Sammie & Budgie Read online

  "Daddy, can I ask you a question?"

  "Sure, but you don't have to keep saying, 'Can I ask you a question?' Just ask me the question."

  "OK. Daddy, can I get a pet?"

  The elevator bell dinged and the door opened. Sammie grabbed my hand and we walked out of the elevator together. His little hand fit perfectly inside my hand. At some point, "Careless Whisper" morphed into a tinkly instrumental version of "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" by Cyndi Lauper.

  "A pet? What kind of pet?" I said, squeezing his little hand gently.

  "A bird!"

  "What?! A bird?" We stopped and he looked up at me, his face shining with childish enthusiasm, his eyes aglow with sparkles and reflections from the fluorescent lights in the ceiling in his line of view above my head. He looked hypnotized.

  "Yeah, a budgerigar! I want a budgie!"

  "Birds are smelly and messy," I said, a little annoyed. We continued walking after I quickly dismissed his request.

  "Budgie! Budgie! Budgie! That's what I would name it. Budgie!"

  "I'll think about it."

  "You always say that. And when you say, 'I'll think about it,' then that always means no."

  "I'll think about it," I said, smiling.

  "Daddy! Quit saying that!"

  We found a reception counter that looked like the place to check-in but it wasn't stationed by anyone. So rather than continue into areas of the hospital we weren't sure we could walk into, we waited for someone to check us in. Sammie Boy didn't mind. He was full of life.

  "Budgerigars are better known as parakeets. Do you know what a parakeet is?"

  "Yes, Sammie, I know what a parakeet is." I looked around for a nurse or an administrative assistant or somebody but I didn't see anybody. The desk was a deserted, plywood island.

  "Well, that's good," he said. "They are the third most popular pet in the world, behind dogs and cats of course."

  "That's very interesting."

  "I know! Very interesting, indeed." He drew imaginary circles in the rainbow-explosion carpet with the tip of his canvas sneaker. "So, can I get one?"

  "I'll think about it."

  He moaned a BIG sigh and threw his arms against his sides and exclaimed in an exasperated tone, "I'll never get one!" He made it seem like the world was ending, and maybe his little world was ending at that very second. Every disappointment in a child's life is always, and I mean always, monumental. Don't ask me why. It just is. Kids make a big deal about everything.

  "Let's discuss it later," I said, then out of thin air a young woman sat down behind the counter. She was young and brunette and kind of slim (but kind of not) and a little irritated, apparently. The pastel cardigan she wore was a size too small; it squeezed her flesh into a succession of bulging rolls and folds, hills and valleys of overindulgence. She gave me a terse smile, part sincere and part deliberate. A name tag on her shirt said BETH.

  "Can I help you?" she said. She rummaged through some papers and office supplies spread out on the desk.

  "Yes, we'd like to see--what's her name, Sammie?" I said, looking at my boy. He tried to peek over the counter-top, his body stretching as high as his toes could push him, but he only could speak toward the ceiling.

  "Selena! Her name is Say-LEE-nah!"

  "Yes, can we see Selena?" I said, leaning on the counter-top with one elbow, smiling as sincerely as possible.

  "Let me see if she's in our system." She typed furiously on the keyboard of her computer and as she typed, a serious look on her face, I couldn't help but think of the song Beth by the band Kiss, and their ridiculous music video with the band--in full-on makeup and leather outfits and high heels--sitting around a prissy brunette wearing a white, cardigan sweater, the drummer Peter Criss serenading her about how he was staying out late, playing with the boys in the band, not coming home soon, and shit like that. Maybe this Beth in the hospital was mad after her boyfriend's all-nighter, sitting at home stewing because her Peter was out late, drinking with his buddies, having too much fun, and refusing to come home to her like she wanted him to. Maybe she drank too much cheap wine from a box in the refrigerator and put herself to sleep with thoughts of a better man out there, somewhere in the world, and woke up hung-over, drank a quart of coffee before heading to work at the hospital. I bet it's true. She typed some more as we waited.

  "Right, there is a Selena in our system. Are you a family member?"

  I looked at Sammie Boy and he looked at me and I realized that there was a certain protocol to situations like this. We weren't family members. We weren't even close friends of Say-LEE-nah. For all practical purposes, we were just concerned acquaintances, or as some would say, nosey acquaintances. How strange.

  "No, we're not family members. You see, my boy Sammie here, he's in after-school care. And Selena is a counselor at the elementary school. And we were there when she fell down and hurt herself. I was the one that called the ambulance."

  "I see," Beth said, still pouty and unconcerned. Her boyfriend must have done a number on her the night before. I could tell. She was pretty annoyed. "Well, only family members and loved ones can go back and see patients. You'll just have to wait out here."

  "OK," I said, looking at Sammie. "Let's go have a seat, son."

  We found a seat nearby. I sat down and patted my legs for Sammie to sit on them. He flopped on my lap and wrapped his arms around my neck. He was a cute, little son-of-a-bitch, he was! And I say that with the deepest affection because it's true. I loved my boy with all my heart and his mother was an absolute bitch. But no worries, I'll get into that later. I squeezed my boy tightly.

  "Is she going to be all right, Daddy?" he said, a distressed look on his face.

  "I bet she'll be just fine. She's in the right place."

  "All the doctors and nurses will take care of her?"

  "Yep."

  "They won't let her die or anything like that?"

  "I hope not."

  "Daddy," he said, perking up. "Maybe if I write Selena a note, then that grouchy lady at the desk will give it to her. Do you think she'll do that?"

  "I don't know but you can try."

  "OK!"

  On a side table next to our chair was a cup filled with pens with 'VIAGRA' scrawled on their shafts as well as a pad of paper with 'PRILOSEC' emblazoned at the top. Good ol' Sammie Boy grabbed a pen and the pad of paper and earnestly wrote a quick note to his counselor--a sweet, sentimental note that said how worried he was for her and that he hoped she was all right and not hurt and how sorry he was for knowing that she was going to hurt herself. When I saw him write that, I tapped him on the shoulder and advised that he erase that part. I didn't want him incriminating himself in any way but I appreciated his thoughtfulness. He erased the 'knowing that she was going to hurt herself' part and signed the note, 'Love, Sammie.'

  "Can I give this to the lady at the desk to give to Selena?"

  I nodded and watched Sammie run over to Beth, her scowl turning into a sweet, closed-mouth smile. Even a sourpuss like jaded Beth couldn't resist the charms of my cute kid. Sammie gave her the note and whispered some instructions into her ear. Beth stood up and walked away while good ol' Sammie Boy returned to my lap. He was very happy and pleased with himself.

  "She said she'd give it to Selena," he said, smiling, beaming with pride.

  "Good. Do you feel better now?"

  "Yes, I just hope she's all right."

  We sat there for a few, quiet moments, Sammie swinging his legs back and forth, my arms around my little boy. He sure was special, all right, not just in the special needs way, but in a kind-spirited way. A lot of kids his age, kids that are in the third or fourth grade, their personalities were starting to curdle, starting to turn into something less kind, less child-like. They wanted to be teenagers. They wanted to be more grown-up. They liked to cuss, learned about sexy things from their siblings, and watched TV shows with violence and foul language and kids behaving badly and stuff like that. But not my Sammie. He was as innocen
t as could be, with a pure heart and pure intention. He was a really good kid. It's true.

  "Daddy?" he said.

  "Yes, my boy?"

  "Can I draw on that paper while we wait?"

  "Sure," I said, giving him the Viagra pen and the Prilosec pad of paper. With his tongue curling through his pursed lips, he hunched over the pad of paper and doodled a little bird flying through the air, a circle for a sun and three bumpy clouds high above the tiny avian creature. He drew what looked like a letter 'B' on the bird's chest.

  "What's the 'B' stand for?" I said, curious about his letter choice, when Beth walked back toward us with a piece of paper in her hand. When she got to where we sat, she knelt down in front of us and handed Sammie the piece of paper. Her sour disposition was gone, replaced by a sweet demeanor that I didn't see there before. Maybe Beth didn't have such a bad night after all.

  "I shouldn't be doing this but here's a note from Selena. You're a sweet boy!" She patted him on the head and went back to her desk.

  Sammie smiled at me and said, "Can I read it, Daddy?" I nodded and this is what the note said:

  Thank you for checking on me, Sammie. You're a good kid and my favorite of all the kids in after-school care! I have epilepsy and I had a seizure. I'm sorry that it scared you but it's something I have to deal with all the time. Please don't worry, Sammie. I'll probably see you back at the school next week. Take care and be good, Selena.

  "She's going to be all right," Sammie said. He folded the note and put it in his pocket along with the Popsicle stick.

  "That's good," I said, placing him on his feet. "We need to go pickup your sister from taekwondo."

  "Do we have to?" Sammie said, whining. "Can't she just walk home?!"

  "No, she can't just walk home."

  "Why not?"

  "Because that would make me a bad parent."

  "You're not a bad parent. You're the best daddy, EVER!"

  "Ever?" I said.

  "Forever and ever!"

  "That's a very long time."

  "I know! Daddy, can I get Budgie on the way home?"

  "No, not today."

  "PLEASE!"

  I grabbed good ol' Sammie Boy's hand and we walked over the rainbow explosion, leaving grouchy Beth and poor Selena behind, leaving the erectile-dysfunctional pens and the acid-reflux pads of paper on the table, and out of the hospital and back to our normal life. We found my car and hopped in, ready to retrieve Sammie's sister and possibly buy ice cream or hamburgers or tacos.

  I couldn't help but think that this day would turn out like that, what, with Sammie's counselor hitting the deck, being rushed to the emergency room, and me and my boy spending an hour or so in a dreary hospital. Being a parent to a special kid leads to very unexpected things in very unexpected ways. It's true.

  Chapter Two

  I had an evening ritual with my kids that I held close to my heart. It was something my therapist came up with to help ease the solemn feeling over dinner we experienced the first few weeks after moving into my apartment, our new home following my divorce from their mother then, later, her unexpected death. I know; sounds pretty goddamn tragic, right? I'll get into that sad story later. But it was a hard adjustment for all of us, going from living in a large two-story, suburban home to a small two-bedroom apartment in a decent apartment complex outside of our neighborhood. During the divorce, their mother and I couldn't agree on what to do with our family home. So, beyond any discussions of what would be best for good ol' Sammie boy and his sister Jessie, we had to sell our home, the solution to all of our typical procedural squabbling. Their mother moved in with her full-of-shit-salesman boyfriend. I rented a two-bedroom apartment with a full-dining room and a garage. It was the largest place I could afford and the only sane option for me after the financial disaster of divorce. The idea of being crushed under a new mortgage was not very appealing to me. An apartment was not very appealing either but it was the best I could do at the time.

  Anyway, once we moved into my apartment and got used to our new schedule based on the elaborate, custody mathematics in the decree, the three of us had family dinners together in a new home with our new family dynamic. It was glaringly apparent that there were three of us instead of four and the new eating configuration was strange, indeed, for all of us. Like I said, a solemn cloud would set over dinner, which made it difficult to enjoy our time together, let alone just chew our food. It was brutal! I mean, there were no proclamations of bon appétit or c'est la vie or whatever at dinner, that's for sure. It's true.

  After a few of these dreadfully sour dinners, I discussed what I could do to lift the solemn cloud with my therapist, Charlotte. She had been my therapist ever since their mother and I separated, which was something like three years before, and after a few minutes of deep reflection, she said to me, "School is a very stressful time for your children. It's a long day for kids that age. And then there is the added stress of living in a new home. And their mother is dead. So, rather than start a conversation like, 'How was your day?' you should ask them something more specific like, 'Tell me something silly that happened to you today?'"

  I thought this was a fun idea! Charlotte was full of fun ideas like this one. I eventually worked this routine into our nightly dinners. One night, I turned to Jessie, my daughter. Normally, she was a vivacious kid--full of life. But her sour disposition drooped down her face and almost seemed to drip onto her plate of chicken nuggets and macaroni and cheese; she looked that sad! I felt really bad for her but I was determined to lift the mood in our apartment. I put Charlotte's fun suggestion into action.

  "So," I said, plopping my palms on the dining room table-top. The sudden noise of my hands hitting the wood startled my poor, little kids. It was like they awoke from a deep sleep, groggy and limp-lidded. "Tell me something silly that happened today."

  "At school?" she said, unsure of what I was trying to get at.

  "No, on Mars. Yes, at school! Were you somewhere else today?" I said, closing one eye and focusing my open eye on her like a pirate peering through a scallywag's unkempt uniform and deep into her troubled soul.

  "Oh, OH, YES! This girl, in my class, her name is Christina. She loves to drink chocolate milk and she was drinking it and drinking it when that boy Chris, he started telling a joke."

  "Uh huh," I said, nodding while chewing my dinner of chicken nuggets and macaroni and cheese. I know what you're thinking. 'What the fuck?' I usually ate what my kids ate for dinner--peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, mac and cheese, pepperoni pizza, mashed potatoes with gravy--whatever was easiest to make. I mean, I only had enough time in the day to cook and whatever my kids were eating was what I was going to be eating. It's that simple. I looked at Sammie Boy. He wasn't impressed with Jessie's story so far. He rolled his eyes, pushing his food around the plate into new, food pile configurations.

  "I know how this will turn out," he said, then shoveling mac and cheese into his mouth.

  "Son, let her finish. Continue!"

  Sammie harrumphed.

  "It was a 'Knock, Knock' joke. It went something like this." Then she pushed her chair back and stood up, acting out the 'Knock, Knock' joke, holding her clinched fist in the air, ready to rap on an imaginary door. "Knock, knock." She looked at me to answer.

  "Oh, right! 'Who's there?'" I said, perking up.

  "Orange."

  "Orange, who?"

  "Orange you glad I didn't say banana! Then that boy Chris, he had a banana on his lunch tray so he picked it up and he put it in Christina's face, right in front of her face. Then, all of a sudden, chocolate milk shot out of her nose!"

  Good ol' Sammie Boy, he started laughing all over the place, his head went back and he slapped his knee, then he held his stomach cause he was laughing so hard, chunks of half-chewed chicken nuggets shooting from his mouth. I guess her story wasn't so hum-drum after all.

  "I knew you were going to say that but it's still funny, sis."

  "I know!" she said, beaming from the a
pproval of her big brother. It was sweet seeing them laughing and talking and interacting. It was a nice change from the somber dinners from the previous few weeks. She sat back down and continued eating, much more chipper now.

  "What about you?" I said, looking at Sammie. He was still snickering from his sister's story. "That's a hard one to top. Anything silly happen to you today?"

  "Yeah."

  "Then tell us."

  "Well, this boy I know, Dez, he was teaching me how to play this new game. He calls it Thump. It's a game you play with a quarter. Do you know it?"

  "No," I said, eating more mac and cheese, which was actually pretty good, if I say so myself. "I've never heard of that game. How do you play?"

  "Well, do you have a quarter? I'll show you guys if you gimme a quarter."

  I reached in my pocket for some change but didn't have anything in my pockets. I had left the contents of my pockets in a bowl on the kitchen counter after we got home.

  "You'll have to get one from the kitchen."

  "OK. Follow me!" He leapt from his chair, ran around the dining room table, and went into the kitchen, his feet stomping on the apartment floor. He rummaged through the bowl on the counter and found a quarter. He raised it into the air like he found a piece of buried treasure. "Got it! Come here and I'll show you."

  He sat on the kitchen floor then Jessie and I made our way into the kitchen and sat down with him, the three of us in a circle. He propped the quarter on its side and held it up by holding the top of the coin with the tip of his index finger, the profile of George Washington peering in the distance.

  "So, this is how you play Thump! Two people or more sit on the floor and the first one thumps the edge of the quarter to make it spin." Good ol' Sammie Boy flicked the edge of the quarter and it spun in front of him like a miniature dreidel, spinning around in an oval path on the kitchen floor. "Then the next person has to thump the quarter to keep it spinning. Like this." He flicked the quarter again and it kept spinning on its edge, a little wobbly this time but still spinning nonetheless. "If it falls down on someone's turn or they make it fall, they lose."