Seduction and Snacks (27 page)

I moaned again and tried to push her head forward so she could take me back in her mouth.

"Hey, what's wrong with your wiener?"

I jerked awake and turned my head, screaming at the top of my lungs when I saw Gavin standing a foot away from me on the couch, staring down between my legs. I followed his line of sight and groaned when I saw the huge morning wood I sported poking up under the blanket.

I sat up quickly and bunched the blanket around my lap as best I could as Claire came running into the living room, a look of panic on her face from my scream moments ago.

"What happened?" she asked in alarm as she ran over and knelt down next to Gavin.

Stop thinking about Claire on her knees. Stop thinking about Claire on her knees. Think about that old lady from Titanic naked.

Gavin pointed to me. "Carter’s got a big wiener, Mom. Sumfin's wrong with him. He was making the same noises I do when my tummy hurts."

Claire smothered a laugh and finally looked me in the eyes.

"I guess I don't need to ask if you slept well!" she said brightly.

I shook my head at how chipper she was this early in the morning after last night.

"How are you even able to function this morning?" I asked, looking her over. Aside from looking a little sleepy, she still looked amazing. Her hair was wild, she had a little bit of make-up smudged underneath one eye and she wore an old tank top and shorts that had seen better days, yet she was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen.

She laughed and pointed to Gavin.

"You learn real quickly that as a parent, you don't have time for a hangover. Extra Strength-Rapid Release Tylenol and I have become very close over the years."

The phone rang and she hurried out of the living room to answer it, leaving Gavin to stand there and stare at me.

"So, how was your sleepover at Grandpas last night?" I asked as I flung the blanket off of me now that my morning glory was under control.

He shrugged.

"Do I have a vagina?"

I stared blankly at him, not quite sure I heard him correctly.

"Uh, what?" I asked, swinging my legs around and placing my feet on the floor.

He let out a huff of irritation with me.

"I said, do I have a vagina?"

I turned towards the kitchen to see Claire on the phone, pacing back and forth. Shit, I was on my own with this one. How the hell does he even know the word vagina? Wait, maybe he doesn't. He's four for fuck's sake. He probably thinks vagina means Cleveland.

"Well, Gavin, um…do you know what that words means?"

Please say Cleveland. Please say Cleveland.

"Papa watched a movie last night and the guy said he felt like he was driving around in a vagina. Can I drive a vagina? Does a vagina have windows and a horn?"

Oh holy mother of shit.

"Shit. Son of a bitch!" Claire cursed as she walked back into the living room.

Gavin opened his mouth but Claire was quick to cut him off.

"Don't you even think about repeating what I said. Go to your room and find some clothes to wear. You have to go to work with Mommy today."

Gavin scampered off and his vagina comment was momentarily forgotten when I saw the look of worry on Claire’s face.

"What's going on? What happened?"

She flopped down next to me on the couch, rested her head on the back of it and closed her eyes.

"My dad was supposed to watch Gavin today so I could finish up some things at the shop but he got called in to work," she said with a sigh.

Light bulb.

"I can watch him for you," I said immediately.

She lifted up her head and stared at me with her mouth open.

"Seriously, Claire, let me do this for you. I would be happy to take him today and get to spend some time with him."

After forty minutes of Claire listing all of the small objects he could fit into his mouth, making me repeat the number for Poison Control back to her eight times and drawing me a diagram with stick figures on a paper towel of how to do CPR, Gavin and I kissed Claire good-bye, got into my car and headed to the library for story time.

It was a public place, full of kids and parents who knew how to take care of kids in case I had a problem or questions. What could possibly go wrong?

***

"…and the sex? Oh you can just kiss that shit good-bye right now. Before we had our son my wife was a dirty little whore. She'd give me blow jobs while I drove down the freeway, she'd dress up in a naughty nurse uniform and greet me at the door when I got home from work and whenever we went out, we always pulled the car over on the way home and fucked in the front seat."

The man sitting next to me let out a great big sigh. He was another father I met when Gavin and I arrived at the library. He was there with his three-year old son and eight-year-old daughter. His daughter was from a previous relationship and he had his son with his current wife. We started talking when I sat down next to him on one of the couches while the boys sat in a circle with a bunch of other kids a few feet away listening to the librarian read them a book. After telling him the condensed version of my relationship with Claire and Gavin, I asked him for some parenting tips since he’d been around the block a lot longer than me. Little did I know it would turn into a "how much kids fucked up my life" speech.

"But after our son was born, my penis got put on the "do not call" list. Sometimes, if I listen really closely, I can often hear the sound of "Taps" being played from my lonely balls," he whispered to me as he waved his hand and smiled at his son.

Jesus. Claire and I hadn't even got to the sex part yet. Was this really how it would be? Before I demanded that this guy tell me something good so I wouldn't have nightmares tonight, his daughter Finley ran over to him with a book in her hands.

"Daddy, can you read me this book about horses?” she asked sweetly as she climbed up onto his lap.

“Sure, baby girl,” he replied, wrapping an arm around his daughter and taking the book from her hand.

See? Look at how sweet kids could be. They might be little hellions sometimes but they definitely had hearts of gold. And there was nothing sweeter than watching a father with his daughter.

"Oh Jesus, Mary and Joseph…where did you get this book?" the man asked as a few parents looked in his direction and shot him dirty looks.

I glanced over to see what the problem was and noticed the book in his hand read “The Big Book of Lesbian Horse Stories.” My mouth fell open in horror and I looked around to see if anyone had noticed that there was porn in the children’s section of the library.

“Honey, go pick out another book,” he told her calmly as he hid the book behind his back.

“But I want that one, it’s got horses in it,” she argued.

“Well, you can’t read that one. That’s a big person book. It’s not for kids.”

Finley rolled her eyes and huffed, handing him the other book she brought over with her, “Poop Eaters”.

This time, her father was the one to roll his eyes. “Poop Eaters”? Again? Really, Finley. You need to find another hobby.”

“She’s got this thing about poop,” he told me as he took the book from her. “When she was little, she used to finger-paint her room with the poop in her diaper.”

He chuckled at the memory and I covered my mouth with my hand to keep the vomit inside. I stared at the little girl’s hands expecting to see it covered in shit.

“A few times when we were at the park she would run up to me and say she had a present for me. She’d hold out her hand and it would be filled with cat poop she found in the sand box. Ahhhh, good times,” he said with a bob of his head.

A few times? This happened more than once? Poop finger-painting? Poop presents? Shouldn't kids be born with the knowledge that you never touch poop? Is Gavin aware that this is a rule no one should ever break?

I looked over at him rummaging through a box of books someone placed next to the reading circle and wondered if he would find poop in there and bring it to me. What if he tried to finger-paint
me
with it? I’d scream. And you can’t scream in the library. What do I do? WHAT DO I DO???

"So yeah, good luck with the whole father thing, dude," the man said to me as he stood up to leave.

I sat there on the couch trying to stop the panic attack I was pretty sure I was having. I need a paper bag to breathe into. Why the fuck didn't I bring a paper bag? Oh Jesus. Poop hands. POOP HANDS!

"Carter! Hey, Carter!" Gavin shouted as he ran towards me and several other adults shushed him.

I stared at his hands, praying to God there wasn't shit on them. How would I explain to Claire that I made our son walk home from the library because I didn't want shitty hand prints inside my car? I winced as he raced towards me, bracing myself for a shit pie to the face or a shit ball to the arm. He was running so fast he couldn't stop himself in time and he slammed into my legs with an "Oomph."

Oh fuck, please let there not be shit on my legs right now.

As soon as he hit my legs, he scrambled up onto my lap, careful not to drop whatever was clutched in his hand. One can never be too careful with a handful of shit, obviously.

He put his knees on my thighs and I felt him crawl up onto my lap. My eyes were squeezed so tightly closed that I was giving myself a headache.

Oh sweet Jesus. Here it comes. A shit sandwich. He's going to make me pretend to eat it like kids do when they make you a Play-Doh cookie. The term "shiteating grin" will finally have meaning in my life.

"I got you sumfin' Carter. Guess which hand?" he said excitedly.

Oh, God, please don't make me choose. It will always be the hand without shit in it.

Gavin quickly grew impatient with my silence. "Come on, Carter, open your eyes. Don't be a wuss."

I swallowed nervously, trying to think of all the ways to disinfect shit from your skin.

Does bleach burn? Probably after I took a layer of skin off with sandpaper, it would. I slowly opened one eye at a time until I could see that Gavin had his arms behind his back.

“Come on, pick one of my arms and see what I gots,” he said excitedly.

"Gee, I guess I'll pick that hand," I said unenthusiastically as I tapped his right arm.

Good-bye clean, shitless skin. I'll remember you fondly.

Gavin bounced up and down on my thighs and swung his right arm around in front of him.

"You picked the right one! Here ya go!" he said excitedly.

I looked down nervously and breathed a deep sigh of relief when I saw what was in his hand.

A book. A beautiful, crisp, brand new library book. Not a book covered in shit, or a book made out of shit. Just a book. The title read “Come on Get Happy!”

I took it from his little hand and held it up in the air to look at the picture of puppies frolicking in a field on the front cover.

"This is a pretty awesome book. How come you picked this one?" I asked him as he put the hand that used to hold the book up on my shoulder and looked me in the eye.

"Because I like you. And Mommy says it’s nice to do things that make people happy. I want you to be happy."

All I could do was sit there and stare at him. I got it now. I got why Claire hadn't crumbled when she found out she was pregnant, why she dropped out of college and gave up everything for this little boy. I suddenly realized that my heart was sitting there on my lap and even though I wasn't here for the first four years of his life, I loved him unconditionally simply because he was mine. He was a part of me. I knew without a doubt, I would give my life to make sure he was safe. I wrapped my arms around his little body, hoping he didn't still think of me as a stranger and would let me hug him.

He leaned into me without hesitation and I rested my forehead against his.

"Buddy, I am already the happiest guy in the world," I told him softly.

Gavin stared at me for a few minutes and then pulled his other arm out from behind his back. “Good, then after you read that one, you can read this one.

I pulled away from him and glanced down in his hand at a book titled “The Vagina Monologues”.

***

After we left the library, I took Gavin to get ice cream and then we headed back to Claire’s house. True to form, Gavin talked the whole way home and I started to wonder if he was like a record player that was skipping and maybe I needed to smack the side of him to get him to stop.

I resisted the urge. Barely.

When we got back to the house, I sat down on the couch and Gavin grabbed a photo album from one of the end table drawers and curled up on my lap with it. He flipped through all of the pages, explaining each picture to me. I saw every single birthday, Christmas, Halloween and everything in between that I missed, and with Gavin's commentary about each event, it almost felt like I had been there.