Page 55 of Little Boy Toy

The next day, Kendry brought over more of his things, including a couple of boxes of toys. I helped him unpack them and let him place them all over the house wherever he wanted them. He was so excited he couldn’t stop bouncing around from room to room.

He took a smaller box and rushed into the master bath. I followed.

Inside the box were a set of rubber duckies, a big one and seven little ones, all classic yellow. He had little red sailboats and whales and a pink, plastic pig.

“Do pigs swim?” I asked.

“Of course!”

I was okay with that.

He looked up at me. “Can we have a bath now?”

“We?”

“Yes! You’re going to join me, right?”

I was here to learn. “Show me how it works for you. What you like.”

“It’s easy. And fun. It takes away all my stress. It will for you, too.”

“Okay, then. Let’s have a bath together.” It was late in the day, but not yet time for dinner. We had plenty of time.

“I’ll show you how.” He became very much the little teacher in that moment. “First, we need to wipe all the dust off the rim.”

I laughed, grabbed some towels and wetted them in the sink.

Kendry put his hands on his hips and shook his head. “The tub has a faucet, you know.”

“Oh. Of course.” I grinned.

Together, we gave the entire tub a good wipe down.

“Turn on the water now,” Kendry said.

On my knees, I drew the bath awkwardly. I didn’t plug the drain until I realized the water was all running out. And I didn’t test the temperature enough, so a lot of hot water was going in. Not my fault. Kendry hadn’t told me any of that.

He was a very patient teacher, showing me how to test the water, how to plug the drain. He grabbed a large plastic bottle from his box.

“This is bubble bath. You can’t have a real bath without bubbles,” he informed me.

“I see.”

He handed me the bottle. “Click it open and squirt the soap in the water.”

I poured in a little bubble bath. Only a few bubbles formed. Disappointing.

Kendry took the bottle from me and gently spoke. “Here. Like this.” He showed me how much to put in. It was a generous amount. Thousands of bubbles started forming, turning the surface fluffy and white in seconds.

Then, Kendry adjusted the water again himself until it wasn’t too hot or too cool. He smiled at me. “Next come the toys.”

He began tossing in the boats and duckies. Everything went in and started floating among the thick white bubbles.

“I like the water deep,” he said.

“Not too deep,” I countered. “I’m going to displace a lot of it.”

“Oh, that’s right.” He looked me up and down. “You’ll take up a lot of space.”

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