“Can I have waffles?” she asked, leaning into his touch.
“Yeah. I’ll make them while you go put on a shirt and another sock.”
She trudged out of the kitchen and Adam popped a frozen waffle into the toaster.
Absently, he added Learn how to cook to his ever-expanding list of things to do.
When the waffle popped up and Gus wasn’t back yet, Adam nibbled on it absently and put another one in for her.
Adam was combing Gus’ hair as she ate her waffle when the doorbell rang.
“He’s here; he’s here!” she shouted, and jumped up, knocking over the syrup jug.
Adam dove for it and got a handful of syrup for his trouble, but did save the jug from rolling to the floor.
He heard Gus open the door and Wes’ quiet voice, but couldn’t make out what he said.
“Hi,” Adam called from the kitchen. “Be right there.”
He washed his hands, cast a glance at the table and decided to leave the dishes for later, and went to greet Wes.
He had forgotten that for the duration of this outing, Wes equaled Wes and Bettie. He caught one glance of the tarantula in her carrier and decided that actually the dishes absolutely needed to be cleared from the table this very instant.
Adam deposited sticky dishes into the sink one at a time, taking deep breaths and saying to himself over and over again, It’s in a box; it can’t hurt you.
When he couldn’t stall a moment longer, he steeled himself and went into the foyer. Wes stood there by himself, staring into space.
“Gus went to get something,” he said when Adam approached. “I put a covering on her.”
He held up the carrier that held Bettie, now draped with a pillowcase.
“Oh god, thank you,” Adam said. “I’m so sorry. I know she’s just a spider being a spider, but I’m terrified of her.”
“I understand,” Wes said simply.
He was wearing brown corduroy pants and a rust-colored wool sweater under a navy wool peacoat. He looked warm and touchable (tarantula aside), and Adam found himself wondering what it would feel like to run his hand up Wes’ back. Feel his warmth through the softness of the fabric.
Gus skidded into the hallway holding her favorite accessories: a khaki explorer-style jacket that was a million times too big for her and a beekeeping hat with a veil of netting that covered her face.
She stuffed them in her backpack and announced, “Ready!”
Adam smiled. “My little naturalist.”
Gus rolled her eyes because she thought naturalist sounded tame, but it was Adam’s joke with himself, as when Gus was younger, she’d refused to wear any clothing, running around the house naked, and he’d called her his little naturist.
Adam buckled his seat belt and Wes slid in beside him, Bettie on his lap. Adam gulped.
“Um. Any chance Bettie can sit in the back seat, because if she gets out in the car, I will crash and kill us all.”
Gus giggled, but Wes must’ve heard the mounting tension in his voice because he solemnly placed Bettie on the back seat and then rested his elbow on the armrest between their seats, blocking any potential spider entry point.
Adam silently melted.
They got to school without incident—spider or vehicular—and Gus ran over to Abel, whom she’d described as having friend potential.
Adam turned to Wes to thank him again for going to all the trouble of coming here today, but Wes wasn’t walking with him. He was standing, pressed to the side of the car, eyes wild.
“Hey. You okay?” Adam said softly, approaching on the non-tarantula side.
“Yes,” Wes said, though he clearly was not. Then, “I don’t go many places.”
Adam almost made a flippant, unthinking comment, like Me neither, since I had a kid or Not many places to go around here anyway. But he quashed the knee-jerk impulse to defuse the awkwardness he felt and really looked at Wes.
Wes wasn’t being flippant. Wes didn’t seem to ever be anything but completely genuine, in fact, except on the rare occasions he attempted a joke. He was holding himself completely still and his eyes looked like he was elsewhere.
Adam touched him very lightly on the shoulder. When he didn’t recoil, Adam let his hand rest there.
“How come?” he asked.
Wes looked down at him, his blue eyes unsure.
“I don’t like people looking at me. It makes me feel very...strange.”
Adam waited for more but no more was forthcoming and there wasn’t really time now to ask all the questions he wanted to.
Instead, he squeezed Wes’ shoulder and said, “Well, there are at least two people here who think your brand of strange is pretty awesome.”
Wes blinked at him.
“Uh, me and Gus, I meant,” Adam clarified, feeling very corny.
“I knew who you meant,” Wes said softly. “Thanks.”
Gus ran over to them and bounced in place. Adam wondered, for the four-thousandth time, if he had ever in his life possessed that much energy.
“Come on, come on!”
Gus grabbed Adam’s left hand and Wes’ right hand and tugged them toward the school. Wes looked startled, but let himself be led.
Adam caught his eye as they were dragged, like a vee of geese, into the flock of children entering the building. He raised his eyebrows in question and Wes gave him a slight nod.
As they made their way down the hallway to Gus’ second grade classroom, Adam was struck with the memory of walking Gus into her first day of kindergarten. She’d held his and Mason’s hands just this way, but had been so tiny she practically dangled between them.
Mason had been flustered, wanting to find the right room and wondering aloud about the school, while Adam had worked hard to hold back tears at the thought of his baby going to school like such a big kid.
Gus had looked up at Mason and smiled and he’d been too distracted to notice. Then she’d looked at Adam and he’d smiled at her big enough for both her parents. She had grinned, showing the gap where one of her front teeth had fallen out the week before, and Adam had felt a physical jolt of love so strong he couldn’t believe he could function after.
How was a parent to survive feelings of such enormity? How could he go about his daily life when another person held his heart in her tiny hand?
It had never gone away, that feeling, though Adam now fancied himself a bit better at functioning despite it.
Now, as if she shared his memory, Gus looked up at him and grinned just as she had that day more than two years ago. Adam smiled back at her and winked.