I hear the rustle first, then the soft thump of feet landing on the carpet.
Here we go again.
At this point I can predict it. He will come into my room, a perplexed look on his face, a nameless terror in his mind. He will talk excitedly about a non-existent situation, either A) asking for or B) demanding that I come and see what only he could.
Either way, my answer is always the same.
“Hey bud, need to go to the bathroom?” I say in same tone I use when asking the dog if he wants to go out.
Over the last year, this twice-a-month drama, in which my sound-asleep son seeks my assistance to battle an unknown demon that is easily slain when he empties his bladder, will play out the usual way. Frantic child roams the house, is persuaded to pee, goes back to sleep.
This night seems the same, the padding of feet on the carpet, a shadow shifting outside my bedroom door thrown by a nightlight bright enough to read by, him poking his head in and demanding via incomplete sentences that I investigate a sound or mysterious figure or (once) the disappearance of his brother, who no doubt was sleeping comfortably a few miles away at his mom’s house.
But when the steps continue down the hallway, followed by a rattle as if a dozen paper towels had quickly been stripped from the roll, I go into active-parent mode.
“Hey bud, need to go to the bathroom?”
No answer. No sound at all.
Damn. Now I am going to have to get out of bed.
Then, a faint “Mommy … ?” His voice is hesitant, cracking. Filled with fear.
I flip off the covers and flip on the light. “Bryson?”
“Daddy?”
Stepping into the hallway, I see him standing there, his hands shaking in front of him. He turns his head toward me.
“Daddy?”
His talent for facial recognition suffers during these nighttime strolls, so I have learned to assure him.
“No, I only resemble your father, I am actually a demon spawned from Hell determined to steal your soul and lead you into an eternity of suffering, bwah hah hah hah!”
Well, no, I really didn’t say that, but I’ve always wondered what would happen if I did.
“Yeah, bud, it’s me.”
“Daddy, you have to see, you have to, you have to, you have to-“
“You have to go to the bathroom,” I say, my knowledge of dealing with his nightmares pretty much beginning and ending with the toilet.
“But Daddy, I don’t know, it’s, I can’t-“
I steer him toward the bathroom, the Room of Answers. Here he will find what it is that he seeks, and I will find a relief of my own, a release from his incomprehensible chatter to which I can only nod and say, “You’re safe, you’re sound asleep, here, let’s get you to the bathroom.”
I learned very early on during this sleepwalking episodes that Bryson doesn’t always follow the proper bathroom-going sequence, resulting in a situation that simply makes Daddy cranky. All the necessities are there: the pulling down of the pants, the pulling up of the shirt, the grasping and pointing of the penis, the urination. It’s just not always in that order. The final and most critical part, the actual relieving of the bladder, can some at almost any step. He could raise his shirt, relieve himself and lower his pants. He can lower his pants, relieve himself and raise his shirt. Or he can start the whole thing off by relieving himself.
So I like to stand over him, reminding him of just what he needs to do to successfully complete the task.
I take his shoulders and center him next to the toilet (I have learned what a difference a few critical inches can make). I then talk him through it. Lower the pants. Lift the shirt. Now with one hand hold the shirt. With the other, grab, yeah, there you go.
Thanks to teamwork, there are no mishaps.
Yet the frightened look does not disappear, even has he thrusts his hands into the sink without turning on the water, rubbing them together for less than two seconds and then wiping them on the towel before he turns on the water.
As I turn off the water, I see that Bryson is grabbing his stomach and is slightly bent at the waist. Then he erupts, emitting the kind of long, deep, buzzsaw-like fart most associated with old men in care homes trying to impress the nurse.
Physics seemed to demand that Bryson be flying around the room like a balloon losing air. About halfway through I expected to see him slowly deflate, his body collapsing in on itself for surely every inch inside had been devoted to storing gas.
When it finally fizzled a few minutes later (or so it seemed) came the proof that he was utterly, inescapably and very deeply in sleep – he remained silent. Not a giggle, chuckle or guffaw. Such a stupendous occurrence normally would have had him bursting at the seams, laughing until his sides were sore, because when you are 9, there truly is nothing more hilarious than one’s own spontaneous noises.
Several aftershocks followed, defying science that tells us the body has a finite capacity. Through it all, Bryson continued spewing Nightspeak.
“I need you to … You have to … There’s something … I can’t …”
More stringent measures are needed.
“Bryson, let’s get you to sit on the toilet for a while, OK?”
Some primitive part of his brain kicks in at this point because the first thing he does is to lower his pants. Bryson is the typical boy who waits until the last second to answer this part of nature’s call. I have watched him countless times rush down the hallway, his pants flying at half-staff, his right hand working the waistband even loser, his left grasped tightly on his cheeks, squeezing the cleft while his bowels laugh at his puny effort to keep the inevitable at bay. And yet nine times out of 10 he makes it successfully, and on the 10th time he does his own laundry.
With this at the back of my mind, I panic when his pajama bottoms puddle around his ankles because his is still more than two feet away from the bowl.
“Waitwaitwaitwait nononono,” I say, wondering if my version of Nightspeak will sink into his brain. “Don’tdon’tdon’tdon’t.”
I lower the seat, grab his left elbow, spin him around and plop him down.
Phew.
As he sits in silence, I once again go over all the facts with him.
“You’re safe, you’re home, you’re with Daddy who has risen from the grave to-“
No, of course not. So then why is that so tempting?
I am calm, rational and eager to go back to bed. I then try to explain what’s happening to him, why he may feel uncomfortable, experiencing the kinds of cramps that normally afflict women once a month.
No, wait, let’s cut out that last part.
“Something you may have eaten disagreed with you,” I say. “Your body is having this weird reaction to it and-“
”What do you mean disagreed?”
Wait a sec. This is a rational thought, an expected response to outside stimuli, which never happens when Bryson is sleepwalking.
His bowels have done what I could never do; awakened him.
“You see, sometimes we eat things and for some reason your tummy has a hard time with it and pretty soon you’re not feeling good,” I say.
“So what disagreed?”
“I have no idea. Sometimes it just happens.”
A few minutes later, when it seemed fairly clear the seismic shifts inside the youngster had faded, Bryson stood and pulled up his pants.
“Ready to go back to bed?”
“Yeah.”
I tuck him in, kiss his cheek, ruffle his hair and say goodnight.
“Daddy, will it disagree with me again?”
“I really hope not. But if it does, I’ll grab the video camera real quick because, honestly, it’ll be better than an episode of The Simpsons.”
Besides, I think, science might be interested as well.
