Janet was livid, Timothy had been out all night again carousing. The tears had dried hours ago and the pain had slowly turned into anger. If he had been employed, he would have fired long ago, but he didn’t need to work, he had been born rich. His great-grandfather, Johann Bjórn, had made a fortune trading railroad stocks and had a son. He fathered a conceited, self-centered, compulsive womanizer, who had in his turn, inherited the family wealth and sired Theodore, who was even more spoiled as a child than his father had been. His mother had died early in Timothy’s life, she had died of a broken heart, a by-product of his father’s pastime. The coroner had ruled death by alcohol and drug overdose.
Three generations of genetic reinforcement and a lifetime of leisure had produced Timothy. He made nothing, thought nothing, contributed nothing to anyone, unless distributing the money from the “Trust Fund Everlasting,” as Timothy called it, counted, which Janet doubted. His donations to liquor stores, bars, restaurants and call girls could hardly be called charitable by anyone except the most sorted character.
Ten years ago he had been different, she had married a handsome twenty-five year old lawyer who had graduated from law school at the top of his class. She sighed in anger and frustration. Five years ago he had received his inheritance, after his father died in an auto accident. He had instantly become the lord of his demesne, accountable to no one; a king enthroned by the sovereign power of invested capital. There was enough money to last a score lifetimes in soft, pampered idleness. The principal was safely tucked away in a trust fund conceived by batteries of lawyers and consisting of cribs of legal documents which protected the principal against government, taxes, lawsuits, natural disasters, economic depressions and the foolishness of those who it nurtured. His inheritance had proved disastrous for him.
Slowly, he lost his drive and ambition and then his faith in himself. He had even lost faith in her love for him because he knew he didn’t deserve it. Now there was nothing left but a spoiled, self-indulgent drunken child, protected against all harm by the thick swaddling of money and booze.
She would have left him, she thought, but she still loved him and she couldn’t bear the idea of Timothy marrying anyone else, no matter how he behaved.
She remembered her wedding night and how she reacted when Timothy told her new name was Norse in origin. Janet told him her first name was Welsh and a form of Guenevere, which meant “white or good spirit”. She had suggested teasingly that he was really a Viking who wanted to steal her away from her true love, King Arthur. Then he informed her that Bjórn meant “bear” and that his name had been common among Viking chieftains. She had sat quietly for a moment and considered her new role as Mrs. Bear, when the thought hit her that if she was Mrs. Bear, then naturally he must be Mr. Bear… Mr. Timothy Bear. He was her Teddy Bear! She had broken up in uncontrollable giggles when the idea hit her and it was several minutes before she regained enough composure to explain the joke to Timothy. His “bedroom” name had been teddy bear ever since.
Not that there was much of that happening in their bedroom these days, she thought glumly. He seemed to have lost interest in her these last years. It wasn’t caused by a lack of libido on his part. She knew he was sleeping with other women and it infuriated her. She had carefully concealed from him what she had discovered about his “extracurricular activities” and how she had exposed him.
What Timothy didn’t know, was that she was psychic and a very powerful and accomplished witch. Nothing that he did was hidden from her despite his halfhearted albeit well-meaning attempts to keep his little “flings”, as he thought of them, secret.
She had tried everything to arouse his interest and failed miserably. “There are just too many good-looking, women who are attracted by the smell of fools with lots of loose money,” she thought.
Janet looked down at herself, “Timothy liked me when we married, he was very attracted to me then and he’s still preoccupied with me. Infantile idiot! He just can’t resist the opportunity for a flirt with some, empty-headed, valley girl.”
Janet sighed again when she thought of the two years it took to perfect her youth spell. She had maintained an age of twenty-seven ever since. Not that she couldn’t make herself younger, she thought. She could make her body, or for that matter anyone, any age she wished, while retaining all their adult mental faculties and memories. She could, however, become young enough to lose control of her body as had happened one horrible weekend when she was developing the spell. One day as a clumsy pre-teenager had convinced her that she preferred to be a mature, but young and firm twenty-seven year old. “Thank the Goddess that Timothy was out of town that weekend,” she muttered to herself, wincing at the memory.
She was thoroughly disgusted with Timothy’s behavior. She had discussed it with her friends and members of her coven, but no one had come up with any scheme to change him.
Last week, at her wits end, she had gone to a marriage councilor, who had discussed the “Peter Pan” syndrome and suggested that time and maturity would cure Timothy. He described Timothy as the “Eternal Child”, who suddenly has had a world of toys given him, and naturally plays with them until he becomes bored. “It’s just a matter of time and age,” he said.
“Age!”, she thought, “After five years of uninterrupted play, he doesn’t need age, he needs a spanking! He needs to want to grow up! He needs his toys taken away until he is mature enough to deserve them. He needs someone to stand over him and tell him what to do, to take care of him until he can do it for himself. He’s just an overgrown child”, she thought. “Just a big baby” and she started giggling, suddenly struck with a mental image of him sitting on the floor in diapers and crying.
“Maybe”, she thought “just maybe, I’ve been looking at this from the wrong direction. I shouldn’t be trying to mature him, he has to do that himself and I know exactly how to make him want to grow up!”
She got up and said to herself, “I think it’s time to do some shopping for Timothy!”