8. Chapter 8
Chapter 8
Scott
M orrie was a shaking bundle of anxiety across from me and I didn’t know how to make it stop. To make it better. I desperately wanted to reach across the table, place my hand on his and settle him as I’d done before with any other boy I’d been with, but I knew I couldn’t do that to him. It would only make it worse.
“I don’t know if I need a Christmas, Scott. I’m fine the way things are.”
“Are you?”
“Yes,” he grumbled. “Why doesn’t anyone ever believe me when I say that? First, Perry and now you. I know my own mind, okay?”
I trusted that he did, but I also had to trust my gut. This boy across from me wanted. He wanted so bad that the thought of it made him nervous.
“Can we try?”
“Try what?”
“A Christmas. Me and you. Tree, presents, baking… all of the things that make a good Christmas.”
Morrie hesitated, playing with the rim of him cup with his poor, cracked hands. “At your house?”
“Yes,” I replied, recalling the clutter at his. “I have a nice home in a quiet community just outside downtown and I’m planning on decorating it soon. I’d like to have company though to help me decide and I’m wondering if there’s a little somewhere who’d enjoy that.”
His eyes shot up to mine, cheeks turning pink above the scruff on his face. He opened his mouth once, then slammed it shut and gave a little shake of his head at himself.
“What were you going to say?”
A small laugh left his lips. “I was going to ask if you’d play with me. It’s stupid. I don’t know where my head is at. You make it hard to not want things, Scott.”
“Who says you can’t want things? If you want to come over, get into some comfy play clothes and decorate the house with me, then you are invited to do that but there’s one thing I’d like to try if you do.”
“What is it?” he said, pulling back a bit and I could tell what he was thinking. His brain was likely leaping to his personal worst case scenario: cuddles and snuggles.
“I’d like you to try calling me Daddy.”
“Oh,” he breathed, sounding relieved. “I can try that.”
“Is there a name you like being called when you play?”
He shook his head. “I’m just Morrie.”
“Is that short for something?”
“Morrison,” he responded, with a gentle smile. “My dad named me after Jim Morrison, but with the names switched, so I’m Morrison James.”
I smiled, sipping at my hot chocolate. Finally, he was starting to give me more about himself and that boosted my confidence a little bit. From his smile, I got that his dad was perhaps someone important to him. “Do you see your dad often?”
“No.”
“Does he live in town?”
“He’s dead,” Morrie offered, blunt and to the point. “I grew up in foster care.”
Everything came together at once in my brain and my heart ached as I watched the discomfort grow on his face. “Morrie, I’m sorry to hear that.”
He shrugged. “It was years ago. I was just a little kid. I don’t remember much.”
Something about his tone made me pause for a moment. His eyes slid away from mine and he looked out the big window, his knees jittering beneath the table and his fingers picking at the rim of his hot chocolate cup. If I had to guess, Morrie remembered far more than he claimed he did about his childhood and what it was like losing his father so young. “That doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt, right?”
Again, his shoulders moved in a shrug so I let it go for the time being though inside I was doubling down on my goal of giving him the best Christmas ever. Had he ever had one? Probably not. This year he would though.
“So, I’m wondering if you like silver or blue better?”
“For what?”
“The ornaments on our tree.”
Morrie shot me an incredulous look and I expected him to snark back that he didn’t want a tree, but what he said instead made me grin. “Blue isn’t a Christmas color.”
“If it isn’t a Christmas color, then why do they make Christmas decorations in that color?”
“Red and green. Maybe silver and gold. Those are the Christmas colors.”
“So, for our tree, silver then?”
After a moment of hesitation, Morrie nodded his head once. He picked up his cup and finished the last bits of his hot chocolate, then placed it back down on the table.
“Ready to get out of here?” I asked, finishing my drink as well.
“Yeah, I have laundry to do and if I don’t get to it, I’ll forget again and I work tomorrow.”
“Can I give you a ride home?”
Again, he paused. “Do you want to come in again?”
“Not this time. How about I just drop you off outside?”
Morrie nodded once and I grinned at him. We cleaned up the table and together, made our way to my car.
I turned the corner onto the quiet, dark street that led to the apartment block and glanced out of the corner of my eye at the boy in the passenger seat. Morrie looked tired, but there was a small, serene smile on his lips as he rested his head on the passenger window, his eyes looking straight forward. He had been quiet since he hopped into the vehicle but that was alright. Today likely hadn’t gone the way he’d pictured it at all, even though it had gone as well as I’d imagined it would have.
“You work tomorrow?” I asked, breaking the silence as I crept through the early evening.
Morrie nodded, heaving a sigh that felt heavy. “Yeah.”
“Where do you work?”
“Sabatello’s Diner,” he replied, as I pulled up outside his building and parked in the spot labeled ‘visitor’. “I just wash dishes and sometimes bus tables. It’s not a great job, but it pays the bills.”
I looked down at his hands where they rested on his thighs, tucked into the sleeves of his jacket. His job had to make his skin even worse. He sighed softly, drawing my attention upwards and I raised a questioning eyebrow at him.
“They’re fine. I have lotion, I promise.”
“You just have to remember to use it, that’s all.”
“Yeah,” he nodded. “That’s true, I guess. Thank you for today, Scott. It was good.”
“I’m glad you had a good time. I did too. I think I have found a love for Humboldt penguins.” A soft laugh met my ears from the seat beside me and I grinned, feeling the sound ring in my head like an accomplishment of sorts. “Do you want to come over and help me decorate my tree this week?”
“And play?” he asked, his voice barely above a whisper.
I nodded. “You can bring Mr. Starkey and wear your ocean pajamas. We’ll decorate the tree and have cookies and hot chocolate together. How does that sound?”
“I don’t know. I don't really do things like that.”
“How often do you let yourself be little, Morrie?”
“At the club, when I go. But…” he trailed off and shrugged his shoulders. “Not all the way. I just play with Perry and we stack blocks and color and stuff.”
“Is that where you want to be? Blocks and coloring?”
“Sometimes. Sometimes, I want to play with bigger toys though. Ambrose bought me some plastic ocean animals and I like those a lot, but Perry is littler than me and he makes it not fun.”
“Have you ever had a Daddy to play with?” I already knew the answer, but his perspective was more important than whatever bits I'd picked up so far.
His expression changed, resembling the grim look he’d given me when I’d asked about his father, and he shrugged again. “Once, but I didn’t do it right and he got impatient with me, so he ended things.”
“Impatient?”
“I’m a tortoise,” he offered, as an explanation. “All Daddies seem to want a hare. That’s why I said Perry would be better. He’s faster than me. He’s cuddly and warm and looking for someone like you. He wants someone like you so bad and he’d give you everything you ever wanted in a boy.”
“I thought we were letting me decide what I wanted.”
“You’ll see, I guess. If you’re determined to learn for yourself, that’s up to you.”
I found I was very determined to learn, but not in the way he was thinking. I wanted to know him, earn the touch that I knew he wanted to give and give him touch in return. The walls were so high around him, but I could take the time to break them down and show him that I was able to be patient. “I think you’ll find that I enjoy tortoises.”
“Yeah?” he responded, almost derisive though there was a hint of something resembling hope in his tone.
“Most definitely. Slow and steady wins the race, Morrie, and I want to be the one beside you when you cross the finish line.”
Morrie snorted once, then the vehicle filled with laughter. Actual laughter that rattled in my ears and made my body feel light. I didn’t know what was so funny to him, but the sound of his laughter and the way his lips were curled into an actual, genuine smile was a beautiful sight.
“What’s so funny?”
“That was the cheesiest line,” he snorted, body shaking as his laughs slowed down.
“It really was, wasn’t it?”
He nodded, ending his laughing on a sigh that sounded less sad and more happy. “I kind of liked it though.”
“Good. Cheesy as it is, I meant it.”
Morrie nodded and reached for the handle of the car door. Pulling it open, he turned to me one last time and murmured another thank you for the good day.
“You’re welcome, Morrie. I’ll see you later this week, okay?”
He nodded and stood up out of the vehicle, waving goodbye as he trudged through the snow-covered walkway to his apartment. I watched him walk away, hands shoved in his pockets and chin tucked into his jacket. Plucking my phone out of the centre console, I sent him one text message as a reminder as he walked into the building.
Lotion and laundry.
The response was quick and I could see him standing in the entryway of the apartment building, clicking away on his phone as three dots appeared on my screen in the text window. He waved once through the window before he headed up the stairs and out of view but the succession of three texts he’d sent me lit up my screen.
I know. I remembered.
Okay, maybe I didn’t remember.
Thanks, Scott.