Jenny Valentine - Iggy and Me and the New Baby

Title Page

1. Please May Can

2. Iggy’s New Teacher

3. Iggy’s Weekend News

4. The Measuring Door

5. The School Fair

6. Twenty Questions

7. In the Rabbit Hole

8. Iggy and Me and the New Baby

About the author

About the illustrator

Copyright

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My name is Flo and I have a little sister called Iggy. I am nine and Iggy is six. We are each other’s only sister.

One morning, when we were walking to school, Iggy asked Mum a question.

She started with, “Please may can…”

I know that when Iggy uses all her polite words at once, she is really hoping for a ‘yes’. She says, “Please may can we have an ice cream and a biscuit?” and “Please may can we go on a bike ride and a picnic and sleep in a tent?”

“Please may can we have a baby?” Iggy asked, with her sweetest good-idea smile.

Mum slowed down, just a little bit.

“No, Iggy, I don’t think so.”

“How come?” said Iggy, and she looked a bit deflated, like an old balloon.

“Just because.”

Iggy said that wasn’t a reason.

“True,” said Mum. “You’ve got me there.”

“So why not?” Iggy asked, and then she added another, “Pleeease,” with extra ee’s, just to be on the safe side.

“I’ve had my babies,” Mum said, and she took our hands, mine and then Iggy’s. “You, and you.”

“You can have more than two children.” Iggy smiled, like that solved it.

“I know that.” Mum smiled back.

Iggy told her, “Thomas Wilkes’s mum has got eight.”

“Nine,” I said.

“Nine?” said Mum.

“Yes.” I counted on my fingers. “Thomas, Ruby, Emma, James, Sophie, Will, Patrick, Sarah and Ben.”

“Wow,” said Mum. “Nine.”

“James is in my class,” I said, “and Thomas is in Iggy’s. That’s how we know. When they go to the supermarket, they have to buy nine of everything.”

Iggy counted, “Nine toothbrushes, nine pairs of pants, nine packets of lemon drizzle cakes.”

Iggy loves lemon drizzle cake.

I said, “The Wilkes’s house is full of people and noise all the time, even when it’s just them.”

Mum frowned. “Well, Mr and Mrs Wilkes might have wanted nine children, but two is enough for me and your dad. That’s what we decided. One under each arm in an emergency.”

“What emergency?” I said.

Iggy was quiet for a minute. “You and Dad have got four arms. There’s room for two more.”

“Good maths,” Mum said, but she didn’t tell me what the emergency was.

“Will you and Dad change your minds?” Iggy said.

“No,” said Mum. “Absolutely not,” and she ruffled my hair and gave Iggy her school bag and kissed her goodbye on the nose.

Iggy doesn’t do ‘absolutely nots’. In Iggy’s ears, an ‘absolutely not’ is always a ‘maybe’.

When Mum says, “Absolutely not,” about a thing, Iggy goes and asks Dad. And when Dad says, “Absolutely not,” she double checks with Mum. Iggy thinks there’s always a chance she’ll get lucky. Sometimes she does.

So later, at suppertime, Iggy asked Dad the question too.

“Please may can you and Mum please have one or two more babies?”

Dad’s mouth fell open. It was a bit full of supper.

“Ewww!” Iggy said, looking away and shielding her eyes with her hands. “Manners!”

Dad finished his mouthful. “I thought you were going to ask me to pass the salt or the butter. I didn’t think you were going to ask for babies.”

“Can you?” Iggy said. “Have one or two?”

“No,” said Mum.

“We can,” Dad said, “but we might not want to.”

Iggy huffed with confusion. “What does that mean? Do you want to, or not?”

“Not,” said Dad.

“Definitely not,” said Mum.

“Please?” said Iggy.

“Absolutely not,” said Mum again.

“Let’s talk about something else,” said Dad. “How was your day, Flo? What did you learn at school?”

I started to tell Dad all about solids and liquids and gases, because that’s what we’ve been doing in Science. Iggy was scowling into her soup, which is a liquid.

“I want one,” she said.

“Well, you can have one of your own,” Mum said. “When you’re older.”

“Yowch!” said Iggy. “I’m not doing that. Not ever.”

Dad and Mum looked at each other and smiled.

“Maybe you’ll change your mind,” said Mum.

“No way,” said Iggy, and she squeezed her eyes tight shut and shook her head.

“Oh well,” said Dad, helping himself to more cauliflower. “No babies for you then. Never mind.”

“Where were we?” Mum said. “What were you saying, Flo?”

“It’s not fair,” said Iggy, interrupting again, before I could even get started.

Not fair is Iggy’s explanation for a lot of things.

When Mum says no to sweets, it’s not fair.

When Iggy has to go to bed half an hour before me, it’s not fair.

When we have rice and broccoli with our supper and Iggy wants chips and beans, it’s not fair.

When Iggy decides we should go swimming and to the zoo and out for pizza and we don’t because it’s only a Wednesday and not anybody’s birthday, it’s not fair.

“Here we go,” said Dad, and he rolled his eyes and winked at me.

“But I really want a little brother or sister,” she moaned. “And it really isn’t fair.”

Dad said, “Flo’s got a little sister, haven’t you?”

“Yep,” I said.

“How’s that working out for you?” said Dad.

“So far so good,” I said.

“See.” Iggy pointed at me. “Flo’s got one. It’s so not fair.”

Mum stood up and cleared our plates away.

“Life isn’t fair, Iggy,” she said.

Iggy sighed and slumped forward with her forehead on the table. Her voice came out all squished and mumbly.

“I’ve noticed,” she said.

In the playground at school, all Iggy could think about and talk about was babies.

She said, “Flo, what do babies smell like?” and “Why do some babies look like old men?” and “How many babies is it possible to have?”

“I don’t know,” I said.

“How many days does it take to grow a baby?” and “Do babies have teeth?” and “Do all babies like mashed banana?”

“Iggy,” I said, “I don’t know.”

“Well, who does?” Iggy looked around the playground. “I need to find out.”

“Why don’t you ask James Wilkes?” I said. “He’s got lots of baby brothers and sisters. He’s probably an expert.”