Passing on Childhood
"Sure Mom, you can come over later." Calvin said, running his hands through his brutally short hair.
"I need a new barber..." He said in the back of his mind as he listened to him mom go on about the new cabin that his dad had bought in his retirement, and they were spending a couple weeks out there for the fall.
Calvin smiled. "Just make sure he guts the fish before you eat them." He said, laughing as he remembered their first fishing trip.
After another few minutes, He told his mother he loved her and hung up the phone. He sighed And leaned back on the couch. His red and black shirt was untucked and wrinkled, and as it was summer, he'd traded his blue jeans for white shorts. He wasn't sure why he always got shirts that were red and black. He just liked the color and pattern. He always had.
He checked his watch and looked outside. The leaves of the trees outside were golden and brown as they traveled down to the lawn in a light breeze. He checked his watch again. Almost 2:30. Kathy was on her way home.
He smiled. his daughter was on her way home from Kindergarten, and, as Suzanne was still at work, he always met her at the mailbox when she got home. He walked out into the driveway, enjoying the breeze and the sunshine that was shining that day.
As he reached the mailbox, he noticed a leaf, bright orange, with black strips of fungus. It made him think for a while. He was jolted back to reality as the yellow bus came up the road. He smiled as Kathy got off the bus. She had his blond hair and her mother's eyes and nose.
"Hey sweetheart." He said, picking her up and walking with her to the house. "How was school?"
"Great!" She said. "I learned to count to twenty!"
Calvin smiled. "Really?" He said. "Show me."
She counted to twenty, and missed sixteen. He gave her a high-five.
When they got to the house, he turned on the TV, put her bag over the kitchen chair and got her a cup of cocoa and a peanut butter sandwich. He smiled, sitting on the couch and watched Blues Clues with her, but his mind was elsewhere.
Suzanne came home and Calvin greeted her, asking her about her day and telling her that his parents were coming over.
"Oh, good." She said happily. "We don't see them much anymore." Calven smiled. Suzanne went to change out of her work suit. Susie Derkins. Who would've thought, with all the bickering they'd done when they were little, that they would end up even talking to each other, let alone being married or having a child.
Calvin wanted another one, but it was more to mess with Susie then anything, because she'd get 'the look' on her face and tall him to try squeezing a baby out and see how much he wanted one after that.
Calvin made dinner that night, Manicotta alfredo with broccoli, and smirked as he thought about what his dad would say.
"Making dinner yourself builds character." He said, smiling to himself.
It was a wonderful evening, joking around with his parents, talking about Calvin's work as a cartoonist and Suzanne's job as a lawyer, how dad was doing in his retirement and how mom was keeping herself occupied now without Calvin around.
Kathy kept interrupting to tell everyone what she'd learned in Kindergarten, that she could count to twenty, (She always missed 16) And that she could add three and three, and how Moe the Maintenance guy made them balloon animals when the teachers weren't around.
The end of the evening came, and his mother pulled Calvin aside. "Your dad was going through the attic and found something." She said and led him to the car. Opening the trunk, there was a cardboard box, labeled "Calvin's toys."
Calvin blinked, then smiled a bit as he saw the side of the box. The word 'Transmogrifier' had been crossed out.
"We brought it with because we thought maybe Kathy would like some of your old toys." His Mom said. Calvin smiled.
"Thanks Mom he said, picking up the surprisingly heavy box and carrying it into the house, where it sat on a stool until the evening was over, Kathy had gone to bed, and his parents had said goodnight and driven off.
He let out a sigh as he and Suzanne sat on the couch together. "It was nice having them over." She said and he smiled. "Yeah, it was." He said. He remembered the box. "Oh yeah." He said, and went to get it, and set it in front of them on the floor.
"Mom gave me this." He said. Suzanne smiled. "Kathy can use some of them." She said.
He chuckled. "That's what mom said." He said to her, sitting with the box between his legs and used a car key to cut the tape. He opened it up and instantly laughed. There on the top was his old safari hat and plastic machete.
He picked them up. The hat was too small and the machete looked more like a dagger now. A fond memory of Safari Al hunting gorillas in Africa flashed through his mind. Suzanne laughed and took the hat off his head. "You look too much like a doofus without the hat hun."
He stuck his tongue out teasingly, before he pulled out a bundle of cloth.
After a moment of straigtening out, he realized that it was a cape And mask. He smiled and put the cape on his shoulders, which looked like he was wearing a backwards bib. "I can see the headlines. 'Stupendous man reverses time: It's Saturday again." He joked and set the cape down. Suzanne smacked the back of his head.
He dug into the box again and came up with a plasic water gun with tin foil around it andan old junior baseball bat. "Remember the time I pretended I was spaceman Spiff and shot you with a paperclip in class?" He asked, leveling the water gun at her.
She raised an eyebrow. "Yes, and I also remember the time you mooned the class with your rocket ship underpants."
Calvin turned red and reached in and picked up a small fedora hat and a trench coat. He smiled, remembering Tracer Bullet as he solved crimes, or in his case, trickiest mystery called math class.
"Calvin..." Suzane said, looking into the box. Calvin, seeing her quiet expression looked into the box and saw what was beneath the hat and coat. There, among his faded tinker toys and a couple children's books was a small battered stuffed tiger.
Calvin couldn't help but stare for a moment. "Hobbes..." He said quietly. Slowly, as if scared he was going to disintegrate, he picked up the stuffed tiger. He was smaller then he remembered.
His eyes got moist as he remembered when Hobbes had disappeared. He'd woken up one morning to find Hobbes gone. He'd run around the house looking and even outside. When he'd asked his parents, they'd looked sad and told him Hobbes had left that morning to go find other tigers, and to say that he said he'd miss him.
Calvin didn't stop crying for days, and kept searching for a way to find Hobbes. As time went on however, he slowly, unrealized even to himself, gave up on Hobbes., and he floated intothe back of his mind as he grew older.
And now, here he was, as if he'd been there yesterday. He smiled at Hobbes, and Hobbes seemed to smile back. Suzanne smiled at him. "I guess he was always there."
Calvin smiled. "I guess so." He said. He put everything back in the box, but he carefully set Hobbes on the couch before he and Suzanne went to bed.
Calvin and Suzanne were woken up as Kathy let out a scream. The night terrors were back. "Your turn..." Suzanne said and Calvin got groggily to his feet.
He went into Kathy's room and comforted her as she cried. "It's okay, there aren't any monsters." He said, hugging her close.
She looked at him. "There are, they live under the bed!" She said, hanging onto him. No amount of comforting could console her, even after half an hour.
Calvin was starting to get tired, but he couldn't leave her. If only there was some way to make her feel safe and still be able to go back to his own bed...
He grinned. "Kathy, I need to go get something. I'll be right back."
"Promise?" she asked.
"Promise." He said and walked to the living room. Hobbes was still sitting there. He picked him up and carried him back to Kathy's room. "I have someone." He said, sitting on the bed.
"He'll keep you safe." He said and handed Hobbes to her. "This is Hobbes. He was my best friend when I was your age. He's smart, he'll always listen, he's good at math and monsters are scared of him." He said.
He kissed her head. "Sleep with him close and monsters will never come near you again." She smiled at him. "I like him." She said.
Calvin smiled at her. "I'm going to bed now. Hobbes," He said, addressing the tiger. "Keep her safe, Like you did for me."
Kathy smiled and flopped back on the bed, hugging Hobbes close to her. Calvin tucked her in and walked to the door.
As he was closing it, he paused and looked back. Hobbes was smiling at him. He smiled back. He'd just passed on his childhood to his daughter, and maybe, just maybe with her, Hobbes would come to life again through her eyes.
And maybe,
Just maybe,
She could teach him to see again.
I just couldn't help it. I always imagined what would happen in this scenario. PLEASE REVIEW! :)