Chapter 7 - Dawson
~
Dawson
To say I was relieved to let Carissa take the reins was the understatement of the century.
With Gage and Boone both on my back and a crying kid hiding in the bathroom, I was sufficiently rattled, shaken in a way not even a game against the Chicago Blackhawks could make me feel.
God knows what would have happened if Carissa hadn’t turned up when she did.
For all my eagerness to be a good caretaker to Henry, it seemed I had fumbled at the very first step of parenting and landed in the worst possible timeline.
Hell, I didn’t even know the kid knew how to lock the bathroom door in the first place, or else I would’ve made a point of hiding all the keys.
A part of me wondered if I would have been better off just wrapping the whole house in bubble wrap and calling it a day.
I was still struggling to wrap my head around just how things had gone so wrong so quickly when Carissa succeeded in coaxing Henry into opening the door. It creaked open just an inch, and Carissa waved a placating hand at the three of us when Boone, Gage, and I all tensed up at once.
“Hey, little man.” Carissa kneeled to talk with Henry, whose one teary eye was visible through the crack. “Can I come in? The other three will stay out here.”
Henry pushed the door open another inch, red-rimmed eyes wandering over all of us before dropping them to his shoes. He sniffed quietly and nodded, and took Carissa’s hand when she offered it.
“Wait here,” Carissa mouthed to me as she slipped through the door.
I shuffled up to listen through the opening, while Boone plopped down on his ass in the hallway, arms still folded tightly to his chest. Gage hovered a little ways off, shoulders bunched up by his ears. He was pretending he wasn’t listening, but was clearly hanging onto every word.
Looking through the sliver of an opening, I saw Carissa sit down next to Henry, who was curled up on the bathroom mat, clutching his favorite helicopter to his chest. She didn’t say anything at first, just sat beside him while he hiccuped and sniffed, and the last of his tears dried up.
Eventually, when Henry had relaxed a little, she curled a gentle arm around his shoulders. “You want to talk about what happened, champ?”
Henry stared at the floor, tousled hair sitting mussed up like a bird’s nest. “Are they going to send me back?”
The sheer volume of sadness and despair in that question hit me like a truck, and it took every ounce of self-control not to burst in there and insist that was not about to happen. Instead, I kept quiet and let Carissa work her magic.
“Back to the orphanage? Of course not,” she said gently. “What makes you think they’re going to send you back?”
Henry rubbed a fist under his nose, scrunching his eyes shut as he pulled his knees up. “Because I’m not big and grown up.”
Carissa looked up at the ceiling, turning that information over in her head. “Is that why you wanted to watch the scary movie? To show Dawson you’re big and grown up?”
Henry nodded briefly before another bout of tears trickled down his cheeks, and he buried his face in the crook of his elbow. “But now they think I’m a baby and they’re going to send me away.”
Carissa sighed deeply before patting Henry on the head. “They’re not going to send you away, kiddo.”
Henry lifted his head slightly to peek at her with one watery eye. “How do you know?”
“Look,” Carissa leaned down to catch his eye. “Dawson didn’t say no to the movie because he thinks you’re a baby, or because he wants to send you back. He said no because he cares about you.”
Henry made a mumbled noise of dubiety and pulled his knees up to his chin.
“It’s true.” Carissa cast her eyes around the room, smiling when she spotted me looking through the crack in the door. “The guys are just looking out for you. They all like having you around, and I know Dawson already thinks you’re the coolest.”
The brief eye contact sent my heart skittering in my chest, and I had to remind myself that I was meant to be avoiding Carissa’s seemingly effortless charms. Never mind that she was currently defending my honor. Putting my own personal hangups aside, I dropped my gaze to Henry instead.
“I… I like my helicopter,” he said, almost as an afterthought, clutching it tight to his chest.
“That’s a good helicopter,” Carissa said. “Strong, reliable, doesn’t argue back. I approve.”
I caught myself smiling. I wasn’t doing anything, but I could still feel the tension in the hallway ebb just a little. She had him. She had him, not me, not Boone, not Gage pretending he wasn’t standing there.
Carissa’s voice shifted again, lighter this time. “Wanna tell me how fast it can go without crashing into walls? I’m gonna guess… supersonic.”
Henry hesitated, then, muffled by the bathroom door, “Super… super fast. Watch out for the chairs.”
“Noted,” Carissa replied, deadpan. “I’ll wear a helmet next time.”
I leaned back against the wall, chest finally unclenching a bit. Boone had started muttering something about rules for helicopter flights, but Carissa didn’t even blink at him. She let the kid talk, let him breathe, let him know it was okay to be scared and still be okay.
Henry’s voice softened, the panic melting into something more manageable. “Dawson… you don’t… you don’t want to send me back?”
I exhaled without realizing it. Carissa answered before I could even open my mouth.
“Of course not,” she said gently. “You’re staying here. That’s it. That’s the plan.”
There was a pause. Then a tiny sniffle, a little laugh, a small voice almost hidden by the door frame. “I… I thought maybe… maybe you wouldn’t want me.”
“You’re more than okay, Henry,” Carissa said, warm and patient. “Even when you lock yourself in bathrooms, you’re okay. And your helicopter agrees. Right?”
A faint squeak of the toy made the hallway feel lighter. Boone relaxed, just slightly, as if the walls themselves exhaled.
I stayed in the doorway, frozen, aware that I wasn’t needed here. She had it. She always had it. The laughter, the comfort, the soft humor, it was all Carissa’s magic.
Finally, after what felt like both forever and no time at all, Henry whispered again. “I… I think… I think I’m… okay now.”
Carissa chuckled softly. “See? Told you. Bathrooms are good for more than hiding, they’re good for talking.”
And for the first time in twenty minutes, the hallway didn’t feel like a warzone holding its breath.
Henry seemed to perk up at that last bit, but then his face fell abruptly, and his bottom lip wobbled. “Gage doesn’t like me though.”
From the corner of my eye, I saw Gage stiffen. The big guy was still standing there with his arms folded, pretending he wasn’t listening, but that melancholic little comment from Henry made his broad back go rigid.
My hand reached out to him instinctively, a motion I’d repeated countless times before, but like always, Gage was already stalking away. I watched him turn on his heel and storm down the hall, disappearing down the stairs without so much as a backward glance.
“Figures,” Boone mumbled as we both heard the distant sound of a door slamming shut.
Later, was what I told myself. I would deal with Gage later. For the time being, I had Henry to worry about. The kid was hurting, and it was partially my fault. Carissa had done her part, and it was time to do mine, so I drew in a breath and pushed open the door.
“Don’t worry about Gage, buddy.” I slipped inside and crouched beside Henry, reaching over to ruffle his wild hair. “He’s just been a little grumpy lately.”
Henry looked up at me warily. “Because I touched his PlayStation?”
Hell, knowing Gage, he could be right, but I wasn’t about to tell Henry that. Instead, I shook my head and settled down beside him, catching Carissa’s eye over his head.
“No, nothing like that,” I murmured in what I hoped was a soothing sort of way.
“You didn’t do anything wrong.” When Henry looked unconvinced, I nudged his shoulder, scratching my brain for any way to lighten the mood.
“How about this: tomorrow’s my day off. What do you say you and me go to the ice rink, huh? I’ll teach you a couple of my moves.”
“Really?” Henry’s head shot up immediately, all of his problems forgotten in a flash. “Can we go fast again?”
“You betcha.” I mirrored his sudden excitement, and the tight knot in my chest eased up in light of his smile.
“Can Carissa come too?” Henry bounced to his feet, whipping his head between the both of us, and my smile wavered just a little bit.
Well, shit.
“Uh…” I drew the pause out for way too long and ran a hand through my hair. “Sure. I mean, if she wants to. You don’t have to, though,” I added quickly, glancing up at Carissa. “I’m sure you’re busy and this is a sort of me-and-Henry thing, so—”
Internally, I was kicking myself for being such an asshole, but what was I supposed to do? It was meant so I could keep my distance. I couldn’t afford any kind of distractions, not with everything else going on, and Carissa (nice as she was) was one hell of a distraction.
“It’s okay,” Carissa cut in with a smile, clearly reading the panic I was miserably failing to hide. “You two go have fun tomorrow. I’ll hold down the fort here.”
The relief I felt meant nothing when it was accompanied by a sharp twist of guilt. She was the reason Henry had calmed down to begin with, and she deserved all the credit for saving us all from this crisis. The least I could do was be nice.
“No!” I blurted out, far too fast. “I mean—look, I didn’t mean it like that.” I cleared my throat, ignoring the little voice in my head that was screaming at me to get a grip. “Of course you can come.”
When Carissa winced at my shameful display of indecision, I tacked on a feeble: “If you want to” at the end.
Carissa hesitated, lips parting with what was probably a polite decline in the making, but Henry beat her to it.
“Pleeeease Carissa?” The kid pulled out all the stops with his pleading. The pout, the wide, hopeful eyes; all of it. You would have had to be made of stone to deny him anything in that state.
“Come on,” I decided to help him along, aiming my own version of puppy-dog eyes in her direction. “How can you say no to that face?”
“Well…” Carissa, clearly, was stronger than me, because she still looked unconvinced.
“Hey, no pressure, but it could be fun,” I waved a hand, trying to sound casual, and met her eye for just a moment. “What do you say?”
Carissa swept her gaze back and forth between the two of us, before finally cracking a smile. “Fine, fine. Why the hell not?”
Henry gave a whoop of approval and I mirrored Carissa’s grin tenfold. Despite my hesitations and all of my firm promises to myself, I found tomorrow couldn’t come soon enough.