"In Navajo, dideests' iit means I will hear about it. The word implies a responsibility on the part of the person who is listening to listen. To listen is not a passive behavior; those who are listening must be open to hearing things they might not particularly want to hear."
--Nasdijj
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.
.
"I don't want him to go to that doctor again," Yami was saying.
Judging by his tone and posture, Solomon deducted that he was royally put off. "Doctor Johnson has been our family doctor for years—ever since Yugi was very young," he explained slowly, trying his best to still the other man's wrath. "I trust him with my health and with the health of my family, and he's never once steered us wrong."
"You weren't there, Solomon," Yami objected, his efforts to keep his voice down for the sake of his sleeping son thwarted by his strong sense of having been betrayed. "You didn't see his face—he was terrified. He will not be able to handle that again."
"—And I sincerely hope it doesn't have to happen again," the elder Mutou agreed, ignoring a most exasperated rolling of Yami's eyes. "Listen. I don't pretend to know everything about medicine. That's why I trust Doctor Johnson's opinion. He needed to do what he did today—and we learned some good news, too. The lacerations are shallow enough that they should heal on their own quite easily. Don't you understand that we had to know? Yugi could have been bleeding to death and we would never have been the wiser. I need you to trust me. This family can't work if you don't trust me."
Yami exhaled sharply, brow tense, stubborn and angry. "No. I need to make decisions for him. If I am to be his father, I have to make the decisions. This family can't work if you constantly take the power away from me."
The older man sighed, shook his head. "I understand what you mean," he explained, "but I'm sorry—I will have the deciding vote in some things. I pay the medical expenses, so I will have autonomy in choosing treatments and medications and such. I know you don't like it, but you'll have to learn to accept that."
Yami looked away, a moment in which he slowly digested these things. "Forgive me, Solomon," he said at last, his eyes downcast in shame. "You are right. I am only angry, for the most part, at the injustice of it all. Yugi shouldn't have to endure any of this." Their eyes met. "It's just not right."
The other man shifted his weight, his expression softening, understanding overcoming him and turning his irritation into empathy. "Yami, my boy," he began, choosing words carefully as he spoke, "misfortune knocks at everyman's door. What makes a person either content or dissatisfied with his life is how he deals with whatever misfortune befalls him. Many things happen to us in our lives—things we cannot change, things we have no control over—and we can either become angry at these things and resolve to shut out the world henceforth, or we can accept them and what lessons they deem to teach us."
Solomon went on with utmost seriousness, some painful memory having returned to him suddenly in those wizened old eyes. "I could be bitter today, but I decided a long time ago that I was going to be the kind of person who accepts misfortune as another part of life and who anticipates growth from suffering." Something unfamiliar came into his voice, something awful, something Yami had never wanted to hear. "It could have been so easy to shut out the world as I watched my beloved wife…slowly lose her fight with cancer. I could have been so bitter, when I lived to see the end of my son's days. My son, whom I loved so dearly."
The old man faltered, emotion strong in his trembling voice. "But I promised myself I wouldn't be embittered against the world because I had no control over it, even when I buried my daughter-in-law and adopted her orphan. Even now as I face infirmity and incontinence, and all the uncomfortable conditions that accompany old age. Even now as I watch my sweet grandson suffer. I will not become angry with the doctors, or the nursing homes in my future, or politicians who take away my Medicare benefits or any of the sort.
"I love my family. I love them too much to be bitter. I will not do it. The memories I have of my beautiful wife, my brilliant son, and my loving daughter-in-law remind me of all I have to live for, and all the ways I am blessed. I am healthy. I am alive. I still have one very special grandchild, and even thought he's been through hell and he hurts all the time, he's alive. He can still smile and love and—he's alive. I am so blessed, Yami. Who am I to say my perfect life isn't fair? I would not even think it."
Struck by the other man's humility in the face of obvious loss and suffering, Yami paid respect with his silence, the inadequate apology of I didn't know mutually understood between them now.
"I don't want to be presumptuous enough," Solomon continued with haste, "to say I am wiser than you. I am not foolish—I realize how old you are. But please understand that I have seen enough hardship to know that this is only a devastation as long as we believe it is. I have seen Yugi overcome many struggles in his life, and I know that this too will pass. Do you trust me?"
Yami swallowed the pang of guilt he felt at having been so thoughtless. "Please forgive my doubt," he said at last. "Of course I trust you."
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Yami assumed that, with the rough day he'd just been through, Yugi would sleep soundly that night and have no need to seek out his father's comforting presence, so it came as quite a surprise when he heard familiar footfalls in the hallway outside his door. He sighed, preparing to toss aside the warmth of his covers long enough to let Yugi climb into his arms, but after several long moments without sign of his door opening or his son pleading entrance, Yami grew puzzled.
Yugi was moving out there, he could tell, but there was hesitation, and shuffling there in the dark, and the footsteps went away and back to his room. Now something had to be amiss, and Yami knew he wouldn't sleep until he saw it to rights, so he left his bed and sought out his son in his room. The place was dark as the night was dark, and it smelled like urine. Yugi had wet the bed.
Yami's eyes adjusted to the dimness, and he saw the boy bent over the mattress, towel in his hands and trying to soak up the wetness in the sheets, but it was to no avail. He was crying because he was broken—he didn't know why he was broken, but he was hard at work trying to fix himself, but it wasn't working—nothing seemed to work, and it only frustrated him and made him ashamed of himself, that he was so helpless he'd peed in his own bed.
For a long moment, Yami only watched him, pained, beside himself with sympathy. When his boy finally saw him there in the doorway, he stopped cold in his efforts and hung his head, crying harder in shame. "I'm sorryyyyy," he wailed, the ammonia smell all over him and so tired. It struck Yami awkwardly that Yugi had just apologized for something—he assumed the bedwetting—but it wasn't his fault, and he didn't know why the boy would apologize for something that wasn't his fault. Guilt could be such a fickle thing in as confused a mind as Yugi's.
Yami had seen him through so much already—held his hands through the hemorrhaging and the nightmares—he had seen the boy more than naked—torn, and helpless—and this was just a very small thing in comparison. Yami wasn't fazed in the slightest, and his heart was suddenly overwhelmed and he found rather absently that he'd crossed the room and was kneeling down to his son.
"Honey," he said, but the rest stuck in his mouth and he forgot what he'd wanted to say, and everything left him but, my sweet Yugi, I wish you didn't have to be so sad.
"Please don't be mad at me," Yugi wept, his voice small there in the darkness and the night.
It took a moment for Yami to assimilate what the boy had suggested—that he would be mad at Yugi for something that was beyond his control. Yami was mad. He was furious, but not at his son. And not about this.
Realizing that his silence was no doubt adding to Yugi's insecurity, Yami took him sternly in his arms and pulled him into a tight hug. Afraid only at first, the boy relaxed against his father's frame and hugged back, burying his face in Yami's shirt.
"No," Yami replied firmly, "I am not mad at you. I know it was an accident. It was not your fault. I am not mad at you. I am not mad at you," he kept saying, gently, surely, whispering into Yugi's hair and holding him close through the tears.
.
Yugi was very quiet the next day.
Nothing was said of his bedwetting, and not much was said at all. Yami was still in his own ways trying to atone for what he'd put the boy through, so he rather spoiled Yugi with his favorite games and activities.
They watched the first season of some comedy show Joey lent them—a futuristic cartoon with outlandish characters and simple (at times crude) humor. Normally, Yami would have protested the show's more-often-than-desirable swearing and promiscuous content, but he felt he was in no position to restrict his son from a bit of mindless television. He was still making amends, after all.
It became a routine—Yami sitting on the living room floor with Yugi's head in his lap—that whenever some sexual innuendo paraded across the screen, Yami would cover the boy's eyes until it had passed. Yugi made no objection, and Yami had the distinct suspicion that his mind was wandering—not entirely focused on the show. It was just as well.
Those several long hours were good. They were restful, and quiet with Yugi laying across the floor, eyes moving with the action on-screen, his father's hand smoothing lazy circles on his stomach, peaceful and content—the feeling of being full and silent and lulled to sleep by the soft rubbing of your skin.
At a glance, Yami was surprised to discover that Yugi was having an erection. He wasn't entirely embarrassed by it—no matter what the boy wanted to believe, he was fifteen—everything is sex when you're fifteen. He was most likely unaware of it in the first place. Even so…
Yami withdrew his hand.
He could acknowledge facts, but he would not encourage fantasizing while your father's hand is still resting on your stomach. But then…he wasn't the boy's father.
Yami decided to push it from his mind and not think on it again.
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"He drew on the wall," Kei was repeating, more for his own thoughts than for clarification.
"Yes," Yami affirmed, visibly perplexed. It was a good change to speak to the man face to face rather than over the phone.
"What did he draw?"
"A dog."
The other man hesitated. "What color?" he asked.
"Blue." Yami failed to see the significance.
"Hmm." Kei was tapping a pencil on a pad of paper. "And where exactly was this wall in the vicinity of the house?"
Yami stared at him. "The hallway outside of his bedroom."
Kei nodded solemnly, as if he'd reached a very profound revelation. "Well," he said, "this could easily mean one of two things. You see, the dog could either symbolize loyalty, friendship, affection—which explains why he would place it in plain view. He wanted you to recognize it. It wasn't a drawing just for himself—it was for his family."
Yami blinked.
"Or," the psychologist continued, "the dog could symbolize the trickster, and all slyness and disobedience, ergo he places it in an area of the house where he knows you are bound to see it. A sign of rebellion. Maybe he wants attention. Anyway, blue is a rather neutral color, so it's difficult to say."
"It just alarmed me that he would so openly vandalize a—"
"—I wouldn't call it vandalism. A drawing is merely a creative outlet used to express an emotion or an idea."
Yami's expression became unreadable. "Yugi knows well enough to not deface something in the house. It's no different than him walking into his grandfather's room and coloring all over the dresser."
Kei nodded. "It's true, usually instinctive morals inhibit children from doing things that are obviously wrong. But Yugi is no ordinary child. He is reaching out." They were both silent for a moment. "What did you do when you found the drawing?"
"I told him it was bad to draw on the walls, that he has coloring books and sketch paper to draw on instead, and I made him clean the wall," Yami replied. "I briefly entertained the idea of giving him a spanking."
Kei's response was immediate. "No. There's no need for that. Spankings are the most archaic means of disciplining a child, and Yugi's been through enough abuse. He doesn't need his father striking him as well."
Yami looked stunned. "I thought all parents gave their children spankings. It's not abuse."
Kei sighed sharply. "No, no, no. Yugi is reaching out to you. He needs you to acknowledge him, not beat him."
"—I never said I would beat him," Yami snapped, put off by the man's crude phraseology.
"I realize that, Mr. Yami, but you have to understand that the spanking is a terribly outdated, and even a dangerous tool for punishing one's children."
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"He said that?" Solomon was incredulous.
"Yes," Yami agreed, sensing the man's shared frustration. "He told me that it is a scientifically proven fact that children who are spanked by their parents are more likely to commit crimes as adults, because of negligent and cruel upbringings."
The older man laughed out loud. "Nonsense. I'll bet you anything, Yami, that this Doctor Kei what's-his-face has never raised children of his own, or if he has, they have become insolent, disobedient brats."
"I only assume as much," he replied.
"You know, it's new age hodge-podge like this that churns out teen pregnancy and high-school shooters. Children need to be disciplined, and men like this psychologist were never punished by their flower child, hippie parents and grew up thinking they could do whatever they wanted without consequence. It's why things like drug traffic and child pornography and the abortion rate are rising. We live in a society without backbone or moral standards and it disgusts me."
Solomon paused for breath, bewildered amusement in his features. "I've been raising children, and a grandson, for the better part of my life. My son received his share of spankings when he was a child, my daughter was better behaved, but not perfect. And you best believe Yugi had plenty of spankings when he was younger, too—and many of them delivered by yours truly. He survived them all and he's a wonderful kid."
Yami smiled. "You raise wonderful children."
"I had help," Solomon retorted playfully and sighed. "No, the spanking is the only real physical—and usually the last—form of punishment that exists. Not a real hard whack or anything to leave a bruise—and I never used a belt—but a firm swat to let him know who's boss of the house, and what he's done is bad and he's not going to get away with it. Without that, it's empty threats. None of this taking privileges away, like TV, or the phone, or the internet, but real time out from play and entertainment to explain to him why he's been punished and what you expect from him in the future, and I guarantee he will have higher respect for you, because he knows who makes the rules, and he knows he can feel safe in that authority. If children realize they are more powerful than their parents, their world crashes down because their rearing is up to them, and they are truly alone." He took a breath.
"You're incredible, Solomon."
They regarded each other, smiling, for a moment. "Well I suppose," the older man chuckled, and sighed again. "You've set the rule down for him, and if he ever breaks it again, you have the authority to punish him. Don't be swayed by this Freudian crap. Your son's discipline is up to you, as his father, and you have an obligation to him to keep him in line when he acts out. I know you'll do fine."
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It was afternoon, and Yami was folding the laundry. He'd been half-expecting it the last few days when Solomon finally confronted him mid-towel.
"You might want to see Yugi's latest work," he said, "under his desk." He had, that afternoon, been picking up toys in the boy's room, an activity Yami wished to discourage, but with which Solomon insisted helping. Helping, meaning he would pick up toys while Yugi escaped to watch television.
Yami left his chore and found the new drawing, a stick figure and rocket ship and swords. Completely meaningless scribbles meant only to rebel. Yami guessed Kei would explain it stood for something obscure and ludicrous—that it signified Yugi's dream of conquering space or some such drivel.
He'd had enough.
"Yugi," he said sternly, softly, and only once as soon as he reached the living room. The boy knew the tone was serious, and he turned to meet his father's eyes. Something there told him what was coming next.
"Yes, daddy?"
"Come with me."
He obeyed instantly, head down as if awaiting his sentence.
"What is this," Yami asked when they were in his room and in front of the drawing, which was plain to see now that he'd moved the desk aside.
Yugi's eyes fell, and he didn't answer.
"I asked you a question," Yami demanded.
Down the hall, Solomon listened with rapt attention, but again, there came no reply.
"Yugi, I told you not to color on the wall. I asked you if you understood me, and you said 'yes'. Now you disobey me, and you do not answer my question," he illustrated carefully, with deliberate slowness, so that his son would hear every word as clearly as the last. "Why did you disobey me, Yugi?"
The boy swallowed, looked up from under his tense brow, his lips pursed.
A chill of unfamiliarity ran down Yami's spine as he realized Yugi was glaring at him. "Take the look off your face," he instructed, his tone suddenly lower than before.
Yugi's chest heaved, his posture ripe with defiance. "No," he growled, and made a move to bolt for the door.
Yami was stung with disbelief for a moment, but it was no moment long enough to let Yugi from his sight, and with impossible speed, he cut the boy off and grabbed him firmly by the shoulders. "You will not run from me when I am speaking to you," he said, and the fear flashed in Yugi's eyes. "For your disobedience, and your rudeness to me, you are going to get a spanking."
The words left his mouth before he had time to think of what they meant—he was about to spank Yugi, a thing he never really thought he'd have need to do—and here he was, bending a struggling boy over his knee, and suddenly a voice whispered doubt in the back of his mind, you are no better than that man.
That man, meaning the man.
Yami ignored it—he'd already said the words, and if he went back on them now, he'd be a liar. Empty threats.
I love you, Yugi. I do this because I love you.
He swallowed—hard—and shut his eyes tight as his hand came down across Yugi's backside. And in that moment, the struggling, and the squealing, and all of the protesting ceased, and silence rushed in to fill the space left by the sound of Yami's hand against the boy's buttocks.
"Now," Yami said finally, quietly, "I want you to stay here in your room and think about why I had to punish you." He then stood and disentangled himself from his son, who yielded to his efforts and lay there on the floor, and the sobs came to him in the trembling, and the knot in his throat, and Yami closed the door as he left.
Yami's knees were giving way, and he only hoped he made no sound as wetness began flowing down his cheeks in tears he hadn't known were there. The floor of the hallway met him when he lowered himself to regain his steadiness. The voice was echoing the same doubts, and he held desperately to the idea that he was helping Yugi, not hurting him—not inflicting pain in him without purpose and leaving him to cry on the floor like him. Him, meaning the man.
His eyes slammed shut again.
I did the right thing. I did the right thing. I did the right thing. I did the right thing. I did the right thing. I did the right thing. I did the right thing. I did the right thing. I did the right thing.
Solomon was beside him now, laying a hand on his shoulder. "It's okay," he whispered.
"I…struck him," Yami breathed.
The old man's voice was gentle and comforting. "No, he's okay. You'll see. You'll go in there and he's going to be just fine."
Yami shook his head in denial. "No, he'll resent me."
"He will not resent you, Yami," Solomon explained. "Give him a moment."
.
The room was quiet as he entered. Yugi lay exactly where he'd been left, but there were no more sobs left in him, and he was quiet. Yami lowered himself very carefully to sit on the floor beside his son.
"Yugi," he whispered.
After a slight hesitation, the boy raised himself up to sit, tear tracks on his face.
"Yugi, do you understand why I had to punish you?"
He swallowed, and his voice was scratchy when he said, "I disobeyed."
"And?"
Yugi sighed, ragged, the telltale sign of a good long cry. "I didn't answer you when you asked me a question, and I was rude to you, and I tried to run away."
He was a wonderful kid.
"Okay," Yami said. "I want you to clean the drawing off the wall, and then you can play again."
Yugi looked pitiful. "Okay," he agreed reluctantly, sensing there would be more discipline should he not comply. Hesitation again. "Daddy," he asked, tears returning to his eyes, his lower lip quivering, "are you mad at me?"
Yami studied his face. "I am a little disappointed in you, yes," he explained. "But I'm not mad. I could never be angry with you—only frustrated. I expect better behavior from you, honey."
"I'm sorry," the boy cried, the stab of regret strong in his chest. Every child understands that anger is a passionate emotion and therefore passes quickly. To have your father say he is disappointed in you is far worse—it implies there is something about yourself that must be changed, not some various circumstance with which your father is angry.
"I know," Yami replied, reaching out to wipe away his son's tears. "And I forgive you."
Yugi sniffled and threw himself suddenly into his father's arms. "I love you daddieeeeeee," he wailed enthusiastically.
Biting back his own tears, Yami hugged him back. He knew then for sure—they would be okay. He would have to be tough sometimes, but all would work out in the end, no one would stay mad at anyone, and things would be okay.
"I love you too, honey."