Playing the 'Son' Card (7 page)

“Sure thing, Uncle Jack.” I could
keep myself up for a few more minutes.

“Coffee, or anything,
Troy?”

This was new, although I thought
that Jack couldn’t be thinking clearly if he wanted to offer coffee
to a 12-year-old just before sending him to bed.

“Sure, Uncle Jack. Coffee sounds
good. Cream and sugar, please.”

“Okay, have a seat. I’ll just ask
Sally to get them for us.” He poked his head into the kitchen, and
then returned to the room, sitting across from me on the
sofa.

“So it sounds like thanks is in
order for tonight, at the pool, Troy,” he started. “The boys must
have really improved their swimming in a short time. We’ve been
suggesting that they take swimming lessons again, in addition to
the diving, but they’ve been reluctant up to now. After tonight,
they’ll probably be okay to do it.”

“Well, they just might,” I
replied.

Jack was just getting warmed up to
his topic. “Those two really listen to you, Troy, and they do
whatever you ask. Almost better than their mother and I. It’s
pretty amazing.”

“Well, they’re nice kids,” I
acknowledged, “And I like doing stuff with them.”

“Yes, well, it shows,” he responded.
“As far as they are concerned, you are their hero.”

I just smiled at that, not knowing
how to reply to that.

“So, Troy,” he continued, “I have a
bit of a request and proposal for you, and I hope you’ll think
about it.” He paused to see what my reaction was, and I just
nodded.

“Ah, you know that Easter is one of
the very few days of the year that real estate agents don’t work,
right?”

I nodded again.

“Um, well, Sally and I were thinking
that it would be really nice if we could take your mom for a little
break, just to get her away for two nights.”

He was really going now.

“There’s a resort not far from here,
on Rosario Island, that’s really nice, and we wanted to treat your
mom to a couple of days with us, and I think it would be really
good for her. I mean, it’s been so great to see her happy in her
work and doing so well, but she does work hard, and we thought she
might be willing to take a break this weekend, if you
agree.”

I was looking right at him, giving
him my full attention. “I’m following you,” I said, nicely. I
looked up to see Sally entering the room with three cups on a
tray.

Jack was now ready to ask the
question. “So, what we wanted to know, Troy , was whether or not
you’d be willing to look after Trevor and Jesse for the two nights
that we’d be away... and if you’d be willing to give up your time
with your mom for those two days.”

He glanced at his wife as she sat
down next to him. “We know that you’ve been looking forward to
spending some time with her, and this is a little bit selfish of us
to take her away, but we were just wondering...”

“Listen, Troy,” added Sally, “We’ll
totally understand if you say no. You’ve been going through a rough
patch, too, being on your own, and dealing with everything, so this
is a lot to ask.”

Finally, they stopped talking, and
just looked at me. Jack reached down to pick up his coffee, not
willing to keep looking at me for the moment. Sally did the
same.

For me, there wasn’t much of a
decision to make. First off, I was happy for my mom that they were
willing to do this, and what was good for her also helped me. As
far as having a rough time, they were right, but that was back in
Spokane. Here, with them, and in this town, everything was
wonderful, and while it would be nice to spend time with my mom, I
was just happy with everything here, and I’d be fine without
her.

I’d picked up my own coffee, and
taken a sip. I put the cup down, and looked up at them. I gave them
my answer. “Sure. No problem. I can look after things
here.”

Their looks of relief were
immediate, and Sally even put her own cup down and came around to
give me a hug and a kiss.

“Thanks, Troy,” she said, softly. “I
know how much she means to you, and you have no idea how much this
will be good for her. We appreciate your sacrifice.”

I didn’t want them to overdo their
words. “Look, it really is no problem, and I totally
understand.”

“Are you going to be okay with the
boys?” Jack looked a little concerned.

“I don’t see why not,” I answered.
“As you pointed out, they seem to listen to me really well, and I’m
sure they’ll do the same for the weekend.”

“Well, I think they will, too,”
Sally added. “Thank you, Troy.”

I nodded again. I sipped at my
coffee again, as the two of them started into a review of how they
did things in the house, and how things would be organized for them
being away. They talked about what food was in the house, and
emergency contacts and information, and generally displayed a
genuine nervousness about leaving their children for the
weekend.

They even mentioned that they’d
never gone and left them before, with anyone, and that this was a
first time.

I assured them that we’d be alright,
and that I could and would phone them if there were any
problems.

Sally then took me into the kitchen,
and showed me around a bit, pointing out where all the food and
cooking utensils were located. She then showed me the laundry room
and then turned me over to Jack, who took me into the study and
showed me where his emergency money was and where the spare keys to
the car were. Then he even took me into the basement to show me
where the main gas and water valves were along with the electrical
breaker panel.

I probably could have found all that
myself, after knowing about that stuff from our place back home,
but it was nice to have him show it to me, all the same.

It was almost an hour after I’d
arrived home that I was about ready for bed. My mom still wasn’t
home, yet, so I said good night to Sally and Jack and headed
upstairs. The younger boys were asleep, so I quietly stripped off
my clothes and got into bed without waking them.

As I fell asleep that night, I
reflected on how much things had changed for the better in the 24
hours since I’d gotten on the bus back home.

I was pretty darn happy with how the
future looked.

CHAPTER

9

I finally managed to talk to my
mother the next morning. I’d been woken up by two boys jumping on
my bed, and trying to tickle me awake. It was a nice, if not a
little startling way to wake up.

They were excited about things.
Evidently, they’d already been downstairs to find out that I was
going to be looking after them for two days, and they were
thrilled.

I managed to get them off me long
enough to get out of bed, and make my way to the bathroom before
heading downstairs with the boys trailing me. They pulled me into
the kitchen, and seated me at the table before taking my breakfast
‘order.’

They scurried off to get my
requested cereal and toast, and I’d just started glancing at their
local paper when my mom came into the room.

She came right over and gave me a
hug and a kiss.

“Good morning, Mr. Evanson,” she
said with a wide smile. “I hear you’ve been very busy since I last
saw you at the office.”

I blushed a bit, and smiled. “Well,
yes, Mom, I suppose I have.”

“Well, my dear, I’m so impressed,
and I’m so pleased.”

She paused. “And I hear that I have
you to thank for my weekend away.”

I looked up at her face, to see that
she was clearly happy about things.

“Well, it’s really nothing.” I
fended off her gratitude. “It’s no big deal to look after things
here.”

She looked serious for a moment.
“Oh, but it is, Troy. I don’t mean that you can’t handle it, or
anything, but it’s just that you’re giving up something of your
own, for someone else, and that is a big deal.”

I tried again. “Well, Mom, I’m happy
to do it.”

She leaned over to give me a kiss.
“I know you are, Troy, and that’s why I love you so
much.”

The boys had just returned with my
cereal, telling me that my toast would be ready in a
moment.

Mom looked at them, and laughed just
a bit. “You sure do have them well trained, Troy. I don’t think
I’ve ever seen them get breakfast for anyone else
before.”

Trevor looked up at my mom. “We can
get your breakfast too, Aunt Liz.”

“That’s okay, Trevor.” She smiled at
him and gave him a kiss. “You just look after your cousin
here.”

Not wanting to appear ungrateful, I
turned my attention to my cereal, and started eating, as the rest
of the household moved on around me. It was just nice to have a
house full of people; happy people, and I enjoyed the spirit that
was present with them all.

Within an hour, Jack and Sally and
my mom were standing at the front door, all ready to go. It was
just about ten o’clock, and they wanted to get to the resort for
lunch. With a ferry ride necessary, and a long weekend, it might
take as much as three hours, even though it was not that far
away.

With a lot of hugs, kisses and last
minute admonishments, they were finally gone. I closed the door,
and turned to the boys.

Before I had a chance to say
anything, Jesse spoke up.

“You want to try our new racing
game, Troy?”

That set the tone for the day, and
really, for all three days. It was Good Friday, and we had
Saturday, and almost all of Sunday in front of us, and the boys
would be happy if we did nothing but play on their game system the
whole time, it seemed.

I had a few other ideas, like going
for a bike ride, with me using Jack’s bike. I also had in mind that
we could even go over to the pool on Saturday during the public
swim time, and maybe play outside a bit if the weather was
nice.

I certainly was optimistic that it
was going to be a nice weekend.

We started out by playing video
games before breaking for a late lunch on Friday. Then we went out
and did some bike riding.

I asked them to show me the
neighborhood, so they rode me all around. I looked at the schools
and saw the local mall and grocery store. I took advantage of the
stop there to pick up a few items to make homemade pizza for
supper. Then, we also stopped at the local video store, where we
rented two movies and one game for their system.

Trevor looked a little concerned.
“Are you sure we can do this, Troy? Mom and Dad don’t normally let
us rent games.”

“Sure, I’m sure,” I replied,
enthusiastically. “After all, they left me in charge, and they
didn’t say not to do this, so I have decided that we can, and we
will.”

That response drew a big smile from
each of them.

After about three hours, we were
back home, and I knew they were tired, because I sure
was.

I fixed us a bit of a snack, and
then with my own tiredness as an excuse and an example, we actually
laid down for nap. We ended up using Sally and Jack’s big bed, and
all three of us lay down and actually slept for little
while.

After that, we got up and I fixed
supper and told Trevor to get one of the movies ready. With our
pizza supper, we settled on the floor of the family room, and
watched a movie.

By the time that was done, it was
really pretty much bed time, but they were not really tired yet. We
ended up with a little tickling and wrestling match on the floor in
the family room for about half an hour.

I managed to hold my own until the
boys ganged up on me and worked as a team to get even with me for
my earlier successes. It was really kind of fun. It was another
thing that I had not done since my father’s death, and I really
enjoyed it.

Finally, I managed to get us all
upstairs and into bed.

The next day started pretty quietly.
We had a lazy breakfast and then played video games until lunch.
After that, we rode our bikes down to the pool, and ended up
staying for all of the three hour public swim.

After that, it got a little
interesting.

Jonathan was there, and approached
us near the end of the public swim. He explained that he was going
to run a training session for his staff, from four o’clock until
six, and wondered if we might be interested in staying around to be
‘pretend’ victims for the staff.

As he explained, “We normally trade
off being victims and rescuers, but it gets a little old and it’s
not all that realistic. If we had you three, and especially because
two of you are smaller sized, it would really help us practice
better.”

After seeing the smiles on their
faces, I agreed on behalf of the three of us, and we ended up
staying around to help out with the training session.

Near the end, Jonathan even had me
join with two of his staff members to play the role of guard for a
couple of simulations.