Gotta be that stomach flu, I thought. Great.
That was how the evening began. It continued with Colton throwing up
every thirty minutes like clockwork. Between times, Sonja sat in an
upholstered side chair with Colton on her lap, keeping the room’s ice
bucket within reach in case she couldn’t make it to the bathroom. About
two hours into this cycle, another kid joined the party. As Colton was in the
bathroom, heaving into the toilet with Sonja kneeling beside him, a
steadying hand on his back, Cassie ran in and threw up in the tub.
“Todd!” Sonja called. “I need a little help in here!”
Great, I thought. Now they both have it.
Or did they? After we were able to move both kids back to the bedroom,
Sonja and I put our heads together. Colton had seemed to kick that
stomach flu the day before. And all day long at the Butterfly Pavilion, he
was his normal self, completely happy except for the strain of holding
Rosie to get that sticker. Cassie had held Rosie too... could Goliath
tarantulas trigger a case of double upchuck?
No, dummy, I told myself and pushed the thought aside.
“Did the kids eat the same thing at the restaurant?” I asked Sonja, who
by then was lying on one of the double beds with one arm around each of
our two green-at-the-gills kids.
She looked at the ceiling and thought for a moment. “I think they both had
some pizza... but we all had pizza. I think it’s that flu. Colton probably
wasn’t over it quite yet, and he passed it along to Cassie before we got
here. The doctor said it was pretty contagious.”
No matter what, it looked like our relaxing, post-turmoil celebration trip
was abruptly coming to an end. And a few minutes later, I heard the magic
words that seemed to confirm my thoughts: “Mommy, I feel like I’m gonna
throw up again.”
Sonja snatched up Colton and hustled him to the toilet again, just in the
nick of time.
When the pink light of dawn began peeking through the curtains the next
morning, Sonja was still awake. We had agreed that at least one of us
should still go visit Greeley Wesleyan and get some large-church ministry
knowledge we could export to Imperial, so I tried to get at least a little