Billy Smiled

Billy Smiled

Dad walked into the playroom, a disaster. He had literally only been gone five minutes, ordering lunch without ‘Happy Clown Town’ playing in the background.

“Is this your idea of a joke?”

Four-year-old Billy looked up. “Is that the stuff from an egg?”

“What?” Dad said, taken aback.

“The yellow stuff in a egg.”

Finally realizing where the conversation went, Dad said, “No, that’s a yoke.”

“Oh...” Billy said, turning back to the piles of books in front of him. He had taken every book in the bottom three shelves of the bookcase and piled them all around between himself and the TV. All the toys he’d had out were piled on top of the books and the dish of popcorn now looked like a hailstorm had blown through.

Dad tried a new approach, “Did you do this?” he waved his hand over the mess.

Billy looked up and squinted a bit, “Dad, I’m the only one here...”

“Right... Why did you do this?”

“So, we would have a fort.”

“A fort?”

“Cubby Scouts! It’s on right after this! Mom said you were a cub scout when you were little!”

It all came back to him. He’d been a cub scout, for two meetings and then the leader got a job in Cincinnati and they never found a new leader, so it all fizzled away. He’d told Jenny about it as a funny story when they were first dating.

She must have told Billy, but left out the bad part. Billy was trying to be like him.

Suddenly his heart was full of love for his lovely wife and this beautiful boy who he had been nervous about being left alone with all day. Suddenly he remembered being young. “Move over Mister!” he said collapsing into the floor.

Billy smiled.