Christmas Eve had come at last, and the house was festooned with decorations. Granny Bacon had called it ‘gaudy’ when she came to visit. Sean was fairly sure that this meant it was completely bloody brilliant.
Part 1
It was two weeks before Christmas Eve, and there was no Mum to be seen or felt in the house by a seriously minded five-year-old called Sean Baker. He was not at all happy about it. Not at all. That said, the absence of Mum merely added tonnage to the weight of Sean’s worries. He’d not been really happy since Mum and Dad had told him about ‘the baby’ that was coming into his home. His home for bloody God’s bloody sake! A phrase he’d learnt from his uncle Steve.
“Where’s Mum?” Sean was sitting at the top of the stairs, looking through the bannisters like a small animal in a particularly benign zoo.
“Mum’s in the pub with auntie Jane and Cloe from the newsagents. She won’t be long, love.” Sean’s dad was making the house look bright but cosy on this day before Christmas Eve.
Sean thought about this for a moment.
“Will she bring The Baby back”, he paused and searched himself for something grown-up to add, “finally?”
The Baby saga had been dragging on and Sean wanted to get it all over with. He wanted to face his enemy in mortal combat if needed. Him a knight in armour, The Baby with whatever weaponry it could muster. Sean felt that would be a lot given the importance The Baby was given by Mum and Dad. They never bloody well stopped talking about it. The Baby this. The Baby that. The Baby’s tests – at a baby’s age! The Baby’s crib. The Baby’s feeding equipment. The Baby even had a car seat like Sean. Bloody The Baby.
His dad laughed as he dusted the shelves in the family room.
“Not from the pub, Seany. That would be a proper Christmas miracle. Anyway, it’s not time yet. Why don’t you go outside and play for a while?”
Outside the old house it was grey and overcast, threatening rain rather than snow. The drizzly kind of rain that got into your hair and clothes. Sean shook his head and went back into his bedroom to continue drawing. His sketch pad was full of monstrous images, mostly of babies doing unspeakable things like eating his toys, cuddling his mother, going to the park with dad, sleeping in his bed, and worst of all the worse things, kicking Sean out into the savage streets with its huge, clumping baby feet.
As far as he was concerned the impending arrival of the home-wrecking interloper was – had he known the word – apocalyptic.
“Bloody baby”, he said.
“Bloody hell, bloody baby”.
“Bloody, bloody, bloody”.
He started to draw again using his favourite red, yellow and black crayons.
Downstairs, Dad had started to unpack the Christmas tree and all its baubles and variously coloured tinsel built up over the years. The angel to go on top of the tree had been in either Dad or Mum’s families for as long as either of them could remember. She was actually a crowned and jewelled ballet dancer, feet pointed, face beatific. Gingerly he reached into the box and retrieved Sean’s favourite decoration, a rocket ship with Santa astride it, arms in the air, beard spread by the high speed. Dad held it in his hand and remembered when he and Mum had taken Sean to the remaining toyshop in town, Mr and Mrs Khawaja’s, so the four-year-old could choose his own decoration. Sean, serious as usual even at that age, had taken his time before pointing at the rocketship.
Mum’s pregnancy had not been easy. Tests upon test following a scan that had highlighted an anomaly in the new baby’s head size.
The young and overworked doctor had told Mum and Dad that there was “Really nothing to worry about, we just need to check a few things”. After the first few tests, however, a grand gentleman, a Mr not a mere doctor, had stood in the background looking over the paperwork. The grand Mr had confabbed with the younger doctor quietly. She nodded a lot but even Dad could see the barely hidden frown that came over her face every so often like clouds over the sun.
Mum and Dad hadn’t bored Sean with the continuing tests. But following what they’d called ‘a very big decision’, they had finally told him that he was going to be joined by an awesomely awesome little sister.
Sean had nodded and muttered, “Bloody hell, not a girl” before returning to his room to readdress his drawing.
Part 2
With two months to go until the arrival of The Bloody Baby, Mum and Dad had sat Sean down on the couch in the family room and had explained to him that his new brother or sister was coming home soon but that everybody would have to be very gentle and kind because the baby might not be very well for a little while.
Sean pondered this and then asked, “Why can’t we get it when it’s bloody better?”
“Sean!”, Mum had said.
“Why though?” As if having The Baby invade the house wasn’t bad enough, now it seemed to Sean that everybody had to be extra specially nice to it.
Dad said, “We’re not going back to the why, why, why stage again, Sean?”
“Why?” said Sean.
Dad and Sean laughed.
Mum, smiling, said, “Seany, the baby is part of our family…”
Sean interrupted, “That’s what you said about the last one, and that one never came home”. He was right. A year previously Mum and Dad had sat Sean down in the family room and told him about the imminent arrival of a little brother. A few weeks later they had told him that that new playmate would not be coming because he had decided to go straight to the afterlife. They said that the afterlife was a very special place that people usually had to wait to get into. Some people, however, got in early.
“Why?”
“Well, Seany, that’s one of those things that we don’t know the answer to yet”, said Mum.
“Why?”
“Because we haven’t learnt enough. It’s one of the loads of things that we don’t know a lot about. It’s like how does Santa deliver presents to millions of kids with just a few elves and a slay? Or why does the daft dog Adelaide love to roll in the manure up at the allotments”, said Dad.
Even Sean had to admit that there were quite a few things he didn’t understand yet. The Santa one particularly irked him. How was that possible? Suitably distracted he went back to his own room and took to imagining solutions.
Part 3
Christmas Eve had come at last, and the house was festooned with decorations. Granny Bacon had called it ‘gaudy’ when she came to visit. Sean was fairly sure that this meant it was completely bloody brilliant. He had helped with everything except the lights, he had watched Dad fiddling and untangling and replacing the dead ones. In a most exciting fifteen minutes, he’d watched Dad ‘changing a fuse’ in one of the plugs. Dad had said a word even worse than ‘bloody’ which Sean had stored for later use.
Despite what the weathermen and women had said, snow was falling. Sean had sat on his chair in his room looking out of the window at it in wonder. Of course, he had a rough idea what caused snow from one of the books his Granny Murphy had given him for his birthday but it still never failed to slacken his jaw and widen his eyes.
As a side issue to the quietening of the world by the snow, Dad had gone to get Mum and The Bloody Baby from the hospital. After a while, Sean grew bored with wonderment and felt the need for company. He picked up his last Christmas elf hat and made his way downstairs to where Uncle Steve was playing a video game on Mum’s console. Mum wrote about videogames for a living and was bloody good at it as far as Sean was concerned.
“Uncle Steve, did you ever have a baby sister?”
Uncle Steve paused mid-freekick, “Yes, Sean mate, of course I did. That’s your aunties Eve and Sarah”.
“No, I meant a Baby sister”, seemed obvious to Sean because Aunty Eve was very cool indeed. He’d only met Aunt Sarah once when he was very young. She lived in Australia, which was a long way away.
“Well, my old mate, they were both babies once. Sarah is my twin in fact, we were both babies at the same time. We came home to Aunty Eve, who was very happy to see us.”
“How do you know she was? You were just babies. She might have been bloody annoyed.”
“She told me she was when I was a bit older, mate. About your age in fact.”
“Oh”, said Sean, a bit nonplussed.
“Sean, mate, what do you want for Christmas?”
“Not a bloody baby sister that’s for sure.”
Sean’s imagination fired up and he was about to ready to list his Christmas needs when he heard the front door opening.
“It’s them, mate. All three of them. Ready?”
Sean was not very much not the slightest bit ready. It seemed like every single bloody day for the last month The Baby things were brought back to the house. Who knew that a baby needed so much stuff. Anyway, Sean sat his ground in the family room waiting for it, for her, to come to him.
The snow kept falling, all silent and refreshing, as the Christmas lights that Dad had mended flickered and lit up Rocket Santa. Uncle Steve had turned off the video game and beckoned to Sean to meet his new sister. Sean had shaken his head. He wasn’t great with new people at the best of times, this was not even close to those. For the first time in a while, he popped his thumb into his mouth and hoped against hope that The Baby would grow up fast and be more like Aunty Eve, who was great fun, than Granny Bacon, who was stern.
After a minute or two the door to the family room creaked open and in walked Uncle Steve with Mum and Dad. Dad was holding the car seat. Mum looked tired but was smiling as she made her way to the sofa and gingerly sat down. Dad placed the car seat gently on the old, dented wooden floor. He was smiling too. Smiling fit to burst. Uncle Steve was, would you believe, wiping tears from his eyes.
“Please go over and see her, Sean,” Mum had never sounded like that, almost desperate but at the same time, underlying that, was a bigger emotion. He couldn’t quite identify it, what with it being the first time, but deep inside him he felt it. He felt that this meeting between him and The Bloody Baby wasn’t just important to her, it was the most important thing. So, of course, he walked to the car seat and stared down.
There was his new sister. Her eyes were closed, her hands were encased in mittens, on her head was a warm-looking cap.
“Come down to her level, Sean”, Dad said. Not an order, more of a piece of sincere guidance. Sean complied. He knelt by the car seat and breathed in her new smell as it mixed in with the usual Christmas smells of fir trees, dried figs, cakes and, he was sure, the snow.
The baby opened her eyes and looked back at him. They were brown, deeply so, just like his. He examined her fat little face. Even at her age, it was more like Aunty Eve than Granny Bacon. Quite honestly, he couldn’t see how she was broken at all. In fact, she looked and smelt remarkably bloody brilliant. She reached a little, mittened hand up into the air and seemed to jerk it about before it dropped back to her side.
“Go on, Sean mate, you can touch her.”
Sean reached out his hand and touched the baby’s hand, which jerked again. He knew he had to do something about that because it seemed to him that she couldn’t possibly be enjoying it. He reached in and held both of hands as gently as he could. Even through the material of the mittens he felt that he could feel her pulse, feel her new life, feel his little sister.
“What’s she called?” he asked the assembled company.
Dad looked over to Mum.
“Well, love, we thought you might like to choose her name. After all, she’s your sister,” said Mum.
The baby’s, her, hands jerked and she closed her eyes again, breathing quietly and almost imperceptibly although Sean perceived it.
He was to name her? Him, Sean, who had never named anything ever, not ever in his life. He didn’t move. He didn’t want to move. He just sat beside his sister thinking of the best name for her he could.
Outside the snow continued to fall and the world’s new silence enabled Sean to think more deeply about his great honour. Inside the house, Uncle Steve went into the kitchen to make some tea. Mum closed her eyes and leant into the old, overstuffed sofa. Dad knelt to Sean and asked, “Any ideas, Sean?”
“Bloody hell, not yet Dad”, whispered Sean. “It’s very important. You can’t rush this”.
Dad hugged him and went to sit down at Mum’s feet.
The lights continued to flicker, the house to creak, the kettle started steaming, everything seemed the same but was changed.
Sean found himself bloody well smiling. He knew what he was going to call his sister.
“Can we call her Hope”, he said.
Mum’s eyes opened, “Why Hope, darling?” she said.
“Mum, we’re not going back to the Why stage are we?” he said.
Dad laughed, even though he was visibly crying.
Sean stood up straight, “Because I hope she’ll like being part of the family”.
“Tea’s ready!” yelled Uncle Steve from the kitchen as the snow fell gently outside.
Sean walked over to the Christmas tree, plucked Rocket Santa from the tree, walked back to Baby Hope and placed it next to her.
