Julia Fierro - Cutting Teeth

“Here’s my philosophy,” Rip said, his voice hushed, as if it was a secret. “It’s simple. Kids are kids. They don’t know what the hell they’re doing, and it’s our job to teach them. So they can go out into the real world someday and be functioning members of society. This”—he lifted his fingers in quotes—“ we-got-to-share-everything rule is BS. Who shares everything in real life? The very opposite is the way life rolls!”

Michael nodded. “Totally. You’re preaching to the choir, man.”

“So why do we expect our kids to act more grown-up than grown-ups? Why do we get P-I-S-S-E-D when they freak out?”

Rip was excited now, as if something truly wise was flowing from him. He straightened his back, and the canoe rocked gently from side to side. “What kind of unpredictable world is that for a kid? It’s psychologically traumatic, if you ask me. Like, Oh, hey, Tommy, I know that’s your most favorite car ever, but this kid here, who we don’t even know, is bawling his eyes out, and so you got to hand it over. Give it up. For the good of spoiled children everywhere. That’s just crazy.”

Michael leaned over and squeezed Rip’s shoulder. So hard it felt good.

“You got a good daddy here,” Michael said, looking down at Hank. “You’re a lucky boy.”

“Yep,” Hank said.

This was it, Rip thought. There couldn’t be any window opened wider.

“Thanks, man,” Rip said. “You saying that means a lot to me. ’Cause I think you’re an awesome dad, too.”

Hank’s small, whining voice interrupted him, “Daddy? Daddy. I have to make a peepee.” Hank clutched at the crotch of his swimsuit.

“Hold on, buddy,” Rip said, patting Hank on the shoulder. “We’re heading home real soon.” And then to Michael, “It means a lot, ’cause I’m in this total dilemma with Grace. Maybe you could help me out?”

“Sure. Anything I can do,” Michael said as he turned to face front, gripping the paddle and lowering it into the still, blue water.

Rip sighed. “I appreciate that. ’Cause here’s the situation. There’s nothing I want more in the world than…”

Michael interrupted him, “Why don’t you get that paddle in the water, okay? We’ll talk on the way home. It’s getting dark.”

“And dark-time,” Harper said, peeking around her father, her little fingers doing a creepy-crawly movement in front of her face toward a wide-eyed Hank, “Dark is when witches and monsters come.”

“Daddy?” Hank mumbled, pressing into Rip’s stomach as he backed away from Harper.

“Harper, sweetie, please don’t scare Hank,” Rip said. “So, like I told you, Michael. There’s nothing I … And we. Grace, too,” he lied. “There’s nothing we want more than a brother or sister for Hank. Like I said yesterday, on the deck”—he laughed nervously—“we have to use a D-O-N-O-R to get this show on the road. And, ugh, she hated going through the whole process at the clinic.”

Michael grunted. “Man, the current is fierce back here. I can’t get the boat to move an inch.”

Rip continued, “I’m cool with it, but it creeps Grace out, you know.”

“Are you paddling?”

Michael’s back arched, and Rip could see the effort he was using. The taut lines of his upper arm muscles gleamed in the alien blue light.

Rip started to paddle, and the resistance almost yanked it from his hands.

“It’s like we’re stuck,” Rip said. “Oh yeah, so”—he paused, trying to find the best way to explain what was a stomach-roiling humiliation, that his wife wasn’t just antibaby, but that he was starting to suspect she was antihim—“you think you could help me out? With Grace? ’Cause I’m at a loss, man.”

Michael lifted the paddle and held it aloft, water dripping from it, cold and black. Michael sat unmoving, his head bent forward, until Hank turned to look up at Rip. The soft down on his son’s cheek glowed.

“What’s wrong, Daddy?” Hank asked, and Rip could hear the terror in his boy’s voice, which sent a shiver of unease through Rip’s gut.

“Michael?” Rip said. “What’s up?”

“Are you asking me,” Michael said, so quietly Rip had to lean forward to hear, “what I think you are? You. Me. Grace”—his voice dropped to a whisper—“and a turkey baster?” Michael laughed, but there was an ugly kink in it. “Maybe a few scented candles and Sade on the iPod?”

It took a moment for Rip to understand. Did Michael think he’d been suggesting a threesome? To squeeze some sperm out of Michael like he was a reproductive vending machine?

Anxiety thrummed in Rip’s chest as he looked around them; at the still water and the blackening branches above and under and everywhere, like an enchanted forest had closed in around them, and the canoe felt too small and he thought they might be trapped there forever, spinning in lazy circles.

“Let’s get out of here,” Michael said, and spat into the water.

“Ew, Daddy!” Harper said.

“Whoa,” Rip could barely speak. His mouth had gone dry. “Wait. I did not mean that, dude. You’re not hearing me right. Or I wasn’t making myself clear, I mean.”

“I heard you fine,” Michael said. Rip could see the sweat blooming darkly under the back of Michael’s shirt. “You need a”—Michael paused, then finished the sentence as if he had a mouthful of bad food—“D-O-N-O-R.”

“In a clinical setting!” Rip said. “A freaking doctor’s office. Not a bedroom!”

“Do not”—Michael paused—“use language like that around my baby.”

“I didn’t even mean you, ” Rip said. “This is some crazy misunderstanding.”

“We’re done talking about this. Done. Get your”—he looked over his shoulder, and Rip saw the rage in his clenched jaw, but then Michael paused, his eyes moving to Hank in Rip’s lap, and he spelled the next word—“F-U-C-K-I-N-G paddle in the water.”

Rip was too mortified to speak. He was stuck in a boat in the middle of nowhere with a pissed-off dad, possibly drunk and practically a stranger. And Rip’s child, his precious only child, was with him.

“Michael,” Rip said, but Michael ignored him, dipping his paddle into the water, stroking with a groan that escalated until Michael released with a grunt.

Hank gripped Rip’s forearm, and Rip could feel the boy’s sweat-slick palm.

“Daddy?” Hank said, and there was no need to say more. Rip knew what his son was feeling.

“Can I have a turn paddling?” Harper asked.

“Michael,” Rip said. He reached over Hank’s head to tap Michael’s sweat-soaked back.

“Don’t touch me,” Michael said quietly. Rip sat back, shifting Hank so his son was as close as possible.

They dug their paddles into the water until it felt to Rip like they were gouging at frozen earth. The back of Michael’s neck turned purple and Rip imagined the capillaries bursting under his own skin. The veins at his temples throbbed. But the canoe moved only what seemed like an inch every try.

They did not speak. The birds called to each other — a sad and lonely plea that mimicked Hank’s whimpering. The drooping willow branches swayed in the breeze. The frogs croaked. More mechanically, Rip thought, than the way he’d imagined the frogs in the books he had read to Hank or in the cartoons the boy had watched. There was nothing natural about the sound. It reminded Rip of the buzz of a city-apartment doorbell, and he wished he and Hank were at home, and the apartment door was buzzing. Chinese food! Hank would shout joyfully, and they’d settle down to watch Toy Story 3 for the fortieth time, and Rip would cover Hank’s eyes with his own hands during the scary parts.