A Fresh Start

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"Carl, it's time to wake up!"

I was having the damnedest dream. I could hear my mother calling for me to wake up, but she had been dead for six years. I dozed on and a few minutes later she called for me again. I rolled over and tried to burrow back into the covers, but the bed was oddly sized and didn't seem right.

"CARLING PARKER BUCKMAN, IT'S TIME TO GET OUT OF BED!"

I groaned and sat up, my eyes still shut, and ran my hands over my face. That didn't feel right, either.

"Man, she used all three names. You're in trouble now!" said my brother.

But that wasn't right. I hadn't seen my brother since we had buried our mother six years ago. He hadn't even come to Marilyn's or Alison's funerals. And as I ran my hands over my face, I realized I was clean shaven, no morning stubble. I continued moving my hands around my head and discovered hair up on top. I lost my hair a long, long time ago.

I opened my eyes and looked around. My kid brother, Hamilton, was sitting on the end of his bed smirking at me. "You better get up or Mom's going to be angry!" But he wasn't my brother. My brother is two years younger than me, so he is 65. This Hamilton was younger, a lot younger, pre-teen younger, a little kid. And what were we doing in our old bedroom, in our house in Lutherville? I haven't lived there in fifty years. I moved out when I was seventeen. I looked around in confusion. It was our old bedroom, our first bedroom, upstairs across the hall from our parents, before we moved to the garage when it was remodeled.

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