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EeeeeeeeEEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeee…
“Joel?” Mike mumbled into the small puddle of drool on his pillow. “D’you hear that?”
“No.” As far as Joel was concerned, it was too early on a weekend morning to accept reality.
“The smoke detector is going off again.”
“What day is it?”
“What does that have to do with the smoke detector going off?”
Joel’s sigh emanated from the bottom of his stomach, taking its fair time to exit his body. He blindly reached for his glasses and perched them crookedly on his nose as he glanced at the clock.
“It’s 6:48 on Mother’s Day morning. It’s for you.”
“Oh Christ – not again!” Mike rubbed his face, smearing the cooling drool over his slight stubble. The distant sounds of robot squabbling could be heard through the air vent.
“Better get up. They’ll be pounding on the door in a few minutes anyway by the sound of it.”
“If they insist on celebrating Mother’s Day for me, shouldn’t you be letting me sleep in?”
“You have far more experience with kitchen fires than I do,” Joel answered, yawning.
“Fine, fine,” Mike grumbled, levering himself up with a groan. As he pulled on his sweatpants he sniped at Joel, “but your ass better be down in the kitchen by seven or I’m sending them up here to make a mess.”
A thin trail of pink glitter sparkled down the hall from Crow’s room to the stairs as Mike made his way to the kitchen, the continued screech of the alarm ringing in his ears.
“Crow, you do this every time! Why can’t you make toast without burning it?” Tom asked, exasperated, as Mike stepped into the room. “You don’t see me burning the cereal!” Cambot hovered in the corner, looking as bored as a spherical hovering robot could look.
“Fine! You make the toast! And I have to pour the cereal anyway for you!” Crow snapped back.
“I would do it if my arms worked!”
“Morning, guys,” Mike said, flipping the switch to turn the exhaust fan on. He stepped over to the sink to open the window above it for good measure. The smoke detector was ear-splittingly loud and Mike felt his headache gathering at his temples.
“What was that you said, Mike, I can’t hear you,” Servo complained.
With a practiced move, Mike stretched up on tippy-toes and pressed the kill button on the alarm. A blessed silence settled for all of three seconds before Tom and Crow resumed their argument. Mike glanced over to the counter where the toaster, or more accurately the toast inside it, smoldered. Some multi-colored cereal lay scattered on the counter, and milk dripped slowly down from a smallish spill to join a smaller puddle on the tile floor.
“So, guys, if you were hungry, why didn’t you knock on our door to wake us up to get you breakfast?” Mike asked, sitting down on a chair that was miraculously cereal and milk free.
“Mike, you big dummy, we’re not going to eat this! It’s for you, for Mother’s Day!” Crow said.
“Crow! We’re supposed to be giving him a gift. Don’t call him a dummy or he won’t like it!” Tom scolded as he turned to Mike. “Anyway, Happy Mother’s Day, Mike!”
“Well, I appreciate the thought, but we’ve been over this before. I’m not your mother.”
“Mike and mother both start with the letter ‘M’, and that’s good enough for me! Besides, who else do we have since you told us we couldn’t give anything to Grandma Pearl for Mother’s Day?”
“For the last time, Tom, Pearl isn’t your Grandma. I don’t even know where she is!”
“She’s in Qatar,” Crow piped up.
“Like I said, I don’t even know where Pearl is, and I don’t want to find out.” Mike shuddered slightly. “And I don’t want you or Tom trying to find her, either.” Mike stopped to think. “Crow, whatever happened to your mother? You did pack her when we were coming back to Earth, right?”
“I had her until someone, Mike, put their case of rice on top of the box she was in, Mike, when we moved from Milwaukee to here, Mike. So it looks like you’re my mother now.”
Mike shifted uncomfortably. “Crow, how many times do I have to say it? I’m not your mother!”
Over in the corner, Cambot blurped warningly.
Crow stared at Mike for a minute, then his bowling pin started to wobble, and he sniffed loudly a few times.
“Crow, you called me Dad just last night! How can I be your mother if I’m your Dad?” Mike futilely tried to reason with the gold bot. Suddenly a loud cry pierced the short-lived quiet, but it wasn’t from Crow.
“Jo-el! Jooooooooooooooooooel! Mike doesn’t love us anymore!” Tom bawled, as he turned and started to hover out of the kitchen, only to run smack into Joel’s midsection as he entered.
“Ooof,” Joel grunted. “Tom, what’s wrong, honey?” he asked as he gathered the bot into his arms. “Of course Mike loves you! He took good care of you while I couldn’t, right?” The little red bot was still wailing inconsolably.
“Mm-mm-mm-mMike doesn’t want to be our mother! We worked so hard on his Mother’s Day gift, and he doesn’t want it! He doesn’t want us!” Crow accused. “Well, I don’t need you to be my mother! I’ll rebuild my old mother. I can rebuild her; I have the technology! I can make her better than she was. Better, faster, stronger...”
“Crow, I didn’t mean it like that!” Mike tried desperately to explain as he felt Joel’s frown of disapproval. “It’s just that I’m a man! Men can’t be mothers!”
“Way to reinforce outdated gender stereotypes, Mike,” Tom sniffled.
“It’s not a gender stereotype! It’s a biological fact!”
“C’mon guys, you know Mike says stupid things all the time without meaning to,” Joel said.
“Yeah, I’m pretty – hey!” Mike scowled.
Joel sat Tom down in his booster seat, snatched a handful of paper towels from the roll, and wiped up the spilled milk and cereal off the counter and floor. “Maybe you guys should think about taking Mike out for breakfast on Mother’s Day sometime,” he suggested. He took the now-cooled toast and attempted to scrape off the char, setting it down on a plate. Crow immediately grabbed for it. Joel raised an eyebrow.
“What? I like it dark!”
“Crow, it’s all black.”
“Good!” answered Crow defiantly, taking a big bite and chewing, and chewing, and chewing.
“Let’s go to Pannekoeken Huis! It’s been a long time since we’ve been there!” Tom said.
“It’s only been a few months, and no,” Mike answered.
“Why not?” Crow said, spraying crumbs.
“One, because it’s always crowded, and today would be twice as bad -”
Tom whined, “But I like pannekoeken!”
“- then you have to sit and wait an hour and a half for that fucking pancake -”
Crow dropped his toast as Tom’s dome went wide. “Mike said ‘fuck’! Joel, Mike said ‘fuck’!”
“Does that mean we can say it now?” begged Tom.
“No!” Joel exclaimed. “Mike, you know better than to use that language in front of the bots!” From the corner came a distinct electronic snerk.
“But Billie says it all the time!” Crow argued.
“Billie is a grown up.”
“Are you sure?”
Joel sighed. “Did you guys wanna give your gift to Mike?”
“I’m not sure now.”
“Crow! Be nice!”
“Oh, all right,” grumbled the gold bot as he got up and walked over to the counter. He picked up a lumpy package wrapped in old newspaper and plopped it on the table in front of Mike.
“There’s a card too! Don’t forget the card, Crow!” Tom reminded him.
“Is this the card?” Joel said, picking it up from the counter as a shower of pink glitter fell. Gingerly he set it back down. “Let’s let Mike open his gift first, then we’ll give him the card, okay?”
Mike picked up the package. “Nice wrapping job,” he said, turning it over in his hands looking for a place to start unwrapping. Failing to find any, he just ripped off the top. A cylinder emerged from the paper, made from popsicle sticks painted in pink and purple and glued unevenly to what Mike guessed was the empty frozen orange juice can the bots had asked for a few weeks back. Covering the ostensible front of the can were wobbly letters spelling out “#1 Mom” in alternating red and gold glitter glue.
“Thank you Tom, thank you Crow,” Mike said mechanically, then he paused. “Um...what is – I mean, what should I use this for?”
“It’s for your pencils. It’s a pencil holder. The rest of the class made these as flower pots, but Crow and I convinced Miss Johnson to make you this instead. She agreed after we told her how you kill pretty much any plant you touch,” Tom explained.
Mike opened his mouth to argue, but a glare from Joel stopped him. “Well, that was very thoughtful of you two, and as soon as I find some pencils, I’ll be sure to put them in here.”
“Now give him our card, Joel,” Crow said. Joel obliged and carefully put the folded piece of yellow construction paper on the discarded newspaper in front of Mike. The front bore a crayon drawing of a man with an over-sized head wearing tan pants and what he guessed was supposed to be a plaid shirt, with the criss-crossed red and blue lines. The man was holding what looked like a frying pan with thick black curls arising from it. Above his head was “Happy Mother’s Day” in pink glitter which also decorated the floor underneath his comically huge feet as well as his pants. Mike frowned slightly, anticipating the smart-ass verse about his clumsiness and cooking skills that he guessed would greet him inside the card.
Mike opened the card to another cascade of glitter and started reading. His eyes grew wide and the hard line of his mouth soft as he finished scanning the page. The card drooped toward the table as Mike looked down and blinked rapidly several times.
“May I?” asked Joel quietly. Mike handed the card over, heedless of the drizzle of glitter falling on his t-shirt.
Joel read:
We wish you Happy Mother’s Day
From your two most favorite bots
We know you’re not a mom per se,
But you’re the only one we’ve got
That’s why we’re asking you today
And we hope you won’t be mad,
Since we think you’re somewhat okay
Will you be our own Mom-Dad?
Joel laid the card down on the newspaper, and gently put a hand on Mike’s shoulder. “Tommy, Crow – you guys did a really good job. I’m very proud of you.”
Mike found his voice, but his head was still tilted down toward the table. “Uh, that was really nice, guys. Really nice. Thank you. Really.”
Tom and Crow looked skeptical. “You’re not just saying you like it?” doubted Crow.
“No, I really like it. You two went to a lot of trouble for me.” Mike’s voice uncharacteristically cracked a bit on the final phrase.
“Crow only wrote the words. I came up with most of the rhymes,” Tom boasted.
“Hey! I’m the one who thought to rhyme ‘dickweed’ with ‘thick Swede’, but you said it wouldn’t work ‘cause Mike’s Danish!” Crow complained.
Joel spoke up. “You know, it’s gonna be a beautiful day today, and it’s been a long winter. How’s about we skip church just this once and go to Lake Calhoun? We can get some sandwiches, maybe some fried chicken, and have a picnic. Spend some family time together.”
Crow cheered, while Tom asked eagerly, “Can we rent a paddle boat too?”
“We’ll see...sound good to you, Mike?”
Mike finally looked up; his eyes were slightly more moist than usual. He cleared his throat and nodded. “Sounds good. Actually,” he said, breaking out into a grin, “I can’t think of a better way to spend the day.”
“It’s settled, then. You two spinach chins head upstairs and pick out what you want to wear today. Mike and I will be up in a few minutes to help you get dressed.”
“I don’t need any help!” Crow protested.
“Crow, last week you got yourself into a double jock lock,” Mike reminded him.
“I don’t know why I just can’t go commando. You do it all the time.”
“I do not,” Mike said firmly. “At least not anymore.”
Joel raised an eyebrow. Mike shrugged. “Well, how often did you do laundry on the Satellite?”
“More often than you, apparently.” He turned to the bots. “Upstairs, and then we’ll get you guys a little breakfast. Growing robots need more than burnt toast.”
As soon as the bots disappeared, Mike picked up the pencil holder, stood up and walked over to Joel. “Did they ever surprise you like this?”
Joel smiled. “Somewhere along the way they found out what Father’s Day was; I think it was the second year I was up there. They made a bunch of posters with pictures they cut out of magazines and catalogs. I held it together in front of them, but later? I cried for an hour in my cabin. I think that’s when it finally sunk in that I had a family just as real as any human one – and that I was a Dad.”
Mike looked down at the misshapen gaudy cylinder in his hands. “It’s kind of artistic in its own way, isn’t it?”
Joel put an arm around Mike’s waist. “It is, Mom-Dad.”
“You know, if they really want to go to Pannekoeken Huis, I think I could put up with it for once.”
Joel screwed up his face. “Ugh, no way. I hate those fuckin’ pancakes.”