This One Time At Band Camp

Chaoter 30

"Tyler! You can't just go around hugging strangers' legs!," Noah says as he runs up to pull the limitless boy from my leg. He looks up to apologize and realizes it's me. "Oh hey Zoey!"

"Hey," I say back a little surprised as Noah picks up the little boy. He starts to wave his little hand at me.

"Who's this little guy?"

Noah smiles. "This is my nephew, Tyler. Tyler, this is my friend Zoey. Can you say hi?"

Little Tyler continues to wave and smile. He shouts out a little hi and put his thumb is his mouth. He's so cute. He's got short brown hair, blue eyes and chubby little cheeks. "How old is he?"

"Just a bit over a year," Noah says sitting on the bench next to me. Tyler begins to fuss a little and points to the swings. "Guess duty calls, sorry."

As Noah gets up, he puts down Tyler. Tyler hold Noah's thumb in his little hand and begins walking towards the swings. I get up and follow. "No worries. What exactly is your duty?"

We reach the swings and Noah lifts up Tyler to put him in the little baby swing and pushes lightly. Tyler's screams in delight and I smile. "I have to watch him for an undetermined amount of time. I've only been with him for 3 hours and I'm already running out of things to do."

"How do you not know how long you have to watch him?" I ask a little curious.

"Well," Noah starts. "My brother Andy showed up in my room around 7 this morning. I was still sleeping and he put the little guy on the bed with me. He woke me up and told me mom said I would watch him as long as needed. Andy's wife, Stacy, went into labor this morning so I have to watch Andy until she gets that other baby out of her. So. Undetermined amount of time."

"Oh!", I say. " I didn't know that. Congrats. Heck, I didn't even know you were already an uncle. Say, how old is your brother?"

"24. "

"Oh wow. That's...different."

"Yea. I know. I was a surprise baby, Or at least that's what I figure." Tyler begins to get fussy so Noah takes him out of the swing. The second his feet hit the ground, he runs to the playground. "Whoa! Buddy! You can't go up there alone!"

"I'll go with him. You could use a break and I love kids," I say following after Tyler.

"You sure? He tends to be a bit of a handful."

"I'm sure. Go sit down," I say. I help Tyler climb the stairs to the playground. When we get to the top, Tyler puts one hand on the railing and reaches the other one towards me. I let him grip my finger and we walk around the playground. I I tighten my grip on him as we get on the swaying bridge. He seems amazed by it. We stay there for awhile until Tyler starts pulling me up towards the big spiral slide. I sit him on my lap and we go down. He screams in delight again.

When we reach the bottom, we walk over to where Noah is sitting in the bench. "Did you guys have fun ?"

Tyler nods his little head up and down. I smile.

"You know, I have a bunch of old toys and games I could bring to your house to entertain the little guy if you want, " I add.

"That would be awesome ," Noah says.

"Ok, I'll run home real quick and grab them. Which house is yours again?" I say looking towards the street

Noah point it out to me. "It's that white one two from the end. I'll see you soon. Thank you!"

"No problem," I say starting to jog back towards my house. It takes me a few minutes, but I get home and find my moms back from shopping. "Hey mom, we still have those old toys right?"

I find my mom in the kitchen cleaning some dishes. "Yea, they're In the attic. why?"

"I'm going to take them to Noah's. His brother's wife went into labor so he's watching his little nephew and he's got nothing to play with," I say heading towards the attic.

"Okay. Have fun !" My mother calls after me as I climb up to find a bag of toys. I find some old board games and some stuffed animals along with a couple of play toys too.

I bring them all down and realize it's way more than I could carry to Noah's house. "Any chance you could give me a quick lift around the block?"

"Mhm. Sure thing sweetie. Just give me a minute. I'll be right out."

I head to the car and put the toys in the backseat. I take this opportunity to check my phone. I find a text from Ethan saying" hey babe. Sorry about last night. Love ya.;)"

I decide not to answer him because I was still pretty mad. My mom come to the car and starts it up. I lead her to the playground and then to Noah's house. I grab the toys out of the back and thank my mom.

I walk to the front door and knock. Noah's answers and Tyler is in the background laughing at spongebob on the tv. "Hey. Whoa! That's a lot of toys. Thanks! Come on in."

I place the toys in a like by the door and observe his house. It was huge. And beautiful. I mean not mansion huge. But still pretty big. The living room had a high ceiling with a chandelier. It had soft fluffy gray carpet and big comfy couches facing an average size tv.

I see Tyler lying on the floor still watching spongebob. Noah calls to him. "Hey Tyler, miss Zoey is back and she brought you some toys!"

Tyler jumps up and stumbles a bit and falls down. He gets right back up though and runs to hug my legs. His smile is a mile wide.

I kneel down so we' re the same level. " what would you like to play with first?" He pulls out a little doggie on wheels with a string that rings a bell as it rolls. He starts to pull it around the room, running.

Noah and I sit on the couch and watch him play. He goes for the cars next and starts rolling them around. Next he goes for a stuffed bear and climbs up onto the other couch with it. He puts his head on it and. He passes out.

Noah taps my shoulder and quietly leads me to the kitchen, taking candy land with him. He sets up the board on the table and we begin to play.

In a hushed tone, Noah says. "Thanks for doing this for me. I owe ya one."

"No worries," I say taking my turn. "It's no big deal."

" you're great with kids, you know. You're a natural. "

"Thanks," I say with a little blush.

I look up and I make eye contact with him. "You're going to be a great mother someday."

My blush deepens and I look away. "You know, he's going to be hungry when he wakes up. We should make him some food. Got any Mac n cheese? Kids love that shit. "

"Well of course I do!" He gets up and opens a cabinet and pulls out a nick of kraft Mac and cheese with shapes like spindle bob. "It's not just little kids that like this stuff."

"True that. He doesn't want it, I do. Cook that Shiz up!"

Noah laughs as he starts to boil some water. I watch him and notice him glance back to me occasionally. I catch myself thinking that someday he'd make a great father too.

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This chapter goes out to my cousin and his wife who just found out they're having a baby boy! Congrats guys!