The Foster Dad

by Christopher X Sullivan

  And yes, it was far-fetched. And yes, the characters came together a little too smoothly and the child was a little too perfect and only put up roadblocks in order to bring our hero and heroine closer together.

  Sometimes you just need the silliness. It’s nice to take a break from the real world and unwind into an unfolding story where the problems get wrapped up neatly and nobody gets hurt. I hadn’t had much time to write over the past month seeing as Mark and I had been dealing with Alex almost nonstop and I spent my free time thinking about my company. Really, the only time I spent actually writing for pleasure was the first half-hour of my morning.

  That old standby worked like a charm, though I quickly grew frustrated with how slow my stories came together.

  And I kept starting new stories without finishing the old ones. That was a surefire sign that I wasn’t setting aside enough time to allow for the finishing energy to manifest. This stupid, flat romance between an incredibly Mark-like hero and a very Amber-like heroine was yet another story I would start, but be doomed to leave unfinished.

  My half-hour ended and I forced myself to wake up Alex. I unzipped the door as loud as I could, but the kid didn’t budge. My feet crunched on the plastic floor, but it didn’t affect him.

  I watched him sleep for a minute. His little face was buried in his pillow and he seemed completely at peace. His blanky was wrapped around his shoulders—we hadn’t unpacked his blanky at all on this camping trip. Mark must have done it when he laid Alex down for his nap.

  It melted my heart.

  “Alex... hey big guy. Alex... wake up.” I picked a clean shirt out of his bag. “Come on, buddy. Time to get up.”

  He rolled over and wiped his eyes.

  “Aren’t you hot under all those sheets and your blanky?”

  He gripped his comfort blanket and stared up at me.

  “Up, buddy. Sit up and help me get this shirt on you.”

  He silently did as I requested. I straightened his hair as much as possible and tried to cheer him up. He looked exhausted.

  “No more nap or you won’t sleep tonight. Come on, don’t you want to take me to the beach?”

  He nodded slowly.

  “How about some food? Are you hungry for an apple or a banana?”

  He nodded slowly again. He held my hand as I helped him out of the tent. The poor kid looked so disoriented. “Where’s Mark?”

  Mark this and Mark that... “He’s fishing with Mr. Sullivan.”

  No comment. He let go of my hand and walked right up to my mom and tried to climb on her. She let him.

  “Alex. You’re too big for that.”

  “Shush,” my mom said. “Let him sit here for a minute and wake up.” She bounced him in her arms. “Alex is just fine where he is.”

  I got out an apple and sliced it into chunks, taking one for myself and leaving the others for Alex. He had his head pressed against my mom like he was a baby.

  I got our car ready to go to the beach, loading up a basket of towels and drinks and snacks. By the time I was done, Alex and my mom were teasing each other and Alex was pretending to still be tired even though his grins proved he was wide awake. I sat on the opposite side of the fire ring and started typing again.

  Gabby, Caleb and Keegan skidded their bikes into the campsite. Alex popped out of my mom’s arms in the blink of an eye. He stumbled at first, then ran up to the kids.

  “Where were you?” he asked.

  “We rode all around the park. Daddy and Caleb fell over.”

  “It doesn’t hurt,” Caleb said, bravely.

  Denise pointed towards the camper and Keegan disappeared for a moment only to return with the first aid kit. He cleaned the scrape and Caleb applied the bandage.

  “Do you kids want to go to the beach? Uncle Mark should be dropping by when they get done fishing.”

  “That won’t be till nightfall,” my mom predicted.

  Not if I call him when we get to the beach.

  Alex returned to my mom and cuddled against her without responding.

  “Alex? Do you want to show me your sandcastle?”

  “Yeah.” He barely whispered and continued to hug my mother. This was starting to make me feel guilty for not finding a female influence in his life. He had Miss Val for the first few months, but living with me and Mark was all testosterone.

  “Come on, bud. We’ve got our bathing suits on. Let’s drive up to the beach. Mrs. S can come with us.”

  “That’s fine,” my mom said. She pushed Alex to his feet. “This will give me plenty of time to get in some relaxing by the fire.”

  “I’ll go with you, Chris,” Gabby offered.

  “Me too!” Caleb quickly added.

  “Me three,” said Keegan.

  “We don’t have room for anyone else,” I said. My guilt must have been extremely transparent because Denise laughed at me and told me it was fine.

  “We’ll only be gone for an hour or so,” I promised.

  We piled into my vehicle with the kids in the back and Keegan in the passenger's seat. Alex’s booster seat stayed on the right side so Caleb squished in the middle seat and Gabby got the seat behind me.

  “Alright, crew. To the beach. Do you guys all have towels?”

  “I forgot mine!” Gabby cried.

  I backed up and let her out to get her beach stuff from the truck. Caleb shouted after her to pick up a towel for him and Gabby did, like a good older sister should. I was proud of her. In fact, since those two incidents when we first arrived, the kids appeared to have settled down and were back to liking each other.

  Oh how I jinxed myself with that thought. We played on the beach for about half an hour before Mark showed up. Caleb was quite passive-aggressive towards his sister the whole time. She apparently didn’t know how to build a drizzle castle correctly. And she didn’t know how to pour the water the right way. And she was always in the way.

  I was sick of it. The only thing I could think of was that Caleb behaved better when his mom was around. At least he wasn’t being mean to Alex or roping Alex into his ill-advised schemes.

  Finally, I cracked and couldn’t stand another minute of building a sandcastle for a tyrant while Keegan sat idly by and let it all happen.

  It isn’t your place to criticize. Let it go. Aw shit, don’t sing that song in your head any-mo-o-ooooore.

  Mark and I had taken Tim and Stacy’s two oldest girls to see a screening of Frozen during the previous Christmas season. Other than that one showing, we escaped from the Froze-aggedon mostly unscathed. We sang Let It Go with Charlotte and Evelynn, but that was about it. I didn’t understand why Stacy would glare at me when I started singing that song and in my mind her anger was always kind of playful.

  Ever since my mom had gotten ahold of Alex... my God. It’s like she wanted to get on the Frozen bandwagon like every other grandparent. Alex knew all the songs. I’m not even trying to exaggerate. After my mom got to babysit a few times, Alex would sit patiently and watch that movie with Char and Evy like it was the best playdate in the world. They would sing the songs together... especially the one about the stupid fucking snowman which was apparently my mom’s favorite song to sing.

  “Who wants to get buried in the sand?” I asked. “Gabbigail?”

  She laughed and smiled that goofy smile. Then she lay on the sun-warmed sand.

  “Let’s dig a ditch first.”

  So we dug a hole. Alex started singing Do You Want To Build a Sandman in place of the snowman song.

  “Is that what Mrs. S sang while you built the buried giant?”

  He smiled and nodded.

  “Did my dad build the buried man?”

  He smiled and nodded again.

  “You know what? My dad built this guy with the headstone at every beach we’ve ever stayed at. One day, we found the bottom keel of a sailboat and we used that as the headstone.”

  “What’s a headstone?” Alex asked.

  “Just...” I sighed. “Do you want to b
uild a sandman?” If there’s one thing a Disney song is good for, it’s changing the subject. We quickly had the ditch dug and Gabby placed in it. Caleb delighted in covering his sister in dirt, though I had to chastise him for pushing it at her face.

  We made good time on the sand adventure. We took Gabby’s picture as she lay next to the sand sculpture my dad had made earlier in the day.

  “How about you?” I asked Alex. “Do you want to make an Alex Sandman?”

  He nodded, giggled and lay next to Gabby with his hands at his sides.

  “Gotta build the ditch first,” I reminded him.

  We sang as we worked and Alex was quickly buried. I took a picture of both of them, then Caleb wanted to join them underground. Caleb had gone from antagonist to jealous of his sister in less time than it took to completely bury Alex.

  “I don’t know... I thought you didn’t think this was fun?”

  “I don’t,” Caleb said, then frowned. “I want to be in the picture.”

  “Ah... that’s it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m beat.” I lay down between the two kids and they giggled. “This is a perfect beach to lay down my blanket and nap.”

  “Noooo,” Alex complained. “I’m down here.”

  “Who said that?” I twisted my head back and forth. “Caleb... did you say that?”

  “Noooo... it’s meeeeee.”

  “Gabby? Alex? Where did they go?”

  Keegan interrupted my stupidity. “I think that’s Mr. Sullivan’s boat.” He shaded his eyes with his sandy hands and squinted.

  “It is!” Caleb yelled. He jumped to his feet and waved his hands. “He’s waving back! He’s waving back!” Caleb jumped up and down. “Mark jumped in the water!”

  Caleb sprinted to the waves. Keegan brushed off his hands and followed.

  “Hey!” Gabby protested. “I’m stuck.”

  “You can get out,” I said. “Use your hands first.”

  She scrunched up her face and tried real hard, then shifted her head to look out over the waves. “Where is he? Are they swimming yet?”

  “Mark is still making his way in. My dad is taking off for the docks... or maybe he’s going fishing by himself.”

  “Help... me... out... of...” Her hand came free, then her arm. Then she slid her entire upper body out of the hole and dug around her legs.

  “Somebody’s sandy,” I said.

  She freed herself and ran for the water, sand falling from her body with every step.

  “Help me,” Alex said. “I’m stuck.”

  “Who said that?”

  “Help meeeeee,” he said. “It’s me, Alex.”

  “Who?”

  He started blubbering.

  “Slow down, buddy. Slow down. You’re fine.”

  He had these big, shining tears threatening to fall down his cheeks.

  I found his hand and freed it. “That’s one hand. Can you lift and get your arm out of here?”

  He lifted and grunted and slowly the sand fell away. I helped him dig away the rest. Then he focused on freeing the other arm. He was still weak and his exertion sounded like sobs.

  “See. You can do it.”

  I pulled his legs out of the sand and gave him a pat on the butt towards the water. “Clean up first.”

  He ran towards the water with uneven, exaggerated strides, which made him look like he was going to faceplant into the waves, but he didn’t. Mark was in waist-high water at that point and clearly visible. The kids were crowded around him and Gabby was apparently trying to do a handstand underwater.

  Alex stopped when the water reached his shins and turned towards me. “Chris! I don’t have my life jacket on.”

  “I know. Wash up.”

  He slowly bent to the water and swished his hands, scared like something was going to jump out of the shallows and bite him. I had to lift him by the armpits and swing him into deeper water, then tell him to scrub his body.

  “I can’t swim,” he reminded me.

  “I know. Mark isn’t that deep. Hold onto me and we’ll go deeper. Just make sure to keep your mouth closed and don’t swallow any water.”

  “Otay.” Alex took my warning to heart and swallowed a deep gulp of air, like he was going to sink on the spot.

  “You’re doing fine.” We got to where the water was up to his chest and he got scared, so I went down to my knees and lifted him onto my body. He gripped around my neck very tightly. “Loosen up a bit, buddy. You aren’t going to drift away.”

  “Otay.”

  If he loosened his grip, I couldn’t tell. We made it out to where Mark and the kids were playing. It was probably three feet deep and with the waves it might have gone up to four feet in some places.

  “Can you feel the ground?” I asked Alex. He shook his head so I told him to stand straight like he was on his tiptoes. “Now we’re going down, down, down.”

  “I can’t do it,” he said when the water came up to his chin. His arms started windmilling and he latched onto me fiercely.

  Mark laughed at us. We took the opportunity to teach Alex how to paddle across the water. He was terrified at first, but once he was able to jump from me to Mark and back again, he got the hang of it. He doggy-paddled away from me and towards Keegan with determination on his face. Keegan knelt and grabbed him.

  Alex’s teeth chattered and he grinned proudly. Then he jumped at Mark and paddled once or twice... but Mark kept backing up and backing up and telling him to go farther and farther. Alex started to sink and Mark held him up.

  “See?” Mark whispered. “You were fine. You did good.”

  Alex clung to him for a minute to catch his breath.

  “Do we have any balls?” Keegan asked.

  “There’s one in my bag.”

  “Caleb, go get the ball and let’s play catch.”

  Mark showed Alex how to go underwater and touch the bottom. Gabby stood in front of them and encouraged Alex to do it. I wasn’t too happy with that development because I saw some water spit up out of his mouth when he resurfaced, but Alex was very proud of his accomplishment, so I guess it was worth it.

  Caleb returned with the ball and a soft, rubber frisbee. We took Alex in closer where he could stand and throw the frisbee, which, surprisingly, he was pretty good at. His aim wasn’t the best, but he had pretty good distance. Alex and Mark threw the little foam ball.

  “Did you bring our baseball stuff?” Mark asked.

  “Your gloves are still in the trunk from earlier. You can go back and get ‘em if you want.”

  “We’ll have to practice catch when we get back to camp.”

  “Yeah,” Alex agreed. His next throw went straight into the water.

  We played like that until we warmed up and our hair dried. Then we packed up our bags and left the beach.

  “What about the sandcastle?” Alex asked as we left.

  “We can check on it tomorrow before we head home,” I said. I held his hand the entire way back to the parking lot. He was acting tired again.

  Mark sat in the back seat, threw Alex’s child seat in the back and held Alex in his arms. We made it back to camp without further incident. We had snacks as we waited for darkness and s’mores. Dad returned around dusk with several fish to clean. Mom and I packed their truck.

  “You can stay,” I told them. “Keegan has another tent. Mark and I can stay in that one and you can sleep on the air mattress.”

  “No.” She wouldn’t cave no matter how hard I tried.

  We loaded the bikes.

  “You can keep the bike,” she offered.

  “Where are we going to put that? He’ll just have to use it when we visit you. How much did it cost, anyway?”

  “It was nothing.”

  The sky darkened and we slipped into sweats to fend off the mosquitoes. Caleb and Gabby were less chatty, but Alex was basically silent. He stared at the fire like a zombie.

  “Do you want a s’more?” Mark asked.

  Alex looked
at the marshmallow on the stick and nodded once. We roasted a marshmallow for him, slapped it on a graham cracker and put a piece of chocolate on top, then I set the sticky mess in his hands.

  “Eat it like a sandwich,” I advised. “Don’t squeeze or the marshmallow will come out the sides.”

  My warnings were a lost cause. He focused intensely on eating the sugary mallow, then licking the melted chocolate. And, of course, the middle leaked around the graham crackers and all over his fingers. He licked some, then wiped the rest on his shirt—Mark must have been teaching him bad habits because he sure as shit didn’t get that from me.

  Then Alex curled up in his canvas folding chair and conked out before the second round of s’mores. I couldn’t eat the milk chocolate and my special graham crackers just weren’t the same as the ones from my childhood, so I ended up slow-roasting a marshmallow for myself until it was perfectly brown and three times the size of a raw mallow. Then I ate it plain, which felt like a crime against my childhood memories. But gluten-free dietary restrictions were a way of life for me. Someday we’d have to make s’mores when Alex was awake and could truly enjoy them.

  That would’ve been a memory to write about, but what I have to re-learn seemingly every few days of my life is that I can’t live for the memories that could be. I have to accept the ones I have in the moment. So what if Alex was a zombie during s’mores? He was still cute.

  “Why don’t you head to bed?” I asked Alex at one point. He shifted in his chair and curled into a tighter ball. It took about five minutes of occasional prodding before he hopped out of the chair and headed towards the tent. I guided the sleepy kid away from the fire ring and was about to show him to the tent when Mark grabbed me and made a motion for me to sit down.

  “He can do it on his own,” Mark murmured for my ears only.

  We watched Alex walk with his little zombie steps up to the screen door, unzip it, sneak inside and leave the flap open.

  “Mosquitoes are going to get in,” I said with irritation.

  “Leave it,” Mark reassured me. Then, after we sat like that for a couple minutes, Mark got up from his chair and lumbered to the tent.

  What da fuck, dude?

  I seethed silently as he snuck into the tent to check on Alex. I could just imagine him helping Alex into his jammies like what I was going to do. I couldn’t take it—I got up and spied on them.