“This is so cool!”

I saw Ben with the corner of my eye, as he cringed.

I smiled at Gus. He was coating his little hands in the not yet dried paint I had on my pallet, before leaving multicolored hand prints on my white walls.

“Gus, stop this. Let Justin pack up,” Ben said sternly.

“Let him play. I don't mind.” I decided against taking Brian's portrait with me, knowing I didn't have the time to work on it, but I grabbed a few sketchpads, colored pens, coal pencils, even some of my acrylic paints and brushes.

Gus listened to Ben, going to stand by his legs, staring at his palms. Paint dripped on the floor, and before Ben could scold him for that too, I picked the kid up and took him to the bathroom.

“Let's wash your hands.”

“Ben is upset,” he whispered.

“Ben doesn't know how to have fun. I love to finger-paint too. There's something about feeling the gooey texture on your fingers.”

Gus beamed, then focused on helping me take all the paint off his hands.

With more clothes packed, along with my art supplies, I was ready to head on to this new adventure.

The drive to Brian's house was filled with Gus talking my ear off about his art projects in school. Suddenly, his eyes lit up and he stared at me intensely, stopping his word vomit.

“Are you okay?” I checked.

“Can you help me with a super secret project?”

“Tell me what you have in mind, and I'll see if I can.”

“We have an art project about the person we love the most in the world. I want to draw Daddy. Will you help me?”

Ben turned to me sharply, narrowing his eyes. I realized I had to choose my words carefully when I declined Gus.

“We'll see what we can do, but you know we don't have to be obvious.” When Gus eyed me curiously, I remembered to use small words. He was a child. “We can't reveal your dad's super secret identity.”

“We can draw him like my hero.”

“That sounds like a great idea.” I grinned at him.

I had a feeling we were getting closer to the destination. We were on a long road with no houses in sight. Figures, Brian's house would be as safe as all his others.

“Jus?”

It was the first time Gus addressed me on my name, or a part of it, at least. “Yes, Gus.”

“Do you know that Daddy is really my hero? He saved me last night.”

Ben snorted, masking his laugh with a cough.

“Oh, yeah? What happened?”

“I stumbled at the top of the stairs. Daddy caught me before I could fall.”

Jesus. He was a real troublemaker.

All I could hope was that Gus wouldn't get hurt on my watch.

When Gus glued himself to the window, I figured we had arrived.

Holy fuck! The house was huge. And gorgeous. Like my ideal dream home country manor.

“I wish Daddy allowed Bruce to come with us,” Gus mumbled.

“Whenever you two are together, things break. Expensive things. Irreplaceable things.”

“It wasn't my fault Bruce waved his tail into that vase.”

“Brian said you were pulling at his ear.”

“I was playing with him!”

“I bet it hurt him,” I interjected, not wanting Ben and Gus to fight. “You don't pull at his ear. You pet his head, brush your fingers through his fur...that's how you play with him.”

Ben pulled the car in the garage. “Okay, everyone out.” His attempt at a joke, left Gus watching him warily.

Loaded with our bags, we walked through a corridor into the house. The door led to the hallway.

Gus immediately ran up the stairs.

I placed a hand on Ben's arm, making him glare at me, so I dropped it. “He's a kid. That's all I wanted to say.”

“I know that,” he snapped.

“Do you? You can't control him.”

“I have to protect him.”

“From other people. Like I said...he's a kid. Kids fall down, pick themselves up, dust themselves off, and are running toward a new adventure the next second.”

To cement my statement, Gus rushed back downstairs, stumbling over his feet. He landed on his knees in front of me, so I helped him up. He looked unperturbed, not even a tear in his eyes.

“Ben! Ben! Look what I found!” He showed him a firetruck. “I thought I lost it!” He cuddled the toy to his chest.

“That probably has a year worth of dust on it,” Ben muttered. “Can you keep an eye on him while I check with the staff taking care of the house? They live in the cottage there.” He pointed to a wooden cabana, close to the trees, a few yards away.

“Sure. We'll be around.” I nodded.

“Let me show you the manor, Jus.” Gus grabbed my hand, leading me to the sitting room. “I love to sit in front of the fire with Daddy. He tells me cool stories, but Mommy doesn't like them. Mommy always com-plains about Daddy's stories.” He shook his head, taking me to the kitchen. He tugged me down so I crouched by his side. Gus cupped a hand to his mouth, leaning to my ear. “Can you keep a secret?”

“Yup.”

He pointed a little finger to the cupboard in the corner. “Miss Sally keeps the cookies in there.”

“Does she now?” I laughed.

He nodded seriously. “Of course, she doesn't know that I know. Mommy always says only one.”

“Then you should listen to your mom.”

Gus got a mischievous look in his eyes, I had only seen at Brian. “Daddy sometimes allows me two when I'm super good.”

I chuckled. “We'll see about it.” I stroked his head, smiling.

“Let me show you my room! It's so cool!”

We took the stairs carefully. Judging by the door, I could tell his room was every little boy's dream. Brian adored his child.

There was a big Donald Duck cartoon pinned to the door.

“Pat his tummy,” Gus prompted me.

“Uh, what?”

“Like this, silly.” He rubbed his hand to the duck's tummy.

To my surprise the bleak opened. “Quack, quack. Hi, Gus!”

Gus beamed up at me. “It was Daddy's idea.”

“Cute.” I smiled, allowing him to enter his room first. Just like I suspected.

Race car bed in place.

The solar system hanging from the ceiling.

There was some sort of measuring device to the side of his closet. Gus went straight to it, gluing his back to the wood.

“Measure me! I bet I grew again.”

I indulged him, raising the handle about two inches. “How long has it been since you visited?”

He scratched his head. “Last summer probably. I don't see Daddy much. I miss Daddy lots.”

“I bet you do. My dad used to be very busy when I was young too.”

Gus's brown eyes widened. “Is he still busy?”

I shrugged, silently wondering why I had brought up my sack of shit father in the conversation. “I have no idea. I haven't talked to him in a while.”

“I bet you miss him,” Gus said seriously. “Oh, look at my cool alien spaceship! It even flies!” He carefully picked up a round aircraft, placing it at my feet, before clicking a few buttons on a remote control. “Uh huh.” His lower lip trembled when nothing happened.

“That runs on batteries. Maybe they're no longer good. You haven't used it in a while,” I explained. “Can I take a look?”

Gus handed me the remote, sniffing.

Upon closer inspection, I noticed the remote controller was turned off and the batteries were in place. Solving the problem, I handed it back to Gus. “Try it now.”

Carefully, he pushed the big button, then squealed when the spaceship lifted off the floor. He directed it to the hallway, then he was running out.

“Hey, hold on!” I rushed after him.

We found Ben downstairs, pacing agitated, talking on his phone. He spotted us at the bottom of the stairs, and approached after hanging up.

“Is everything okay?”

“It's the first time we come here when Brian didn't call beforehand. If any of us thought about it, we would have remembered Sally mentioning she was pregnant in September when we were here for Gus' birthday. She gave birth to her child two weeks ago. She's home with her husband. I told them to not even think about coming here.”

“Oh, so what do we do?”

“I know how to cook,” Ben said seriously. “The problem is that Brian needs me back. I just got off the phone with Drew. He's on his way here. Can you take care of Gus for a few hours?”

Too much information thrown at me in such a short period of time. “Okay. I can do it.”

“Good. Then I'm off.” Ben went to Gus, dodging the flying spaceship right on time. “I have to go. Be good for Justin.”

“Great. I like Jus.”

“That's good then.” Ben cracked a smile, patting the child's shoulder. “I wrote you some emergency numbers on the notepad in the kitchen.”

I nodded, walking with him to the door. “Do we have anything to eat? Gus might get hungry.”

“There should be snacks. You can order take-out. The proofed companies are in the notepad as well. I really have to go.”

“Okay, thanks. Bye.”

Ben shook my hand. “I guess you're all right.”

“Gee, thanks.”

After closing the door, I turned to find Gus watching me curiously. “Do you want to work on the special art project?” I asked.

“Can I have some water, please?”

“Sure, come on. Turn that off. You don't want the batteries to run out.”

While searching for water, I found we had pretzels and Gus's praised cookies. I grabbed two bottles of water and a bag of pretzels. “Come on. Show me to a room where we can get dirty. We don't want to upset your daddy by dirtying this whole house.”

“My playroom.” Gus ran up the stairs.

I found him into a room on the last floor. It was an open-space room. He even had a mini easel installed there, which showed me how serious he was about painting.

We sat on the floor and I handed him my sketchpad and pencils. Unlike other children who got upset when they didn't manage to draw the way they wanted, Gus was the picture of calm. He used the eraser a lot, trying harder.

I helped him by making a quick sketch of his daddy in superhero clothes.

He copied it as best as he could, better drawn than many kids his age. He even added an eye-band like Zorro’s.

“What's wrong?” I wondered when I saw him frowning. “It turned out real nice.”

“I'm thinking what letter to put on his chest.”

“D?”

He gave me a disbelieving look. “P. If anyone asks, I'll tell them it's from Perfect.”

I gave him a watery smile. “Sounds like an amazing idea.”

Gus handed me the pencil. “Can you draw it? I might ruin the pretty drawing.”

“It's your special project.”

“Please, Jus.”

“Okay, okay.” I focused on penciling a nice P that wouldn't look too complicated for a five year old to make. “There you go. We're going to paint it tomorrow.”

“It looks real pretty! Thank you, Jus!” He hugged me tightly.

“It was all you, kiddo. Now how about a bath and then to bed with you. It's pretty late.”

“I'm kinda hungry.”

Shit. I had forgotten to order take-out.

My phone rang, and after pressing my finger to my lips, I answered. “Yeah?”

“Hey, I'm almost there. Did you two eat?”

It took me a moment to figure out who it was on the other side of the line. “Drew? No, we didn't eat. We were just talking about it.”

“Then get ready. We're going shopping. Brian told me to do the groceries before arriving, but I decided to take you with me.”

I laughed. “Okay. We'll get ready. Are you close?”

“I'm pulling up in the garage.”