Chapter Text
Erik always knew that he has a daddy. His daddy got sick before Erik was born, and he had to go away. Erik says this when his friends ask where his father is or if he has a father. They accept it because a lot of kids don't have their mama and father both at home. He used to say things like, my daddy is an astronaut, because they felt true, but now that he's older he has figured out the difference between what feels true and what really is true.
He knows a little bit about his daddy. He knows that his daddy was smart and that he and Mama loved each other. He knows that once he said to Mama, "Were you sad when Daddy had to go away?"
"Yes," she said, and her face looked funny and she wiped her eyes. "I was really sad."
That's why Mama doesn't talk about his daddy and doesn't have any pictures. It makes her too sad.
Grandma and Grandpa say some things about his daddy too, when they don't think he's listening. Most of the things they say show that his daddy wasn't a very good person. Once he heard Grandma on the phone saying that his daddy had ruined Mama's life and that it was good he was gone. After he heard that Erik went to his room and played with his dinosaurs, bashing them against each other until he felt better. "You ruined my life!" the Brachiosaurus said, jumping on the Allosaurus. "Get out! You don't do that!" said the Triceratops. Then he lined them up and made them all wait their turn, like he was learning in nursery school.
Mama said that his daddy had a sickness in his mind that meant he couldn't be a good father and it was hard to explain. She hadn't been there when he had heard Grandma on the phone. After a long time Erik realized that this means Mama didn't know Grandma had said it.
One evening after supper Erik's Mama sits him down and tells him that she's seen his daddy and talked to him and he'd like to meet Erik. “My daddy's sick.”
“Yes, I know, pickle, but he’s doing a lot better.”
“Is he in the hospital?”
“No, I told you, remember? He had a sickness in his brain. But he’s better now. I’ve talked to him.”
Erik leans against Mama. He doesn’t know what to think of this but he feels safe next to her.
“He lives far away but you met him once. You remember my police friends we helped this winter?”
Erik sort of remembers. He remembers hiding in the back of a car, which was exciting, and a police woman with red hair who was nice and so pretty that he'd said yes when she'd asked if he was going to be a police officer like Mama, even though he's not sure. And the policeman with her, too, was really handsome, and he looked nice too, even though he didn't speak much German. Maybe Erik would like to be a policeman after all, if he can be like that policeman.
So when Mama asks him if he remembers the job, he hides a little bit of excitement because he thinks he might see the red-haired police woman again.
“Is that policeman my daddy? The one with the lady?” He would like that, that policeman was so nice. He had a smile that made Erik feel happy to be there.
“No, your daddy was the one who you hid in the car with. He gave you a high-five when he left. You remember him?”
Erik doesn’t, but says he does anyway. Sometimes it’s a lot easier to tell people what they want to hear.
“He called me the other day and asked if he could talk to you on the computer.”
“Can he?”
“I said he could. Wouldn’t you like that?”
Erik doesn’t think he would, but he says yes.
“Okay. I’ll call him right now.”
She brings Erik to sit in front of their new computer and sets up the camera. When a picture appears on the screen it’s of a regular-looking man who he doesn't remember at all. “Hi Erik!”
“Hi,” Erik says softly.
“Did your mother tell you who I am?”
“Yes.” Erik looks down.
“Erik, look at the screen,” Mama says. He doesn’t want to but he looks. She puts her hand on his back and it makes him feel a little bit better.
"You didn't remember me, did you," the man says smilingly.
"A little."
"He did, Sebastian," Mama says. She sounds happy. Erik gives Sebastian a little smile and then looks down again.
"How are you doing, are you getting along in school?"
"Yes."
"Having fun with your friends?"
"Yes."
Mama shifts behind him. "Erik, why don't you tell Daddy what we did yesterday. At the park."
It takes him a little while to remember. "Oh. We went to the fountain with the fish, and we fed them and counted them."
"How many were there?"
"I don't remember."
"And it was fun?"
"Yes," Erik says faintly.
"Okay, it's getting late. I'm going to say good night now."
"Good night," Erik says.
"It would be nice if you called him Daddy," Mama prompts him.
"Good night, Daddy."
"Good night, Erik."
After the call ends Mama hugs Erik tight. "That wasn't so bad, was it?"
"No," he says dutifully. But he'd rather not do it again.
Later Mama finds him sitting on the floor looking at the album of his baby pictures. “Want me to tell you about them?”
He nods and climbs on the sofa and leans up against her where she’s warm and her shirt is soft. Mama opens the album. “Here I am at my baby shower. There’s my friend Frieda, and auntie Rosalie, and you’re here, in my tummy.”
“How could I fit in your tummy?”
“Well, you were much smaller then. Remember the baby book we read? You grew inside my tummy until you were ready to come out.” She turns the page. “Here’s some more pictures, there’s Grandma. And this was a program from the party. We played games and it was so much fun. Here’s a picture of you inside my tummy.”
"It doesn't look like anything."
“The doctor knew how to look at the picture and tell that you were healthy. There’s your head . . .” Mama points at part of the picture. “And there’s your little feet. You were curled up inside me.” Erik curls up against Mama’s side now.
“And here’s when you were born and I saw you for the first time.” In the picture Mama is sitting up in a bed with a big puffy cap over her hair. She looks tired but she has a big smile on her face. “I was so happy! You had a squished-up little red face and when you came out you didn’t cry, you just looked all around you with big wide-open eyes. I loved you so much. All I wanted to do was to hold you and look at you.”
There are more pictures of him: with Grandma and Grandpa, with auntie Rosalie, and at home with him on Mama’s lap in a blanket. There's his baby footprints and a handprint. He puts his hand over the tiny handprint on the paper and wonders how he could have ever been so small. At the end of the album is a cd. “What’s this?”
“That’s the song I used to sing when I was pregnant with you. It's called ‘Beautiful Stranger.’ The singer made it after she had a baby of her own.” Mama sings: “Da-da-da da-da da-da da da da da-da da. That one.”
Erik knows that song. He leans onto Mama’s lap and she pets his head. He feels very safe.
One day a big package comes for Erik. It’s not his birthday or Christmas, and he’s so excited that he runs all over the house squealing while Mama gets the scissors to open it. Inside is an erector set. “Look,” Mama says, “he already put it together for you! Wasn’t that nice? It’s a building crane.” There’s a letter, too, which Mama says they can read together. Erik wants to say no thank you. He's not sure that he wants anything from Sebastian Green.
The letter, which Mama reads to him, says that this was Sebastian's favorite toy when he was young. Sebastian knows it's for kids a little bit older than Erik, so he's put most of it together himself and Erik could finish it with the tools Sebastian included. Erik doesn't want to do that. When Mama finishes the letter he says, "I wish I had a dog instead."
"Erik! Don't be ungrateful. Your father worked hard on this, and you can finish it together."
Finishing it together is so awkward it's painful. He has no idea what to do, and Sebastian encourages him no matter what he does. Erik pokes at the kit with a screwdriver until Sebastian says he has to go. Alone in his room Erik breathes a sigh of relief. He lies facedown down on his bed.
Mama, of course, comes in to check on him. She hangs over him nervously after every call with Sebastian. "How did the call with Daddy go?" she asks.
"I'm not good at finishing it."
"Maybe I could help you with it later." She rubs his back. Erik rolls away from her. He never wants to see the toy again, and he feels like he wants to run away, like all his skin is itching.
"I'm not good at it. I don't want to do it."
"You can't stop working at something just because it's hard."
"But I don't want to." He never wanted to. This was all that man's idea. Maybe if Erik is really bad at it, that man will get tired of Erik and give up.
"Your daddy will be really disappointed."
This is a way of saying that Mama doesn't approve of what Erik is doing. Erik doesn't say anything.
"Do you want to make your father feel bad?"
"No," he says in a little voice. But he doesn't want to work on the toy anymore either.
"Then I'll sit with you and help you while Daddy tells us what to do."
At least if Mama's there it won't be that bad, he guesses. Hopes.
Sebastian calls again early in the morning, when Erik is in the middle of breakfast, and that day Erik doesn't want to get on the bus so that Mama uses an angry voice and when he gets to school he kicks his cubby partner Emily in the foot for getting in his way. Mr. Meyer sees it and takes Erik aside and tells him never to kick anyone again. He says it in a serious voice and Erik spends part of the morning feeling sick because Mr. Meyer hates him.
At free time Mr. Meyer comes up to him and says in a nice voice, "I think Emily feels bad because you kicked her."
Erik doesn't know what to say. He looks down at his feet because he feels so ashamed.
"Will you tell her you're sorry and you'd like to be friends again?"
Erik isn't sure he can do that himself, but . . . "Can I draw a picture for her? I didn't mean to kick her."
"I think that would be nice."
He goes to the art table and draws a picture of Emily. He knows she likes Bibi Blocksberg. So he draws Emily on a broomstick, with a red bow in her hair. He doesn’t know that much about Bibi Blocksberg so he draws a blue sky and the tops of trees at the bottom of the paper. It takes him a while to draw, and free time is over by the time he's done, so he can't ask Mr. Meyer or Mrs. Pohl to write "I'm sorry" at the bottom after he's put Emily's name on the picture. But he folds up the paper and between activities he goes up to Emily and mumbles "I'm sorry" and gives her the paper and runs away. And after lunch at recess Emily asks him if he wants to play Cat and Mouse with her and some other kids. She stands next to him and they hold hands tight and tilt over onto the ground laughing when Felix crashes into them. So he guesses everything is all right.
But when he comes home and sees the toy he gets a feeling like there's a hard little rock inside himself. That man makes everything go wrong. Erik is starting to hate him.