Hearts On Campus

That’s Ryan’s way of showing me how much he enjoys something he’s no way even eating.

“Well, daddy will be proud,” I murmur to Ryan, wiping down his hands and face.

“Icken ummato! Icken ummato!”

Famous first words, I groan and then smile. Kissing baby Ryan’s forehead, relieved when it’s nowhere near as warm as his dad’s, but he does have the same cheeky smile in his eyes.

“Chicken Tomato is right, buddy. Do you wanna help me call Doc Winters?” I ask him, knowing the answer before I’ve even finished asking.

I spoon him out some more soup, then go take the rest to his dad before coming back to call the doctor.

Ryan’s actually eating it now, using his spoon like a big boy, slurping carefully and trying not to make a noise. Just like his dad does.

I get through to the doctor personally and explain Wes’s temperature and symptoms, he agrees to call around as soon as he can.

“He’ll be fine, Katelyn. Just a little temperature, he’s as strong as an ox otherwise,” Winters tells me after examining Wes.

I breathe a sigh of relief, and seeing the doctor out I hear the house erupting again.

“Mommy! Jamie turned my light off.”

“Mom! Jane’s putting make up on my uniform.”

“Mom! I’m hungry.”

“Icken ummato! Icken ummato!”

The dryer pings, finishing its fifth cycle for the day, my phone chirps with a message from my publisher, and I can hear the sound of my own hologram stuck on a word, repeating from one of the computers giving my virtual lectures.

I hear Wes’s voice too, weak and thin, calling out for more soup and maybe some water too.

There’s never a dull moment in the Heart household, and like I end up replying in answer to my student’s original question once I sit my real self down, back at the monitor with baby Ryan on my knee I reply.

“It’s love, Joel. The ‘underlying theme’ or ‘quantifying factor’ you’re looking for in anything is love,” I tell him, I tell all of them in the class, switching the image back to the real me from the computer generated me.

“Not as a number or value in your equations, not as something you’ll see on paper or even read from any data… but something every great inventor, poet, scientist or even just stay at home mom is fully aware of.

“It’s the one thing that makes us do what we do, it’s the feeling that drives us to make, see and do things,” I hear myself saying with no shortage of emotion in my voice.

“Umm, Professor Heart?” one of the students asks.

“Yeah?” I respond, eager for questions now that the lecture’s over.

“Is any of that gonna be in our test?”

“No, Joel,” I smile. “That’s something you’ll get tested by long after you tell yourself you’ve figured out anything, computer related or not.”

Ryan gurgles, and I can feel he’s made a contribution of his own to my lecture, so I wrap it up.

I change him and settle him back down to sleep before heading back to check on Wes.

He’s sleeping now, empty soup bowl by his pillow and a thin red mustache I just know tastes like chicken tomato soup.

“I hope you feel better soon, Wes,” I whisper in his ear, watching a smile start to play on his face as he twitches in his dream.

“We all hope you feel better soon, and we love you lots. Doc winters says not to worry because you’re gonna be fine.”

He murmurs something, still sleeping and I lean in to hear what he’s saying.

“Love. Love you, Katelyn…”

And I love you, my forever and always.