Ty looked up. "Mom, Dad, this isn't what I want! I don't want you to give me everything you think I could want! All I want is for us to be a normal family. Not perfect, but normal. I'll still do chores, I'll still do my homework. I won't get my way all of the time. I want things back the way they were, except that I'd like you all to be just a _little_ bit nicer to me, and I promise I'll be nicer to you, too!"
Ty turned to Dustin. "Dustin, thank you for the Xbox. I appreciate that you're making a sacrifice, and trying to make me happy. But I don't accept it. It's still yours. I'd love to play games with you from time to time. But if all this was just about my wanting stuff, well, here." He gestured at the coffee table, made a wish, and another game console appeared, with a bunch of games. "You can have that, Dustin."
"Um, thanks, Ty," Dustin said, seeming confused.
Ty continued, "I already demonstrated that if I don't want to do my chores the usual way, I can just wish them done. That seems like cheating. I did that as a demonstration because I was angry about things in general, not because I'm not willing to do chores. I'm sorry that I didn't actually get the chores done while you were away, like I was supposed to."
Ty looked to Mark and June, but they didn't look like they understood what was going on any better than Dustin did. "I can tell that you're all terrified of me, and of what I might do if I got angry. I get it that you feel you need to prevent that. But I'm not trying to set myself up as the head honcho. I don't want you all tip-toeing on eggshells around me. I'm not going to kill you, or turn you into newts. I've said multiple times that I don't want to hurt _anyone_, my family least of all. But I want to _have_ a family. If you just always give me everything you think I want, and let me do anything, we're not a family. I don't even know what to call that, but it's not good, and it's certainly not what I want."
June and Mark looked at each other. This obviously wasn't the response they expected from Ty. After a moment, June turned to Ty. "But Ty, I don't understand. You're telling us you don't want the things you want. How can that be?"
"No, Mom," Ty replied gently. "I don't want what you and Dad, and Dustin, think that a 15 year old with a God complex wants. I want to live like a normal 15 year old boy, in a normal family. Maybe that will be a little hard for all of us at first, but I think we can do it, especially if you can stop worrying about what I might do to you, because I _promise_ I'm not going to do bad things to any of you."
Ty looked at Mark . "Dad, I know you get mad at me at times. And I get mad at you too. But that's part of being a family. If you tell me I have to mow the lawn, I'm not going to go into a rage and turn you inside out. I might grumble about it, but I'll mow the lawn. When I said that 'things were going to be different', I didn't mean that you all were going to become my servants, dedicating every waking moment to keeping me happy. Or keeping me from gettng angry. All I meant, as I told you before, is that I think we should all treat each other with a bit more respect. And I didn't mean that because I could force you to. I wasn't implying an 'or else'. I meant that we should do that because it will make all of us happier. And that has nothing to do with my power."
Ty looked around the room. "Does this make any sense to any of you? Or do you just think I'm a monster?"
Mark said, "Son, you've given us a lot to think about. But knowing, from experience, just a few of the things you're capable of makes it hard for us to see you as just our 15-year-old son, or to understand your feelings or motivations. I can't even imagine what I'd do with power like yours, but I never would have guessed that it would be pleading to have a normal life."
"I agree with Mark," June added, "and I wasn't lying about wanting you to be happy, though I admit that you do scare me, even if that's not your intent. Maybe we all just need to think about this more, before any of us says anything we might regret. Perhaps we should call it a night."
"That sounds like a good idea," said Mark. "Would that be OK with you, Ty?"
"Yes, Dad. Let's all take some more time to calm down, and that may help us find common ground."
June said, "You boys have school tomorrow, and Mark and I have work. For now, I suppose we can all try to act normal. Since Lisa's visiting tomorrow, I'll plan for dinner. We can see how that goes, and maybe discuss this more the following evening."
"Thanks, Mom," said Ty. "Thanks Dad and Dustin, too. Good night." Mom said they'd try to act normal. He wanted things to _be_ normal, but maybe _acting_ normal was as close as could be expected for now. He hoped everyone acting normal might eventually lead to everyone being normal. At the moment, his power seemed more like a curse than a blessing.
Ty stood up and headed upstairs, and Dustin followed with the game console. "Thanks again, Ty," Dustin said.
"Don't mention it, Dustin."
Mark and June were left in the living room. Mark said to June, "That went _nothing_ like I expected. We're in uncharted territory."
June replied, "That's for certain. I do believe Ty when he says he doesn't want to hurt us. I mean, he's had plenty of opportunity, and the one really bad thing he did, to Dustin, he apologized for and fixed. He apologized for sending us away on that bizarre "vacation." Apparently he's fixed whatever problem he'd created with Lisa, as well. Now we know that we can't do what we offered tonight, which is frankly a relief, because that apparently would make him even _less_ happy."
"I agree," said Mark, "but even though he said he doesn't want us 'tip-toeing on eggshells', what else can we do? If we slip up and make him angry, who knows what could happen? Even if it's nothing more than being frozen again, that was bad enough, and I don't ever want another repeat."
"Agreed! I guess we'll have to hope that if we do something he doesn't like, that he'll let us know _before_ he gets really angry," June replied.
"Well, I don't think we're going to figure out any more tonight," Mark said. "Let's get ready for bed."