Tuesday Tiny Tale -The Sponge

~ tidalscribe.com

The other kids called him The Sponge because of the effortless way he soaked up information. His parents had thought he might meet his match at the large senior school, no longer top dog as he was at  primary school, but he was soon a legend. Far from being an awkward genius his quick wit and sense of humour attracted friends and the fact he did their homework for them ensured a loyal following.

Mr and Mrs Nardo had followed family tradition of naming first born sons Leo. By the time he was four they had realised he was far cleverer than them and his younger siblings just took it for granted that Leo knew everything. They were not quite as clever as Leo, but their parents continued producing babies, considering it was their duty to contribute to the gene pool.

At school the teachers played down his abilities. As he appeared to have no syndromes, nor be on any spectrum they were not eligible for extra funding to get university professors in to keep Leo challenged. Instead, an afterschool club was started, for children with ‘extra interests’, it was not to be suggested that the little group were clever or cleverer than all the other pupils.

Leo was soon running the group and showing off his party tricks such as writing normally with his left hand and writing back to front on the other side of the paper with his right hand at the same time. He said it was easy, but nobody else in the group could do it. Parents were persuaded to contribute so the group could buy Lego and chemistry sets and all sorts of items that inventors would need. A teacher was present merely for health and safety reasons.

Dinner time at home was always lively and Mr and Mrs Nardo tried to make sure all the children got a chance to talk about their day, but somehow by the time they were eating pudding Leo had an intellectual conversation underway.

‘I was thinking it would be impossible to work out who the cleverest person in the world is, because nobody else would be clever or knowledgeable enough to understand how much that person knew or understood.’

‘Or she’ butted in his sister’ why can’t the cleverest person be a woman?’

‘They could be’ said Leo ‘but I was thinking it would be me, but how would I know?’

His parents sighed.

‘I don’t think it matters,’ said his father ‘all you have to do is use your talents for good, not for power or money.’

‘Yes I’ve already considered that. I will need a good deal of money for all my inventions, but I could get investors for that. I thought I could save the whole planet.’

‘Rather ambitious, but an excellent idea’ said his mother. ‘Will that be after university?’

‘No, soon, I’ve already written a book about how to do it. I just need to publish it. You can read it if you like.’

After dinner his parents sat at the state of the art computer they had given Leo for Christmas and started reading the word document of 300, 000 words. There were only about thirty words they understood.

‘The first few chapters are about metaphysics’ said Leo airily ‘I want readers to keep an open mind about the universe.’

His father hoped they would not be expected to proof read it and suggested as a joke he self published on Amazon first. Leo thought that a good idea and persuaded his father to open an account, then leave him to get on with it.

By Sunday evening he had borrowed his mother’s Kindle and showed the family his new book. By Wednesday a box arrived from Amazon with his weighty tome in paperback. He took a few copies to school.

The head of the science department was surprised and impressed with the cover design and happy and not a little amused to accept a signed copy as a gift, promising to start reading it in his lunch break.

In the afternoon science lesson Leo asked him what he thought of it so far. He responded by asking Leo what his parents thought of it.

‘Well to be honest, I don’t think they understood a word.’

The teacher was relieved as he grappled with the right words of encouragement.

‘Ah, I am managing to understand it so far, well the introduction at least…’

37 thoughts on “Tuesday Tiny Tale -The Sponge”

    1. Hello Robbie, yes I can imagine. I asked my pilot son how far maths went, is their a limit. The most complicated he could think of was calculating how much fuel for a flight according to speed, atmospheric conditions, altitude…. I didn’t ask the actual HOW!

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  7. This story had me riveted from the very beginning, Janet. It is crazy hard to know what to do with young minds like his. His parents had their hands full! The teachers didn’t have a chance! 🙂

    I had a student like that in my first-second grade combo class. He read about ham radio operations and other science at the time while I taught. He brought a lecture to my class about life in tide pools a few years later when I taught fourth grade. He’d be about 42 now, and I don’t know what happened to him.

    Thanks for stopping by Story Chat. I hope you will consider submitting a short story for publication some time this year.

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    1. Hello Marsha, yes children are naturally curious, the world is all new to them. Then take a child that is also very intelligent and there is no stopping them!
      Yes I certainly hope to join in the fun on Story Chat and submit a short story.

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  12. Such an insightful story, Janet. I used to work with little kids, and some just had a different way of viewing the world – a different sort of intelligence that just wasn’t appreciated because it didn’t fit the norm. I hope Leo finds his niche in the world.

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