After All • Calum Hood (Sequel to ISTTY)

59

Just as I expected, spending time with Mali made me feel renewed, better. After leaving her flat, I went to pay a little visit to my parents, I wanted to say goodbye before leaving again, I'm more than grateful with them as well, they helped me so much with everything, with Madeleine, with Wyatt and even with Annie. I was there for a while then I decided it was time to go, I have a son that I want to spend time with as well, he's my number one priority.

Madeleine was on the sofa, she saw me enter the flat but she didn't say a word to me, she just looked back at her phone and I internally thanked her for that. Wyatt was on the floor playing with some hot wheels, once he saw me, his face lightened up and with difficulty, he stood up and extended his arms towards me

—Daddy -he says almost in a whisper-

—Son -I smile to him and then hold him- how is daddy's champ behaving? -I ask him as I poke his side, making him laugh desperately-

—Daddy, daddy -he would repeat in between laughs-

Madeleine's looking at us with a smile plastered on her lips but the moment I realised I saw her looking at me, she turned away

—Madeleine -I get her attention-

—Yeah?

—I, um, I'll take Wyatt out, you know, since I'm leaving tomorrow...

—Oh -her face saddens- of course, sure. There's no problem, I guess you want to spend time with him before you leave -she gives me a weak smile and I nod-

—Go, day bye to your mommy -I put Wyatt down on the floor and Madeleine extends her arms, he starts to walk over there-

—Be a good boy, alright? -she kisses his cheek-

—There's anything that I should take with me?

—Hmm, yeah, the diaper bag. He's starting to be potty trained but he got some accidents from time to time so you better take him with the diapers on -she says and I nod, walking away to Wyatt's room to pick up whatever's necessary-

After getting everything I needed, I walk back to the living room. Truth is the idea of going out wasn't the best, I wanted to lay down and rest before leaving but being on the same house as Madeleine doesn't seem like the greatest thing to me, so... I hold my child and then put him on his chair, making our way. After thinking for a while, we ended up on one of Australia's malls.

Even though Wyatt is a little kid, he's pretty intelligent—he speaks already -though it's just babbling- and he also walks. Whenever he wanted to go inside a store, he'd point at his with his tiny hands making me chuckle, there's a store of children's clothes that we went in because Wyatt wanted us to go there, it's carnival themed, there are a lot of lights and even a little carousel

—Calm down buddy -I giggle, he's just focused on trying to get me into the carnival themed store-

Inside of the store, apart from having a lot of children attractions, it's full of clothes and a lot of them caught my attention, now I'm focused in getting my son new clothes whilst he's mesmerised by the lights. There's this little horse machine that kids ride and Wyatt couldn't stop looking at other children play there, it makes me chuckle and shake my head at my son's innocence, I walk to the cashier and pay for the coin, Wyatt still fully focused on the horse—we start walking there and he can't hold his excitement. Seeing him so excited over something so simple made me feel super good. We wait until the little girl that's there finishes her ride, then I carefully put Wyatt in it, he's looking around everywhere trying to get every single detail of the horse, I pull my phone out and snap some pictures, looking at him like a proud dad