spins to face her. “You said I could have ice cream!”
“But then you did something you shouldn’t have, and that’s the consequence.”
“I didn’t know I couldn’t!” he screams, and it’s the first time I’ve ever seen him like this.
I say, because I feel like I need to say something, “Benny, you shouldn’t talk to your mother like that.”
His little eyes narrow on mine, and then he bursts out in tears. “You said we could have ice cream!” He pushes Mia, hard, and I have to catch her when she falls back a step.
“Benny!” I scold, and his eyes widen, right before he bolts.
I run after him, picking him up quickly. He’s kicking and screaming, and I’m trying to calm him down, but he won’t stop crying, and his little fists keep thumping at my chest, trying to hurt me, trying to push me away.
“Let’s go,” Mia hisses, leading us to a cab. He doesn’t stop on the ride back to their apartment, and he’s still going as we step inside. For the first time since he started, I release him. He runs straight to his room and slams the door. Mia winces at the sound, her hands gripping the back of the couch, chest rising and falling with her harsh, sharp breaths.
“I’ve never seen—” I start.
“It happens,” she murmurs, and when she looks at me, her eyes clouded, I die a little on the inside. “It’s not about the stupid ice cream,” she says, almost like a confession. “He has no friends his age, so he gets anxious being around other kids, and he doesn’t know how to act or behave, and I can tell it gets to him, you know? But he won’t talk to me about it. He just shuts down, and then he’ll have these—”
“Outbursts?” I cut in, and she nods, gives me a knowing look.
My son has outbursts.
Like me.
“I’ve tried the picture thing, you know? The three words thing your mom did for you, but he doesn’t—” I trap her against my chest, holding her tight. The warmth of her pent-up breath floods my beating flesh. “I don’t know what to do when he’s like this,” she cries. “I can’t hold him the way you did, and he just keeps going and going with me. I end up with bruises—”
“Mia…”
“It doesn’t happen often,” she says, as if trying to justify it. “Maybe once every few months.” She pulls away, her eyes pleading when they meet mine. “Do you think I should do something—take him to see someone?”
“I don’t know,” I tell her honestly, my mind racing. In my eyes, in my mind, Benny’s perfect.
She steps out of my arms and wipes at her eyes. “I’m scared they’re going to slap a label on him, and he’s going to have that stigma his entire life, and it’s not the worst thing that could happen. I know that. But what if they put him on meds and he’s no longer my Bennett?” She shakes her head. “Sorry, I don’t know why I’m dumping all this on you.”
“Because I’m his dad?” I say quietly. “And you shouldn’t have to make these choices alone.”
She swallows loudly before glancing at Benny’s door. The crying has stopped. “Benny?” she calls out.
When he doesn’t respond, we make our way over to his door. I knock. “Benny?”
Still nothing.
Slowly, quietly, I open the door, and there’s our son, asleep on the floor of his blue bedroom. “He must’ve worn himself out,” Mia says, the giggle escaping her such a contrast to what we were feeling only minutes ago.
I step inside and carry him to his bed while Mia pulls the covers down. I put him in the middle of his bed, and without saying a word to each other, Mia and I get in on either side of him. Mia strokes his hair, causing his breath to hitch. His eyes open, just slightly, and he says, his little voice barely audible, “I’m sorry, Mama.” And then he lets out a sigh, falls back asleep. His muscles relax enough that his fisted hands open, revealing a rock he’d been gripping on to. “What’s this?” Mia asks, taking it from him.
My eyes squint at what she’s holding, and then my heart soars right out of my chest. “It’s amethyst. I gave it to him the second time I met him.”
Mia pouts.
I run a hand over my face, try to make sense of the last hour. I want him to know I’m his dad. That I, too, had