Once I ease him onto the couch, I lay everything out on the table. “Okay. Open them.”
He does as I ask, looking from me to the table. His expression shifts from curiosity to confusion.
On the table sits a small, polished wooden box. It’s the kind that might hold a watch or other knicknack. And next to the box, laid out in a row, are three items: his apartment key, his car key, and the fob for his building’s laundry room.
His head tilts. He looks from the keys to my face and back again. The confusion deepens, clouding into something like worry.
“I… I don’t understand. Are you giving these back to me? Did I leave them here? I’m sorry.” His voice is small.
My heart cracks. Of course, his first instinct is to assume he’s in trouble. “No, pretty boy. You didn’t leave them. I took them from your jacket earlier.”
Now he looks truly alarmed.
“You took my keys? Why would you…”
A look of horror washes over his features. His breath hitches.
“Are you asking me to move out? Is this because of the other day? With the smart mouth? I’ve been good, I promise, I won’t do it again.”
“Whoa, whoa, pretty boy. Stop.” I step forward and take his face in my hands, forcing him to look at me. “Look at me. Breathe. You are getting this so very backward. This is not a ‘go away.’ This is the absolute opposite of a ‘go away.’ Do you understand?”
I try to pour out every ounce of my love into my gaze.
He shakes his head, a tear escaping and tracing a path down his cheek. I catch it with my thumb. “No. I don’t.”
I release his face and pick up the wooden box. My own hands aren’t entirely steady. “Open the box.”
With a hesitant glance at me, he takes it. The latch clicks softly. He lifts the lid.
Inside, nestled on a bed of dark-green velvet is a single slip of paper. It says: Move in with Daddy?
If he says yes, then I’ll pull the key from my pocket to give to him. It’s the key to this apartment. To what would become our home.
He stares at it for another long second. The gears are turning, his beautiful, bewildered head. He looks at his old keys on thetable. He looks at the paper in the box. He looks up at me, his eyes wide.
Deciding to put him out of his misery, I tell him my thoughts.
“I don’t want you to have to drive twenty minutes to do your laundry. I don’t want you to retreat when you need ‘big space.’ I want to be your space. All of it. The Little space and the big space and every space in between. Your lease is up next month. Don’t renew it.”
I take his left hand. Pulling the key from my pocket, I press it into his palm.
“I want you to come home and usethiskey. Every single day. I want you in dinosaur pajamas waiting while I cook dinner. I want your plushies to stage a full-scale invasion. Move in with me. Officially. Let this be your home.”
The silence stretches between us. He remains still, as if he’s sorting through each word I’ve said to make sure I’m being honest. It takes everything I have to stop myself from trying to convince him further.
My patience is rewarded a moment later when the confusion melts away to reveal a glorious smile. “You’re asking me to live with you?”
“I’m telling you I want you to live with me,” I correct gently. “But yes. That’s the question. Will you? Will you come home to me, every day?”
Instead of answering, he launches himself at me, throwing his arms around my neck and burying his face in the crook of my shoulder. I hold him, one hand cradling the back of his head, feeling the soft strands of his hair, the other wrapped firmly around his back.
This is my answer. I don’t need the words to know he wants the same future as me.
All too soon, he pulls back. “Yes, Daddy. I will move in and bring my army of stuffies.”
The relief I feel is instant. I kiss him softly at first, then deeper, pouring all my love into it. I need him to not just hear, but to also feel how much he means to me.
“But,” he starts, a flicker of his bratty side returning after our kiss, “what if I’m messy? What if I leave a mess everywhere?”
