Sarah found Caleb's room without much issue. She was pleased to find it was mostly clean aside from clothes tossed towards the empty laundry hamper. She took inventory of the mostly normal room, a desk and chair to do homework, a bed, a dresser for his clothes, shelves.
Sarah began to look closer and was soon disgusted. Well used power ranger figurines and Digimon monsters, pokemon cards and decks in various places, Minecraft plushies, and an old Xbox 360 with Lego themed games.
"Am I dating a 14 year old or a 7 year old?" Sarah asked herself horrified. But she had promised herself, Caleb will be different from the others, she isn't going to let this one go (or discard him) so easily... Relationships take work, hard work, which is why she studied the nuances to mold reality in ways to include history... which is much more complex.
There was her last boyfriend, Peter, who wanted to know guitar. She tried to help and she accidentally melted his brain, leaving him comatose. Her parents grounded her for 2 weeks after cleaning that up. Just because they had to rebuild a personality for him, and to keep any discrepancies from becoming obvious, had to rebuild the rest of the family, which led to them all needing new identities and legal documents... doesn't mean she should be punished, I mean, she lost her boyfriend and that should be punishment enough!
Before that was Brandon, and he wore ratty old t-shirts, so she enhanced his wardrobe. Then he became grounded for stealing so she made her mom remember buying the clothes and continued to upgrade his attire... Well, apparently the family didn't have good finances because his parents began fighting over wasted money, trust deteriorated and eventually the home broke apart and his parents wanted a divorce. Brandon was really upset because it was his fault his mom wanted him to have nice things... Sarah was grounded and forced to break up, they were made a new family to fix their deeply held feelings of resentment and mistrust, which Sarah's parents say Sarah put there, how unfair!
There was Jared, Hunter, Dylan, Marco, Phil, Chase, Steven and Will, but even Sarah admits she deserved to be grounded for Will.... But this time is going to be different... Sarah has been practicing the incorporation of modifying history with her bending of reality, like her parents asked (demanded). Changing an apple into an orange is easy, making it so that apples and oranges were purchased last week as groceries is harder, and making everyone remember the bag of oranges sitting there is harder still. (Which is why the neighbors have an idea that something is going on.)
But all of these groundings forced her to study, and she was paying attention to what her parents were doing to fix things so Sarah was now totally confident that she could make sweeping changes without paradoxes and was eager to use her powers again.
Caleb entered his room to find Sarah scowling at his Pokemon deck. "Hey, what's the matter? Do you play?"
"So are these cards and toys yours, or your little brothers'?" Sarah asked careful to make sure she probes and doesn't jump to conclusions. She doesn't want a repeat of that Will incident.
"Oh, No, Anthony would destroy them and couldn't understand the rules to play yet." Caleb chuckled light-heartedly.
"But aren't these, a little... young and kiddish for people our age? We are entering high school when school is back in session." Sarah asked cautiously. "Aren't you afraid of being picked on and bullied if anyone finds out you have pokemon and minecraft plushies?"
Caleb thought about it carefully, "I never considered that as a concern. I and my friends enjoy it, and people who want to be mean and hurtful will find something to be mean about, so I should live my life in the best way I can and ignore them."
Sarah was mortified, he just said being ostracized in high school doesn't matter! Clearly Caleb is way too immature to understand what this will do to him! It is her duty as his girlfriend to protect him! She knew girls mature faster than boys but never expected it to be so severe. He shouldn't be the same age as her, that's the problem.
Thinking fast, Sara began thinking of all the nuances tied to changing his age to 16 instead of 14. Legal documents, friends, his knowledge and grade in school, his outlook on life, his stuff, his chores in the family, his friends, his ability to drive, and his body... As a kicker she specifically wanted to make sure he was more mature mentally... so after having learned how to not melt someone's brain, she included some extra hardships and self reflection time in the mix, and it was important for her to add a recent break up to make sure he was available now, to be hers.
"So Caleb, I just wanted to stop by to let you know I'm glad we are together and I look forward to going out with you soon. Text me and we can plan a date." With that she smiled and kissed him on the cheek releasing the pent up magical energy she had harnessed into him.
"Thanks babe, I'm looking forward to it too. I'll walk you out." Caleb smiled and felt dizzy for a second. His first kiss!
Changing history takes time which is why the families changed overnight... Sara could have easily turned Caleb into a 26 year old man immediately if she wanted to, but he'd be terrified and not have any legal id, the family would be panicked by the intruder and think their son was kidnapped and the cops would get involved... no more incidents like last year..
Sarah walked back home and applauded herself for doing such a good job.