I walk toward Ethan, shaking my head. “All of the sudden he cries now?” I say to him.
“Mom talks to him differently.”
“What?” I snap.
I walk past Ethan. He follows me into the living room, where I sit on the couch to put my shoes on.
Ethan sits next to me. “He doesn’t cry because Mom doesn’t really talk to him like that.”
“He made a huge mess. And it was dangerous!” I argue. Ethan just shrugs.
“Okay, so what would mom have done, then, Ethan…if you know everything?”
“Why are you mad at me, Dad? I’m just telling you. Mom likes that kind of stuff, she’s like a science nerd.”
“Your mother is far from a science nerd.”
“I mean, she would have asked him what exactly he was trying to do. Noahissmart. He sometimes does some cool stuff. He’s made that slime before and tried to make conductors with other things.”
“Then why were you calling him stupid?”
Ethan stares at me for several seconds. “Because I knew you would get mad at him and make him feel dumb for doing it.” I could feel the heat behind my face getting more intense. My anger was escalating, but Ethan was right. “He’s crying in our room,” Ethan says again, glancing down the hall.
“What?” I say.
I gage Ethan’s expression. “Noah is in there crying. Can’t you hear him?”
The boys’ bedroom is at the end of the hall but our house is not gigantic. “You know I can’t hear that well. Is he crying loudly?” I genuinely do not know what to do in this moment. I feel inadequate. I’ve always prided myself on being a good father. If Dani ever even hinted to me that she thought I wasn’t holding up my end of the deal, I would get extremely angry. I knew dozens of men who spent zero time alone with their kids. I was always hands-on, from diapers to coaching their sports teams. I didn’t understand why I found myself stumped now when they were basically old enough to take care of themselves.
“No, it’s not loud, but I can hear him. You should go talk to him,” Ethan says.
I hold back the urge to scold Ethan for telling me what to do. Instead, I stand and head down the hall. As I get closer, I can hear Noah sort of whimpering. I knock once and open the door. Noah is sitting on his bed; he’s not hysterical, just likely feeling sorry for himself.
“I cleaned it up,” he says in a clear voice.
“What exactly were you trying to do?”
He looks up and stares, nonplussed, before finally saying, “Now you’re interested?”
“Don’t be a smart-ass.”
“I thought I was the opposite of a smart-ass?”
“Noah! Watch your mouth!”
He shrugs.
I know I’m shooting myself in the foot. If there was one thing Dani always said about the way I parented, it was that I was constantly shooting myself in the foot. Noah picks up his phone and starts scrolling through it as if I’m not even standing there. It’s the first time I realize I don’t really know him at all. Kids are not our clones. They grow and change and we have to get to know them all over again at every new juncture.
“Noah, can we talk?”
“Do I have a choice?”
“Look at me.” Noah looks up and sets his phone aside. “I’m sorry,” I say.
“I was going to clean it up. I didn’t plan on leaving it there. Why can’t you trust that we’re not little kids anymore?”
“I know you’re not.” I gestured toward the end of the bed. “Can I sit?”
