Stone
I could tell that he was gearing up to play twenty questions, while I just wanted to watch him play. There were brightly printed schedules tucked in laminated sleeves on the table, detailing the various activities offered during the next leg of our journey.
“Have you checked out the bingo car?” I asked when I spotted it on the list.
“I haven’t done anything yet,” he admitted. “I didn’t even realize they had a bingo car, which is sad, because I love bingo. I hope they have awesome prizes. I had to leave most of my stuffies at home because there wouldn’t have been room for anyone to sleep in the bed, even me, if I’d brought them all.”
“I guess that means there isn’t room to add one to the collection if we happen to win,” I said, sighing. “Sad. I love a good bingo game.”
“Who says there isn’t room for more stuffies?" he declared. “There’s always room for more stuffies, especially if they have unicorn ones.”
“Looks like we have our plan for the afternoon then,” I declared.
Knowing the meals were included in the ticket he’d gifted me meant I went ahead and ordered a burger and ate it while he ate his nuggets, daintily dunking them in different sauces, a new one for every bite. He wasn’t messy about it, though, and paused to wipe his fingers whenever he got anything on them. Honey, ranch, sweet and sour, and barbecue sauces were lined up in front of him in a specific order. One dip, one bite, and on down the line he moved, consuming each nugget in four bites before moving on to the next one.
I hardly paid attention to my burger. I was too interested in watching him, the serene look on his face like glimpsing a rainbow peek out from behind a cloud. There was just something about the soft, genuine smile on his face, like he was the luckiest boy in the world to have those nuggets.
“How was your burger?” he asked, burping at the end of his sentence and blushing afterward. “Excuse me.”
“Not bad at all,” I replied. “Though I suspect the nuggets are the yummiest thing on the menu. I might have to order them next time and an assortment of sauces to go with them.”
“You like nuggets?” he asked.
“What’s not to like?” he replied. “Back when my bandmates and I were just getting started, we’d stop at these places that had giant boxes of sliders and family-sized packs of chicken tenders, find a park or some nature center we could pull into and sit at a picnic table or in the back of the van, and share a feast. We could pack those bite sized sliders away too and fight over the dipping sauces like a bunch of toddlers because they never put enough in the bags.”
“Sounds fun,” he said, cocking his head as he studied me. “Your face lights up when you talk about them.”
“Because I miss the rat bast…” I stopped myself before I could finish the word, casting furtive glances around me in the hopes that no one had overheard my near slip-up. Fortunately, we were seated well away from the next occupied table.
The knowing smile he gave me was like an arrow to the heart. He knew what it was like to be lonely and miss people, though I hoped he wasn’t wasting time missing the asshole who’d bailed on him. Maybe I wasn’t as big of a bastard as I thought I was, because I’d never even think about doing to someone what his so-called Daddy did to him.
Even with my limited knowledge of the dynamic, I still understood that there was supposed to be a sacred trust between Daddies and their littles, pets, and the submissives they took care of, that demanded they put the needs and emotional well-being of their partner first. Maybe I was just a vagabond guitar player and not the brightest crayon in the bunch, but it didn’t seem like the man Payden had been waiting for had given any thought to how devastated Payden would be when he didn’t show up. Though he did seem to have bounced back enough to have embraced taking this trip with me. Still, it might be a good idea to pay close attention to how he’s feeling, just in case he was masking his pain as hard as I usually did when I don't want to deal with it.
“Ready for bingo?” I asked once I finished swirling my onion rings around in ranch dressing that tasted like it had been made with real buttermilk.
Yeah, I was getting nugs and onion rings the next time and dunking the fuck out of them.
“Uh-huh,” he replied, doing an adorable shimmy in his seat while he used a wet wipe to finish cleaning his hands.
“Then let’s go see if the numbers will be in our favor this afternoon, little unicorn, or if we’ll be riding off into the sunset with our tails tucked between our legs.”
“You don't have a tail, silly,” he replied, hopping down and taking my hand.
“No, but you do,” I reminded him, carefully scooping it up and draping it over my arm, even if it wasn’t long enough to reach the floor. I stroked the pretty colors and watched his face light up even more. “And it’s way too stunning to be tucked and hidden as you slink out of a train car.”
It felt good to hear him giggle all the way out the door.
“You like words, don’t you?” he said as we passed from one car to the next. “I can tell by the way you put them together.”
“I love stringing together the lyrics of songs, though I guess you could say that some border on poetry, since there’s no music to them yet and I don’t know if there ever will be. You must like words too to work as a journalist.”
“They’re fun,” he replied. “And I love getting to share the events I attend and the conversations I have with others so that even if they weren’t there, it feels like they were a part of it.”
“Songs are the same way,” I said as we reached the bingo car. “No matter how personal the experience was, there’s always a way to write it so others can relate.”
“Whoa, look at all the prizes!” He declared, pointing to the table at the far side of the car that was so filled with a colorful assortment of toys, stuffies, and baskets that they practically blacked out the windows.
“We’d better hurry and get our cards so we can try to win a few of them, then,” I encouraged and ushered him over to the table, where we were presented with a dozen bingo cards and our choice of assorted, colorful bingo markers.
