"Yes. That would be great. Thanks," Sam said. "See you soon."
As he hung up, Wyatt could swear that Sam sounded as happy as Wyatt felt. And as soon as the boys found out about the trip into town, they were too.
They all met up with Sam in front of the café, and Wyatt noticed that all of them together made for a pretty big group. "Are you sure all of us visiting won't be too much for Mr. Jasper?" he wondered.
"Hmm. I don't know," Sam said. "His place is small."
"How about if you take the dogs to visit Mr. Jasper, and the boys and I will take the opportunity to do some shopping. We have two dogs. We need more dog food. That OK with you?" he asked the boys and they both nodded. "We'll get some food for us too and go have a picnic lunch somewhere. How does that sound? And maybe Sam can come with us. He does love a picnic." Wyatt looked at Sam and hoped he wasn't pressuring him.
Sam smiled tentatively, but his pretty, gray eyes brightened at the invitation. Wyatt considered that a good sign. After a moment Sam accepted with a nod. "OK. I'll let Mrs. Del Rio know that I'm taking my lunch break right after I get done with this delivery." Sam took charge of the dogs and went off to deliver Mr. Jasper's lunch.
That left Wyatt and the boys free to get some shopping done. Soon there was dog food and stuff from the deli in their cart. They couldn't get any frozen breakfast food, so Wyatt steered them to the cereal aisle.
As they passed by a display of doughnuts, he was considering picking up something sweet for their picnic when he realized it should have been the boys who clamored for dessert.
In fact they hadn't asked for anything sweet or any snacks or anything at all. The last time they went shopping, they didn't ask for anything either.
Wyatt would have expected to have to say no to them at least a few times. He wondered if they weren't comfortable enough with him to ask for anything.
Rather than guess, he decided to let the boys tell him the reason. "How come you didn't ask me to buy you anything?"
"We're not supposed to ask," Riley said.
"No?" Wyatt said as they stopped in the middle of the cereal aisle.
"We're only supposed to ask Mom and Dad to buy us stuff, not anybody else," DJ said and his chin started to quiver as he blinked to try and hold back tears.
Riley's eyes filled with tears as well, and his little face scrunched up as he got ready to cry. It was such an odd thing to make them feel the loss of their parents, the closest people to them, the ones they could turn to for anything.
Wyatt keeled down in front of them right there in the middle of the grocery store aisle. He put his arms around both boys and told them, "You have me now. I'm your uncle and you can ask me anything."
The boys rested their little heads on his shoulders and nodded, sniffling as he rubbed their backs. Wyatt held them for a bit then he pulled back so he could look at them. They were teary eyed as they blinked at him.
He cupped both their faces and told them, "I'm always here for you. Whatever you need, you can come to me. And if you see anything you like, you can ask me to buy it. Just know I might say no." He said it with a smile and the boys nodded. "So is there anything here that you want?"
Turning all around, Riley found something and pointed. They were in the cereal aisle so he zeroed in on a colorful, fruity cereal. It wasn't the healthy kind they had at home.
"We can get that. But we won't have it all the time. That can be our special cereal. Go and get it," he told Riley who eagerly ran over, grabbed the big box and carried it back to the cart. Wyatt turned from his big grin to DJ, who looked pleased. "Now it's your turn. When you see something you want, let me know."
DJ didn't ask for anything in the breakfast aisle, but a little later, he pointed at a tray of brownies.
"Those are perfect. I was thinking we should get something sweet for our picnic with Sam. And we have a dog named Brownie. Great idea, DJ," Wyatt told him, and the brownies went into the cart too.
"We should get ingredients," DJ told him.
"Ingredients for what?" Wyatt asked.
"For Sam," DJ said.
"So he can teach us how to cook something. Maybe we will. I like how you think," Wyatt told him. They couldn't get any meat though, so they got some rice and pasta and picked out some fresh vegetables that Wyatt wouldn't have a clue what to do with.
With their shopping bags full, the kids couldn't wait to show Sam what they got. When they met up with him, he was duly impressed.
"You guys did some serious shopping," Sam said as he looked into their bags with approval.
"This means we'll need your help to cook this stuff," Wyatt pointed out to him. "How did the visit go?"
Sam smiled down at the dogs. "These two were pretty well behaved. Mr. Jasper was happy to see them. He recognized Brownie. He said he tried to get her to come to him a bunch of times, but she wouldn't. I told him the secret was our meatloaf sandwiches, but he said you must have the magic touch," Sam said and he grinned at Wyatt.
