Page 71 of The Doctor's Surprise Family

Iopened my eyes as I usually did, a few minutes shy of six a.m. The first thing I did was stretch out my foot, to bump up on Claire’s foot as she slept beside me. Most mornings, she slept through that, but this morning, she woke. She smiled and stretched and rose up on one elbow, and the second she did, a door slammed down the hall. Footsteps came pounding, slapping on wood, then our door flew open and Oli charged in.

“Dad! Dad, wake up! It’s morning already, and I can’t find my shoes!”

“Whoa, hey, hey buddy.” I groaned and sat up. “You don’t need your shoes yet. You’ve still got hours.”

Oli jumped on the bed. “But school starts at eight! And Mike’s dad’ll be here by seven thirty. And it’s six already, so that’s, uh… that’s…” He counted on his fingers. “Less than two hours.”

“Your shoes are downstairs,” said Claire, rubbing her eyes. “I took them to polish them, so it’s okay. You’re fine.”

Oli tugged on my arm. “Come on, Dad. Get up!”

I threw off the covers. “Okay, I’m up. You pumped for school?”

Oli bounced on the balls of his feet. “Adam says we get cubbies to keep all our stuff. Not lockers, though. Only the big kids get lockers.”

“Cubbies are better, if you ask me,” said Claire. “Nothing worse than a lock when you’re too tired to focus, and you’re spinning that little dial, and you’re one number off…” She covered a yawn. “Could you grab his breakfast while I deal with this?”

It took me a moment to twig to what “this” was: Oli had dressed himself for his first day of school. He’d done a fine job, in the sense his clothes were on straight. His buttons and zippers were all done up right. But he’d picked out a bright orange dinosaur shirt, with a yellow vest over it, then bright blue pants. His socks were the ones he’d won a while back, at the ring toss at the county fair. They had little bells on them that chimed when he walked.

“I’ll make pancakes,” I said. “Blueberry, if you’re good.” I hoped that’d be enough incentive he’d get changed in peace, and I guessed it was, because I didn’t hear any yelling. Twenty minutes later, he came shuffling downstairs, long-faced in gray slacks and a button-down shirt. I saw Claire had let him keep his fun socks.

“You look amazing,” I said.

Oli stuck out his lower lip. “I look boring.”

“You look like a big kid, all ready for school.”

Claire grabbed a plate for him, and a couple of pancakes. She plunked them down in front of him. “Syrup or jam?”

“Syrup on one, then jam on the other.”

Claire poured his syrup, then spooned out his jam. She poured him some orange juice and frowned at his plate.

“Careful with those blueberries, with your nice new shirt.”

I mouthed a quick “sorry,” but Claire just smiled. She mussed up Oli’s hair, then smoothed it back into place. She was as excited as he was for his first day of school, but I could see from her fidgeting, she was nervous as well. And if I was honest, so was I. In about forty minutes, we’d hand over our baby, and he’d be in the school’s care for seven whole hours. A lot could happen in one hour, let alone seven. Oli could scrape his knees. Learn bad words. Lose his new pencil case. Flush his belt down the toilet. No teacher could watcheverykid every damn minute.

“Hey, Oli?”

He looked up.

“What do you do if you ever get lost?”

Oli rolled his eyes at me,yeah, okay, Dad, but he chewed and swallowed and set down his fork. “I find an adult,” he said. “Tell them our number.”

Claire bit her lip. “And what’s our address?”

Oli sighed, but he rattled off our new address — just two doors down, as it happened, from our old one. We’d moved twice since I transferred back to the States, first to Claire’s parents’ guesthouse, then a place of our own. Claire’s neighbors had moved out and we’d moved in, and I’d put up a swing set in the backyard. It would be weird to look out there later this morning and not see Oli playing on the swings, or perched on the slide reading a book.

Claire came up behind me and leaned on my back. “I never believed Mom when she said they grow up too fast. I couldn’twait, in his colic phase, for him to grow past that. Buthowis he five? Going to school?”

“We could have more,” I said. “Start the clock back again.”

Claire smacked my arm, but her smile was back. She watched Oli eating, neat as could be, leaning over his plate to catch any drips. “One more, maybe. In a couple of years. And if you think you’re exempt from those three a.m. feedings?—”

“I don’t think that.”

“We’ll make a schedule,” said Claire. “Stagger our shifts.”

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