Seduction and Snacks (23 page)

I stared dreamily at everything. I may have a slight weakness to sweets.

"Holy hell, what are those things?” I asked pointing to a row of white chocolate clumps the size of my fist with caramel on top.

"Oh, those are something new I’m experimenting with. I melted a bowl of white chocolate, added crushed up pretzels and potato chips to it and then once the dropped spoonfuls solidified, I drizzled caramel on top. I may have gone a little overboard on the size of them. Right now they’re called Globs."

Sweet Mary in heaven. I wanted to ask this woman to have my babies.

Oh, wait…

A knock sounded on the front door and Claire asked me to answer it for her while she set the table and finished up.

Jenny and Drew were the next to arrive. I held the door open for them and shook my head at Drew while Jenny walked in and made her way into the kitchen to talk to Claire.

"Really, Drew?" I asked, looking at his shirt.

There was a picture of a little kid on it shooting a gun above his head. The shirt read "Don't hit kids. No, seriously. They have guns now."

"What? Kids nowadays are the devil. This shirt is a PSA for you, dude. You'll thank me one day. So, where is the little guy? Does he need his diaper changed or anything? Maybe I can show him my car or give him some candy," he said as he looked around me and rubbed his hands together.

"He's four Drew. He doesn't wear diapers. And you might want to dial down the creepy kidnapper vibe just a notch."

"Whatever. Take me to your demon seed," Drew said.

We walked past the kitchen and I stuck my head in and asked Claire if it was okay to head back to Gavin's room. She told me where it was and we went down the hall and found him sitting on the floor in the middle of his room, squirting a tube of toothpaste right onto the carpet.

"Whoa there, big guy. What are you doing?" I asked as I quickly made my way over to him and took the now empty bottle out of his hand.

He just shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know."

Shit. What do I do? Should I go get Claire? I don't want the kid to think I'm a traitor though. He would get mad at me for tattling on him. Wait, I was the adult. I couldn't let him walk all over me. I needed to let him know who the boss was. And right now, it wasn't Tony Danza.

"I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to be putting toothpaste on your floor, are you?" I asked.

"That's a dumb question, Carter. Of course he's not supposed to put toothpaste on the floor," Drew said seriously.

I looked back over my shoulder and gave him a dirty look.

"I know that. I'm trying to get him to admit what he did was wrong," I said through clenched teeth.

"Okay there, Dr. Phil. I'm pretty sure he knows it's wrong otherwise he wouldn't have done it. Kids are dumb. They do things they aren't supposed to all the time because they can. Being an adult sucks. I could never get away with putting toothpaste on my floor now."

It was like dealing with two children.

"Why would you…you know what? Never mind," I said, turning back around to face Gavin.

"Your mom wouldn't be too happy about you making this mess. How about you show me where the towels are and we'll clean it up before she sees it."

There. He won't hate me for telling on him and I still let him know it was bad. I am an awesome parent.

Obviously Gavin was very excited to clean if it meant we didn't tell Claire what he did. I briefly wondered if she was going to find out and possibly cut my penis off or smother me in my sleep. And then I wondered if I told her, would Gavin punch me in the nuts again, or maybe go for the throat this time? I don't know whether to fear my kid or his mother.

Twenty minutes later, the carpet was good as new and Drew and I were sitting Indian-style in the middle of Gavin's room, praying to every higher power we knew that the girls wouldn't walk in the room right this minute.

Gavin had decided we should play dress up. We tried getting him to play something manly like cops and robbers, running with scissors or lighting shit on fire - anything but this. Unfortunately, you couldn't win an argument with a four-year old no matter how much you tried. Drew and I were both currently dressed as babies, complete with pacifiers in our mouths and holding on to stuffed animals. He stuck us each in these giant sun hats of Claire’s that flopped down over our faces. Drew’s was pink and mine was white. I drew the line at putting on one of his old, unused diapers that he found in a drawer in his closet from before he was potty trained.

"Hey, Uncle Drew, I have a secret to tell you," Gavin said.

Drew pulled the pacifier out of his mouth.

"Give it to me."

Gavin leaned in by his ear and whispered just loud enough for me to be able to hear him.

"You smell like beef and cheese."

Gavin pulled back from Drew’s ear and Drew rolled his eyes at him.

"Dude, your secret sucks," he said.

"YOU SUCK!" Gavin yelled.

"Guys, dinner is ready so you should…"

Claire’s words were cut off when she rounded the corner of the room and caught us. The abrupt halt to her feet caused Jenny, who had been following close behind, to smack into the back of her. Claire put her hand over her mouth to hide her giggles. Jenny couldn't have cared less about shielding her enjoyment of the situation. She bent over at the waist laughing her ass off out loud and pointing.

"Oh my God, someone tell me they have a camera," Jenny said in between laughs.

"Do you want me to spit up? Because I'm not afraid to go there," Drew threatened.

Both of us ripped off our baby crap while the girls laughed and gave Gavin high-fives. Drew and I stood up while Jenny lifted Gavin into her arms and told him how awesome he was and cooed all over him. He ate up every word and I swear that kid smirked at us as he put his head down on Jenny’s chest - which was currently on full display with her low-cut top and push-up bra.

"Oh my God, I am so jealous of that kid right now. I wish I was cradled to her tits. Cradled like a baby," Drew whispered.

"Do you hear yourself right now?" I asked as we all walked out of Gavin's room and into the dining room where we were greeted by Liz and Jim who were already seated.

***

After an extremely delicious dinner where there was only minimal fighting between the two children, and by children I mean Drew and Gavin, Claire started bringing out tray after tray of all her sweet goodies.

Now all I could think of were Claire’s sweet goodies on a tray; her delicious num-nums on a silver platter. I would love to eat her off of a tray. I want to lick her Globs.

"Carter, do you want some?"

"Fuck yes."

"Awwwww, Carter said the t-u-l word mom!" Gavin tattled.

Oops.

“Who taught you how to spell?” Drew asked with a sneer.

“Dude, I’m four,” Gavin replied.

I excused myself to go to the bathroom before I did something even more embarrassing. I stood there peeing and trying not to think about Claire being naked on a tray when the bathroom door suddenly opened and Gavin walked in.

"Oh, hey there, Gavin,” I said nervously as I tried to turn my body away from him without interrupting the flow. “Uh, I'm kind of going to the bathroom here buddy. Can you shut the door?"

He did as I asked, however, he didn’t leave the room before he shut the door. Now he was locked in a small, enclosed space with me while I tried to take a piss. And now he was staring at my junk. Okay, this wasn't awkward at all.

"Um, Gavin can you look somewhere else? Oh hey, look at that duck in the tub. That's pretty cool."

Still staring. Was this something I should be concerned with?

"Wow, Carter. You've got a HUGE wiener."

Suddenly, Gavin being in the bathroom with me didn’t seem so bad. If only he could have been in the bathroom with me in eighth grade and passed that little tidbit around for Penny Frankles to hear, I might not have gone to the eight grade graduation dance solo.

I finished pissing, zipped up my pants and flushed the toilet, all while trying not to pat myself on the back. Yeah, I had a huge wiener. You bet your sweet ass I did. I almost needed a wheelbarrow to carry it around. And because a toddler said it, it must have been true.

We got back to the table and I couldn't keep the shit-eating grin off of my face.

"What are you smiling about? Do you have gas?" Drew joked.

"Hey, Mommy, Carter has a HUGE wiener," Gavin said around a mouthful of cookie, holding his hands up in the air about three feet apart, like you do when you're telling someone how big the fish is you just caught.

Claire quickly reached over and pushed Gavin's arms down while everyone else at the table laughed. I just sat back and smiled and tried to keep my anaconda penis tucked under the table so it wouldn't scare anyone.

"Hey, Uncle Drew, you wanna hear a dirty joke?" Gavin asked excitedly.

"I don't know, will it get you punched?" Drew replied seriously. It was almost touching how concerned Drew was with getting Gavin in trouble.

"The pig fell in the mud and walked across the street to the dirt and then climbed the roof!" Gavin shouted, falling immediately into a fit of giggles at his "dirty joke".

Everyone chuckled at Gavin's attempt at humor - except Drew.

"Dude, that wasn't funny at all," Drew said with a straight face.

"You wanna piece of me?" Gavin shouted, holding his little fist up in the air at him.

"Alright, that's enough. Gavin, go put your pajamas on, and I'll be in shortly to read you a story," Claire told him.

Gavin scampered down off the chair, giving one last threatening look to Drew before running to his room. Five pairs of eyes all turned their attention to Drew.

"What?" he asked. "It wasn't funny and I totally didn't get it."

"Okay Claire," Liz said, turning her face away from Drew, probably so she wouldn't feel the need to choke him. "Time for the real show. Tell us what you've got here," she said, pointing to all the trays on the table.

Claire went around the table pointing out what each item was. Snicker Surprise cookies, homemade turtles, Pretzel Turtles, White Chocolate Buckeyes, white and milk chocolate covered potato chips, pretzels, cashews, peanuts, raisins, rice krispies, bacon and a cookie called a Cranberry Hootycreek – which Drew kept calling a Hooterpeep.

Everything was amazing and I think we were all in a sugar coma by the time we sampled everything. Jenny circled the table and snapped a few pictures of everything for the advertisements before we inhaled the stuff and Claire blushed a bright shade of red at all the compliments we threw at her.

"I definitely got some good pictures, Claire. I think for the front cover of the brochure we should pacifically focus on the chocolate-covered stuff," she explained.

"You mean specifically?" Jim asked.

"That's what I said," she replied. "Pacifically."

"Hey, Claire, can I come with you to put Gavin to bed?" I asked, hoping to divert the attention from Jenny’s weird use of the English language.

Her face lit up with my question which instantly made me grateful I had the foresight to ask.

We left everyone to clean up the dining room table and walked back to Gavin's room to find him asleep on top of his toy box. I laughed as soon as I saw him.

"Don't laugh," she whispered with a smile on her face. "That's not the funniest place I've seen him fall asleep. I've got an entire photo album dedicated to his sleeping habits. On the back of the couch like a cat, sitting up at the dinner table, face down at the dinner table, under the Christmas tree in a pile of toys, in his closet, on the toilet…you name it he's fallen asleep on it. He's like a horse. He can practically fall asleep standing up. Jim gave him the Indian name of Chief Sleepsanywhere and Liz recently changed it to Captain Narcolepsy."

She moved quietly into the room and scooped his little body up easily, placing a kiss to his head as she walked over to his bed. I leaned against the door jam, trying not to get too sentimental and girly at just how sweet it was to see her taking care of him. She covered him up with a blanket, smoothed back the hair off of his head and kissed him again before turning around and walking to me.

"So, Mr. Ellis, how freaked out are you right now by all of this domesticated parenting crap?" she asked.

There was a smile on her face as she stood right in front of me but I could tell it was just there for show. She really was nervous about how I was handling all of this. I glanced over her shoulder at the little boy that was fast asleep in his bed and my heart started beating faster. I had an undeniable urge to grab onto him and never let him go, to protect him from anything bad that might come his way and to shelter him from scary things like the boogey man and clowns.

Shut up, clowns are scary as fuck.

I looked back down at the incredible woman standing in front of me and knew I felt the same way about her.

"I don't want the boogey man to get you and I hate clowns," I blurted out.