✧𝙽𝚘𝚊𝚑✧
Kiara has this really bad habit. I don't know how to help her fix it or how to even encourage her to, but it's gotta be fixed one way or another.
What's her terrible habit? Well. It's nothing huge. It's just the way she leaves before I have a chance to fucking wake up.
At least she left a note this time. That's something, right? I mean, it's progress. Plus, it's not like she's gone forever. I'll see her again soon this time.
She still leaves me alone in her apartment though. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little hurt by it. It's not even like I slept in this morning—it's eight forty-five. Even still, the place feels like it's been empty for hours.
She had time to shower though. That much is clear when I walk into the bathroom to see a familiar pair of blue panties on the floor along with my t-shirt that she must've swiped from the bedroom floor before she went off to start her day. Also had time to make breakfast. A small plate of waffles sits out on the counter, covered with a sheet of foil to preserve its warmth. That's where I find her note.
She casually declares she has some errands to run today—doesn't specifically say what kind. But she does say that sometime in the afternoon she wants to see if Aaliyah wants to get her nails done with her and maybe get herself a haircut. She asks me to pick Cam up from her mom's, and tells me I can either take him to mine or back here. She just wants me to text her and tell her where I'm taking him once I decide.
So, basically, she left early this morning and I probably won't see her until around dinner time, maybe. Great.
I decide I'm going to take Cameron here out of spite. That way she has to interact with me a little more since Cameron never wants me to go when I'm over here. He never wants to leave when he's at my place either, but we have an easier time coaxing him away when we remind him about all his stuff back at his mom's.
That reminds me though. I've been meaning to fix the guest room in my apartment specifically for him. It'll have to be done sooner or later, so why not today? It'll help that he'll be with me too. He can pick up what he wants in his room, and when we're done we can come back here to wait for his mom.
Okay...So, this kind of works out great then. Still hurt she decided to leave before I woke up though.
__________
I've been out with my kid before. Out with a kid too. Usually, it's a pretty easy thing. Just take their hand and don't let go of it under any circumstances, are you're golden.
This system worked with all of my cousins, my sister, and a friend's kids. I thought it worked fine with my kid, but no. He decided he just had to be different than all of the other kids.
I lost him. I don't know how. Honestly, I don't even want to talk about it. I just want to find him so I can throw him over my shoulder and keep him there for the rest of our trip.
"Cameron!" I call out loudly, uncaring of the other people in the store. It's not big. There's no way he went far. "Cameron Stone! Come on, man. Not funny." I glance into each aisle, ignoring the looks of disapproval I get from other parents.
His mom will kill me when he inevitably snitches on me.
I mean, it's gonna happen. Whether he means to or not. the kid is going to tell on me to his mom. And then she's going to get pissed at me and declare that she's absolutely never ever going out with me since I can't take up the simple task that she gave me today.
Literally all I had to do was watch him. I somehow failed at that. Even though I do it almost all the time, I failed this time around.
I look through a few different aisles and while walking into one, I see just briefly a little kid running around the corner and into another. On instinct, I backtrack and pounce into the previous aisle just in time to get in the way of said kid that's bolting down the aisle and to a different one.
He knocks into me pretty hard. I reach out quick to catch him before he can fall backwards. It's too late though. The damage is irreparably done.
Good news and bad news!
Good news is the kid turns out to be mine. Bad news? I'm so completely awesome that I'm practically a brick wall compared to my poor kid. The same poor kid that just sprinted full speed into me. And although he doesn't fall backwards or smacks his head on the tile, other damage is done to him. It doesn't take me long to realize his mom will definitely kill me when she finds out.
First and foremost, he starts crying and reaching for his nose. It's a little red, but upon further inspection, I find it's not broken and/or bleeding. "Walk it off, buddy. You're all right." I encourage him at first. But then I realize there is blood. Just not where I thought. "Oh, shit." I whisper as I lower myself to my knees to get a better look.
"I'm bleeding!" Cameron stares at his palm with smudges of wet blood on it with wide, horrified eyes. I visibly see him stop breathing when he shuts his mouth. He opens it back up again after a second and spits in his palm, completely careless about how gross that kinda is. Mostly because it's not just blood in his palm anymore.
"Ah, fuck."
Cameron opens his mouth up wide, giving me a good view of the empty space now in the very front of his mouth. Of course, it had to be his front tooth. The hardest place to hide from his mom. Not that we're not going to tell her, but it'd be nice if we can slowly ease her into the fact that our kid's front tooth is now empty.
He whines a little as he explores that new empty space with his tongue. I grimace a little bit. "All right, relax. Just a lost tooth—We're okay." I look down at the tooth in his palm. I don't even know where to go from here while we're in the store. I think we're going to have to abandon the things we were going to buy from here and cut our trip short to head back home.
He's still whining, but his crying is starting to relax while the horror sets in. It distracts him enough to stop the tears. "Daddy, my tooth is gone." He sounds panicked, as if he never thought this could ever happen to him.
"Aw, come on. You've lost a tooth before, right?"
"No!"
"Oh." I awkwardly whisper. The situation gets a little bit worse at that. "Uh," I take a breath. "Well, it's fine. A new one will grow in, in a little while, and it'll be like it never happened." I assure with a smile as I reach out to nudge his shoulder. He's still frowning down at his palm.
"...What do I do with it?"
"Well, you know the tooth fairy, right?" God, I hope Kiara's cool with giving him the whimsical story of the tooth fairy. I mean, she let him believe in Santa. It should be fine.
He slowly nods. "Yeah."
"So, we're going to put it under your pillow tonight, and it'll be fine." I don't remember this concept being so creepy.
"But what about right now?" He sniffles a little. "I'm bleeding."
"Uh," I squint at his palm. "Maybe we can..." I trial off as I start getting up from the ground. "Okay, let's go find someone..." I reach for his non-bloody hand to keep him with me while I go find someone that works here. It doesn't take me long to find a lady who's dressed like she works here. "Excuse me," I call.
She pauses and smiles at me. "Hi, how can I help you?" She politely asks. Her bright expression almost dies when he looks down at my son with blood on his lips and on his hand. "Oh, my God."
"Oh, he's fine." I awkwardly assure. Her eyes dart back to me, eyes a little wide and nose scrunched. "We just, uh, need...I don't know. A little baggie or something." I glance down at him. He shrugs.
She stares. "I...Can get one." She slowly looks down to him. "Are you okay?" She whispers, mostly to him. I sigh at that.
"My tooth is gone!" Cameron shouts dramatically, staring up at her like she's insane for asking. "No!"
"Cam," I squeeze his hand briefly, struggling a little not to at least chuckle at that.
"Oh," She finally seems to understand the horror scene in front of her. "Okay, well, follow me. I can grab one for it." She starts smiling again and turns to walk away. I guide Cameron along with me while I follow him. "So, are you excited for the tooth fairy?" She asks with a glance over her shoulder at Cameron.
He shrugs. "I guess." He decides. He glances down at his palm, clearly uncomfortable with it. He looks up at me like I'm going to help him, but I scrunch my nose. He mocks the action, and interestingly, he looks a lot like his mom when he does.
Kiara likes to say he looks like me. She says his eyes, his hair, and even sometimes the way he just is all is like me. I'm not saying I don't see the similarities too, but I think she sees more than I do. Maybe it's easier for us to find each other in him than it is ourselves though. For me, it's easier to find a lot of her in his expressions and the way he talks. A lot has to do with the natural things a kid picks up from their parents after being around them for so long.
Like his mom, he likes making this face at me all the goddamn time. Which means I get stared at like I'm stupid twice as much.
I like it.
Once we're handed the little Ziplock from the front counter where we would've paid, I open it up and hold it out to Cameron. He pauses and frowns up at me. I scoff. "Hell no. That's your tooth. I'm not touching that shit." I shake the little bag at him to get him to just drop the thing in there.
He makes that damn face at me. He drops it in on his own though, and I zip it up. He frowns again when I try to hand it over. I raise a brow, reminding him silently that it's his. I sure as hell don't want anything to do with it.
"All right." I mutter as he awkwardly holds his little bag. "Thank you." I look at the girl who gave it to us. She also grabs a little wet wipe from behind the counter to give to Cameron. I help him with that one, wiping his hand then his mouth where a bit of blood is smeared on his lip. He's just going to have to deal with the taste of blood in his mouth for a minute. He doesn't look totally bothered by that one though. "Are you up for buying the stuff or are you ready?"
He makes a face at his little plastic bag then looks up at me. "I wanna go." He mutters uncomfortably. I chuckle at that and look at the girl for one more nod of appreciation. She smiles at us, so I reach for Cameron's hand that wasn't just bloody to start walking with him out of the store.
"Well, we still have other stuff. It's a start." I reason on a shrug, mostly to myself. He can continue adding things when he's ready. We also need to figure out his clothes. I don't want him bringing his little backpack every time.
"Mom's gonna be mad."
I cautiously look both ways before crossing the distance connecting the store to the parking lot like a good dad before I look down at him to see what he's talking about. He starts down at the bag in his hand. "No, she won't." I lie right to him. She won't be mad at him, at least. Maybe at me because I'm sort of the one who made him lose it in the first place.
I'm sure it was loose already—there's no way it wasn't—but still. It was a harsh way to lose a tooth. Especially his first one.
Cameron looks up at me with a frown that makes it look like he pities me for thinking otherwise. I roll my eyes with a smile. "Okay, come on. Seriously, she won't be that mad." I reason, this time honest. She'll probably send me a narrowed eyed look when Cameron tells her how it happened, but other than that, that'll probably be it.
He sighs. "Can I still eat?" He asks, still absently exploring that new feeling on his own.
I laugh. "It'll feel weird at first, but you'll be fine, Nut. Promise." How long has it been since I've called him that? I wonder if he's noticed. Or if the last time was as long ago as I think it was.
"Does that mean we can get ice cream?"
I send him an apologetic look. "Sorry, not today." I hum. He's already beginning to frown deeply. "Mom said no ice cream today."
He huffs when we stop in front of my car. With my freehand, I reach into my pocket for my keys attached to the little remote. "Why not?" He asks on a whine.
"Because she said." I simply answer as I lead him over to the backseat door, opening it up and letting his hand go. He sighs sharply at that and starts climbing on into his own car seat. "Without the attitude, Nut." I remind on a hum. He purses his lips in a pout as he roughly drops into his seat. I grab the seatbelt and reach over him to buckle him up even though he could easily do it himself.
"I thought I was ungrounded." He crosses his arms over his chest to pout some more.
I pause at that. Sigh and lift my hand to rest absently on the inside of the car door, the other resting on the outline of the doorway. "Cam, you are...but you're still not really out of the woods." I point out. "They said you're having problems at school still. What's up with that?"
He starts frowning more genuinely now. "Nothing." He mumbles, cagey about the question. He now looks like he just wants me to go away.
I hesitate to do so, unsure of what I'm supposed to do. Kiara never seems to know either. "Maybe..." I look away from him, kind of annoyed with myself that I don't know how to help my son. "Maybe you should, um, talk to Kinsley about that." I mutter.
Kinsley as in his therapist. He saw her for the first time about a week or so ago, and Kiara and I still don't know how it went. We asked, of course, but he didn't really say much other than they played Jenga and got to know each other. We didn't want to push for much more than that, not wanting to invade on the space Kinsley is probably trying to put together for them.
He doesn't answer me, keeping his eyes down on the little bag in his lap. He lines the seal absently with his fingers over and over, keeping himself busy like that. I let out a breath while I wait for a response that isn't coming. "Okay," I whisper with a little nod. Even that doesn't get his attention. I think he's just waiting for me to get the hell out of his face about it.
I don't know what I'm supposed to do about it though. Am I supposed to get out of his face and let it all run its course? Is it bad of me to even suggest things for him to talk about with her? I mean, what the hell am I supposed to do about all of this? There's nothing I can do to change the fact that it's already happened to him, so now I have to figure out how I'm supposed to handle the consequences. It's admittedly, a little exhausting.
I reach over to brush some brown wavy strands of hair off his forehead. That gets him to look over at me. "I love you." I tell him the only thing I can really think to say. I have no great fatherly advice. Nothing helpful to assure him with other than the fact that I still love him. He might not understand the importance of it yet, but he will one day. I hope it'll be enough. It would've been enough for me, I know that.
"Love you." He mumbles in response. At that, I reluctantly take my hand off him and step back from the door so I can shut it. I take an extra moment just for myself before I have the courage to walk around to the driver's side and take him back to mine.
__________
Kiara has this really bad habit. I said this already, but I'd just like to circle back on it for a second.
She has this really. Bad. Habit.
I'm calling it her avoidance maneuver. She likes to avoid just about everything unless it absolutely requires her attention. For example, the wellbeing of our son. The wellbeing of her mother. Keeping up with her friendship with her best friend. All things that require her attention pretty often just so no one feels neglected—it's how she operates.
I am not one of these things.
She knows I'm a grown man who can take care of myself. Knows that at the end of the day, no matter what, I will always still be right here. There is nothing about me that she needs to keep up with. Nothing that doesn't involve our son, at least. But even then, it's not about me. It's about him.
I get it. Our son is our son, and we will both drop whatever we're doing because nothing is more important than him. Her mom is her mom, and she's getting older. She needs her daughter. Her best friend is her best friend, someone who's always going to be a shoulder to cry on—always in her corner as Kiara is in hers. It's important to have friendships and keep up with them. Maintenance, I guess.
While I understand it and respect it...I mean—Damnit. It'd just be real fucking nice if I was someone's priority. Just once. Just once I want someone to willingly drop what they're doing and just talk to me the way I would with them. And I know I've fucked up countless times and have lost that privilege to be a somebody to someone, but I'm starting to get tired.
I'm starting to wonder if it might just be in my head too. Maybe there are people who will drop whatever they're doing for me and I'm just being an ass and ignoring it. Maybe I can't see it—I don't know. I wish I could. Really fucking wish I could.
For now though, I try not to think about the fact that Kiara hasn't really bothered to look at me yet. She's been home for thirty minutes now—We're about ready to start putting out dinner plates. She still hasn't looked my way. She said hello, but it was passive. One of those things you just say because that's what you're supposed to.
Rightfully so though, her attention hasn't left Cameron. I can't be mad about that—How pathetic would it be to be mad at that?
She's a little busy assuring him he won't be missing a tooth for the rest of his life. It happens. It's late, even. She tells him about the tooth fairy better than I did, mentioning the money this time. She, surprisingly, laughs when he tells her he ran into me and started bleeding. He leaves out the part where he'd been missing for a good five minutes before then.
When she excuses him to go wash up, I think this is it. She's going to talk quietly with me about what we both know we need to talk about. She'll do it reluctantly, but this is one of those musts I was talking about. I think it's worth at least five minutes of her attention.
Kiara doesn't seem to agree with that. She sends me a quick, genuine smile...but that's it. I feel my shoulders sink a little when she walks around me to go to the kitchen. Probably to have plates ready for when Cam comes back.
I have to remind myself that she just does this. It's her instinct to avoid something that she doesn't want to do and isn't actively breaking down right before her eyes. She does the same thing with stuff at work or whatever else she doesn't want to deal with at the moment. The situation between us—if you could even call it that—isn't something that's in dire need of her attention. So, she avoids it. Ergo, avoiding me.
I follow her to the kitchen and stand in the doorway to watch her. I catch sight of her newly done up nails. They're red—Burgendy. Not really that long and pointed at the end. It suits her, I think. And her hair looks good. She did go ahead with the haircut she mentioned maybe getting in her note. It's just a trim though, now just a few inches shorter and nearly to her waist, the bottom of it now a straighter line than it had been. I like it.
I want to tell her as much, but I'm afraid of the awkward look she's going to give me before she forces a little smile and a laugh as she thanks me in a tone that suggests she isn't sure if I'm messing with her or if I mean it.
I end up being useless to her. She puts Cameron's plate together as well as her own. She hums something about me being a big boy and making my own plate. Sounds playful.
"Actually," I call before she can walk past me with the two plates in her hands. She pauses to look up at me. "I have to get going."
She doesn't bother masking her surprise. "You do?"
"Yeah." I shrug. I feel myself absently start tracing the L-shape line between my thumb and pointer with my other hand.
"For what?"
I frown. "What?"
She turns to put the two plates in her hands down on the counter then looks back at me, bracing one hand on the counter and the other on her hip. "What're you so busy with?" She clarifies.
I don't know why I wasn't expecting her to ask. I figured she might frown or something because that's kind of just how she is, but I wasn't expecting a question. In such a stern tone too, like she's fully aware I have absolutely nothing to do.
"I just..." I shrug again. "I have something to do, Kiara."
"Yeah? What is it?" She challenges knowingly. I open my mouth, but nothing comes out. She continues. "I know it's not with Aaliyah—I was with her all day and she never mentioned having something to do with you. And you hate being around your parents—so." She shrugs that one off. "What do you have to do at six o'clock in the evening, Noah?"
She's kinda got me. She'll know any excuse I try to throw out is bullshit, so what's the point? I choose to keep quiet. Pleading the fifth, and all.
"Mm." She accepts my silence with a tipped-up chin and a raised brow. She looks away for a moment just to pick up the two plates. "Make your plate, Noah." She dismisses simply as she continues on out of the kitchen.
I sigh quietly as I glance over at the stove where Cameron's favorite sits. Without any other choice, I go over to grab a plate. I grab a Capri-Sun from the fridge before I go join them at the table.