“Well, if you’re sure.” Jake gets up gingerly from his air mattress and pads down the hallway on socked feet, his steps no louder than a whisper.
I look up at the constellations and remember the times that Lynda and I used to lie in the grass and look up at the stars. “I miss you,” I say to her in my head.
Then I roll over and prepare for sleep, sandwiched between my two girls. I’m pretty sure I’ll wake up with Kerry-Anne’s foot in my face and a toe up my nose, but it’ll be worth it.
12
Bess
I’m startled awake when I hear knocking on the front door. “What’s wrong?” I ask from where I was sleeping on the couch as Eli walks by me and looks through the window.
“It’s Mr. Jacobson,” he says quietly.
He opens the door and Mr. Jacobson whispers vehemently, “It woke up!”
“What woke up?”
“The little one,” he says.
Eli scratches his head. “Which little one?”
“The little…baby Aaron one,” Mr. Jacobson says, obviously too flustered to remember.
“Miles?” Eli supplies as he tries to rub the sleep from his eyes.
“Yeah, that one,” Mr. Jacobson clarifies. “I volunteered to watch it while it slept, but it didn’t follow the rules. It woke up.”
Eli chuckles. “Babies have a tendency to do that.”
“Well, come and get it.” He motions for Eli to follow him.
“Where’s Aaron?” Eli asks.
“He’s up at the house sleeping in the fort.”
“And he left you to babysit?”
“Shut your trap and come on.” He motions again for Eli to follow him, and Eli slips his feet into the shoes he’d left by the door and he follows him into the yard.
I get my shoes and follow too. “How did you end up babysitting?” I ask.
“Stop asking stupid questions,” Mr. Jacobson says. So I shut my trap too and stay quiet. We all traipse across to Aaron’s cabin.
I can hear babbling from the bedroom, so I follow Eli in that direction. Eli walks across the room and stares into the portable crib. Miles is lying there talking to himself. “He’s not even crying,” Eli says.
“Yeah, well, how was I supposed to know what he’d do next, huh?” Mr. Jacobson asks caustically. “One minute I was asleep in that very comfortable rocker over there and the next it was talking to me from the crib.”
“Did you call Aaron?” I ask.
“Why would I do that?” Mr. Jacobson rubs the top of his head. “You two were right next door.”
Eli chuckles as I stand there. I’m sure I look dumbfounded, because I really am. Neither Eli nor I know anything about babies. But Eli reaches into the crib and lifts Miles out. He makes a snorting sound when Miles grabs his nose. Eli carries him to the dresser that Aaron has set up like a changing table. He lays him gently on the fabric pad and starts to change him.
“Where’d you learn to do that?” I ask in awe.
“Gabby taught me this morning,” he says. “It’s not that hard.”
“I like them when they’re big enough to wipe their own asses,” Mr. Jacobson says. He motions toward the baby. “When they’re this size, I don’t know what to do with them.” He grumbles low under his breath. “I like them more when they’re asleep.”