warm pop sitting around, ashtrays with cigarette butts, and the trash can was always overflowing. Dana was not helping out like Daniel wanted her to.

One morning Daniel noticed that Cindi had gone to the store and stocked up with some things. It bothered him to see what she chose to buy. Even having talks with her about the effects too much sugar has on the kids, and adults, she still chose products that weren't even close to being healthy. There was a humongous chocolate cake on top of the fridge that looked delicious, but Daniel didn't want to be a hypocrite and have a piece. Boxes of cereal with bright colored cartoon characters laughing at him peeked out from the cabinets. He looked in the fridge and saw that no one had drank a drop of the the vanilla flavored almond milk that he got for them to try. Up in the cabinets still sat all of the the cans of tuna that he brought over. It hurt Daniel's feelings that Dana hadn't opened even one of them. Neither of the protein powders he bought for AJ hadn't been touched. The bag of stevia had been bullied an pushed to the back by two four pound bags of granulated sugar that now stood in front of the cabinet, guarding the stevia so no one could get to it and use as a healthier option. Daniel felt like that even though he was trying to help them, no one was listening.

Daniel kept to himself about his feelings, bagged up the trash, and asked Dana to take it out. She agreed, and while Daniel was handing her the bag, he reminded her about the $20 he gave her to help her mother around the apartment. While she was outside Daniel was trying to think of a way to get his point across to her about working to earn money.

When Daniel was buying bicycles, Dana already had one. She also had a skateboard, but it wasn't in good shape. When she came back in, he asked if she wanted to go to the mall and check out the skate shop. She did, so they headed that way. Daniel didn't want to be the mean parent figure, but brought up again that it was important for her to help and take the trash out every time that it needed to be. Dana nodded her head like she understood, but didn't really say anything.

They got to the skate shop and browsed for the parts needed to have her board rolling smooth. Daniel found out that it was about the same price if he just bought her a new board, so he did. On the way back to the apartment, Dana told him that she was going to fail 7th grade this year unless she went to summer school as part of the 'No child left behind' program. Daniel considered what she had been going through, but still felt disappointed that he bought her the board because it seemed she wasn't trying hard enough at things. He thought about what kind of influence Andy was, and how toxic he was for her. Daniel came up with a compromise. The board was pretty plain, so he had in mind to give it a custom paint job. He told her that she would have to earn the board by getting through summer school so she wouldn't flunk the 7th grade. Although she was disappointed, Dana agreed. She then instructed Daniel to make sure to keep the Enjoi name on the board. He recognized someone's desire to fit in by having something that was in style, and would do this for her somehow.

When they got to the apartment, there was a note that Cindi had purchased a Family Plan at the YMCA and everyone was there now to go swimming. Daniel told Dana to grab her swimsuit and they would go there. They arrived at the Y, but it turned out that Cindi didn't include Daniel's name to be part of the family plan. This hurt his feelings a lot, but he didn't say anything when Cindi and Kirk came out to get Dana. Dana just walked away toward the pool area and didn't thank him for bringer there, or anything he had done. Daniel felt Theyah's telepathic presence when Kirk came up and asked Daniel if he was going to go swimming with them. The tone that he heard seemed so sarcastic and prodding, rubbing it in that Cindi didn't include him as part of their family, after how hard he was trying and all of the things he had helped with as if he were. Daniel just smiled and said no, not letting Kirk see how hurt he was. He would've chipped in the money to pay his share for the membership. Now it would cost him a lot more to join.

Daniel went back to their apartment and slowly in a mildly sulking manner, gathered all of the foods and his blender that he brought over. The food had basically been untouched. He figured that if they didn't want them, he should just take it all back and take them to his house. He thought about taking the Xbox one more time, but just grabbed Kirk's headset remembering that the last time he was playing online and talking to his 'friend', it sounded a lot like Theyah. This was upsetting Daniel that they had infiltrated his family, and were manipulating things here too. He wondered if every thing that was done to try and better things, Theyah would work to counteract those efforts. It appeared that way to him. Daniel walked away toward his truck feeling heartbroken and the loser of a battle that he didn't want to be a part of but was forced into, over and over.

Daniel didn't remember how he got there, but he awakened slumped over and parked with the engine running in his apartment's parking lot. He wasn't as upset and sat there for awhile thinking about things that had happened recently, and then decided to go inside to journal about it.

He wrote about how anxious and upset he was getting that Cindi wasn't adapting her and her children's lifestyle to match any of Daniels suggestions. He meant well, but by taking a pack of cigarettes away when he saw two new packs on the stove, taking Kirk's headset, and seriously thinking about stealing the Xbox so they would do something except play that all of the time, he was still being just as controlling as Andy was, but in a different way. Controlling is Controlling, and Daniel was guilty.

Daniel thought back to his days of video gaming which sometimes included punching, kicking, smashing, and shooting which would lead to harming or killing people and things because being part of the game. The graphics weren't as realistic as if someone was being murdered in real life these days, but it was still going on. Except for the time he tried to be a bully in junior high school, just to try and fit in with the crowd, Daniel hadn't ever started any fights in his life or killed anyone, so he realized that maybe he should just relax about what games the kids are playing. Just because Kirk was yelling, "I'm going to kill You!", more than ever lately, he was a sweet kid and would end up being a fine young man. Daniel took the time to acknowledge his awareness of his dark side that he had, as shown by Carl Jung's philosophy speaking about our Shadow self. This had been brought to his path for him to choose to study, and he did, though not extensively.

He had to admit that maybe he was jealous that Kirk was playing with and talking to Theyah. He revisited the possibility which he believed, that their souls had been together in a past life or lives. Once again Daniel accepted that he had broken Theyah's heart, at least, in another lifetime. On reoccurrence he would know the pain of having a broken heart, and missing Theyah, maybe for the rest of this life. No matter how many times he had said he was sorry, it hadn't been enough.

Daniel kept being forced into battles with Theyah where he hadn't acquired the same weapons of remote viewing and mind reading. He didn't understand how they all got satisfaction from controlling him this way. The only weapon he had was his heart, and Theyah, with the help of seemingly unlimited adversaries, made it their continuing mission to tear away at the scabbing that covered stab wounds in his heart from years ago.

Daniel returned with humility the next day, and put Kirk's headset back on the TV stand. Hannah was about to start a virtual class, and he asked her if he could sit with her and learn. She smiled a bit, agreed, and allowed him to sit next to her on the couch. Then Daniel was surprised and sat motionless as he felt yearning and hopefulness came over him.

He recognized the teacher..