Within minutes, he was asleep, his little palm resting on my cheek.
I watched him for a moment, listening to him breathe, adoring his peaceful expression. He was such a loving, sensitive soul. I wanted to shelter him forever, and yet I wanted others to know and experience his sweetness too. But it took time and patience—who would give it to him? Who would look past the quirks and grow to love the person beneath? I knew I couldn’t follow him around for the next ten years, forcing kids to be more understanding and grown-ups to be less ignorant, teachers to be more tolerant and doctors to be less dismissive. Eventually I’d have to let go a little. Eventually.
I took his hand from my face, kissed it and held it between us, closing my eyes.
? ? ?
Scotty woke up for good about two hours later, and I left him in his bedroom playing with his dinosaurs while I went to shower. I hadn’t gotten nearly enough sleep to feel rested, but I was in a good mood, partly because of the sweet quiet time I’d had with him this morning, and partly because of the memories of Jillian from the night before.
Stepping beneath the spray, I couldn’t help smiling as I washed my hair and soaped up. First chance I got, I was going to read through our texts again. Just thinking about them made my cock start to swell. Groaning, I looked at the open bathroom door, wishing I had five minutes to lock it and jerk off before getting dressed. It would feel so good. But it never failed—every time I attempted that while Scotty was awake, he would come knocking. His timing was uncanny.
Gritting my teeth, I concentrated on other things—today’s schedule, a client meeting I had tomorrow, the loads of laundry I had to get done, the dry cleaning that needed to be taken in. At this point, I was an expert in reclaiming control of my body like that. And sometime today I was going to look at the schedule for the coming week and weekend. I’d promised Jillian a date, but I needed to make sure I could get Sarah, the usual sitter, to watch Scotty. My sister was good in a pinch and only lived forty minutes away, and I did want my son to be close to my family—it was the only one he had—but I also wanted to keep my sanity. Scotty was dealing with enough frustration at school; placing additional stress on him at home wouldn’t be good for him, and Monica stressed him out.
Hell, Monica stressed me out.
After drying off, I dressed in dark jeans and a clean white t-shirt, then went to get Scotty, so I could get him cleaned up before we went down for breakfast.
“Come on, bud. Shower time.”
“I’m still playing.”
“You want that iPad time, you better come with me now.”
He thought about it for a moment and decided to come, taking my hand as we went down the hall to the bathroom we shared, the only one on the second floor.
The funny thing is, he never wants to get in the shower because he hates the feeling of soaping up, but once I get him in, he loves the water. He just doesn’t want to do the things he’s supposed to do—if I didn’t stay in the bathroom and force him to use soap, he’d just play around, using his hands as characters, reciting lines from movies or TV shows or commercials or even just scripts he makes up based on whatever he’s thinking about. Sometimes he sang them. Sometimes all I heard were sound effects.
After five minutes of growling and crashing noises I assumed were dinosaurs fighting, I opened the curtain a little. “Did you soap yet?”
“No.”
“Scotty, come on. You’ve had five minutes already. Do it now.”
He said nothing, just continued with the sound effects, his hands moving in front of his face. I sighed, reached in, and handed him the soap. “Do it. Now.”
It would get done faster and better if I did it myself, but I told myself not to. Part of me wondered if eight years from now I’d be checking up on my sixteen-year-old, making sure he used soap in the shower.
“Done,” he said a minute later.
“Good. Let’s get that hair washed.” I opened the curtain.
“Noooo,” he whimpered, pleading with me with those big eyes.
“Yes. It’s Sunday, you know the rule. And we’ve got to do it now if you want iPad time before church. Look at my hair, it’s all wet too, see?” I tipped my head toward him. “I washed it already. We can brush our hair together. And you can brush my beard too.”
He protested a little bit more but eventually gave in and let me wash it. (He counts while I do it, and I’ve mastered completing the chore in twenty seconds.) When he was clean and rinsed, he got out and dried off, then we went down to his room, where he got dressed on his own with only a couple prompts from me.