“We probably should have done this
earlier, huh?” Chris said as he tried to fold a stubborn pair of
Ty's jeans. Eventually, he gave up and moved onto a shirt. “What
time is it?”
Ty looked over at the small clock by his bed. He shrugged. “How am I supposed to know?”
“Just you watch, your mother is going
to be here early and none of this will be packed and she'll bite my
head off for it.” Chris wasn't having much luck with the shirt,
either. It seemed like Ty's clothes were just too small to be folded.
Ty picked up the pants that Chris had discarded and doubled the fabric over with ease. Chris stared at him for a moment, and then narrowed his eyes. Ty went on to do the same with several other pieces of clothing that Chris had given up on earlier in the evening. By the time Chris managed to almost fold the one shirt, Ty had finished with nearly half of the clothes on his bed.
“I never knew you had such a talent
for laundry, Ty,” Chris said. Ty looked up at him and grinned.
“Maybe I should just let you do these, and I'll pack your other
stuff.”
There seemed to be no objection to this plan from Ty, so Chris set the shirt aside and gathered a few items from the other side of the bed. Other than clothes, Ty had mostly chosen to bring movies and small books with him. There was also his school stuff, of course, and some more clothes.
Chris groaned an indeterminable amount
of time later. He had just placed what felt like the eightieth shirt
in the suitcase, and there didn't seem to be an end to the clothing
any time in the near future.
“Tyrone,” he whined, “why didn't
you make me pack all this stuff earlier? I still have to get my stuff
together, too. And your mother is probably already walking up the
stairs as we speak.”
Ty paused after placing a pair of sweatpants in the suitcase. He stood up straight and put his hands on his hips, giving his father a stern look. “Daddy, I am not the adult here.” For a moment, the room was completely silent. Chris frowned at Ty, and Ty kept his hands on his sides. Then, quite suddenly, Chris began to laugh, and Ty started giggling, and before either knew it, several minutes had passed and they had not made any further progress.
Chris sighed. “I feel like we just
wasted more time.”
“I think we did,” Ty offered. Chris
grabbed another shirt. He could not for the life of him remember ever
purchasing so much clothing for Ty. Perhaps a decent portion had come
from other people in the form of gifts. Perhaps Kirsten had bought it
all for him, just to add one more bullet point to her ever-growing
list of ways to torture Chris. It was certainly possible.
The reign of fabric did eventually come
to an end. Chris rejoiced as he placed the last pair of jeans in the
suitcase, and he gave Ty a celebratory high-five. Almost every other
item on the bed had been packed away as well, except for a few DVDs
and a small stack of books. Ty was picking them up as Chris walked
around the side of the bed.
Ty's stuffed elephant was lying on one
of his pillows. Chris grabbed it and went to place it in the
suitcase, but he was stopped by a tiny hand upon his wrist.
“Wait, daddy,” Ty said, slowly pulling the elephant out of Chris's hand. He held it close to his chest and stared down at it. “I'm not bringing him with me.”
“You're not?” Chris asked with
great disbelief. He wondered if maybe he had heard Ty incorrectly,
but Ty shook his head in response.
“No. I want you to take him,
so that you will have something to remember me by while you are
gone.” Ty held the stuffed animal up for Chris to take back. Chris
slowly sat down on the bed as Ty handed him the elephant.
After a long bout of silence, Chris
finally spoke. “Are you sure?” Ty nodded firmly. “I mean, I'm
pretty sure I won't forget you.”
“I want you to take him. He'll be
safe with you.” Ty seemed to think that the matter was over with,
as he walked away and attempted to close the suitcase. Chris stared
down at his elephant-laden hands. Without saying another word, he
stood up and headed for his own room.
The suitcase he was to use was still
sitting idly in the dark corner by his closet, but Chris had no
intention of bringing it out just yet. He set Ty's stuffed animal
onto his bed and reached for the drawer of his nightstand. He grabbed
a thin chain with almost no consciousness of doing so. But as he
pulled the necklace out of the drawer, he paused.
It was obviously his most prized
possession, as he had thought of it immediately and without doubt,
but that was part of the problem. He held the tiny heart-shaped
locket tightly in his palm, the chain slipping through the crack
between his index and middle fingers.
The reason he was hesitant had nothing to do with Ty. He was more fearful that something would happen to it in the hands of Kirsten. He knew very well that she didn't exactly take care of her own possessions, let alone those belonging to other people.
But after a minute or so, Chris shook
his head and realized that he was being absolutely ridiculous. It
shouldn't matter whether or not he trusted Kirsten; Ty had been kind
enough to give Chris his stuffed elephant. Chris was pretty sure that
elephant may have been the only thing Ty loved more than him in the
entire world. Therefore, he should have no problem giving Ty the
locket in return.
With the necklace still secure in his
fist, Chris walked back to Ty's room. The little boy was still trying
to close the suitcase, rather unsuccessfully. Chris sat down on Ty’s
bed and beckoned him over. Ty obeyed immediately and bustled towards
where Chris sat, staring with big innocent eyes.
“I have
something for you,” Chris told him, answering his unasked question.
“So you won’t forget me, either.”
Ty’s gaze fell
upon Chris’s hand, his eyes bright with excitement. “What is it?”
he asked in a whisper. Chris took a deep breath, then, slowly,
released his fingers to reveal the heart-shaped pendant.
“It’s a locket
– a necklace. See, it opens,” Chris fumbled momentarily with the
tiny clasp on the heart, “like that, and you can put pictures in
it.”
Ty frowned at the
emptiness of the heart’s interior, at his reflection in the gold.
“How come there aren’t any pictures in there?”
“I took them out
a while ago.”
“Oh.” His eyes
flicked up to Chris’s again. “Can I put pictures of me and you in
it?”
Chris thought for
a few moments. “You could, but I don’t think I have any pictures
of us that are small enough.” He furrowed his brow, and Ty twisted
up his mouth. Silence ensued for roughly a minute before Ty jumped
and exclaimed:
“I know! I can
draw teeny pictures and put them in!” He hopped in place several
times, then leaped towards Chris with great exuberance. “Can I,
daddy, can I?”
Chris laughed.
“Yeah, that’s a good idea.”
“I have to get
my crayons.” With a look of determination, Ty set off to find his
backpack, which lay beside the open suitcase. He rummaged through it,
quickly extracting a small cardboard box. He ran back to Chris and
held out his free hand. “I need the locket, please.”
“All right,”
Chris replied, carefully setting the open heart in Ty's hand. “You
draw, I'll close your suitcase for you and then start packing my own
stuff. So, if you need me, I'll be in my room.”
“OK, daddy, and
I will be drawing in the living room!” Ty closed his hand around
the necklace as Chris had done, beaming at his hidden palm, then
promptly ran out of the room. Chris stood up and took a moment to
rejoice the fact that Ty had not questioned why Chris had a locket or
why it was the locket that Chris had chosen to give him. But Chris
realized, of course, that Ty was bound to ask these questions
eventually, and so he tried to prepare himself as he went on with his
packing.
Ty set the
necklace and box of crayons on the small table opposite the couch,
then grabbed a few pieces of computer paper from Chris's printer. He
stood by the table, as it was too far from the couch and too high
from the ground for him to sit. He pulled a crayon out of the box and
decided that the color was fine.
He placed the open
heart on the paper and tried to trace its shape with the crayon.
Finding this to be a rather difficult task, he looked around for a
pencil instead, which he found lying on the computer desk in the
corner of the room. With the pencil, he made a new and better outline
of the pendant. He realized then that he had hardly any space to work
with, but he would have to make do with what he had. Some of the
crayons produced lines too thick for the drawings, so his rendering
of Chris was given more hair than it should have had, and his own
eyes – though certainly large in real life – took up almost his
entire face. Overall, though, he was highly pleased with the end
result.
Ty ran into
Chris's room and requested that Chris aid him in cutting the pictures
and placing them in the locket. Chris had to retrieve a pair of
scissors from the kitchen, and so it was on the kitchen table that Ty
laid his paper and the locket. He watched cheerfully as Chris cut the
pictures. He tried to help Chris when it came to shoving the tiny
pieces of paper into the even smaller pendant, though he couldn't do
much.
But ten minutes
later, Chris stood behind Ty's chair and fiddled with the clasp in
the back until it locked properly. Ty jumped down from the chair and
beamed at the necklace. Chris knelt down beside him.
“Doesn't it look
wonderful, daddy?” Ty asked, admiring his drawings.
“Yeah, it does,”
Chris told him. “Now, don't sleep with it on. Make sure you take it
off before you go to bed at night. And don't let your mother get a
hold of it.”
Ty laughed. “OK,
I won't.” As he stared, he twisted up his mouth, and Chris knew
what was coming next. He braced himself. “Daddy, where did you get
this, um, locket?”
Chris grimaced.
“It was a Christmas gift I received a few years ago,” he said.
Then, keeping his eyes down, he quietly added, “From Jonathan.”
Ty said nothing else, and merely stared at Chris until suddenly there
was a loud knock. Ty widened his eyes.
“Is that mommy?”
He didn't wait for an answer, though; he bolted from the room and to
the door. By the time Chris walked into the living room, Kirsten was
walking inside, and Ty was hastily stuffing the necklace under his
shirt. Chris stifled a laugh.
“Oh, you
actually decided to come,” Chris said with a condescending smile
aimed at Kirsten. “Good!”
“Uh huh.
Finished packing Ty's things?” Kirsten threw a smirk back at Chris,
folding her arms across her chest. Ty still stood behind her, fixing
his shirt so the necklace was no longer visible. Chris rolled his
eyes, but was secretly relieved that Kirsten hadn't arrived early,
like he had feared.
“Yes, actually.”
And he thanked whoever that Kirsten didn't ask about his
things.
“Then you can
help me bring them to the car, right?” Kirsten looked down at Ty,
who had just finished messing with his shirt. “Or maybe I should
stay and watch Ty and you can run them down to the car.”
“Or I can
stay and watch Ty and you can run them down to your
car,” Chris replied. Before Kirsten could fight back, he headed to
Ty's room. The suitcase was right where he had left it beside Ty's
bed. He grabbed it and made sure to pick up Ty's backpack as well.
Then he returned to the living room.
Ty ran up to him
as soon as he entered the room. “Daddy, I want to bring my stuff to
the car with you!” he exclaimed, beaming. Chris threw a look of
contempt at Kirsten and gave Ty his backpack to carry. Kirsten sat
down on their couch and made herself look rather comfortable.
When they came
back from the car, Kirsten was still in the same position. She looked
over at them as Chris closed the door and smiled. “I thought you
two were never coming back,” she said. “Glad to see you made it.”
Chris narrowed his
eyes at her. “I assume you knew quite well that the elevator is
broken?” Kirsten gave a small shrug as if to say that maybe
she had known. “Yeah, well, so did I. It has functioned properly
maybe once in the entire time we've lived here, so don't think your
evil plan worked or anything.”
“I didn't have
any evil plan at all, Chris, I don't know what you're talking about,”
Kirsten replied in an obvious tone. Chris sighed and turned to his
son, who was still standing by his side.
“Do you want
anything to eat, Ty? I'm sure your mother wasn't planning on feeding
you.”
“Can we have
grilled cheese sandwiches, daddy?” Ty asked, pointing his large
eyes in Chris's direction. Chris smiled.
“Is that all you
ever want?”
Ty held his hands
out defensively, giving Chris a look that seemed to imply he thought
his father could be a bit daft at times. “Well, they are
delicious!”
Chris shook his
head and laughed. “Come on,” he said, leading Ty towards the
kitchen. “Kirsten, do you want anything?”
Kirsten looked up,
clearly startled by the lack of malice in Chris's voice. “Sure,”
she agreed; after all, she wasn't going to just pass up an
opportunity to take advantage of Chris's politeness. She followed the
other two into the kitchen and sat down with Ty at the table.
“Mommy, do you
think grilled cheese sandwiches are delicious?” Ty inquired of
Kirsten while messing with the salt shaker on the table for
entertainment. He looked up at Kirsten, who was watching him and
smiling. Kirsten nodded.
“They are pretty
tasty.”
Ty gave her a
serious look. “Grilled cheese sandwiches are my favorite. Daddy
makes them all the time.”
“I see that,”
Kirsten answered with a bit of a laugh. “I hope you like mine as
much as your father's, since I'll be the one making them for a while.
But between you and me,” Kirsten leaned close to Ty and continued
in a hushed tone, “I think mine probably won't be as good. I'm not
that good of a cook.”
“Neither is
daddy,” Ty whispered back. Chris whipped around and set his hands
on his hips as he glared at the two of them.
“Hey! Just for
that, I'm gonna burn yours.”
Ty giggled. “But
you can make delicious grilled cheese sandwiches and delicious
pancakes, and that's what matters. Please don't burn my food, daddy.
I think the firemen don't like coming around here so often.”
Ty tried his best
to stifle a roaring laughter while Chris pointed an accusing finger
at Kirsten and said, “He gets this from you, you know.”
“I don't know,”
Kirsten told him, throwing a cautious glance at Ty, “I think we're
probably equally responsible for this.”
“Fine, but when
you're not here he never does anything but praise me. It's always,
'Oh, daddy, this food is so delicious,' or 'Wow, daddy, you've done
such a good job at raising me'–”
“And then he
comes over to my place and complains about how you always threaten to
burn his food and then actually do,” Kirsten interjected with a
smug grin. Ty subsided his laughter to look at the two of them with a
confused expression strewn across his small face.
“Well, I don't
remember saying any of those things,” he mumbled. Kirsten focused
on Ty with her head tilted to the side. After a few moments, she just
smiled and poked him in the stomach to make him laugh again.
The three sat and
peacefully feasted upon grilled cheese sandwiches until the plates
were all empty and Ty's eyelids were beginning to droop. Chris
collected all of the dishes and brought them to the sink as Kirsten
led Ty back into the living room.
Ty scratched at
the back of his neck, where the locket's chain was rubbing against
his skin. He wanted to move it, but was afraid that Kirsten might see
if he did. Instead, he just continued to rub his neck and watched as
Kirsten grabbed his coat off one of the hooks by the door. Suddenly,
he had a sinking feeling.
Chris had walked
into the room as well by this point. He too watched as Kirsten took
Ty's coat and brought it over to the little boy. His chest seemed to
tighten ever so slightly as Kirsten said, “Hold out your arms, Ty,
I've got to put this on you.”
Ty's voice cracked
even before he spoke; he made a sort of anguished noise and asked,
“We are leaving?”
“Yeah,”
Kirsten confirmed with a nod, “it's getting late. Come on.”
Ty did as she
asked and lifted his arms. When the coat was snug against him, he
turned to Chris with shining eyes that were so saturated Chris
thought they were making his own vision blurry, until he realized
that he too was tearing up. He bent down so that when Ty came up to
him and crumbled forward he was able to grab him and hug him even
tighter than he had the night when Ty first learned of Chris's trip.
“Goodbye,
daddy,” Ty sniveled. Chris had not expected to break down just as
much as Ty, but as he held on he found it impossible to do anything
but let several tears drip down his cheeks, not caring that Kirsten
was probably watching and thinking he was overly effeminate.
“Goodbye, Ty,” he replied in a gravelly voice. “Listen, I'm gonna try to call you as much as I can, all right? I'm gonna try – two or three times a week I'll call you. As much as I can.” He recoiled and pushed back some of the hair in Ty's face. “Be good for your mum, yeah? And try to have fun. Don't be such a sad sack.”
Chris laughed
shortly, and Ty responded by lifting his hand and drying a small bit
of Chris's cheek while frowning deeply. Chris smiled at him and
thought that he could continue to be strong from this point on. No
more crying.
But he realized
after he whispered, “Thanks,” and let Ty go that watching him
actually leave did even more damage to his masculinity than he could
ever have anticipated. He felt a little ridiculous standing in front
of the closed door and bawling, and when there was a knock a few
minutes later that feeling only intensified.
“Hey, Chris,
what's wrong?” was the first thing that Tristan asked as he stepped
into the room after Chris held the door open for him. Chris wiped his
cheeks and tried not to look too embarrassed.
“Nothing, I just
– I just had to say goodbye to my son,” Chris explained with a
few stutters and dry hiccups. He tried to smile, but failed as his
lips quivered and his eyelids fluttered. Tristan did smile, though, a
smile that was sympathetic and slightly mocking, but somehow
comforting nevertheless.
“I'd imagine
that was hard.”
“Yeah. Well,
I've still got to finish packing, so...” Chris trailed off when he
became aware that the ending to that particular sentence was maybe
we should go to my bedroom now. He already felt awkward enough
because of his actions, he didn't need his words to worsen his mood.
Tristan was quite intelligent, anyway, and could understand his
meaning without the concluding phrase.
“All right,
then. Lead the way,” he kindly said, gesturing for Chris to start
moving onward. Chris marched on quickly and with an odd stiffness
that came from the idea that he should suddenly act with extreme
caution until he felt he could safely not make an idiot of
himself.
He didn't even
turn around when they were actually in the bedroom. He just kept
going until he reached the open suitcase on his bed and he grabbed
one of the books he had set on his pillow with the intention of
placing it in the suitcase. Tristan wasn't paying him any attention,
though, just strutting around the room and taking particular notice
of Chris's exposed wardrobe through the open closet door.
“Wow,” Tristan
said so loudly that Chris, startled, whipped his head around to see
what had happened. “That is a lot of lavender.”
Truthfully, Chris
couldn't decide if the statement was meant in a positive or negative
way and so he instead decided to just remain calm. “Uh, yeah. I
guess it kinda is.”
“Seriously, how
many of these shirts do you own?”
Tristan began to
flick through the shirts that were hanging and Chris cringed a
little. “Probably about fifty.” Tristan looked back at him with a
look of slight disbelief, then laughed and went back to examining the
clothing. Chris went into defensive and loquacious mode. “Well,
they're really comfortable. And cheap. And Ty says I look good in
lavender.”
“He's right. You
do.” Tristan stopped his inspection and joined Chris by the
bedside. For several long and silent seconds they stared at each
other and Chris frantically searched his brain for the next
appropriate thing to say.
Being a writer, he
thought maybe he could come up with something more clever than,
“Plus, I think I'm allowed to be stereotypically gay in at least
one aspect of my life,” yet his vocal chords did not seem to agree.
Luckily for him, Tristan found his verbalization amusing.
“So, you went
for the girly clothing?” Tristan grinned. “Good choice. Do you
need help packing?”
Tristan's head
turned as he observed the books piled on Chris's pillow. Chris
followed his gaze and gave a slight shrug. “Uh, sure.” He looked
down to see Tristan's hand gliding over the comforter pulled tightly
across the mattress.
“You have a
really nice bed,” he slyly remarked. Chris's mouth involuntarily
twitched upward in the corners.
“Well, thanks.”
Tristan's hand fell back to his side and he looked up at Chris.
“Maybe when the
packing is all done you could show me how nice it is.”
Chris blushed and
awkwardly averted his gaze. “Subtle.” He could hear Tristan laugh
softly in response. He lifted his eyes again and felt a smile stretch
across his face. “There's not actually much left to pack. Just the
stuff on the bed here and I should probably go get my toothbrush and
razor and things from the bathroom.”
Tristan agreed to
pack Chris's books while Chris ran to get his toiletry items. Within
ten minutes the suitcase was filled, zipped tight and stored in the
corner of the room for the following morning. Tristan was already
lounging on the bed by the time Chris walked back from setting the
suitcase down on the floor.
From the other
side of the bed, Chris crawled over to where Tristan lay, then
flopped over onto his back and accidentally let his head fall
onto Tristan's abdomen. “Oops,” Chris said in an obvious way.
Tristan slid his
fingers under the collar of Chris's shirt and down as far as they
could reach. When Chris glanced at him upside down, Tristan arched an
eyebrow and echoed, “Oops.” Chris smiled and looked back down
towards his feet, remarking how they were both really in quite odd
and slightly uncomfortable positions, if not just because Tristan had
his elbow bent almost completely backwards and Chris was so tall that
his feet were hanging off the edge of the bed. He tried to wiggle
away so that Tristan would pull his hand back and maybe he could sit
in a more proper fashion.
Proper was
not what Tristan had in mind – and neither was sitting.
Tristan was rather tiny even for his size and therefore able to move
with even more haste than Chris; as he was trying to maneuver into a
new and cozier position, Chris found himself being pinned down into
the mattress with a surprisingly muscular twenty-five-year-old
straddling him.
Thus, it was a good half hour before Chris was actually able to sit as he had intended, and even then he was still half-lying at the top of the bed with an arm around Tristan and the fingers of his other hand laced with Tristan's, the combination of said appendages resting on Chris's bare stomach. Both men were breathless, stripped down to their boxers (though they had actually been wearing even less mere minutes before) and contentedly sleepy. Chris could feel Tristan's eyelashes scrape against his skin as Tristan closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
They laid in
silence for the next fifteen minutes. Tristan tilted his head back to
get a better view of Chris, only to find that Chris had fallen
asleep. Tristan smiled to himself and reached over to turn off the
light on Chris's nightstand. He repositioned himself against Chris,
pulling the comforter over the two of them, and tried to sleep.
In the morning
they both woke up within five minutes of each other. Tristan asked
what time it was and when they had to be at the airport; Chris told
him that they had a few hours left before they had to leave.
“Oh, a few
hours, huh?” Tristan seductively mumbled, leaning into Chris and
running his foot over Chris's leg. “That's quite a long span of
time to have to fill...”
Chris let out a
soft laugh. “I'm sure we'll manage.”
After three hours,
two plates of breakfast and one hasty shower, Chris and Tristan stood
outside of the apartment building at the back of Tristan's car. Chris
hoisted his suitcase into the open trunk and wondered how it was that
he didn't have more stuff – although he was glad to have to carry
so little.
The entire ride to
the airport was spent between listening to the radio and listening to
Tristan talk about his friend Claire who also worked at the school.
If Chris had been the jealous type, Tristan's stories may have caused
him a bit of worry; luckily, Chris was quite level-headed and he
believed Tristan's promise that he would never sleep around while in
an actual relationship (though he did admit to being rather
promiscuous otherwise).
Tristan insisted
on carrying Chris's suitcase into the building for him. It was almost
a comical sight; Chris had never realized until this point just how
large his suitcase actually was, as compared to his size it looked
relatively normal. Since Tristan was significantly smaller than
Chris, though, in his arms the suitcase seemed giant. Chris held back
a laugh when Tristan tried to open one of the doors at the entrance
without setting the suitcase down, and he felt bad for even thinking
to laugh after Tristan actually succeeded.
Just before Chris
had to board the plane, Tristan made sure to let him know just how
much he would be missed: As a result, their goodbye kiss had
attracted a small, unwanted crowd, mostly composed of disapproving
mothers and their children. Chris was apt to just ignore them, but
Tristan appeared to be feeling much more playful; he turned to one
middle-aged woman with dark brown hair and promptly told her, “Feel
free to keep staring, but if you want a show, we're going to charge.
A lot,” which worked effectively in forcing her to walk away.
When the woman had
disappeared, Chris chuckled and asked, “How much is a lot?”
“Enough that
we'd never have to work ever again,” Tristan answered, resting his
hands over Chris's collarbone. Then he lifted one eyebrow and added,
“Or just enough that we could make a living out of doing it.”
“In airport
terminals?”
“Hmm, perhaps
we'll have to upgrade to something more luxurious in time.”
They shared a
laugh and one more goodbye, then Chris set off on his own. As he sat
down in his seat on the plane, it hit him just how lonely he was
bound to be for the next month. Thinking about loneliness was one
thing – and bad enough – but actually having to live the feeling
was much worse. He thought about the irony, how he would probably be
surrounded by a lot of people – the plane's seats were already
nearly all occupied – and yet he may as well have been locked up in
an empty room. If he were a poet, he thought, this experience should
give him plenty of inspiration; unfortunately, he couldn't even
fathom writing at the moment. He started a countdown in his head of
how much time was left until his return.
The subject hardly
left his mind. That night, as Chris mused on the fact that it had
been almost a full twenty-four hours since he had seen his son, he
was struck with an idea. For almost every night of the next month he
was scheduled to do a book reading or some other sort of similar
event, yet he still had plenty of free time to spare. Why not use the
time productively?
He pulled a blank
paper from his suitcase (he had figured that bringing along a
notebook and pen would be smart, despite his earlier lack of
motivation) and began to jot down several ideas and little sketches
to go along with them. Within an hour he had an entire storyline
planned out for what was to be a small children's book, a book which
he would write, print, and perhaps even illustrate himself and then
present to Ty as a gift. It was brilliant, really. Ty would
absolutely love it. Chris was getting excited just thinking about the
little five-year-old's reaction.
“Daddy,” Ty
would say, eyes as large as saucers, “you made a book just for me?”
Chris would tell him that yes, the book was made just for him. Ty
would jump around a bit and ask to be read to. He would probably talk
about it for ages afterward.
There was only one
small problem, which was that Chris couldn't draw to save his life.
Even the sketches he had drawn on the page were horrendous. He
thought back to Ty's crayon drawings of the two of them and decided
that Ty was probably a much better artist than he could ever hope to
be.
He considered his
options: The book didn't really need illustrations, did it? He
had read loads of books to Ty that contained no illustrations
whatsoever. One more picture-less book wouldn't make a difference. Or
he could always find someone else to create the illustrations for the
book. The book might feel less personal then, though.
Unless, of course,
he were to give the job to someone he was close to.
Chris sat up
straight and reached for the phone at his bedside. He wasn't sure how
much the hotel charged per call, and he didn't know if the number was
considered long-distance, but neither mattered to him at that moment.
He held the receiver in one hand and with the other he dialed. The
other line started ringing and he held his breath as he waited for
his brother to answer.
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