What a Daddy Will Do
“Daddy!” Gus shrieked as Lindsay opened the door to their house in Toronto.
Bending down I scooped up my five year old son, the one I hadn’t seen for almost two months. “Sonnyboy,” I whispered in his ear, as his arms encircled my neck and his love encircled my heart.
“Hello, Brian,” Lindsay said cheerily.
“Hello,” I replied giving her the obligatory kiss on the cheek.
“Come on in.”
“Thanks.” I set Gus down and found his little hand in mine immediately. I smiled to myself. Unadulterated, pure love! That’s what Gus gave, and that’s what I wanted to give him in return. With Justin away in New York, I found myself alone a lot of the time, and the phone calls with Gus several times a week help to fill some of the void in my life.
“Daddy, I asked Mommy if you could take me to lunch,” Gus said eagerly. “You will, won’t you?”
“If … if that’s all right,” I said quickly. The prospects of having Gus all to myself for an hour or two were wonderful.
“Yay!” Gus crowed.
“It’s fine,” Lindsay laughed. “Gus has been bugging me for days to let you take him out for a man lunch.”
“Man lunch?” I asked.
“Just you boys,” Lindsay clarified.
“Oh,” I replied. Then it dawned on me that I had come straight from the airport in a taxi. “I don’t have a car, and I let the taxi go. I’ll have to get another cab.”
“No, Daddy,” Gus said confidently. “We can walk to my most favorite rest’rant. It’s down the street … that way.” He pointed dramatically.
“Does he have a favorite restaurant?” I asked Lindsay. She nodded her head. “It’s not McDonalds, is it?” I asked with a feeling of horror overtaking me. Surely I hadn’t come all the way to Toronto to get my arteries clogged with all the McCrap that they served in those poison emporiums.
“No, it’s not,” Lindsay laughed.
“I’ll show you, Daddy,” Gus said tugging on my hand. “Let’s go.”
“But I just got here.”
“I know, and I want to go,” Gus said emphatically.
“He wants some alone time with his daddy,” Lindsay said gently. “Go ahead. We can catch up when you come home.”
“Okay,” I said as I let Gus drag me towards the front door of the small townhouse the munchers had rented in Toronto. “We won’t be long.”
“Take as much time as you like,” Lindsay chuckled. “Gus has his favorites that he likes to order.”
I raised an eyebrow, but decided to say nothing more till I found out where we were going and what I was in for. Setting inside my carry-on bag which I had dropped on the front porch when I had picked up my sonny boy, we started down the street. Gus held my hand tightly as he babbled on about how he loved school and his friends and the teacher and the kids on the street where he lived. I listened with a smile on my face. At least he seemed to be happy in Toronto and that was certainly what I wanted for him. It wouldn’t stop me from missing him though, when I was in Pittsburgh and he was hundreds of miles away.
“How far is this place?” I asked after we had been walking for about ten minutes, and Gus had stopped talking to take a breath.
“That’s it up there,” Gus said pointing to the corner that was up ahead.
As we approached the intersection, I noted that we had left the residential area and come to a street lined with small businesses. I looked at the buildings on each corner, noting that they all seemed to be donut shops, none of which I had ever heard of. “Where’s the restaurant?” I asked Gus.
“That one,” Gus replied pointing across the street to something called Tim Hortons.
“What is a Tim Horton?” I asked bewildered.
“Tim Horton is a famous hockey player,” Gus informed me. “He was killed in a car accident a long time ago, but he made these places.”
“Did he now?” I asked staring at my precocious son. “How do you know all that?”
“I asked.”
“Oh! Who did you ask?” I wanted to know, as we crossed the street.
“I asked in here. They have a little paper that tells you about Tim Horton,” Gus explained patiently. “Mommy read it to me. You can get one if you want, Daddy.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” I replied, before pulling open the door of this, my son’s favorite ‘restaurant’.
“You line up here,” Gus said pulling me along to fall in behind some burly guy who looked like he’d just stepped out of his eighteen-wheeler.
“Great,” I said sarcastically. You didn’t even get waited on in this dump. I obviously needed to teach my son about the art of fine dining. Maybe for dinner.
The truck driver gave me a look upon hearing my sarcastic tone. “Cute kid,” he said smiling down at Gus.
“Yes he is,” I replied.
“I want that one,” Gus said pointing to a picture hanging from the ceiling.
“That looks like a lot of food,” I observed. Gus had indicated some sort of combo that had a sandwich, soup, a drink and a donut.
“Mommy always shares with me.”
“Smart mommy.”
“That’s what I want.”
“Yes, sir,” I said seriously, making Gus giggle.
The truck driver smiled at us as he took his coffee and headed for the exit.
“Next,” a voice said from behind the counter. Gus and I stepped up to the cash register.
“My son would like that,” I said pointing to the sign.
“The full combo?” I nodded. “For here or to go?”
“Here.”
“What kind of sandwich?”
I looked at Gus. “Ham and cheese,” he said quickly with a happy smile.
“Soup?”
“Begebull.”
“That would be vegetable,” I told the girl.
“Drink?”
“Appa juice.”
“Apple juice,” I repeated.
“Donut or cookie?”
“Timbits,” Gus stated.
“Huh?” I had no idea what Timbits were.
“Those, Daddy,” Gus said pointing to a couple of trays with small round donuts that were probably the centers of the larger donuts.
“Smart,” I said aloud.
“Excuse me, sir, which ones?” the girl asked.
“We get four, Daddy,” Gus explained. “I pick two and you pick two.”
Gus had obviously done this many times before. I should speak to Lindsay and Melanie about allowing my son to eat this crap. “You can have them all, Gus,” I said.
“No, Daddy, that’s too many. We share. I want appa fritter and waspberry.”
I sighed and was about to say the same as Gus, when the girl informed me, “We have Timbits in all the flavors of the full-size donuts.” She batted her lashes at me suggestively.
Great! Now I was being hit on by the counter person. “Sour cream glazed and chocolate dipped,” I said quickly.
She nodded. “Would you like a regular or whole wheat bun for your sandwich?”
“Whole wheat,” Gus supplied.
At least that was semi-nutritious.
“I’ll have a coffee,” I added.
“Regular, medium, or large?”
“Hm,” I said. No ventis or grandes or other ridiculous sizes. “Medium.”
The girl gave me the total which was very reasonable for all we were getting. I used a credit card to pay for it, since I didn’t have any Canadian money.
“You can pick up your order down there,” she told me pointing to where another woman seemed to be assembling sandwiches in full public view. They seemed to have nothing to hide.
“Get a tray, Daddy,” Gus advised as I took the coffee, juice and Timbits from the girl, who gave me her warmest smile. Naturally I had to smile back. I could hear her giggle as we moved away.
By the time we got down the line, the woman behind the counter there handed me the soup followed quickly by a rather decent looking sandwich. I set them on the tray with the drinks and followed Gus to a table by the window.
“This is my most favorite table,” Gus said as he climbed onto the chair.
“Oh, why’s that?”
“I can see cars and people and lots of stuff,” he said happily as I unloaded the tray.
I imagine you could see people and cars from any of the tables, but Gus seemed to think it was quite a coup getting this particular table, so I wouldn’t argue with him. I looked around for a place to put the empty tray, and Gus pointed to a trash bin with a spot on top that held some other empty trays. I added ours to the pile.
I handed Gus the spoon to eat some soup.
“It’s too hot, Daddy. Mommy always eats some first, and then when it’s the right temperature she gives it to me.”
“I see,” I replied. I had a lot to learn.
I tasted the soup which was surprisingly tasty. After three or four spoonfuls, I thought it had cooled enough for Gus, so I handed him the spoon and pushed the bowl over in front of him. He carefully raised a spoonful of soup to his lips.
“Perfect,” he said as he sucked the soup in.
I smiled. He was quite the little character for a five year old. I missed seeing him more often.
“Have some sandwich,” he advised me as he continued to slurp his soup.
“How come you can pronounce sandwich and not vegetable?” I asked, amused at his vocabulary and its eccentricities.
“I can pronounce vegetable,” he said very clearly, “but sometimes I don’t want to.”
I almost choked on my first bite of the sandwich. I chuckled and ruffled his hair affectionately. Sometimes he really was my son.
When Gus finished the soup I handed him the other half of the sandwich.
“Too much, Daddy,” he said. “Break it in half.”
“Okay,” I said doing as instructed. I proceeded to eat the rest of the sandwich while he nibbled at his piece. I opened his apple juice and he drank thirstily. Trying the coffee, I decided this place wasn’t so bad after all. The coffee was delicious.
“This is my Timbit,” Gus said laying down the last bite or two of his sandwich and picking up one of the little donuts.
“Which one is that?”
“Apple fritter, it’s deeeelicious.”
I laughed out loud. Apparently Gus could say apple perfectly clearly too, and he certainly knew which Timbit was which. Gus bit off a piece of the apple fritter and handed me the rest, so I could have a bite. I had to admit it was rather awesome. Soft, melt in your mouth, sweet with just a bit of apple and a hint of cinnamon, it was very good.
“This is yours,” Gus said handing me the chocolate one.
“Want a bite?”
He shook his head. “I love the waspberry one … almost as much as the apple fritter.”
“Can you say raspberry?” I asked expecting him to say it perfectly like he had the other words.
Gus frowned. “That’s what I said. Waspberry.”
I stifled my laugh. My very smart son had found at least one word that he couldn’t say properly … at least not yet.
“This one must be sour cream,” I said picking up the last little donut.
“It might taste awful,” Gus advised.
“You think?”
Gus nodded his head. “It’s sour.”
With a grin I bit off a piece. It was very good. “It’s not sour at all,” I told him. “Try a little bit.” I broke off a small piece.
Gus looked at the tiny piece of dough. Uncertainly he took it from me and placed it in his mouth with a grimace on his face. He chewed tentatively for a second. Then a smile crossed his face. “It’s good,” he said with surprise.
“Yes, it is,” I replied. “Ready to go?”
“Yep,” Gus agreed as we stood up. He took my hand and we started past the case holding the Timbits. I had to marvel at who had thought up this way to use the part of the donut cut out and possibly wasted, or molded back into full size donuts which would be chewier because of the extra handling.
Gus and I walked back home, his hand in mine. I had to admit I enjoyed Gus’ favorite restaurant. I even made a small purchase before we left.
“Did you like Tim Hortons, Daddy?” Gus asked as we approached the townhouse.
“Surprisingly I did.”
“Yay!”
I smiled as we opened the door.
“Did you have a good time?” Lindsay asked us.
“I certainly did, and I brought you a present,” I added, holding out the box of two dozen Timbits.
“Well, thank you very much. I have a pot of coffee brewing. We can all enjoy one or two.”
We went to the small kitchen of the townhouse and sat around the table. Gus said he was too full for any more Timbits, but Lindsay and I had several each. I had asked the girl to give me some of each flavor, so I got to taste many of them. They were all rather delectable.
After a bit, Lindsay laughed and said, “You do realize that each Timbit is 50 – 100 calories.”
“Shit!” I reacted. “They’re all yours.” I pushed the box towards her.
“It’s okay, Daddy. I’ll play with you while you’re here. Mama says she has to work them off when she eats too many Timbits.”
I chuckled, getting a glare from Lindsay. “I’m glad you’ll help me, Gus,” I said.
“Can we go to Tim Hortons tomorrow too?” he asked.
Now I groaned while Lindsay laughed.
or email to thymewriter@gmail.com
Return to the Junk Food Challenge