The next day in a crowded mall, there were two men: one handsome, innocent-looking youth with an indifferent gaze, and an older man, similarly handsome, yet unlike the youth had a pleasant smile.

"Sooo...?" questioned my father.

"What?" I replied.

"How does this shirt look?" he inquired, pointing at a shirt in one of the clothing shops through the glass windows. The shirt in question would leave my bellybutton open, which in my eyes, looked ridiculous.

At first, when asked if I would like to go to the mall, I thought it would be a good opportunity to have a look at the world with my own eyes. After 2 hours of shopping though, the novel experience of traveling to another reality dwindled. While my father was enthusiastic about shopping with me, I was dying of boredom but couldn't show it on my face so I mainly showed a neutral, indifferent expression. 

"Father, we need to talk." 

"... Okay." The sudden seriousness of my voice surprised him. 

"I'm a grown man now and I need to be seen as such. The... incident made me realize that these skimpy clothes... aren't for me anymore." 

As if given a change of perception, his expression turned from confusion to understanding. "I see, it was my mistake. I just got so excited about finally having spent time with you for the first time... that I forgot... What do you think we should buy?" 

"Come with me father," I replied while taking his hand with a smile. 

***

"What do you think?" I probed his thoughts on the shirt I got. 

"... Why the creepy skull?" he inquired about the coolest aspect of the black shirt. 

"Cause it's cool, duh," I stated the obvious.

"... Are you getting into another phase right now?"

"What..no, I just like black and skulls. I'm not turning goth, black just happens to be my favorite color now." 

"Ray, it's not even for men, that shirt is for women." His statement may have injured my pride a little but my determination to acquire these awesome shirts only grew. 

"Don't care." 

"And the other shirt is literally only a picture of a toilet with a dagger in its hand," he stated about the cool-looking murder toilet that has a hand coming out of the toilet seat with a dagger. 

"That's just a mix of funny and cool," I replied unfazed. Most of the clothes I acquired were of the same nature. Most of the shirts were mainly black, grey or white with a mixture of other colors and pictures such as animals in cool poses, cartoon and anime characters, or just cool words and phrases in different italics. I bought multiple black and blue jeans and simple pants and shorts as well. Normally I would never buy this much clothes but considering I burned most of them I figured I might as well buy it all now in a bundle. 

After clothes shopping I acquired some time to relax while Adam does his grocery shopping. Currently I'm doing what any sane grown man would do when given time alone at a mall: shopping cart riding. Using the shopping cart to keep my upper body higher while pushing it with my feet then keeping my feet off the ground while I ride out the momentum through the huge hallways of the mall which were perfect for shopping cart riding. 

The people who walked past would look at me either with amusement (mainly the women) or annoyance (usually the men). But neither was a concern for me and neither did I care about how they spent their time. 

After being seen, a few kids even decided to join, mainly girls. The solo cart race turned into a four-way championship race. But due to my obvious skills (my older age, longer legs and more experience), the race went obviously in my favor. 

'Stupid kids, this race is mine. You actually thought that I would give pity points and let you win, damn delusional if you ask me. Hahaha.' 

But unexpectedly, an underdog arrived and decided to steal my thunder, a TEEN but one of a similar age as mine. While smiling at me, she almost passed me by. Unfortunately for her, though, I was never the honorable type, using my feet to dismantle her own balance with her cart thereby slowing her. I passed her by with a face of pure delight and ultimately won the race. 

Finishing the race by the mall sliding glass doors, I pivoted my weight back onto my feet. 

"Haha ha ha, losers meet pure defeat, defeat meet losers." I expressed with a smug expression. 

"You cheated! You kicked my trolley," exclaimed the girl when she left her trolley behind and stood in front of me. 

"I don't remember that being against the rules or making any to begin with, though," I retorted with a grin. 

"..." Silenced by my rebuttal she looked at me with a dumbfounded expression. "... Are you really that petty? You do know you were originally competing against kids, right?"

"Point being?" I asked, confused. 

"And people called ME immature," she said, seemingly to herself. "You're a weird dude, you know that?" 

"Weird means irregular, irregular means special, special means exceptional... ," I said to myself. "... I accept the compliment." 

"..." She continued to stare at me with a dazed expression and a loss of words, most likely due to my brilliance.

"Hey! You cheater!?" 

When the children, looking 12-13 years old, finally arrived and finished the race, they immediately started heading towards me. The teenage girl in front of me had a crooked grin as she looked at me, as if justice was about to be served as the group of pre-teens approached. 

"Hey! What's your name?" she asked, pointing towards the teenager in front of me. 

"... Rory," puzzled by the unexpected question she answered hesitantly. 

"You CHEATED!! You only entered the race halfway, I saw you!You don't deserve second place," she shouted with anger boiling in her voice. The children behind her who agreed with her statement shouted the same. 

"..." The unexpected turn of expectations silenced Rory. 

"My na-names Amber, by the way. I.. I can get se-second place, right? Sh-she cheated," the pre-teen then turned towards me and asked with a sudden high-pitched voice, glancing back and forth between my face and her own fiddling thumbs with a sudden red tint to her cheeks.

Her reddish-brown hair cascaded down to her waist like a waterfall and her big wide eyes were greenish-brown. She was practically the cutest thing I've ever seen. Amber wore blue jeans and a yellow shirt with an anime character picture on it. Her waist was slim, and she was practically as thin as a board indicating her young age. 

'OH MY GOD, that is so fuckin adorable it should be illegal. If I could I would kidnap her, dress her up in even cuter clothes, take pictures then hug her till she faints. I can't handle this level of cuteness.' When I was young I had a pretty big family in my past life and as such I had tons of nephews, nieces and cousins who were usually younger than me. I took the role of babysitter whenever I took care of them at family reunions and grew to love taking care of kids. 

Before my thoughts could even catch up to me, I already had the girl in my arms, off her feet and hugged her in the air. "O... sorry, you were just so cute I couldn't help myself," I said as I finally let her down while fearing the FBI. 

"I think I can die happy now...I mean, no... no... I-it's nothing. I-I didn't mind," she stuttered with a dazed expression. 

Given some time to think and realize the current situation and it's equivalent in my old reality, I smiled and gave her a kiss on the forehead. 'Now I won't be looked at like some creep whenever I talk to a kid.' "Thanks for the fun time Amber and all you other goof-balls. You should probably get back to your parents now before they get worried." 

"O... Okay..., wait which school do you go to?" she inquired. 

"Castle High," I answered understanding her current mindset. 'Sorry kid, but you're too young for my tastes, but you are adorable, so I wouldn't mind using you as an exclusive huggable teddy bear.' 

"Really, I'm a junior there an... and w... will I see you there?" 

"I guess, it would be weird for me not to be considering that I'm apparently your senior," I responded with a jovial tone. 

"O...I-I mean... yeah, of course you would, s-sorry about that. T-That was stupid of me, see you there! " she replied embarrassed yet more enthused. While she walked away, a group of kids behind her started whispering with her as they walked away. 

'Kids are adorable,' I thought with a smile. 

"Hey we're not done with this!" 

I turned towards the voice with surprise, noticing that there was still someone beside me. 

"... You... You asshole, you forgot me, didn't you," she said while looking at my surprised expression with vexation. 

Rory wore a black jacket, white shirt and black jeans. Her shoulder length dirty blond hair was styled to the right side of her head while the left side was shaved into an undercut and her eyes were ocean blue. She had moderate sized boods and a big ass with good looking thighs, I noticed while gaining some time to examine her. 

"See ya," I responded with an indifferent smile and turned away when I saw my father walking towards me. 

. 

..

...

"Yeah, see you next week," she responded with irritation clear in her tone. 

Surprised by her response I looked towards her but she was already gone. 

***

"Sooo...?" 

"What?" 

"You sure looked like you were having some fun with those kids, never saw that side of you," my father stated as he drove back home. 

"And?" 

"And you looked quite spirited with that girl..., " his statement left to be continued as he glanced at me and looked back to the road. 

'Oh god no. I'm not getting into this dramatic, girl talk bullshit.' "Stop, just stop. Let's just not... okay?" 

"Stop what? I'm merely taking an interest in your life. " he said as he continues to act ignorant. 

'Ugh, I have no choice. I'll have to use my trump card.' "Dad, can you please stop." 

"..." 

. 

..

...

For a split second, reality seemed to have suddenly forgotten its own existence. Time itself seemed to have folded, the car turned silent. I practically felt the air particles in the car freeze...

Then reality seemed to have regained its clarity and continued as if it was an illusion. 

My step father looked at me with a shell shocked face which quickly turned into radiant joy. His smile was so full of love and sweetness that it metaphorically blinded me and irritated my eyes. Motherly kindness practically radiated off of him, which was a weird thing to feel, for me, from a man. 

"Okay son," he said.

'...Well... at least I got him to stop... so I count that as a win!' I mentally exclaimed with triumph.