Rafael Yglesias - Only Children

He hung back, his weight a dragging anchor. “I don’t think we should,” he said, after almost toppling them both.

“Why not?”

“Shouldn’t we stay close by?”

“It’s ten minutes by cab.”

“Should we be in a theater? We can’t call—”

“Sure we can! Eric, he’s with your parents.”

“Some recommendation. Look what they did to me.”

“What did they do to you?” Nina demanded. She thought his mother and father odd, but mostly in a good way, protective, concerned, loving.

“Made me a nervous wreck about my son.”

“Eric, I don’t want to spend our first night out in three months in the lobby of our building.”

“Okay, but.” He sighed. Eric turned his back to her and looked downtown. The World Trade towers could be seen standing alone in the distance, two fat boxes of dotted lights. “Let’s just have dinner. I don’t want to rush uptown.”

“We have plenty of time,” she argued, but with a hopeless feeling. For a moment, among the other partygoers, she had felt young, abrupt, unscheduled.

“We can go to that new restaurant in SoHo.”

“We’ll never get in.”

“Come on,” he said, his big hand pulling her in tow.

She thought: we’ll end up eating crummy bar food, Eric’ll talk about Luke and the market, he’ll say we should get home early to make love, we will, his parents will stay for an hour raving over Luke, Eric will enter me and push in and out tediously until I come, and he’ll come, itching to get out of bed to watch his tapes of the business show, to read his research, fiddle with his numbers, and start that late-night mumble, the chant of dreams—“Low earnings multiple, half book value, possible takeover.”

Try to be cheerful, she ordered herself.

Nina tried. She put her arm through Eric’s, she talked about going back to school, she walked among the others, the ones with real parties to go to, trooping down Broadway past the winking, leering lights, and pretended it would go differently.

But it didn’t.

THE WOMAN came down, her round face came down, a balloon floating right into Byron’s eyes. “Hello, Byron. My name is Tracy. We’re going to go in here and play some games. Your mommy’ll wait for you out here.”

“Okay.” Big boy Byron, big feet forward! He marched on the shiny floor. Foot slaps.

The room was big. There were white hot dog lights way up. Like the big tunnel. Big tunnel to Grandma.

“How many eyes do you have, Byron?”

Big balloon head. One. Two. “Two. Like you.”

Smile. “How many ears do you have?”

“No ears,” Byron said. Cups on ears, his hands covered them. The hair tickled inside.

Bigger smile. “How many ears do you have?”

Dance, big boy. Tunnel sound. His hands were glue, his head a teacup. See my handle, see my spout. “No ears! No ears!”

“Sure you do, Byron. How many?”

Dance! He spun and spun and spun, covered ears, covered hair, hands stuck. “Can’t hear! No ears, no hears, no ears. No hair! Don’t have hair!”

“Let’s make a picture, Byron.” Balloon head floated down. “Draw a picture of your family. Here’s some paper. Want to pick out a crayon?”

She pushed him like a stroller. There was a yellow table. She smiles, but her voice frowns. He stood still. The crayon box was right in front. He looked at the balloon head.

Smile. “Pick out any color.”

“Draw!” he shouted. “Draw!” he shouted again. His voice came out like water from a faucet. Whoosh! He picked up a red crayon and danced it across. Broken red. Big X. “There!” he said, and pushed the paper, pushed the box, sliding off the table. “There!” he said.

The balloon head bobbed, up and down, no smile anymore. Just the frown.

“Where’s my mommy?” he asked. Balloon head was no fun.

THE DOOR closed. Night. Good night moon. Luke fell. Down on the blanket, yellow and soft.

Mommy and Daddy went out into the glowing night.

He sucked hard and smelled the bakery of sleep, warm and pungent.

Listen. Grandpa’s voice. Rumble, rumble. Like Daddy — underground.

I’m alone!

I’m alone!

The room was dark and empty. Out — out — out in the glowing night.

He wanted to grow up, grow up huge out of the crib, out of the dark, big and bigger, to be in the day, to be in the day with Mommy and Daddy.

I’m alone!

I’m alone!

He cried. He cried. And heard a baby cry. And screamed.

There was a crying baby in the dark.

The rumble, the feet came, and scared him.

Press into the blanket and hide. Hide from the crying baby and rumble feet.

“Luke?” Grandpa brought the light, the hot light in, and with him, Daddy’s voice. “Luke? Can I read to you?”

“Yessss!” It hurt to talk. Water was everywhere.

Grandpa caught him. Luke went up, big and up, out of the dark and the crib, into the warm light.

Luke squeezed into the hot body, fell against the pillow chest, and rested.

There was no crying baby.

There was Luke and Grandpa.

Grandpa opened the book and read.

“ ‘In the great green room,’ ” Grandpa rumbled, thundered inside, “ ‘there was a telephone. And a red balloon.’ ”

Balloon in room. Luke laughed.

Grandpa looked at Luke. His face, his bright white face, got so big. Luke squeezed into the hot. “I love you, Luke,” Grandpa sang.

Grandpa glowed in the night. Safe and hot and big. Glowing in the night.

“What’s going on?” Grandma said, and with her came more light.

“We’re reading,” Grandpa said.

“Can I listen?” Grandma asked.

“Sure,” Grandpa said. “That’s all right, isn’t it, Luke?”

He sneaked into the warm, against the rising, falling chest. Grandma took his hand and held it — smooth and cool she was, calm and gentle.

Grandpa rumbled like the outside: “ ‘Good night moon. Good night room. Good night cow jumping over the moon. Good night air. Good night nobody.’ ”

Grandma kissed Luke’s forehead. Soft and cool. She left.

But Grandpa stayed and rumbled on, rumbled on, rumbled on. Luke put his ear to the thunder and the heat. In Grandpa’s white bright glow, Luke baked to sleep.

THE TESTER looked at Diane with the dead eyes of a bureaucrat. Eyes without the possibility of appeal. “I don’t think he’s ready for this yet,” she said.

Byron hopped across the linoleum floor, slotting his feet in each black and white square as he moved, an unguided pawn in New York’s educational game.

“You should have him tested again in six months,” the tester continued, returning a form to Diane. The woman’s body was already half turned, ready to dismiss any complaint, or deflect any inquiry.

“What happened?” Diane asked anyway.

“He doesn’t want to answer any questions.”

“No! No! No!” Byron sang, hopping his way on the squares. “No, no, no!” he chanted.

This brought a smile to the tester’s face. “Don’t worry. That’s very common with bright two-year-olds. Give him another six months.” And now, having expended the full supply of her goodwill, the tester did show her back to Diane.

Diane would have liked to have the woman arrested. She wished she could say anything, anything at all, to disrupt the tester’s control and self-confidence. “I was thinking of enrolling him in Suzuki violin,” Diane said abruptly.

“I would wait on that too,” the woman said, and then gestured at another anxious parent.

“No!” Byron hopped on one square. “No!” Byron hopped on another square. Then back and forth, rocking and chanting. Diane noticed the stares of the other adults, followed quickly by averted eyes, and felt her red-hot rage at this humiliation. She had come to test Byron’s IQ early, just in case he needed tutoring. Obviously he would.