"Dad, what do I say?" Mark called to his dad, who was on the front porch.
"I don't know. Introduce yourself. Pretend you're stuck on Mars and people back on Earth are interested to hear how you're going to survive... being ten. Your rough life. Tell them about all your life-and-death problems."
"Funny, Dad." Mark turned back to the camera on his communicator and gave a very passable impression of his father's trademark half-smirk and waggled his fingers together to indicate his opinion on matters.
"Alright. So my name is Mark Watney, but not that Mark Watney. The other one. I'm ten. My birthday was two days a go. And my parents forgot to throw a party for me-"
"Oh, for Christ's sake," muttered Mark from the porch.
"Yep, you heard that right, citizens of Earth, I didn't even get a birthday party; in fact, I spent my birthday waiting around all day-"
"You poor, poor kid," mocked his dad.
"For the best birthday present ever! Or maybe it's the worst? I don't know yet, how I feel about being a big brother to someone. But at least she was born on my birthday, right? So now I've got a two-day old baby sister. No more only-child-of-Mr.-famous. Also, now I've got someone to blame stuff on. That's going to be awesome."
"Except for you just mentioned that plan within my hearing. Whoops!" chimed in his dad.
Mark rolled his eyes at the camera.
"So like I said, I'm ten years old. I'm in the fourth grade at the school where my mom is a teacher. My best friend's name is George. He has a sister already, so he says he'll show me the ropes."
"My favorite subject in school is definitely... anything other than science. I hate science-"
"The hell you say?" His dad poked his head in from the porch, to be greeted by a familiar, sarcastic smirk. "You little monster." He shook his head, fondly.
"Haha, just messing with Dad. I love science, actually. And art. My teacher this year is Mr. Taylor, and sometimes I wind up getting in trouble for being-"
"A little smartass?" suggested his dad, offscreen.
"I was going to say 'too loud' but you see, citizens of Earth, what a potty- mouth Dad I have to live with? Mom makes him put money in a swear jar in the kitchen when he uses bad language. I bet half his paycheck winds up in that jar. Let's go see. Mom's going to crack down on him hard, too, now that we have a young and impressionable new family member." He smirked for the camera again, and the camera wobbled for a moment as Mark walked into the kitchen to show the five-gallon water bottle that was currently half-filled with change and bills.
"Baby sister, can you say, 'college fund'?" He mugged for the camera.
Mark angled the camera around to show the rest of the small kitchen. A backpack was slung around the back of one kitchen chair. "That's my homework. Saving it for later. My favorite thing is to remember it right at bedtime, so Mom and Dad have to let me stay up an extra hour to finish it. Smart, huh?"
The camera rounded back into the living room, and then into a small bedroom.
"This is my room. Or maybe I should say, 'our room'? Because my parents really didn't think this new baby thing out very well at all, am I right? A family of four, in a two-bedroom house with only one bathroom? Geez guys, call a Realtor already," he quipped.
"I hope my baby sister likes baseball," he said with a grin, as he panned the camera around the various posters of baseball players. "We don't really have a real baseball team here on the island, but my dad grew up in Chicago, so we're all Cubs fans in this house. See that guy? Ernie Banks. Mom named me after him, my middle name anyway, because I was born right after the Cubs finally won a World Series. After like a hundred and fifty years or something."
"People always think it's so weird that I was born while my Dad was off visiting another planet and all, and I guess it does sound strange. I didn't meet my dad until I was a year and a half old. I don't remember it at all. All that Mars and Sundance stuff was happening either before I was born or when I was too little to remember it."
"My dad's crew from the Ares mission though, they are still his best friends, and that means I get to be friends with their kids. Val is closest to me in age, but she's a girl and everything, so I wouldn't say she's like my best friend. More like a know-it-all older sister. She wants to go fishing, when she comes to visit on Monday. And we all know," he paused to look at the camera, pulling a mock-terrified face, "what Val wants, Val gets!" He rolled his eyes.
Mark paused for a moment as the camera headed back to the living room. "The only one of the Ares kids that was old enough to remember all that stuff as it was happening is probably Dave. He's fifteen, and goes to high school in Virginia. He's a lot older than me but we're pals because we're the only boys."
"No, you're not," came the long-suffering voice of his dad, offscreen.
"Oh, right. The Vogels have a son, too. He's a lot older than me! He's a grown-up. Doesn't count. Anyway, so all the rest are younger than me. All girls! Val has a sister, and Dave has two younger sisters. And the Lewises have dogs. Golden retrievers. Three of them. So unfair. I wish we had even just one dog." Mark looked hopefully in the direction of the porch, making sure his voice carried.
"Not happening." came the voice of dad. The camera angled around to head outside to the small porch. Mark clambered up onto the porch swing and swung his legs as it creaked. He panned over to his dad, who had his gardening gloves on. He wielded his gardening shears at Mark menacingly, and mugged for the camera, and then went back to re-potting his plants.
"So this is our house," he continued as if he hadn't noticed, "which Mom picked out. You can tell, because ya know, it's pink. It didn't used to be this bright, but I guess my dad has a smart mouth, and yeah. Now it's like Pepto. I've lived here ever since I was born. Which, like I was saying before, happened while dad here was off playing spaceman."
His dad looked up again, and held his gloved hands up, fingers splayed. "Surprise!" he said, grinning.
"Yea, my dad here is getting experienced with the 'Surprise!' parenthood thing, don't you think?"
"C'mere, you punk." Mark tried to make a break for it, and the camera wobbled wildly as he was duly caught and his hair was ruffled by his dad as the two of them laughed.
"Aw, dad! You got dirt in my hair!"
"Oh, did I? I'm sorry." He shook his gardening gloves out, careful to make sure all the contents landed on Mark. "So very sorry. Whoops," he deadpanned, "And it's not dirt, it's -"
"Soil, yes. I know." Mark rolled his eyes. "Did I mention that my dad is a total nerd?"