Mind Games

“Daddy! Time to wake up! Bunk’s here! Bunk was in my room. Here’s Bunk.”

Bray, hair as wild as the joy in his eyes, climbed onto the bed in his Spider-Man boxers. “Hi,” he said to Thea, and bounced his way between her and his father. “That’s Daddy’s shirt.”

“He … let me borrow it.”

“Okay. Bunk was sleeping in my room.” Climbing onto Ty’s back, he bounced some more, and patted Ty’s head. “Time to wake up!”

“Got it.”

“You slept in Daddy’s bed.”

“Yes, I—”

“Bunk slept on the floor in my room. I’m gonna play trucks with Bunk.”

“Good idea,” Ty said. “Go do that.”

“Okay.” After climbing off the bed, he raced off again with Bunk following.

“I guess he’s all right with it.”

“Thea, he woke up with a dog in his room. He’d’ve been all right if I’d had five women in bed with me.”

“Really?”

Ty opened one green eye. “As an example not drawn from experience. Although, this one time on tour? I think it was Chicago—”

“Let’s just table that while all your bones remain intact, and I ask if you have a spare toothbrush.”

“Got spare brush heads for the electric deal.” He sat up, and with his hair as wild as his boy’s, scrubbed his hands over his face. “God. Coffee.”

He waved vaguely at the door, then rolled out of bed. She got up more cautiously as he walked out, then checked to make sure the borrowed T-shirt covered all it needed to cover.

He stepped back in the doorway. “Bathroom. Toothbrush, fresh brush head, toothpaste. Coffee.”

“Okay, thanks.”

Then he smiled. “You look good.” And walked away.

While Bray crashed trucks in the room across the hall, she went into the bathroom. A stool stood in front of the little vanity where two toothbrushes and toothpaste sat.

The smaller one had Spider-Man shooting out a web. She picked up Ty’s, and got an instant flash of him with Bray on the stool beside him, brushing their teeth.

Though she admitted she wanted to linger in that flash, she blocked it out. Intrusive, she reminded herself.

She looked at herself in the mirror. Good was subjective, she thought, and wished she had a hairbrush.

Bray pushed open the door. “I gotta pee,” he announced as she stood with a mouthful of toothpaste.

And proceeded to do so.

He flushed, then turned to study her. “Daddy says you gotta wash your hands after.”

Nodding, she managed to rinse out her mouth and ease aside so he could climb onto the stool. He batted at the water.

“How about some of this?” She pumped liquid soap onto his hands.

“That’s Daddy’s toothbrush.”