WOULD YOU PLEASE?

By

Sean Ruane

Why is the baby doing that? Is she supposed to be doing that? I don’t think so. Please take that pen from the baby, please, would you? I know that your baby can’t write and I’m calling you out on that, aren’t I? Yes, your baby cannot write and she is eating a pen, yes, damn-near swallowing it, if you’d care to notice. Would you like me to go get the pen from your baby?

Oh, you’ll do it?

Great!

What smells like shit?

Oh, it is your baby again.

You are not feeding that baby the right foods; I can tell you that. Your baby is pooping at a fourth grade level. She is a genius. She has the forehead of a thinker and the hurt eyes of a martyred prophet.

What? Are you talking to me? No, you're not; I see you are still on your cell phone, blowing hot air.  You are going to get head cancer and then what will become of your baby, that pen chewing shitbird? Is your husband a peach? Can he undo what you’ve done, child rearing-wise? You are putting on makeup, bright red lipstick; I can see you make those movements that always go along with putting on lipstick. You pull your lips together tightly over the tops and bottoms of your teeth and then make a little moue; you open your mouth wide and finish with a pucker. You are looking at your reflection in the window.

Do you see your baby?

No, you don’t. If you did you’d notice that I am spraying it with perfume because the diaper she’s stewing in smells like summertime gangrene.

Your baby found another pen and is writing on her arms.

How adorable!

She is in your purse and you look at me and then her and then at yourself in the window; you switch the phone to your other ear and talk louder.

Your baby and I are playing tic-tac-toe on her fat arms. I am winning because your baby cannot master the game--nor can she write. I’m having difficulty, too, because of the coils of skin on her fat arms. Each arm is like a pink snake trying to choke down donuts.

Oh my, but she is a fat little baby!

Your wunderkind has found your lipstick, inevitably, and removed the cap. Dear thing, she thinks it’s a pen!

Yummy, yummy she thinks as she sticks the lip end straight into her inky mouth.
Pretty baby, I exclaim, and squat down to her level and help her apply it properly, taking it from her, making a big circle starting at her chin, going up the cheek, over the upper lip just below the nose and back down again towards the chin. Then I color in the circle with the lipstick until, sitting there with your purse around her fat shoulder, steeping in useless shit, I’ve created a caricature of you, dear lady.

Don’t be mad with her, she is just a baby. 

She didn’t mean to do it and maybe you didn’t either.