Baby Duck

Baby Duck

“And now for your local forecast … a strong slow moving storm is battering the region with severe weather at this hour and is expected to last well into the early morning.  The storm will pack a wallop with possible hail, significant rainfall amounts, up to 50 millimeters are expected as well as periods of thunder and cloud to ground lightening. Hurricane force winds with gusts up to 96 miles per hour are also expected and could cause wide spread power outages.  Local officials are cautioning residents to stay inside unless it’s an emergency and to have their weather preparedness kits fully stocked and on hand.  Wind and rainfall warnings are in effect.  This is Sam Shaw and you’re listening to KJCW 95.5FM, High Bay Hills most trusted radio station.”

Charlie Roop was rolled up like a ball of yarn behind the chesterfield but he wasn’t one bit scared.  Charlie wasn’t afraid of anything especially a silly old storm but the violent wind gusts that howled through the windows and creaked among the shingles, the thunder that rattled incessantly and the bursts of blinding lightening arrested his mother Aggie.  Whenever there was a storm like this she paced the floor boards of their two bedroom farmhouse a half mile along Loki Almond Road and pulled her coat sweater tight around her middle as if to protect herself and when Charlie went out of sight she’d call to him, “Baby Duck!?  Where are you?” 

In his usual precocious way he’d pop out from behind a door or a piece of furniture that camouflaged him wielding a sword made of paper towel rolls or wearing an eye patch, “Right here, Mama.”

Aggie would grip her chest melodramatically and roll her eyes, “Stay where I can see you?”

For as long as Charlie could remember, in his short five years of being on this planet, his mother behaved in the exact same manner every single time a storm brewed.  Charlie loved them; they fired up his overactive imagination but not with worry or fear but with contemplations of adventure.  Often times, like today,  he would stand in the living room window, watching the wind thrash sheets of rain around and pretend to be at the helm of a troubled pirate ship or navigating a river raft down a tumultuous water way.  There were no limits to his appetite for ingenious explorations and was an expert at turning the most mundane things into excitement.  The fun only lasted until Aggie grouched at him to move away from the window for fear of flying debris.  “You won’t be satisfied until the barn door is torn off its hinges by the wind and comes right through that window!  Scuttle your butt.  Skedaddle.”

In front of the ice-cold window he was dressed in a crisp white captain’s hat with well-worn rubber boots up to his knees and his pajama pants bunched inside, he scissored a plastic straw between his fingers and pretended to smoke a cigarette.  Charlie sighed and took a long fake drag and shook his head.  He did what she asked but not without an incredulous rebuttal, “Holy macaroni, Mama. You need to cool your jets.  Sheesh.”  

“I’ll holy macaroni you alright.  Hustle.”  He constantly flustered her with his youthful quick wit but having him divert her attention was always an earnest blessing.

Aggie knows exactly where her crippling fear of storms came from, her Granny Roop.  After the incident, as a child the mere mention of a potential storm sent her into crying fits.  She Googled it and found that she suffered from what is called astraphobia, an atypical fear of stormy weather, in particular, thunder and lightning.  No matter how hard she tries to rationalize her fear, she can’t seem to quell her alarm when storm days loom.  The second the wind picked her heartbeat accelerated and she would start pacing, trembling, and sweating, close to having panic attacks complete with crying jags and extreme nausea.  This made even worse by living in an old refurbished country-style farmhouse just on the outskirts of town, the property peppered with trees and a handful of deteriorating barn structures.  She always thanked her lucky stars Charlie didn’t inherit it.  He was the most valiant child she’d ever known.

Aggie had the cordless phone resting between her right ear and shoulder, leaned into the corner of the kitchen counter, talking to her mother.  She could hear Charlie in the other room running around playing while the weather outside grew more and more unpleasant and her anxiety heightened.  Her voice shook as she spoke into the receiver, “The weather is so bad that it’s enough to drive wood splinters into brick.”

Her mother, non-plussed  at the other end of the line said, “Aggie, you need to get a hold of yourself.  It’s a just a little bit of wind and rain, child.  You are going to give yourself a heart attack one of these days, worrying about things you can’t control and about things that pose no real threat to you.  It’s just a storm, darling.  That’s no fear you have but rather a penchant for over-exaggerating.”

“I think its Gran’s fault I am like this to be honest.  You remember! When I was Charlie’s age, her dragging me to Great Aunt Norma Jean’s in the middle of the night and throwing me in the storm cellar.”

Her mother balked, “She did not throw you in the storm cellar!”

“Yes, she did!  With creepy cousin Arthur!  I was frozen with fear and fell asleep; when I woke up I was in there alone.  I had to lift that heavy cellar hatch myself; the wind kept slamming it shut down on my knuckles.  When I did get out I ran all the way home. The rain was coming down sideways in buckets and Old Man Robinson’s cow got struck by a big bolt of lightning.  It just fell right over in the field.”

“Old Man Robinson’s cow did not get struck by lightning. I think that was just your imagination getting the best of you.  You just need to saddle up and get over this, you’re a grown woman.  A storm is a storm is a storm, darling’.”

Before Aggie could deliver her affronted discourse a deafening clap of thunder sounded, forcing the power to go out.  Aggie screamed and Charlie stopped dead in his tracks, startled by the sounds coming from his mother than the cacophonous noises outside.  “It’s ok, Mama.  I have my flashlight.”  Charlie slid the big red button forward on the top and pointed the fluorescent light in Aggie’s direction.  He smiled, “See?” 

She swallowed a sob for Charlie’s sake and quickly wiped a tear from her eye, “Thank you, Charlie.  You’re so clever.” 

“Mama, can I hug you? I think you need a hug.”

“Of course you can and yes I do.  Come here.”  She stooped down and Charlie wrapped his little arms around her neck and squeezed her tight.

“You give the best hugs, Baby Duck.”  She kissed him on his rosy cheek, flushed from playing.  “What do you say we have a huddle?”

“Last one under the blanket is a rotten egg!”  Charlie sprinted toward the living room wiggling the stream of light as he ran and dove for his seat. 

“First one there is the stinky cheese!”  Aggie called out after him and they both laughed.

Aggie lit a slew of candles around the living room that flickered gently against the soft green walls then sat down with Charlie in one of the two over stuffed Edwardian chairs she upholstered herself with tapestry woven rugs and tucked her legs under her.  Charlie cuddled in and covered his mother’s lap with a generous length of a handmade quilt.  The storm raged outside filling the room with a subtle damp draft.

They sat quietly for a few minutes; Aggie tried desperately to ignore the moaning wind and opted to concentrate on the comfort of her son wedged into her side.  Charlie broke the silence, “Mama, why do you call me Baby Duck?”

Aggie looked down at the sweet face of her boy, his eyes were deep blue pools of kindness and his face was framed with thick blonde curls, “Because you are just as darling and precious as a brand new duck, you’re my baby.”

“I am not a baby, I am five years old.”  Aghast, Charlie curled his lips in disapproval and pointed to himself tapping the tip of his index finger into the middle of his chest.

“You’re a big brave boy now but you’re still my baby.  Baby ducks need a warm, safe place to live, to be fed and loved and protected. “

 “I guess.  We do live in a pretty nice house and it’s always toasty warm.  Plus you do make really yummy peanut butter sandwiches with squishy bananas and you love me this much.”  Charlie stretched his arms as far apart as he could to demonstrate. “That’s an awful lot.”

“I love you to the moon and back, just like it says in our favorite book.”  Aggie kissed his hair gently.

“Maybe I could be a bear instead of a duck but kind of not a baby one but an in between bear.”  Charlie twirled a loose piece of thread from the blanket around his finger as he talked.

“Why would you rather be a bear?” his mother asked.

“Because silly, if I was a bear I could shield you when storms come. I would just roar back at it and scare it back into the sky.  Or I could be a magician because then I could wave my magic wand and zap the scared right out of you!”  He motioned to wave an imaginary baton in front of her eyes and nodded deep in the day dream of it, “Then you’d be amazed.”

Aggie felt a wash of unconditional love and warmth come over her at the mere notion that her child wanted to come to her rescue in the face of an irrational fear.  “I am always amazed by you.”

Charlie asked his mother why she was afraid of thunder and lightning and storms, Aggie couldn’t formulate a good enough response.

“Mama, you know, just because there’s a storm now doesn’t mean there won’t be sunshine soon.  Granny Roop said you were made of fool’s gold for being so scared of them. “

“Granny Roop should mind her bees wax.” Aggie said, agitated her mother would say that to Charlie.

“I just don’t understand why you are such a scaredy cat.”  Charlie shrugged innocently.

“I don’t really understand it either.”  Aggie fibbed. Her voice trailed off and fixed her gaze on the 1960’s elephant lamp and a small army of vintage lead soldiers marching across the walnut end table top beside them.  She didn’t want to share her cellar story with Charlie to not impart her anxiety on him even though she knew he was made from stronger stock. 

“Stormy days are the best.  Just because we can’t go outside doesn’t mean we can’t have fun.  I like when I get to stay inside with you. We get to take lots of naps, snuggle with the candles on when the lights go out; we get to horse around and tell stories and eat junk food because there’s no electricity to cook anything.”

She tickled him under his chin and asked, “How did you get to be so smart?”

In a very matter of fact manner he said, “You.”  Aggie felt very put in her place. “You always tell me that sometimes bad things happen for good reasons. God makes it storm so he can empty all the clouds and clear the sky so it will be nice outside.  That’s what my friend Lily Weaver from school told me at church on Sunday when Pastor Gary said there was one coming.  Makes sense to me.”

For most of the storm the thunder sounded in a long low rumble but a sharp loud crack rattled the house, the loudest clap either of them had ever heard and they both screeched in unison.  Aggie’s heart pounded in her chest against Charlie’s face that burrowed in from the earsplitting scare.  Shivering, she squeezed Charlie, “Are you ok, Baby Duck?”

He looked up at his mother, eyes widened in shock.  “Cheese and rice that was loud!  I could hear the lid on the cookie jar make that funny little jingle sound like when neighbor Silas drives the tractor too close to the front porch.  Are you ok, Mama?”  Aggie nodded nervously and forced herself to glance at the living room window.  Charlie laughed fretfully and said, “I almost pooped in my pants!”

Aggie and Charlie stayed curled up together in their chair until almost midnight.  They tried to play I Spy With My Little Eye but it was getting too hard to see with the candles burnt down so low.  Aggie’s anxiety started to wane a little as the weather subsided.  While having a little bed-night snack of cheese and red seedless grapes Charlie made a confession to his mother, “I know you always tell me I if I eat my broccoli even though it’s the yuckiest food in the whole wide world that I will grow up big and strong.  I believe you when you tell me that except I really hate broccoli and I hide it in my milk glass and pretend I eat it so you won’t get mad.  Sometimes I even hide it in my napkin and flush it down the toilet.” 

“Is that right?”  Aggie arched her eyebrow dying to laugh at him but kept a straight maternal face.

Charlie answered her worriedly, “Yes, Pastor Gary said that lying is bad and when you lie to your Mama it makes your ears double in size. I felt really bad and I like my ears so I thought I better tell you.” 

Aggie smiled at the irony of Pastor Gary’s comments, “I am very proud of you for being honest, Baby Duck.  How about this, because you told me the truth I won’t make you eat broccoli anymore but you will have to have a different kind of vegetable.  Something you like. How does that sound?!”

“Jellybeans!”  Charlie exclaimed jokingly.

“I’ll jellybeans you, silly rabbit.  Ok, time for bed.  It’s late and we don’t want to miss the Sand Man.”

“I better sleep in with you tonight just in case you get more scared. Just in case.”  Charlie moved lazily from his mother’s side, shuffled toward the bathroom, kicked off his rubber boots and brushed his teeth. 

Aggie checked all the windows and doors and peeked outside through the side door window.  She strained to see in the dark. The barn looked like it was doing good enough but the tree next to it was bent almost in an arch as if it was made of rubber.  She shivered and scuffed her slippers all the way to her bedroom just in case there were any stray toys littering the floor.  Charlie was already curled up on the pillow, “All tucked in, Mama.”

“Aren’t you forgetting something?” she asked.

“I already took my rubber boots off.”  Charlie had a bad habit of forgetting to take them off before bed.

“Did you say your prayers before you tucked in?”  Aggie straightened out the opening of the blankets he haphazardly made for her.

Charlie bolted up, “Oops.  I forgot.  I’m pretty sleepy.”

“A quick prayer then off to dreamland we go, ok?”  Aggie and Charlie knelt by the side of the bed and pressed their hands into prayer position, closed their eyes and bowed their heads.

“Our Father who does art in Heaven … “ Charlie started his prayers this way every night and Aggie never had the heart to correct him.  He continued, “Dear God, before I say anything else I want to say sorry for what happened with the broccoli and I promise not to ever do it again.  Also, I really hope that Lily Weaver will forgive me for calling her a cuckoo bird. She said Jesus’ Mama Mary was married to Verge.  I tried to tell her that her husband was Joseph and that she was the Virgin Mary.  She gets mixed up sometimes.  Anyway, can you make sure Mama has a good sleep and happy dreams tonight after that crazy storm?  And maybe even help her not be scared anymore?  It makes me really sad when she’s afraid but at least I can protect her.  I hope you got the sky all cleared up so I can ride my bike tomorrow.  Please bless my favorite friends Pudge and Jacob, my new baby cousin Amelia, Granny Roop and Winston, her dog.  And most of all, bless my Mama.  I’m glad she’s my Mama because she’s fun. She takes really good care of me and loves me so much.  I love her so much too.  And now that my Daddy is in Heaven with you maybe he can tell you how to help Mama not be scared of the storms?  He wasn’t scared of anything, just like me.  He was a lot like Superman.  And maybe you could give him a hug from us too? We miss him a whole bunch.   Thank you for listening, my Lord. Amen.”  Charlie lifted his head, yawned and stretched oblivious that Aggie could hear every word he spoke because Lily Weavers told him one morning in Sunday school that even though you say your prayers out loud, your parents can’t hear you because you’re talking to God. “I’m soooo sleepy.” Charlie flopped down on his pillow and snuggled in.

Aggie tucked him in and gave him a kiss goodnight.  Charlie was snoring before she was settled in herself.  She watched her boy as he slept and whispered to herself, “Thank God for you, Baby Duck.  You are my hero.”

**

This makes short story number five in as many months!  Go, Nic!  I was surprised at how fast this one came to me after fighting with 'Half Windsor Knot' for so long.  The funny thing is, when I was combing through what I had finished up to last night, I was sitting in bed with my sheets and a red pen when this new character kept nudging me.  Whoa, Nelly.  I literally had to shush her.  She seems a little pushy and I think she will prove to be quite a handful.

I enjoyed writing 'Baby Duck'.  I didn't know anything about Charlie's Dad until he was saying his prayers.  That took me quite by surprise.  I had been thinking as I was writing about him, where he was but I trusted that if it was something I needed to know he/they would tell me and they did.  I choked up writing that bit.

I will admit, I am a little bit nervous about this writing marathon.  My fear is that whenever I am blocked it might kill me.  The floodgates opened when Mr. Joseph William Whistle called on me and it's been full steam ahead ever since.  I am the eternal optimist though and I know it isn't over until the fat lady sings.  She's too busy eating bagels to bother with me right now.  And for that I am grateful.

The Roops were a delight and I hope you enjoy.

In propinquity,
Nic