Just Keep On Keeping On: The Beach
And help I get her. After that day I enrolled her in therapy, paying the small fee with my own money. She's set up to go for three months, so that's all the time I have left with Steven. Three months. And when I give him back to Jade, I know I'll most likely never see him again, knowing Jade.
A part of me still hopes she doesn't get better.
Anyway, a month passes by quickly, Steven and I hardly conversing. He still seems upset and while I want to tell him that his mother is going to come by in three months and pick him up, I don't because I have no idea how he'll react. Still, I want him to be that somewhat happy kid he had been before for the last twelve weeks I had left with him, so I decide to take him out for a day of fun at the beach.
When I tell him my plan he seems enthusiastic about it so the next day we pack up our things for a day at the beach and just go. Luckily, for the first time in a while the car ride isn't silent and Steven shares with me his fascination with sharks. I don't bother to point out to him that sharks aren't exactly friendly when he expresses his desire to swim with them and pet them all day long.
We arrive at the beach soon enough and Steven immediately takes off and jumps into the water, leaving me to trail after him, carrying all our stuff, and apologizing to the miffed beach attendant when Steven zipped right past him without paying for a bracelet. Then I traverse the hot sand, doing a kind of jig to try to avoid burning my feet in my stupid flip flops, and finally settle at an open spot near the water.
I set up all our crap before tracing Steven's steps and going over to him in the ice cold ocean water. He's standing ankle deep and going no farther in, a look of fascination and fear battling for dominance on his face.
"Hey, Steven, buddy, what's wrong?"
"I...I can't swim," he replies quietly.
"You...you can't swim?" But every little kid knows how to swim! I shake my head at Jade's parenting skills. "Okay, fine. I'll teach you, that is, if you wanna learn."
"Oh boy I do!" he exclaims cutely.
"Okay, great," I smile and bend down so that I can pick him up on my shoulders. He squeals with joy and I take him a little further into the ocean so that I'm in to my thighs. Luckily the waves aren't that big nor that strong so I'm able to brave them without putting Steven down. He's giggling happily and having a grand ole time up there, but all good things have to come to an end so soon I take him down, spin him around once and put him down. The water comes to around Steven's shoulders and he shudders at the chilly water, but continues to grin nonetheless.
Suddenly a wave strikes us and Steven goes flying back, chortling amusedly. He picks himself up and immediately races back in, jumping over the waves that he can.
"Okay Steven, ready? I'm going to show you how to dodge the next wave. You're going to go under it, all right?" He nods his head ecstatically and watches as I dive under the water, pretending a wave is overhead. I come up in a second. "Get it?"
"Mhm!" he tells me.
"All right then. Practice right now before a real wave comes." As there were only waves that did not break coming towards us at the moment. He demonstrates what he can do by flailing downwards so that his head is underwater and his lower body is sticking straight out. When he remains like that for twenty seconds or so, kicking his feet sporadically, I frown and lift him back up. "What was that?"
He shakes his head like a dog to get his hair out of his face before looking up at me, that broad smile still slapped on his face. Man this kid was resilient.
He shrugs. "I try dive like you," he explains the obvious.
I roll my eyes but accept that this isn't exactly a very good place for a toddler to learn how to swim. We end up backing a little farther out of the water and just jumping over the baby waves, although occasionally a wave would break and send Steven crashing into the sand. Every time he got up with a chuckle and a light shining in his eyes.
Eventually we got out when Steven's lips turned blue and his teeth started chattering. He tried to tell me that he wasn't cold, but I threw him over my shoulder and walked back over to our spot on the beach, suggesting we make a sandcastle.
We only get so far before I get bored and thirsty and sit down on the chair a few feet away from Steven. I grab a water from the cooler I brought along and as I'm drinking it, a little boy runs up to Steven and starts to excitedly chatter to him. At first Steven is reserved and cautious, but the adventurous stranger is able to get him to open up and they start working on the sandcastle together. Not far behind the young boy is a girl, running up to him and apologizing profusely.
"Hey, it's okay. Steven likes the company," I smile at her and she seems to relax. "If you want you can sit down over here," I invite, pointing towards the other chair that was meant for Steven, but since him and his new friend were busy playing in the sand it was currently unoccupied.
"Thanks," she grins back and takes the seat. I take the chance to examine her. She looks to be around thirty or so, only maybe a few years older than me with a pale body and a nice physique (what?). She has pale green eyes and light blonde hair that may or may not be dyed.
"I'm Catherine by the way. What's your name?" she starts up the conversation.
"Robbie," I crack a grin at her.
"So what's your son's name?"
"Oh, uh, Steven? No, he's not my son," I choke out. I was to young to have a boy his age.
"Oh...Is he your brother than?"
"Nope, not that either," I awkwardly reply, not exactly sure how I'm going to go about my relationship to Steven.
"Okay...Babysitter?" she presses, thoroughly confused.
"Yeah...I'm his babysitter," I decide and her expression immediately clears up and she looks happy once again. "What's your kid's name?" I venture.
"Josh," she states proudly. "You know, you're a real nice babysitter to take your kid to the beach," she remarks. I just smile in return when suddenly Steven runs up to me.
"Hey Robbie can Josh and me go in the water? We going to catch crabs!" I let out a snort at his nativity.
"As long as you don't go in the water," I give him permission but he pouts and gives me a puppy dog look.
"Aww, pwease?" he tries, using his 'cute' voice.
"No, sorry buddy," I shake my head, refusing to give in.
"But why not?" he whines, shuffling his feet on the hot sand.
"Because...a big monster will attack you!" I make up a reason and shoot forward out of my seat and grab him, hoisting him up in an almost planking position across my shoulders. He lets out a shrill squeak of happiness and holds out his arms as I spin him round and round.
"I'm a helicopter!" he cries out, making helicopter noises.
"Not for long!" I warn him and then stop spinning and place him back on the ground, falling after doing so. "The plane crashed!"
"Oh no!" he shouts. "I better call 911!" He dials up a pretend phone while I twitch on the ground animatedly, earning laughs from the woman and Josh. "Oh no they no answer!" he squeals, horrified. "I better save you myself!" He grabs my hand and tries to pull me back to my seat.
"Go on Steven! Just leave me and save yourself!"
"No, I can't!"
"Yes you can!" I splutter. "And just remember, believe in yourself and you will achieve great things!"
"No! Robbie! You can't do this!" he begs, falling to the ground on his knees as well.
"And, scene," I proclaim and get to my feet, wiping sand off of my bathing suit.
Steven lets out a hearty laugh before taking off with Josh towards the ocean and I go back over and take my seat next to the woman.
"You have a really close bond with that kid, huh?" she asks, almost to herself.
"Yeah, you could say that," I respond quietly, watching as Steven romps through the water with Josh following closely behind.
.
After that day Steven opens up again, but it only lasts for a week or so before he begins to withdraw into his own little world again like he's reminded of something very bad. I get the awful feeling that he knows about something that's going on.
Anyway, more time passes and I spend all of it I can with Steven, even taking off some time from my job to be with him. Even though he acts depressed, when we do things that he enjoys he immediately perks up and it's almost as if reality isn't happening.
Ha. If only.
One day as I'm making pancakes for breakfast, he waddles out the room groggily, dragging Benjamin, his stuffed wolf, by the leg. "Hey buddy!" I greet him as he takes a seat down at the table. "Morning!"
"Ugh. I had such weird dream last night," Steven voices offhandedly.
"Yeah? What was it?"
"It was about you and me. You was turned into a fwog and I had to find a way to turn you back. I try get Jade to kiss you, but she just wouldn't. But then a magical sharky came along and he bopped you on da head and saids that you needed to just enjoy bein' a fwog 'cause you was stuck like dat. So you beginned to hop 'round and eat flies." Steven makes a face as he recalls his dream. "It was just weird...just so weird." He shakes his head as if to get rid of the dream.
"Well...What if I said your dream was actually true and I am a frog?" I shiftily remark, smirking at him. I then proceed to hop around much akin to a frog and make croaking sounds. This makes Steven giggle and he joins me and we both act like idiots, er, frogs, and bounce around the room.
Afterwards we end up jumping into each other and fall back in a fit of giggles and laughter. When I'm able to compose myself I go back to the kitchen and remake the pancakes which have burned. When I serve it up to Steven, he sticks his tongue out and tries to eat it like a frog which incurs laughter from both of us.
And as I'm looking at him, my laughter dies down and I just stare with a sad smile on my face. I was really going to miss this.
.
I plan as many fun days as I can until it's the day before Jade comes. I really want to take him out to do something incredibly fun that will just knock his socks off, but my college courses decided to all be on the same day and last for hours and give me a shit load of homework. I considered skipping, but I've already missed so much school because of Steven that it's just not smart and I can't do it. So I don't.
And we end up having an uneventful day, although when it's time for bed and I tuck Steven in as per usual when I'm home at 8:30 I linger, reluctant to leave him. "Hey...You want to hear a bed time story or something?" I ask and Steven giddily nods his head yes.
"All right...What to make it about...Hm...Oh, I know. This is about a shining knight and his little pet shark," I grin and Steven is instantly hooked, his eyes going wide with interest. "Okay...So once upon a time there was a shining knight in armor. He was the best knight there ever was. He slayed every dragon and conquered every city he was told to. He even had a best friend named Rex. But even though he was incredibly successful, wealthy, and handsome as well, he just didn't feel right. There was something missing-"
"I bet I know what was missing!" Steven interrupts.
"Steven, hush! You're ruining the story!" I admonish and he quickly apologizes before promising not to do it again. I accept his apology with a nod of his head and continue my story that I was completely making up on the spot.
"And the knight just didn't know what it was. So he began to search for what was missing, only, it was hard to find something when he didn't even know what it was that was lost in the first place. Although, luckily for him, what he was missing waltzed right into his life without him having to find it. It had been a small shark, washed up on the shore when he was taking a walk on the beach one day.
"So he bent down and said to that shark, 'You need to get in that water, huh?' And of course the shark couldn't talk so it just flapped it's tail in response. So the knight decided that he would pull out his magic wand that he retrieved from the tallest mountain, and make this abandoned shark magical so it could live on land and talk. And live it did. It stayed with the knight everywhere the knight went and the pair went on adventurous missions, killing evil wizards and rescuing stranded unicorns. They become almost like father and son.
"But one day the little shark became very sad and the knight didn't know why. So he decided to ask the shark and the shark told the knight that he was very upset. He missed his family and while he had some good times with the knight, he also had some good times with his family and missed them. Then the little shark went up to bed as it was very late and left the knight to ponder what he should do.
"The knight, being one of valor and honor, took a very long time to think of what to do because he wanted to make sure he was making the right decision. After all, he didn't want the little shark whom he had become such close friends with to be sad. So the next day the knight set out and left the little shark with his best friend Rex. The knight went diving to the very depths of the ocean of the beach he had found the little shark washed up on all that time ago only to look for the little shark's family.
"He eventually found the shark's family and struck them with his magic wand so they could talk to him and tell him if they wanted to see their son again. The shark's family replied that yes, they did very much want to see the little shark, so the knight proceeded to take them back to his castle to see the little shark.
"When the little shark saw his family, he was overcome with joy and rushed out to give everyone hugs. 'We missed you little shark!' the family exclaimed and the little shark said that he missed them to. The little shark and his family talked for a few hours and seemed to be having so much fun as the poor knight stood in the corner, feeling oddly out of place watching everything unfold.
"When it was time for the shark's family to leave, the knight stepped in and told them that they should start heading back to their home. The shark's family agreed but then asked if the little shark would like to come with them. Sadly, the little shark declined their offer saying he couldn't leave the knight, but the knight could recognize that something was amiss in his friend. His friend wasn't happy. There was something missing within him just like there had been something missing in the knight all that time ago. So the knight took the little shark aside and told him that it was okay for him to go with his family. The knight said that he wouldn't be mad and that he knew the little shark was missing his family very badly. He said that sometimes it's okay to leave everything behind for the sake of your loved ones.
"So the little shark agreed to go with his family and gave the knight a hug one last time before leaving to go back to the ocean with his family to live happily ever after. Meanwhile, the knight decided that he should get back to his job and work on conquering all evil and he knew that in his heart one day he meet the little shark again.
"The end," I wrap up, rather pleased with myself, but at the same time a heavy sorrow in my chest.
Steven smiled at me happily, contentedly. "So they both got happy endings?" he inquires, blissfully unaware of the knight's pain.
"Yeah," I lie, "they both got their happy endings."
"Good," he says and snuggles back into his bed. I give him a regretful stare, unable to pull myself away. He looks at me with confusion and I just shake my head.
"Goodnight Robbie," he chirps, thinking I was going to get up and leave.
"Goodnight Steven," I reply softly and then lean forward slowly. He remains still, gazing up at me, watching me. I lightly kiss his forehead before getting off the bed and turning out the lights.
As I'm about to leave the room, he pipes up. "I love you...Dad."
Despite my sadness, I respond. "Love you too."
That night I don't go to sleep. Just watch T.V. until it's three or so in the morning.
Author's Note: Long chapter :) I tried to make this chapter cute...hope it worked. Anyway, lots of time skip, and Jade comes next chapter so you'll see if Steven stays or goes or even perhaps a compromise?
Any who, hope you enjoyed!