A Missed Opportunity

25

✧𝙽𝚘𝚊𝚑✧

There's only two weeks left until Christmas, and my son is slowly losing his mind. He wants to know what the presents under the tree are, and he wants to know now.

It's gotten so bad that, apparently, most of the time the presents are hidden until they have company. Then the presents get put out but only for decoration. What torture that must be for the poor kid.

Lucky for him, his mom counts me as company. I come over often, weekdays or not. All of his toys and things are here, so unless we're having a sleepover, I'm usually here. And while I am here, those presents sit out in the open for him to squint dramatically at while he tries to envision what's behind the thin sheet of paper wrapped around each one.

I feel bad for the kid, so I give him one present early when I come around tonight. With his mom's permission, of course. It was surprisingly hard to convince her to let me give it to him early, but I managed after I told her I was taking her boyfriend out on a date tonight and wanted a little bit of joy before I do. She huffed and puffed about it, but told me I could do it. She also told me he wasn't her boyfriend, but whatever. By the looks of things, he will be soon anyway.

But anyway, Cameron is ecstatic when I hand him a little box wrapped mostly with tape. Kiara gasps in horror when she sees proof of my wrapping skills. And she grimaces the entire time Cam struggles excitedly with the tape and paper. Ultimately, I take pity and reach for my pocket knife and the box. He insists on doing it himself with my knife, but I ignore him and just cut some of the tape before handing it back to him so he can open it himself still.

Once Cameron finally has the wrapping paper off, he goes on to gasp loudly at the box before him. Then scoop it up, shoot up from his spot on the ground, and hold the box above his head like it's the treasure he's been searching for his whole life.

He ruins that picture pretty quick though.

"Big boy walkie talkie!"

"...Yeah." I sigh. Kiara giggles to herself while we sit here and watch him scratch desperately at the box. "Okay, okay, let me see." I chuckle and reach out for it. He hands it over quick. He doesn't even argue with me about the knife, waiting anxiously for me to hand the open box over.

"Yes!" He celebrates the new walkie talkies he now has. These ones don't have SpongeBob on them though. Instead, his is orange and mine is hopefully blue—unless he steals it from me—and we'll be able to reach each other from our own places. I'm not far from them, but I'm still not a hundred percent sure it'll work completely all the time. Maybe not. It's worth a shot though.

Talking to him on his moms phone when I can't be around is fine and all—I mean, she gives us privacy and isn't floating around in the background while I'm just trying to talk to our son, but still. I guess it's more like the convenience of it for us all. Kiara doesn't get her phone taken away from her and we don't have to coordinate some random time through the day where she for sure won't need her phone.

What we're doing now works for us, but Kiara agreed that these are worth a shot. Neither of us think Cam's ready for a phone yet. We're both still a little iffy on when that will be though, honestly. She says fifteen. I think by thirteen, it might be a little depressing for the poor kid in a classroom of kids who already at least have something more than a tablet.

We'll see.

Cameron's grin is wide and uncontrollable. He hugs the blue one to his chest and holds the orange one out to me, already aware of what we can use these for. I smile to myself as I reach for the one that I silently told myself would be his. But I think I always knew that's not how it would for sure go. I knew he'd take the one he wanted and there would be nothing I could do to argue about it.