The Kids Grow Up, Trish Hanan [books you need to read .txt] 📗

big grin. “Actually though, these are in fact, diamonds, emeralds, sapphires, rubies and topazes but I lied because I didn’t want them all picking them up and collecting them. I was a selfish greedy little boy and I want to say that I’m not sorry, guys. I’m still a selfish greedy little man and they’re all mine and I’m not sharing.” He laughed and the dogs barked.
“My daughter Emma has a jewelry store and I’m sure she’d die for some of these stones to play with so I’m going to pick up a few for her and the rest will just lay here in this canyon where they’ve lain for millions of years and that’s kind of wonderful, at least I think so,” he said and grinned.
Then he moved on to the coffee fields and showed them how to pick coffee and when he was through picking coffee he picked tea and flew back to Edenville, roasted and dried it and left it at the center for them to divide. When he checked his email someone told him they were low on sugar so with a sigh he flew to Athens and collected sugar cane, brought it back to the Mill, processed it and left it at the Center for them to hand out. Then he loaded up more food and went back to Savannah, he wanted to explore some caves next. Harry had remembered a particular cave and wanted to investigate a sound he remembered.
Harry did two shows on caves and then one on the monkeys and one on some flowers and insects he found interesting. He also explored a dozen caves without success until he remembered that the cave he was looking for was located by the field where all of the blue oranges were and the monkeys were found. Then he found it quite easily.
The three explorers entered the cave and Harry heard the bats flying ahead and Bo whined because he heard them too. Harry patted his side.
“Its okay, fellow, if you leave them alone, they’ll leave you alone,” he whispered and hoped he was right. He paused and listened and sure enough, he heard that tinkling sound he had heard almost a hundred years before and it seemed to be coming from the left. Harry walked slowly to the left and kept the beam of the flashlight directed to the floor of the cave. If you beamed onto the bats, it sent them into a panic and they began to swoop around and attacked you.
“What’s this ahead of us?” Harry whispered more to himself than to the dogs that were walking very close to his side. Up ahead he could see another entrance to maybe another cave and it was lighted or had light. He stepped over the threshold into the second cave and gasped. He was walking into a magical cave, with purple crystal walls and a hole in the ceiling shot down sunlight from somewhere and it was sparkling.
“Holy crap,” Harry exclaimed and the sound echoed through the cavernous room and down a long corridor. Harry walked to the middle of the huge room; it must have been a hundred feet wide, sixty feet high and sixty feet wide in places and stared with awe. It was purple crystal, pink crystal, blue crystal, black crystal, every color crystal you could imagine, all over the walls. A room made of crystal, he had heard of such caves, but never in his wildest dreams had he ever imagined he would ever find one.
Then Harry looked at the black crystal again and got an idea. If he got a large black communication crystal and built a tower here in Savannah and one in Eden then he could communicate with everyone live via the telephone. They could even put a tower on Sherwood and Mykonos and the whole planet could communicate with one another. Hell, they could even launch one into orbit and have communication that way, but they could start with communication towers. He got out his laser knife and looked for four matching crystals of approximately the same size and about the size of a cantaloupe. He found them easily on the west wall about knee high and cut them out. They hummed as he cut them and he put them in his back pack. Next he cut several large purple energy crystals about the size of golf balls that were needed to run the towers. These went into his back pack and he happily began to walk out of the cave. Then he went back and cut off a few little ones of each kind that he would need for hook ups. Then he flew home the happiest he had been in a long time.
Harry took out his architecture computer and designed four tall communication towers out of petrified log, steel from the extra bins and parts from an electronics store he had in Sherwood. He then flew out and brought the entire store and put it in the field out back of his house. Then he called DJ, Steve, Synta, Brian and Carl and asked them to come over and listen to a project he had in mind that he was very excited about and needed their input. He also called all of his sons and invited them to join the team. He put the black and purple crystals on the table and placed a towel over them.
“What’s up, Harry, its good to see you’re inviting people over,” Steve said in lieu of a greeting. Harry rolled his eyes.
“That’s a fine way to say hello to an old friend,” he teased and Steve flushed.
“Sorry, I guess I’ve been spending too much time with Kathleen,” he apologized. Harry waved his hand.
“Let’s make a deal everyone,” he announced. “I won’t bore you with whining about my divorce and you won’t bore me with advice about moving on,” he said and they all looked embarrassed and agreed.
“So what’s this project all about?” DJ asked and they all nodded.
“Yeah, Harry, its good to see you all excited about something,” Jackson remarked and Harry sighed.
“Enough already; anymore cracks like that and the person who said it is off the project,” he said firmly and everyone looked sheepish.
“Okay, we get it, everything’s normal,” Adam said just as firm and glared at everyone. They all nodded. Then Harry handed out schematics of the towers and they all looked impressed and a little confused.
“This looks like a communication tower,” Carl said. Harry nodded.
“That’s exactly what it is, Carl,” he told him. They all looked confused.
“But Harry, in order to build a communication tower, don’t we need a very large black crystal at the top of the tower and a large power crystal to run it and we don’t have either,” Steve said and nodding Harry giggled. DJ jumped to his feet, his face all lit up and he rushed to Harry and picked him off his feet and spun him around while the others looked surprised. Then DJ turned to them.
“He’s found a crystal cave, don’t you get it, that’s why he wants to build communication towers, because Harry’s found a crystal cave,” he shouted and they all looked at Harry who nodded again. He leaned over and took the towel off the table and they all gasped at the sight of four huge black crystals and the four golf ball purple ones. DJ picked up a black crystal and gazed at it.
“Holy crap, I can bowl with this thing,” he declared and everyone looked horrified. He laughed and put it down. “I was teasing,” he said and they relaxed.
“Where did you find these, Harry?” Adam asked. Everyone looked at Harry who smiled.
“Remember back when we were young and exploring Savannah?” he asked Steve and DJ who both nodded. “Well, remember the day the monkeys threw the blue oranges at you, Steve?” Steve laughed.
“Oh yeah, I remember that, they almost attacked us but you pushed them away,” he said. DJ grinned.
“Before we found the blue oranges we had been in a cave and I heard a tinkling noise but the girls were screaming so loud it scared the bats and they flew down and attacked us,” Harry said. DJ snorted.
“Those damned bats had the worse smelling shit, it was totally disgusting,” he told them. All the boys looked impressed. Harry grinned.
“That tinkling noise was the sound of the wind flowing through the crystal cave, it’s in that cave to the left and once we set up these towers, I want to take everyone there via live camera,” he informed them. Steve grinned.
“Oh, man, that would be a great show, everyone would watch that one, we could play that on prime time,” he gushed. Harry nodded.
“Now all we have to do is build the towers and put them into place and we could communicate from anywhere on the planet,” he told them and they all nodded. Danny stood up.
“Well, let’s get to work then,” he said and they all stood up. Project Communication Towers was underway.
While Harry cut down the necessary trees the other men got to work cutting up the bins they would need, they needed a lot of steel to reach the height they wanted. When they had all the building materials gathered for all four towers they sorted through the electronics store for the components they needed for the processors. Then they built them and mounted them on four hexagon shaped pedestals to be placed at the top of each tower.
Everyone came to stare as they built the four towers side-by-side, foot-by-foot and everyone asked what they were doing. They just said they were building something.
“I can see that, but what are you building, Henry?” Kate asked, with irritation in her voice. Harry sighed.
“Its like this, Mother, it’s a secret project and I’m not a liberty to tell you right now but you’ll figure it out for yourself by the time we’re through,” he told her and she sighed.
“Then just tell me now, Henry,” she snapped. He grinned.
“And spoil the surprise, never, now go away, we’re working,” he said and waved her away. None of the husbands working on the project told their wives and his two daughters didn’t know which pissed them off.
“Why do they get to help and we don’t, that’s sexist and wrong, Harry,” Emma snapped at him. He sighed and agreed.
“You’re completely right, Emma Rose, and I’m sorry, will a big bag of diamonds, sapphires, rubies, topazes and emeralds make you feel better?” he asked and she grinned.
“Well, yes, they would,” she declared and he told her to take the big blue bag in the closet. Cassie sighed.
“I don’t suppose you have one of those for me?” she asked. He nodded.
“You can have the green bag, darling, of course, I would never bring home precious stones for your sister and not bring home some for you, what kind of father do you think I am?” he teased and she hugged him.
“The best kind,” she declared and ran for the house. All the boys laughed.
“Give a woman a few million in precious gemstones and she’ll love you forever,” Adam teased and they all grinned. The girls came back with big grins on their faces carrying pillow case sized bags of precious stones. The boys were impressed.
“Damned, maybe I should start wearing a