The Castaway Hotel: Next Generation - 52. New Beginnings.

Joshie’s birthday was on Wednesday, so after he woke up and came downstairs, we all made a big deal about this being his special day. We decided to do this now, because Dion had agreed to let Shelly have Joshie stay overnight with her and her parents. She’d asked Dion if he would allow this so they could celebrate Joshie’s birthday with him tonight, since we weren’t having Joshie’s party until the weekend. After Dion agreed this would be fine, he packed a bag with a few items so Joshie would have some play clothes and another school outfit for the next day. He then slipped the bag into the trunk of their car before they left for school, so he’d have everything with him when he dropped Joshie off with his mother on the way home.

The situation with the other boys seems to have calmed down recently, at least now that his dads have agreed to allow Elliot to attend Noah’s next game. It isn’t that they are letting Elliot off the hook, but since it might be the only time he’ll be able to see Noah play, his dads have decided to make this exception. However, Elliot had to agree to an alternate punishment to earn this privilege.

As usual, Jesse drives the boys to school every morning, but it is also his week to pick them up from their practices each afternoon. This means that except for when the boys have a game or a meet, I am hardly involved with them at all during this period.

With so many other things going on, I’ve been trying to do whatever I can to make things easier for everyone else. Although I’m not sure if the trivial matters I’m taking care of actually relieves the others of any significant burdens, I don’t know what else I can do for them. I’ve tried to think of different ways I can assist them, but I keep coming up empty. I wish the boys would just tell me if there is something more I can do to help.

One thing that will be changing is that this is Danny’s last week working full-time at the hospital. He has been advertising the opening of his new practice for about a month now, in much the same way that Brandon had done with his dental office, and he’ll begin working there on Monday. The following weekend, he will start his new shift at the hospital, but I hope he doesn’t have to do this for very long. I don’t want him working seven consecutive days every week, even if he is basically only working part-time Monday through Friday. He’s still going to be there for eight hours a day.

Unfortunately, his final week at the hospital has turned out to be very hard on Danny, because he’s been putting in extremely long hours. After finishing his twelve-hour shift in the E.R. during the day, he comes home, eats dinner with the rest of us and then goes to the health center to make certain things are getting set up for Monday’s opening. Brandon went with him the first night, but since there wasn’t a great deal he could do to help, he’s stayed home the following evenings and spent his time with the boys instead.

I even offered to help Danny set up his new office, but he quickly assured me that I’d have the same problem Brandon had. He pointed out that they have to do this themselves, because they know where each item should go and they have to be certain everything is where it needs to be. I feel badly that I can’t do more to assist him with this process, but I do understand what he is telling me.

This pace kept up until the weekend, when we got a little breather. Saturday morning, we ended up leaving the house early, so we could go to Noah’s game. Brandon had to take Noah down to the school first, so he could ride on the bus with his team, but Brandon assured him the rest of us would be coming to see him play.

We all rode together in the Suburban this time and arrived at the other school well before the 9:00 kickoff time. Elliot was thrilled he had been allowed to come with us and was now totally glued to the action. In fact, I’m not sure if he ever took his eyes off of Noah throughout the entire time, from the warm-up period and throughout the match. I believe he was watching his brother even more closely than Noah had paid attention to him, when he went to watch Elliot dive.

It turned out to be another exciting game, even if it was still scoreless at the end of the first half. However, early in the second half one of Noah’s teammates scored a goal and then about ten minutes later, Noah scored off a corner kick. The right wing on Noah’s team took the corner kick and managed to send the ball just short of the goalmouth. One of the boys on the other team tried to head it away, but the ball didn’t end up going very far. This allowed several other individuals from both teams to briefly come into contact with the ball, and after it bounced off yet another boy, Noah was able to get a foot on it next. He made solid contact with the ball and sent it flying toward the goal. The ball glanced off the left upright and, fortunately, skidded off the post and glided into the net for a goal.

Noah was grinning from ear-to-ear as his teammates congratulated him, but I noticed he was also looking around so he could see our reaction too. I believe he wanted to make sure we had seen what he’d just done and that we appreciated his effort. He looked thrilled when he saw we were standing, clapping and cheering for him, and it turned out that Noah’s goal was the last time anyone scored in this game. When the final whistle blew, his team won the game, 2 – 0.

Since Noah was required to ride back on the bus with his team, the rest of us hopped into the Suburban and headed home. When we got there, we quickly discovered that some of Joshie’s friends had already arrived for his party. Earlier in the week, Dion had invited all of the children from Joshie’s first grade class, so there were kids running all over the place. I could immediately tell that Dion and Trey were overwhelmed and needed a hand getting things organized, so I asked Jesse to drive to the middle school to pick Noah up for us. Once he agreed, the rest of us took a couple of minutes to unwind a bit first, before we jumped in to do what we could to help make Joshie’s sixth birthday party a success.

Shortly after Jesse arrived home with Noah, Dion realized he had forgotten something and asked Jesse if he’d be willing to run to the store and pick it up for him. Jesse quickly agreed and Noah asked Jesse if he could go with him. Jesse told him he would have to ask his dads for permission to do this, so Noah ran over to find one of them. He located Brandon first and got permission to go, and when Elliot overheard their conversation, he wanted to be able to join them. He hurriedly asked Brandon if he could go too, but his dad was quick to remind him that he was grounded and, therefore, wouldn’t be allowed to do this. Elliot appeared to be pouting as he walked away, but he looked absolutely dejected as he watched the other pair drive off.

While Jake and I fired up and manned the grills, to get the food started, Danny and Brandon helped to bring the other items out of the house. Once the boys got back from the store, Jesse and Noah helped to organize a kickball game and played in the field for both teams, since there weren’t enough children who wanted to play. All of the boys from Joshie’s class were anxious to join in, but only a few of the girls wanted to participate. Most of the girls had either worn a dress or had on a nice pair of shoes, so they decided they would just watch, since they didn’t want to mess up either item.

Those who played in the game seemed to have fun, but Joshie was a little disappointed that he didn’t do as well this time, as compared to the games he’d played with the family. Since his friends didn’t know that his cousins and uncles took it easy on him, Joshie’s friends threw the ball to get him out, instead of missing him intentionally. This meant that Joshie ended up making a couple of outs, which seemed to surprise him. He still did very well, but it was kind of a rude wake-up call for him to learn that he had feet of clay on his birthday.

We fed the kids hot dogs and hamburgers after their game ended, along with potato chips, pretzels and soda, before we let them top it off with cake and ice cream. Dion had made sure to let the other parents know this party was for Joshie to have fun with his friends and not to accumulate presents, which meant gifts were not required. In this regard, the party was a huge success.

Once the last of the parents had picked up their children, Joshie went to find his fathers. He had a question that had been bugging him all day, but he’d waited until after his party had ended to ask it.

“It’s my birthday, so when will my brother be coming here to live with us?” he asked, very directly.

Dion and Trey immediately understood why he was asking this question. It was due to the way they had answered him previously. They had told Joshie that his new brother wouldn’t be coming home until a month after he had his next birthday and that is a difficult concept for someone Joshie’s age to comprehend. At least now they’ll be able to give him a more understandable response.

“Joshie, it’s still going to be a few weeks until he gets here,” Dion began. “Wyatt is still in his mommy’s tummy, but when he comes out, we’ll be bringing him home a day or two later.”

“How many days?” Joshie pressed.

“It’s hard to say, but maybe twenty-five,” Dion told him.

Dion then flashed his fingers to indicate how many days this would be. He put up all of his fingers on both hands twice and then one more time with just one hand. Joshie frowned.

“That’s too many,” he insisted.

“It may be, but there’s nothing we can do to make it happen any sooner,” Dion reasoned. “I’m afraid you’ll just have to wait.”

Joshie seemed disappointed, but he knew it wouldn’t do any good to argue. He tried that the last time and it had done nothing to speed things up.

The rest of the weekend passed quietly, although Elliot continued to sulk. He was upset that he hadn’t been allowed to ride to the store with Jesse and Noah, plus he hadn’t been permitted to play in the kickball game with the rest of the boys either. His options had been greatly limited throughout the weekend because of the grounding, which meant he definitely wasn’t a happy camper.

As he set about doing the laundry, which he had agreed to do so he could go to Noah’s game, Elliot acted as if we were treating him like Cinderella. Picking up on this fact, the rest of us decided to play along. Since I had been the one chosen to instruct him on how to do this chore, as we didn’t want him to ruin any of our clothing, I pretended to be the wicked stepmother. Joining in on this illusion, Danny and Brandon took on the personas of the ugly stepsisters. We were having a good time mockingly ragging on Elliot, the same way those characters would have done with Cinderella, but we also thought we were being funny. Elliot, however, definitely didn’t find our antics amusing, but he continued doing his job.

We made it through the rest of the weekend and Elliot managed to hold up his end of the compromise. I think in the end Elliot was satisfied with the deal he’d made, even though at times he had begun to question whether it had been worth it. By the time the boys left for school on Monday, things were pretty much back to normal.

That evening at dinner, Elliot reminded us that he had a swim meet the following night, which instantly caused a problem. This problem didn’t involve any of the adults, but it did affect Noah. After learning about the meet, Noah quickly began to complain that he wanted to watch Elliot too, but he had practice after school and wouldn’t be able to attend. We discussed this situation further and I told him that Elliot’s meet wouldn’t start as early as his practice, since Elliot’s team would have to wait for the other squad to arrive first. This, in turn, meant that Noah should still be able to get to the high school in time to see most of it.

After digesting this information, Noah didn’t seem totally convinced this was going to work out, so I promised him that one of us would hurry over to pick him up, just as soon as he finished his practice. I explained that by doing this he should get to the meet in time to see Elliot do his optional dives, although he might miss one or possibly all of Elliot’s required dives. Although this option wasn’t perfect, it did seem to placate Noah slightly, but he still insisted that he’d prefer seeing his brother do all of his dives.

The following afternoon, the rest of us got to the high school pool before the competition got underway. I kept a close eye on my watch during the early portion of the meet, so I would know when it was time to leave so I could pick Noah up. I’d offered to do this so his dads would be able to stick around and not miss any of Elliot’s dives. Even though some of the races were held first, the diving still got underway before it was time for me to make my run to the Middle School.

Since we’ve never had a diver in the family before, some of what we saw was confusing. Even being able to follow the rules governing the diving competition was a bit of an education for us. I think I understood it a little better than Elliot’s fathers, since I typically watched the diving events during the summer Olympics and have seen many more of those competitions than either Danny or Brandon. I hope you’ll bear with me as I try to explain this to you, the same way as I did for them.

Each diver has to do three required dives, which are designed to showcase his mechanical skills. After each dive is completed, every judge gives the diver a score, between one (lowest) and ten (highest), to signify how well he performed the dive. The highest and lowest judges’ scores are then dropped and the remaining scores are added together. This total is then multiplied by the degree of difficulty factor for that particular dive, which is rated between 1.0 and 3.9. Dives with difficulty levels of 1.0 to 1.9 are the easiest dives, difficulty levels of 2.0 to 2.9 are in the mid-range, while those rated 3.0 to 3.9 are the most difficult to execute.

The degree of difficulty for each dive is pre-determined by the governing organization and standardized (into charts) for all competitions. The result of the multiplication process then determines the diver’s final score for that dive. In the end, the scores from each of his dives are added together to establish the diver’s grand total and final ranking among the various competitors.

Even before Elliot had a chance to make his first dive, Brandon began to get anxious. It all began when he noticed how high the platform was and I saw his face grow pale. Shortly after that, he started to panic.

“Wow, that’s pretty high,” Brandon commented, nervously. “Do you think it’s safe for Elliot to do this?”

I smiled when he made this comment, because I realized he was putting himself in Elliot’s place. Elliot had confided in us that he’s afraid of heights and Brandon could empathize with him, because he suffers from acrophobia too. Elliot insists he’s able to block his fear out when he dives, but I’m not so sure his father will be able to do the same. Instead, Brandon is reacting as if he is the one up on that platform, instead of his son.

When I looked over at Brandon again, to see how he was holding up, I noticed Joshie was gripping his uncle’s hand and giving it a reassuring squeeze. I could only think of how this was another instance of role reversal, as my grandson did his best to reassure his uncle and help him get through this.

When it was finally Elliot’s turn, he performed very well and appeared to execute his dive with grace and agility. I was only able to watch him complete the first of his required dives, a back dive pike, but then I had to leave before he did the inward dive pike, so I could keep my promise to Noah.

True to my word, I left the pool at the time I thought Noah would be finished with his practice and drove over to the Middle School. I had barely pulled up in front of the building when I saw him come shooting outside. He raced over to the Suburban, jumped inside and quickly buckled up.

“Come on. Let’s get moving,” he urged.

I could only chuckle at his behavior, but did as he requested. A short time later, I was pulling into a parking space back at the high school and Noah was urging me to hurry up, so we didn’t miss anything.

We walked very quickly, in fact it was almost a jog, and arrived at the pool before Elliot had completed the last of his required dives, a forward one and a half somersault. Noah and I quickly took our seats, but Noah was sitting on the edge of his, as he watched his brother prepare to make this dive.

Elliot did a nice job and executed the dive very well. Not only was he graceful when he did the somersault, but there was very little splash as he entered the water. I think we were all impressed, but I don’t believe any of us were cheering for him as loudly as Noah.

Once the required dives were completed, the competitors began to prepare to do their optional dives. These are the more complex and visually spectacular dives that each diver uses to showcase his particular strengths and overall talent. For his first two optional dives, Elliot performed a forward 2.5 somersault pike and a reverse 1.5 somersault tuck. Again, he performed them well, but we soon discovered both of these dives are only in the mid-range of difficulty, at 2.6 and 2.1 respectively. Even though he’d executed these dives fairly well, when the judges’ scores were multiplied by the difficulty factor, his total score did not place him on the leader-board. This was because some of his competitors had scored better on their dives, so he didn’t currently rank as one of the top three in total score.

Noah was cheering very loudly after Elliot completed each dive, but I’m not sure if Elliot could tell who was making all of the noise. The way Elliot kept glancing over at us, I suspected he was either slightly embarrassed by how loudly we were cheering for him or a little nervous about having to perform these dives in front of us. After all, this was the first time we’ve come to one of his competitions. I thought he might have even selected the easier dives to do this time, so he would have a better chance of performing well today, because he didn’t wish to mess up and embarrass himself in front of the family.

When it was time for Elliot to do his final dive, his coach approached him for a quick pep talk. Although we couldn’t hear what was being said, we could see Elliot shake his head emphatically. Then, after a few more words from his coach, he reluctantly nodded in agreement and waited for the competitor ahead of him to complete his dive.

About that time, the coach looked up and spotted us in the front row, so he came over to chat. The coach knew me from when I was superintendent, but he’s also familiar with Danny and Brandon, since they’d both been in his P.E. class at one time or another. It didn’t take long before we were all involved in a conversation about Elliot, as we waited for him to do his final dive.

“Coach, what were you and Elliot discussing, before he went over to do this dive?” Danny asked.

“Elliot has played it rather cautiously with his first two optional dives and that’s hurting his overall score,” he answered. “He’s a better diver than what he’s showed so far, so I told him to relax and try one of the more difficult dives that he’s been working on in practice. He’s never done this one in a meet yet, but I feel he’s capable, so this should be pretty interesting.”

After saying this, the coach excused himself to rejoin the team. As he was walking away, we observed Elliot begin to climb to the top of the platform. This time he appeared to be more nervous and the expression on his face suggested that possibly either his fear of heights or the difficult level of the dive might be affecting him this time.

Once Elliot was standing on the platform, he slowly approached the edge and then began to kneel down.

“Is he doing that because he’s scared?” Noah asked.

“He probably is a little scared,” I agreed, “but I don’t believe it’s why he’s bending down. I think it probably has something to do with his next dive.”

No sooner had I said this then Elliot leaned forward and began to push himself into a handstand at the very edge of the platform. I didn’t even know he could do a handstand on the ground, let alone so high up in the air. The crowd grew quiet and the only sounds you could hear were the water slapping against the pool tiles and the gasps from a few of the mothers in the crowd as they watched what Elliot was doing. I took a quick glance at Brandon and discovered he was desperately clinging to Danny and Joshie at this point, as he tried to determine if he could watch this dive or if he would have to turn away.

We all held our breath as Elliot’s arms began to tremble slightly as he lowered his body ever so slowly. Then, he pushed away from the platform and began the dive. His takeoff wasn’t perfect, but the triple somersault and his seamless entry into the water were breathtaking. As Elliot came out of the water, a huge smile appeared on his face when he heard the heartfelt round of applause that greeted him.

It was at this point that we learned the dive was referred to as an armstand back 3 somersault pike. When the judges’ scores were multiplied by the 3.5-degree of difficulty, the resulting total greatly boosted his overall score. Even though his team didn’t win the meet, Elliot was awarded a bronze medal for his effort.

Now that the meet had finally ended and the awards had been presented, we waited in the bleachers for Elliot to shower. When he eventually emerged from the locker room, his damp hair, jeans and sweatshirt were a strange contrast to the shiny, bronze medal he still wore proudly around his neck. He blushed when we cheered and patted him on the back, but he made sure we each got a chance to inspect his medal.

“That was incredible,” Noah told him. “I don’t care if you didn’t get the highest score today, you’re still the best to me and I’m really glad you’re my brother.”

I think those two have formed their own mutual admiration society and the rest of us are thrilled that they have grown so close. Elliot later confided in us that he thought Noah’s reaction had a lot to do with what happened with the bully and how he’d protected him, but I disagreed. I believe Noah’s strong feelings for him had begun long before that incident took place.

I had seen Noah following Elliot around for quite a few weeks prior to the run-in at the middle school and Noah had also consciously chosen to go to Elliot for help each time he had a problem. He had sought Elliot out so he could speak to him about his initial reluctance to shower with the other boys on his team and it was Elliot who had explained to him why some of the other boys were more developed than he was. Elliot was also the one whom Noah went to when he had another problem and Elliot ended up explaining about erections to him too. I believe all of these previous encounters have added up to explain why they now have such a close bond. In fact, I don’t think it could be any stronger, even if they had grown up in the same household.

While I had been thinking about their situation, some of the others had been praising Elliot.

“That was awesome, son,” Danny told him, “but you scared your dad to death though.”

“Awww. You don’t have to worry about me,” Elliot replied.

“I wasn’t talking about me,” Danny laughed. “I don’t think your other dad took a breath until you finally climbed out of the pool.”

All eyes were now focused on Brandon.

“Okay, I’ll admit it. I got nervous just watching you climb up the ladder,” Brandon offered, as he put his arm around Elliot’s shoulder. “I’m certainly glad I didn’t close my eyes though, because those dives were impressive and the last one was absolutely spectacular.”

“Thanks, Dad,” Elliot smiled. “I was nervous too and had to concentrate like crazy just to keep from thinking about the height.”

“That last dive was way cool,” Noah gushed, as he moved even closer to his brother. “I couldn’t believe you could do that. It’s so high and then you had to stand on your hands too.”

“Awww, thank you,” Elliot replied. “It was a little scary, but I’ve been practicing really hard so I could use it in a meet.”

It was nice to see such a happy smile on Elliot’s face again, especially after watching him mope around the house these past few weeks. We were all very proud of him and even Hayden and his parents came over to tell Elliot how impressed they were with his last dive. I think this made Elliot’s smile grow even wider.

The rest of the evening was pretty quiet, except for everyone talking about how impressive Elliot’s final dive had been. Jesse was somewhat speechless after first witnessing that dive, but he finally began to praise Elliot for what he’d done, and Noah also continued going on and on about how great his brother had done. The boys were still pretty wound up when they went to bed, so I’m not sure how long it took before they finally fell asleep.

Elliot was still pretty keyed up when he came down to breakfast the next morning. This was due to the fact that he was fairly positive that some of the other students would be talking about his final dive, since quiet a few of them had also been there watching the meet. If you remember, I’ve told you before that I thought Elliot was a passive attention seeker, so now he was reveling in the anticipated attention he felt he was going to attract at school.