I finished spooning soup into the third bowl and slid it carefully across the table to Gideon. The girls to his right and left were already happily slurping down the rich broth from their own bowls and looked up greedily as another bowl of their favorite soup slid by in front of them. But the boy seemed tired and was resting his head on the table and had apparently not even noticed that the food had been delivered to the table yet.

I reached over and tapped the little man on the shoulder. “Gideon,” I said, “Your soup is here. You should eat some. It’s your favorite. Wonton Soup. It’s delicious and it’s good for you. It’s nice and warm.” I glanced at his sisters. “And there is only so long I’ll be able to protect it for you.”

The boy propped his head up in his hands and frowned down at the bowl, then he laid his head back down on the table. “I don’t want to eat that soup anymore.”

“What? That’s crazy. Why would you not want to have any soup? I thought you liked this soup?”

“I did, but… I don’t want any of that soup now.”

“It’s not spicy or anything. You’ll like it!”

He took a deep breath and looked into the bowl again, chasing the wonton around with his spoon. He seemed sad. “I just…” he dropped the spoon, “Can I not eat it, Dad?”

“Sure, I guess,” I said, “But why not, this is your dinner. I thought this was going to be a special treat.”

“I just don’t want to eat it anymore because now I know it’s from Star Wars.”

Everyone at the table shared a look of confusion as we all struggled to figure out what the boy was talking about. Finally, it came to me. “Wait, Gideon, no. You can’t possibly mean… Gideon, this is Wonton Soup. Not Tauntaun soup. It’s not made out of the kangaroo horses that live on Hoth. Hold on, did you really think I have been feeding you soup made out of the weird ice horses that Luke Skywalker rides on?”

He laid his head back down on the table and covered his face with his hands. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

His sisters were falling out of the seats laughing. “Mmmm, Tauntauns!” they said, slurping at their soup even faster now. “If you don’t want it, I’ll take it!”

The little boy pushed the bowl away from him with the back of his hand, and slowly slid beneath the table in embarrassment.