Babies and Fools

A Short Story By Lo Brewer

Angel Statue Under Cloudy Skies © Pexels

It was Sunday, my second favorite day of the week next to Monday.  Monday meant school, my absolute favorite place in the world.  In school I was smart, which meant I was important.  I always had the right answers, I volunteered to help after school, I was polite and well behaved, and teachers absolutely loved me for it.  Sunday meant Cream of Wheat, “Steampipe Alley,” the large colored section of the comics and most importantly Monday was just a night’s sleep away.

That Sunday morning after my show was over I wandered into the kitchen to read the funnies while my parents talked about what was going on in their respective sections of the newspaper-obituaries for mom and the crime blotter for dad.

“Stew, says here that Sophie Jones is dead.  Didn’t we know a Sophie in high school?” my mother said.

“Hmm, no…no I think it was Stephanie Jones wasn’t it?  How old was she?”

“Says here 50.  And that she grew up here in town.  So she would have been in school at least with you if not both of us.”
“Lynn, I don’t know anyone named Sophie. Now Stephanie, Stephanie I remember. I went to the Junior Dance with a girl named Stephanie,” my father said.

“But Stew you must know her.  I mean it says she grew up here in town, and…”

“Why don’t you just look her up in your yearbook?” I asked. 

“Oh hush Bitty,” my mother said.  My parents called me Bitty because I was smaller than everyone else my age.  I hated it. 

“But Mom if you just…”

“Bitty, we’re having an adult conversation.  When you become an adult, then you can join in,” my father said.

The ease at which they dismissed everything I said or did was alarming. It was an issue of great contention in our house, solely on my part of course.  I oft voiced my disdain for being treated like I was invisible.  But due to the aforementioned invisibility that I was plagued with, my cries fell on deaf ears.

“Say Lynn, will you look at this…A cat burglar was trying to evade police at that luxury high rise on Broad.  He climbed out of a window, slipped and fell five stories.”

“Oh my!”

“Yea, but the fall didn’t kill him.  He bounced off an awning and landed in a pile of trash bags on the curb.  He was knocked out just long enough for the police to make it there to arrest him.”

“You know what they say, ‘God takes care of babies and fools,’” my mother said.

“They who? Who’s this ‘they’ that you’re always talking about,” I said.  I knew such a flippant question would probably get me in trouble.  But at least I’d have their attention.  I looked at them waiting for at the very least a ‘Hush Bitty.’ But it didn’t come.

“Speaking of God, Lynn did you hear there’s a new church down by the Grand Union?”

“I think I heard something about that.  It’s a Korean Baptist something or other. Oh, that reminds me.  I need to stop at Grand Union for a few groceries.” my mother said.

“Mom can I go? PLEASE?!”

“I guess so Bitty.  But put on some real clothes.”

“Why do I have to change?” I was obsessed with wearing pajamas outside and did so often because by the time my parents noticed that I had walked out of the house in my favorite Wonder Woman jammies, we were well on our way to our destination and it was too late to go back home.

“I guess it doesn’t really matter,” she said with a shrug.  “Come on.”

I threw a coat over my footed blanket sleeper and ran out to the car.  When we pulled into the parking lot of the grocery store I hopped out of the car and made a b-line for the 25 cent space ship ride stationed in front of the store. But was beckoned back by my mother.

“Bitty, I said you didn’t have to change. But you can’t come inside with me looking like that.  Just sit tight and I’ll be right back,” she said.

She locked me in the car and I was alone, which wasn’t much different from being with either of my parents since they never paid me much attention anyway.  After about 30 seconds of solitude I found myself painfully bored. I climbed into the driver’s seat and pretended I was on the space ship ride. That ride and the prospect of being outside in my pajamas were the only reasons I accompanied my mother to the grocery store in the first place.  I suppose I should have been satisfied with at least accomplishing one goal. I sat there jerking the wheel back and forth and pretending to move the gear shift when I heard laughter from outside the car.  I kneeled backwards on the seat and saw families standing outside the new church that had opened across the street.  Children were playing in the grass just beside it, parents were talking and laughing. I closed my eyes and wished I was there with them.  When I opened my eyes, it was as if I were moving closer to them.  A look to the side broke me from my dreamlike state as I realized I was moving towards them.  The car, which had previously been parked in the inclined lot of the grocery store was now barreling toward the busy street that separated Grand Union and Christ Our Lord’s Missionary Baptist Korean Church.

In a panic, I turned around and tried frantically to make the car stop. But I was frenzied.  The only thing I could think to do at that point was cover my eyes and await my impending death.  Just as I thought all hope was lost I felt the car smoothly roll to a stop. I uncovered my eyes and I was somehow back in the passenger seat and the car was driving back into the lot. As it slowed I found the courage to look to my left.  There sat my savior, a man of indiscriminate age and race, smiling at me.

“Thanks Mister,” I said, unsure of what else to do.

“Just doin’ my job kiddo,” he said. And in what seemed like a flash of a moment he was gone.

I knelt backward on the seat again in attempts to see where he went. But he’d vanished.  Just then my mother keyed back into the car.

“You know, I thought about it Bitty, and I don’t see why you can’t get on that silly ride.  Come on, let’s go.”

“Mom, did you see him?!”

“See who Bitty?” she asked.  “Look, are you coming or not?”

“Babies and fools…” I said to myself with a chuckle.

“What’s that Bitty?”

“Oh nothing Mom,” I said.  I got out of the car and grabbed my mother’s hand as we walked towards the supermarket.  She looked down and smiled at me for what seemed like the very first time as she lifted me into the spaceship.

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