42. Adam
Adam
I creep into Dylan’s room with the hope that he’s not already awake. With it being the fourth of July, I should be working. We have the big block party, but my team assured me that family comes first.
So here I am creeping into Dylan’s room for his birthday.
When I’m close enough to his bed, I kneel on the side and gently shake him awake.
“Wake up, birthday boy.” It takes a few more shakes and some raspberries to his neck for him to wake up.
The sleepy smile on his face makes everything worth it.
“It’s my birthday!” Dylan exclaims and pops up out of bed.
“It is. What do you want to do today?”
He pouts his lips as he thinks about it. “The zoo.”
“Today?”
“Yeah, Daddy. It’s my day,” he says, like I should know.
I ruffle his hair and stand up. My knees crack as I do and I let out a groan. “That it is. Do you want pancakes?”
He nods his head fast and then purses his lips.
“What’s up, buddy?”
“Can Emily come to the zoo with us?”
My lips twitch and my heart warms. While we haven’t been together all three of us. Dylan has been itching to spend time with Emily. “Yeah, buddy. She can come with us.”
“Okay.”
I lean down and kiss the top of his head and ruffle his hair before I head downstairs. I pull out the pancake mix and mixing bowls to get started on breakfast. When I have two cakes on the griddle, I call Emily.
“Hi, baby.”
“Hi, sunshine. Do you have plans today?”
I hear a door close and a huff of laughter escape her mouth. “It’s summer. That’s my plan.”
“Fair point.” I cradle my phone between my ear and shoulder, flipping the pancakes when they’re ready. “How would you feel about spending the day at the zoo with me and Dylan?”
“Really?”
“Yeah, baby. It’s his birthday and he wants to go to the zoo. And he wants you to come along.”
Emily blows out a breath and if I know her, she’s holding back emotion. “Okay. Um, do you want me to meet you two there, or?”
“Don’t be a goof. Dylan has requested pancakes and I’m extending the invite to you. If you haven’t eaten yet.”
“Does iced coffee count as a meal?” Emily deadpans.
“Absolutely not. Emily Marie, drive your cute butt over here and I will feed you.”
“Yes, Daddy.”
“Jesus Christ woman,” I blow out a breath as I hear laughter on the other end of the phone. “I’m gonna hang up. Bring a change of clothes and I’ll see you soon.”
“I love you.” She sings songs into the phone.
“I love you, too.”
With a laugh, I hang up and finish up the pancakes. On the other eye, I start up the bacon and eggs. Dylan might not eat all of it but I’m sure Emily and I can polish off the rest. The TV turning on signals that Dylan has emerged from his bedroom. Still dressed in his Iron Man pajamas, he sits and watches an episode of Transformers.
“Did you brush your teeth?”
A murmured ‘yeah’ comes from the living room. I have to accept that I didn’t raise an early morning kid, even though it’s almost nine in the morning. With the bacon sizzling and the eggs cooking I make work on my first cup of coffee of the day.
Emily: Do I need to grab anything for the birthday boy and his daddy?
Me: No and if you keep calling me that I’m withholding an orgasm for making me sprout a boner near my son.
Emily: Promises, promises.
Emily: Be there soon.
Ten minutes later my phone pings with a notification from the camera in the driveway. Knowing it’s Emily, I make sure the eye on the stove is set to low and head to the door to meet her.
Her steps up the front stoop are timid. I try to see where she’s coming from.
“Come here,” I open my arms to her.
She walks into them easily. Her arms find their way around my waist and we just be. As a couple that’s still finding solid ground. As a single dad who’s dating his son’s former teacher. But through the mud that’s our new reality, we’re just us.
“It’s weird that I can spend so much time with you and still miss you when we’re not together. That has to be a sign. Good or bad, I have no clue.” Emily says while still wrapped around me like ivy.
I kiss the top of her head. “Well I know I’ve never felt like this. Don’t laugh, okay?” I wait for her to nod before telling her, “You give me butterflies. Every time we’re around one another. I sometimes have to pinch myself that you gave us a chance.”
“I’m glad I did,” she tells me.
“Daddy? Did you forget about the food?” Dylan yells from inside.
“Shit!” I start and rush back into the house with Emily’s laughter following me.
“He doesn’t always do this,” I hear Dylan say as I quickly pull the half-burnt food off the stove.
I can still salvage the rest of the food. So I finish up breakfast while I feel the peanut gallery watching me.
“How old are you today?” Emily asks Dylan.
“I’m seven.”
“No way. I loved being seven.”
I turn and see them both sitting at the island and my heart warms.
“What did you do for your birthday?”
“Hmm,” she muses as she tries to remember that far back. “I think my parents took me for ice cream. Since it was February and we were living in New York, it was too cold to do anything outside. But I claimed very early on that it was never too cold for ice cream.”
I plate the rest of breakfast and put everything on the island. Dylan grabs more than what he can eat and Emily laughs when she sees how full his plate is.
“Can you eat all of that?” She asks him.
“Mm-hmm. I have to eat all my food so I can grow big and strong like my daddy.”
Emily looks at me over the top of his head with a twinkle in her eyes. “Big and tall like your daddy, huh?”
Watch it , I mouth.
“Yeah and then I can get stronger and play baseball forever.”
“I don’t know about forever, buddy,” I tell Dylan.
He shrugs and eats most of his food before he pushes away his plate. “When are we going to the zoo?”
“In a few hours. I need to clean up and you need to shower. Get off all of that syrup.”
“Okay.” Dylan says, slinking off his chair and heading upstairs.
Emily and I take our cleared plates and Dylan’s half-eaten food to the sink. She rinses the dishes and I load them into the dishwasher.
“First meal done,” I praise once everything is wiped down.
Emily leans with her back against the counter and I mirror her position on the opposite side.
“It does get easier,” she claims. “My life is so much different now.”
“How so?”
“I thought I’d be married and have a kid, maybe two, by now. Living in a house.” She crosses the small distance, wrapping her arms around my waist and looks up at me. “You’re not a consolation prize. I don’t want you to think that. You are the prize. If it makes me a bad person for saying that I’m glad my life looks different, then so what.”
I didn’t think I was a consolation prize. But I’m glad she cleared that up. “I think you’d be a great mom. As much as I hate the way your past affected you I am glad that you ended up here.”
I hold up my phone and take a picture of my two hearts while they watch the lions in the enclosure. We’ve been at the zoo for just over two hours. Most of which was spent running through the water sprinklers to hopefully cool off.
Summer has made itself known. There hasn’t been a day when the temperature wasn’t in the nineties. Maybe I should’ve insisted we do a children’s museum instead. But then I wouldn’t have seen the smile or heard the laughter spilling from my son’s mouth. I wouldn't have seen the pure joy emanating from Emily at her first zoo experience. These are the moments that make being with them special.
“What’s your favorite animal?” Dylan asks Emily.
The awkward band-aid has been ripped off. As soon as we entered the park, Dylan grabbed Emily’s hand and toted her where he wanted to go.
“My favorite animals are squirrels and geese. But I also really like tigers. Maybe it has to do with Aladdin and how Jasmine had Rajah as her pet. I always thought that was cool.”
“That would be really cool.”
“What’s your favorite animal?” Emily asks back.
“Sharks,” Dylan claims proudly.
Emily blanches and I can’t stop the bark of laughter from escaping.
“Why sharks?”
“Because they’re so cool!” Dylan claims.
“I’ll take your word for it,” Emily hesitantly says.
The rest of the day is spent traipsing around the zoo until our feet hurt and Dylan is asleep on my shoulders. Emily makes me stop to take a picture of the three of us. And despite the dead weight of Dylan, my smile has never been more alive.
“He’s still out,” I announce when I walk into my bedroom. I close the door behind me and fall face-first on the bed next to Emily.
“I expected nothing less.”
I feel movement on the bed as Emily moves closer to me. She straddles my back and the moan I let out has me glad the door is closed.
“Never stop that.” I groan as she digs her thumbs into my lower back. I didn’t realize how tight my back would get from carrying Dylan. He’s a small kid, but man does he weigh a good amount.
“What do you two normally do for his birthday?” Her hands continue their magic on my back. Slowly I feel the muscles begin to loosen and I can finally breathe normally.
I flip through other birthdays of his and come up blank. “Now that you mention it, I can’t remember. We always watch fireworks. Even though it’s a holiday, Dyl still claims that the fireworks are a present for him. I usually cook on the grill and he has a cake. But I had no cake and no food prepared for the grill. I feel completely unprepared.”
Emily slides off my back and lays next to me. “He had a blast today. Don’t think you need to go over the top for him.”
“I know,” I breathe out. “Sometimes I still feel like I’m failing.”
“Adam, you are that little boy's hero. He worships the ground you walk on.” Her hands slide through my hair and I love that she loves to do that. “What brought this on? Is it seeing Chelsea?”
“I thought I was fine after seeing her. You reassured me that I had nothing to worry about. But I can’t stop the negativity and the crippling fear of what she said from rolling in.”
“I’m with you. Every step of the way I am with you.” Emily declares.