Chapter Text
September 1949
Darry heard the front door to the Mathewses’ house creak open. He looked up from his toys to see his mama standing there, a hand resting on her round belly.
“Hi, Darry.” She smiled.
“Hi, Mama!” He shot to his feet and wrapped his arms around her legs. He gave her belly a little kiss, too, hoping the baby inside was happy to see him. “Hi, Baby!”
The baby didn’t have a name yet, so they just called it Baby for now. Daddy had all kinds of ideas, but Mama said they should wait to decide ‘til it was born.
Mama patted the top of his head. “Did you have fun with Keith?”
“Mhmmm.” He nodded, looking up at her. Keith was fun, even though he didn’t talk so good yet. Mama said it was because he was only two. But he had fun trains at his house and his mama let them eat apple slices with peanut butter, so Darry liked him.
Darry’s mama sat down on the couch and chatted with Keith’s mama for a while, talking about doctors and babies and something called labor. Darry didn’t pay them much attention; instead, he plopped back down on the floor to continue playing with Keith.
“I want green,” he said, grabbing the little metal train and placing it on the tracks.
“Gween,” Keith echoed. He lined up the other train behind Darry’s. “Mine owange.”
Darry pushed his train around the small track, ramming it into the orange one when Keith didn’t move his out of the way. He made a crashing sound with his mouth, puffing out his cheeks. Keith just laughed at him and clapped his hands.
They played like that for a while, pushing their trains around the track, across the floor, and even up the walls. After a few minutes, Mama stood up from the couch and announced, “Well, we’d best be goin’.”
“Can I stay?” Darry asked.
Mama shook her head. “Not today. It’s about time for your nap, ain’t it?”
Now that she mentioned it, he realized he really was tired. He yawned, big and loud. “Okay.”
“Say goodbye to Keith,” she told him, grabbing hold of his hand and pulling him to his feet.
“Bye!” he called as they headed toward the front door.
“Bye-bye!” Keith said, waving his chubby little hand. That was one of the words he was really good at, along with choo-choo and uh-oh.
On their way out, Darry’s mama said goodbye to Keith’s mama and thanked her for watching him, and then they started the short walk home.
Darry wanted to walk faster, but he tried his very best to be patient the way his mama taught him. Ever since Mama’s belly got big, she’d been walking slow and funny. She said it was because her feet hurt. Sometimes, she made Daddy rub them while they watched television. Mama never wore normal clothes anymore, either — just big dresses and shirts that looked like circus tents.
Darry pulled on the hem of her dress to get her attention. “When’s baby brother coming?”
Mama glanced down at him. “In a few weeks. And it could be a baby sister, you know.”
“Yuck.” All of his friends were boys. He didn’t think he’d like having a girl around. Well, except for Mama, of course.
He spent the rest of the walk telling her all about his afternoon with Keith. He made sure she knew how cool his trains were and how much he wanted some just like them for his birthday. She said his birthday wasn’t for four more months — after the baby was born — but Darry thought that sounded pretty soon. Four was not very many, after all. He wondered what kind of birthday cake the baby would like.
Once they’d arrived home and Mama had helped him get his shoes and jacket off, she led him to his bedroom so he could take a nap. Except now that he’d started thinking about the baby, he wasn’t so tired anymore.
“What will Baby look like?” he asked as he laid down on the bed.
Mama sat down next to him. “Well, I’m not sure. We won’t know ‘til they’re born. But you look just like your daddy, so I’m hopin’ this one looks like me.”
Darry hoped so, too. His mama was pretty, so maybe this new baby would be pretty like her.
He sighed happily. He liked talking about the baby. He wanted to know more. “How big?”
“Small. Babies are small.”
“Small like Keith?”
“Even smaller.”
“Like this?” He pinched two fingers together, leaving a space no larger than a pea.
Mama laughed. “Not quite.”
“Like this?” He stretched his arms as wide as they would go.
“No, no, that’s too big.”
“Then how big?”
“Well, today at my appointment, the doctor said the baby’s about seventeen inches tall.”
Seventeen! Darry knew that one. He’d been practicing his numbers with Daddy. “One two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven twelve thirteen fourteen fifteen sixteen seventeen!” he exclaimed without pausing for a breath.
“Very good.” Mama patted him on the back, and he felt warm inside knowing he’d made her proud. “Are you gonna help the baby learn their numbers when they get older?”
“Uh-huh. When Baby gets three years old like me.” He held up three fingers.
“I’m sure they’ll like that.”
He looked at his mama’s belly, imagining the baby inside and wondering what they’d be like. Would his brother or sister be good at counting like Darry? Would they like to play with trains? And more importantly, how could a whole baby fit in Mama’s tummy? Seventeen was a really big number. Way bigger than four.
“What is inches?” he asked, thinking back to what she had told him a minute ago.
“Oh, it’s —” Mama tilted her head to the side. “Well, it’s something we use to measure things so we know how big they are.”
“But — but what is it?”
“Hold on.” His mama slid off the bed, standing up with a groan. “Stay right here. I’m gonna go get something.” She returned a moment later with a yellow ribbon that had a bunch of numbers and lines on it.
“What’s that?”
“It’s a measuring tape,” she explained. “You can use it to see how many inches something is.”
“Anything?”
Mama nodded. “Anything.”
“Even this?” He grabbed a little green army man from the nightstand and showed it to her.
“Mhmm.” She took it from his outstretched hand and held it against the yellow ribbon. “Looks like it’s three inches.”
“Is that smaller than Baby?”
“It sure is.”
He jumped out of bed and grabbed his model airplane next. He had built it with his daddy. “How many inches?”
Mama measured it, then announced, “Twenty. That’s bigger than the baby.”
He looked around the room, searching for something bigger than an army man but smaller than an airplane. After digging in his toy chest for a minute, he grabbed a teddy bear and shoved it at his mama’s chest. “Inches?”
Mama lined up the yellow ribbon with the bear’s head and smoothed it carefully down its plush body, stopping when it reached the bear’s feet. “Well, would you look at that! Seventeen inches.”
“Same as Baby?”
“Same as Baby.”
Delighted, he climbed up onto her lap, the bear clutched in one hand. He poked her belly to get the baby’s attention before pressing his face against it and saying, “Baby? You have same inches as my bear.”
Mama petted his hair with one hand and held her tummy with the other. “I reckon you’re gonna be a good big brother,” she said.
He ignored her. There were more important things to discuss. “Does Baby know what inches means?” he asked.
Mama laughed for some reason, even though it wasn’t funny. “Oh, Darry. I think it’s time for a nap.” She picked him up under his arms and laid him on the bed, then pulled the blanket up. He cradled the bear in his arms, pretending it was his new baby brother or sister. He couldn’t wait until he could hold them for real.
Normally, this was where Mama would kiss his forehead and tell him to sleep well. But today, she stretched out on the bed next to him, closing her eyes.
“Mama? You takin’ a nap, too?” He kept his voice quiet, just in case she was already asleep.
“Uh-huh.”
“How come?”
“The baby makes me extra tired.” She peeked her eyes open, then winked at him. “Daddy can wake us up when he gets home.”
“Okay.” He grinned, snuggling up to her side and resting his hand on her belly. “‘Night, Mama. ‘Night, Baby.”
It might have been his imagination, but he thought he felt the baby kick his hand in response.