I Taught My Son to Call His Father “Uncle Ethan” Chapter 07
Chapter 7 A Park Full of Strangers
Ethan drove straight from the hospital to Dreamland Studios.
The roads were jammed.
Cars stretched endlessly ahead, bumper to bumper, like a river trapped in place.
Sweat gathered in his palms as he gripped the wheel.
He called me.
No answer.
He called again.
Still nothing.
The third call went straight to voicemail.
He told himself I was angry.
So he texted.
“Zoey, Teddy is okay. I’m coming now.”
“Don’t leave. I’ll be there soon.”
“I didn’t miss it this time. I really came.”
Nothing came back.
Then he called Leo’s kids’ smartwatch.
It was off.
1
His heartbeat began to pound.
Panic tightened around his throat, slow and cruel.
Suddenly, he remembered what I had said the night before.
“It’s far.”
At the time, he had thought that meant a trip.
Now he heard it differently.
My voice had been too calm.
Not angry.
Not disappointed.
Finished.
Ethan hit the gas.
A red light burned ahead.
He glanced at the clock.
He ran it.
Horns erupted behind him.
He did not slow down.
The second red light.
The third.
He drove through all of them.
Serena’s messages kept appearing.
“Ethan, Teddy is still crying.”
“His wound is bleeding again. Please come back.”
“I really can’t handle this.”
Then came photos of Teddy’s injuries.
The Ethan from before would have turned around.
This Ethan looked once, then muted her.
At 3:10, he reached the entrance of Dreamland Studios.
Before the car fully stopped, he threw the door open and rushed into the crowd.
Parents were everywhere, hands linked with children.
Laughter, music, vendors, footsteps-all of it crashed over him.
Every white shirt.
Every blue backpack.
Every small hand held by a woman.
Each one made hope flare in him for half a second.
Each one crushed him a moment later.
A Park? tof Strangers
He stood among strangers and kept calling me.
“Zoey, answer. Please answer.”
He ran toward the entrance while dialing.
A staff member stopped him.
“Sir, your tickets.”
He pulled out the three tickets.
His hands shook so badly the paper nearly slipped from his fingers.
Three tickets.
A father.
A mother.
A child.
The family he had finally remembered to show up for.
But we were already gone.
He entered the park anyway.
He searched like a man refusing to understand.
Mascot Land.
The carousel.
The gift shops.
Every place Leo had ever mentioned, Ethan went there.
At last, he stopped in front of a yellow mascot character.
On Leo’s sixth birthday, Leo had hugged his picture book and made that wish.
“Dad, I want to go to Dreamland Studios and see the yellow mascots.”
Ethan remembered his own answer.
“Childish.”
“Too crowded.”
“Too much trouble.”
“Wait until you’re older.”
Then he brought Teddy.
He had held Teddy in the photos.
He had smiled like the father Leo had wanted.
Ethan crouched by the roadside and covered his face.
Only then did he understand that hurt did not vanish just because no one talked about it.
It stayed.
It accumulated.
And one day, it returned with interest.
At dusk, he saw a woman and a boy outside a restaurant.
White shirt.
Blue backpack.
For one wild second, he thought it was us.
He rushed over.
“Zoey! Leo!”
They turned.
They were strangers.
The woman pulled her child behind her, startled.
“I’m sorry,” Ethan said.
His voice was scraped raw.
“I thought you were someone else.”
He stayed at Dreamland Studios until dark.
The lights came on.
Fireworks burst overhead.
Children screamed with delight all around him.
Ethan stood there, holding the three wrinkled tickets.
Finally, he understood.
Leo and I had waited.
We had waited too many times.
This time, we simply stopped.
