That One Dream
DEP Story Prompt 29 of 52
This ends better than it starts. Way better.
I decided early that I didn’t want children. I had learned from my parents. As the oldest of four boys, I was expected to watch over them whenever our parents ditched us, wherever they ditched us.
Have you ever sat through four back-to-back screenings of Oklahoma in French? I have. I think I was eight. I also watched a documentary on Ike & Tina Turner several times in a Casablanca cinema where a spilled bag of popcorn caused a stampede of rats.
My brothers and I wandered Copenhagen’s Tivoli Gardens for a whole day when the place was closed. Beyond count were the occasions we stood outside a restaurant or cafe in London or Paris or Barcelona waiting while our parents took a break.
See where I’m going with this?
My soulmate came with a daughter, which was fine, because it meant I could be a casual parent, enjoying the perks and avoiding the responsibilities. Everyone liked the arrangement.
A decade later, my partner announced she was pregnant. Now, I had grown into being a stepdad and was comfortable with it so we chose to expand our family. I did the classes, attended all the appointments, and lied about not seeing him in the ultrasounds.
I promised to be in the delivery room, and I was, though I still missed the birth because it took less time than my getting properly gowned. I caught up with my son in the nursery, counted his fingers and toes, and added his grandfather’s name because the resemblance was uncanny.
Don’t Ever Do That. Ever. No Matter How Badly You Want To. Ever.
Talk about a can of worms and resentments. More on this later.
My son was colicky due to I’m not sure what, but it meant I spent a lot of the next four months tapping his back as we sat in a rocking chair. I was fine with it because we bonded in a way that was entirely new to me.
That’s when the fear started. My partner sat me down and just laid it out there. “I’m pregnant again.”
This was my worst nightmare and for good reason. My oldest sibling was eleven months younger than I, so for a month each year we were the same age and my authority went out the window. I was still responsible for him, but he ignored anything I said.
Nor was that all. I worried my bond with my son was at risk. Did I have room to— could I — love another child as much, would I be forced to love my son less, and what about favouritism (which was what caused my parents’ breakup)?
I loved my stepdaughter (and still do), but we were more like great friends rather than father-daughter.
I was a mess, and worse by the day. Terrified didn’t even begin to cut it. Then, about a week before my second son was due, I had a dream.
Nicolae Ceaușescu and his wife were deposed as Romania’s tyrannical dictators in December 1989, and executed on Christmas Day. Thereafter, stories of their depredations and the conditions they imposed on hospitals and in particular, orphanages were unending.
My dream took place in Romania, in a bombed-out and abandoned hospital and I was searching for my son. I could hear him as I tracked through blood pools and discarded medical equipment, down flight after flight of stairs and along eternal corridors.
And then I came to a room with a tattered curtain for a door, and behind it was my son, standing in a crib, screaming. I grabbed him and turned to leave when I caught movement in another bed.
There was another baby boy and I could not — would not — leave him, and I did not. That was how I met my second son and knew everything would be fine.
And I was able to placate both my mother and my father-in-law when it came to names. Still, never use family names if you can help it.
Read DR Rawson - The Possibilist’s post about upcoming contests