How to Party with an Infant

by Kaui Hart Hemmings

  “Oh, sweetie,” she says. “Thomas had to go.”

  Tara looks at Barrett with her mouth open. “Oh, he had to go?”

  “He had to go,” she says.

  “He’s okay,” Gary says.

  “Yes, sweetie,” she says. “He’s okay. He’ll be okay.”

  There are a lot of women who look like Dora at San Francisco playgrounds because . . .

  A hood party is racist because . . .

  Thomas is dead because . . .

  Her boy is growing up. He will become . . .

  She can’t fill in the blanks.

  Tara turns the page, and there’s their answer. The mystery is solved.

  “Turn the page quietly,” Gary says. “Let’s take a peep. Here is our green sheep, fast asleep.”

  * * *

  Barrett and Mele push their daughters on the swings, both secretly wishing there was a swing button they could press. Ellie leans back in her bucket seat, splayed as though on a zip line. She looks up, in love with the show in the sky.

  “Did the moms ever find out about the party?” Mele asks.

  “God, no,” Barrett says.

  Mele thinks about the toons, the princesses that make Ellie so happy. Who cares if she’s playing with plastic toys and reading books that aren’t about biracial eagles with two proud fathers? Who cares! There’s a show up there in the sky!

  She tells Barrett she’s thinking about chicken wings, corn on the cob, maybe some play on hot dogs.

  “Haute dogs,” she says.

  “Haute dawgs,” Barrett says.

  “Maybe some kind of coleslaw.”

  “With cartoons in it so the kids will eat it.”

  “Dora Slaw,” Mele says.

  “And don’t forget the cake.”

  Mele wonders: funny, sad, light, heavy. What approach do you take? Do I dare do chicken? Do I dare eat a peach? Thomas, birth, death, children. Birthday parties, times you once fiercely knew.

  “Why did Tara go to the funeral?” Mele asks.

  “The parents wanted children there. They wanted a lot of life there.”

  She wonders when Ellie will stop being entranced by a crowd singing “Happy Birthday” to her. When the awe of oneself begins to diminish, when you don’t think celebrating your existence is justified.

  Mele will create a recipe for an irresistible cake that makes even teenagers line up like toddlers, giving in to their childish selves. She’ll create a bulimic’s fantasy, an anorexic’s nightmare, a stoner’s wet dream. The cake demands loud singing and seconds. A campfire s’mores ice-cream cake.

  “Did you still want to look at dresses?” Barrett asks.

  “Sure,” Mele says, backing out of asking directly where she stands. She can’t get a read on what Barrett thinks of her going to the wedding, but she must be somewhat supportive if she’s willing to let her shop her closet.

  They are both standing with their arms crossed, overlooking the playground as if it’s their kingdom.

  “Have you spoken to him lately?” Barrett asks.

  Mele’s always embarrassed by this question, so rare is it that she and Bobby talk. He usually texts: Need anything? Or, All OK? the kinds of general questions that you’re supposed to answer no and yes to. You can’t say: I need love and eggs. You can’t say, Yes, all is okay except when it isn’t.

  “Yeah,” Mele says. “We check in. He’s been busy with the . . . wedding and all.”

  Barrett nods, and Mele knows she doesn’t believe it. When is a man busy with the wedding? It’s then she reads Barrett clearly. She doesn’t think Mele should go. She needs to hand Ellie over for the wedding and pick her up when it is over. She could even wait in the car, bring a book.

  “Is it okay still? To come look at dresses.” Is it okay to go to the wedding?

  “Stay for dinner,” Barrett says and gives Tara a push. She’s a friend that makes you live with your thoughts.

  How do you help your child make good food choices?

  I don’t know. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t. Sometimes I cook up boxed mac and cheese and call it a night. I rarely have the motivation to sculpt food into “magic pinwheels” or “giggly goblins” or whatever. I have all the time in the world, but when I attempted to make a face out of apples, raisins, and squiggles of bread Ellie looked at it and said, “What the hell is that supposed to be?” or at least it seemed she was saying this, especially since my Picassowich ended up on the floor and in the buckle of her high chair.

  After hearing about Barrett’s son’s birthday party, I came up with Insert-Your-Favorite-Toon Slaw. Dora, Barbie, Caillou (such a pussy of a boy), Diego, Handy Manny—you just pick a character and stick it in for incentive. Barrett told me a story that reminded me that pop culture affects the palate. Sometimes it’s all in a name. Cinderella Salad, you could call it. Or Belle’s Beauty Slaw. Or Jasmine’s (the token minority) Magic Confetti. I use the characters to help me. I think of them as my bitches.

  Tonight needed no such supports. We went to Barrett’s for dinner, and Tara eats like a sumo wrestler and Ellie likes to copy everything Tara does, out of fear most likely.

  Tonight, Tara, newly four, asked me at the dinner table what I would do if someone asked me to show them my penis.

  “Um, well, I don’t have a penis,” I said, looking at her parents. They both continued to chew, unfazed—they’d obviously been through this before.

  “I mean, your she-she part,” Tara said. “If someone asked you to show them your she-she part.”

  “You mean my vagina?”

  Gary coughed.

  “What?” I said. “If she’s going to know penis, she should know vagina, right? Why should we get the stupid nickname? Oh, shit. Have I crossed the line?”

  “No, no,” Gary said. “It’s fine.”

  “What would you do if someone asked to see your verchina?” Tara said, but before I could answer she yelled, “You tell a teacher!”

  “That’s right,” I said.

  “You tell a teacher!” Ellie mimicked.

  “What if the teacher’s the one who asks?” Gary said.

  This confused the shit out of Tara.

  “You tell Mommy and Daddy,” he said, all proud ’cause he knew the answer.

  “Daddy, what would you do if someone asked you to show your penis?” Tara asked.

  I smiled politely, trying not to look down at his lap.

  “I’d tell a teacher,” he said. “Unless it was Mommy. Then I’d look up in the sky to see if any pigs were flying around.”

  Further confusion.

  “I can’t believe teachers are talking about this stuff already,” Barrett said. “I tried to help her put her panties on and she said her body was sacred.”

  “Your body is sacred,” Gary said, and Barrett rolled her eyes.

  “We didn’t talk about sex until fifth grade,” I said, remembering when Ms. Lum (who wore this cool multicolored eye shadow) asked the class to think of all the slang terms for vagina and say them out loud: pussy, snatch, box, oyster, choach, coochie, cunt, slit, stink hole, punani, tuna, va. Then we did the penis beginning with the meats: sausage, wiener, and frank, then dick, rod, prick, schlong, dong, dipstick, tubesteak. As we got comfortable, everyone started to yell the obscenities with a crazed glee. Ms. Lum wrote our responses on the chalkboard, then asked how these words made us feel. We looked at the dizzying array of bad words written out in her petite cursive. Good! I thought. They make us feel good!

  “So you ready for the big day?” Gary asked and promptly got elbowed by Barrett.

  “Seriously?” she said.

  “What? You ladies were looking at dresses. I thought it was out in the open.”

  “It’s not her big day, idiot,” Barrett said.

  “It’s fine,” I said. I loved being with Barrett and Gary. They were so cozy and adult. I wanted them to adopt me. I looked across the table at Gary and could imagine being so endeared and annoyed by him, like a real husband.


  Ellie and Tara got up from the table to play with Tara’s new tool bench.

  “If Barrett remarried would you go to the wedding?” I asked. “If Tara were the flower girl?”

  “I don’t see Tara as a flower girl,” Gary said. “She’d be a flower killer. Maybe your sister’s kid though. She’s obedient.”

  “So you’d go?” I asked.

  “Hard to say,” Gary said. He leaned back and sipped his wine. God, he’s great. As a single person you know what the best trait in another person’s husband is? When they don’t flirt with you! Gary didn’t flirt!

  “Did she cheat on me?” he asked, and rubbed Barrett’s head. She lurched away. “Or did I cheat on her? If I cheated on her, then I’d go. I’d support you, hon.”

  “You’d never cheat on me,” Barrett said. “You’d be the worst.” She looked at him like she wanted to either kill him or hug him.

  “So, Gary, you could possibly be supportive and show that you’re okay with your life. You could show that you’re mature—that you’re not threatened?” I took a bite of sweet potato.

  “Show Barrett I’m mature?” Gary laughed. “If she were getting married, I don’t think she’d notice me.” Barrett made eye contact with me, maybe hoping I’d get his message. I’d be caught up with how I was perceived, what I was proving, whereas Bobby wouldn’t even notice I was there. I needed to actually feel self-assured and not just pretend I was.

  “I’d bring a date,” Gary said. “For sure.”

  “But I’d know she was a fake date,” Barrett said. “With fake boobs.”

  “Ho ho!” he laughed. “You’d be so pissed! But how would you know she was a fake date?” he said, becoming contemplative. “She could be the love of my life.”

  They were getting off topic. “Do you think it’s ridiculous that I’m going?” I asked.

  They both looked down and moved some food around.

  “Not ridiculous,” Barrett said. “It just seems like it would hurt.”

  “But maybe you’d go and it wouldn’t hurt,” Gary said.

  I thought about this, the wedding like a thermometer.

  “Knowing what he’s like, would you want him back in your life?” Gary asked. “Would you want to marry him?”

  “No,” I said, surprising myself. “Lately, no.”

  “Time heals all wounds,” Barrett said.

  Indeed, but it’s the sense of possibility that has soothed me. The slight change of focus. And perhaps, the wedding would just be an experience. Something to write about. That’s what I like about writing—I can look on coldly: observing, hearing, and feeling, knowing all of life can be used on my own terms. Even when I was young I’d experience life this way. Always noting, always writing in my head, narrating my own steps. I can walk into that wedding with my mental pen and paper.

  Beautiful white doves were released above the newlyweds. One pooped on the bride’s soft and loose updo. Mele assured the bride that no one noticed and that it blended right in to her shit-colored hair, then she danced with her date under the stars. She could feel him—

  “Has it been enough time?” Barrett asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I think so.” I took a sip of wine. “Henry mentioned maybe coming with me.”

  Barrett raised her eyebrows. “His wife’s okay with that?”

  “Well, yeah. I mean, you know. They’re not even speaking to each other. Plus, we’re friends. I’d be like a charity case. It would be like if I went with Gary.”

  Gary gave me a look like I wasn’t making a very good case.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I kind of told Bobby I had a date.” Admitting this seemed to confirm everything Barrett was thinking: that I wasn’t psychologically ready, that I was hurting myself.

  I left their house without a dress.

  * * *

  After a night with Tara and her tools, Ellie was craving princess books. I tried my best to not skip ahead or comment on all the extraneous adverbs, but with the nuptials creeping in like a tide, I couldn’t help but ask Ellie some questions. In regard to the prince whisking off these chicks with their shy laughter and porn bodies, I asked: “How does she know she’ll even like him? They never even spoke to each other. He could be a total loser. He could be like, ‘Hi, wanna ride my horse.’ ”

  “I want to ride his horse,” she said and pulled the covers up to her chin.

  “But why would she go off with a stranger who did nothing more than kiss her? I mean, is he stable? Does he work, or just live off his parents? What are his table manners like? His taste in music? His morals?”

  “He likes silly music, I bet, and Bob Marley.” She yawned, then said: “I’m not tired.”

  “Are you excited to be in a wedding?” I asked.

  “Yes!” she said, holding her fists together.

  “Would you be okay if Mommy wasn’t there?” I didn’t know if I wanted to hear the answer.

  “Yeah,” she said as if it was no big deal.

  “Well, I might go,” I said.

  “Okay,” she said, and then I had to stop myself with my petty baits and lures. I wonder why Daddy didn’t want to marry me? I wonder why Daddy doesn’t spend more time with you? Depressing, confusing questions from a depressed mom.

  This was why Barrett and Annie thought I shouldn’t go. They wanted me to cut ties, let Ellie have her own memory of the event, not pollute it with my needs.

  I needed to let Ellie love what she wanted to love.

  I closed the book. “Did you love the story?”

  “I loved the story pretty much,” she said.

  I kissed her on the forehead. “Good night. Love you.”

  “Love you more,” she said.

  “Love you more.” I stood and walked away, slowly to hear her shout: “Love you more!”

  Each time this happens, I imagine her in the bed, mouth still open from yelling, hands gripping the sheet. She’s expectant and wondering if there’ll be one more answer from me or if that was all. Eyes wide open, waiting; the suspense coming from knowing the result and enduring. Every night the same thing for both of us, and yet still the hope from her that it’s not over, the satisfaction for me to fulfill this wish. We’ve got this. The two of us. We’ve had another day together.

  “Love you so much,” I said, and then, softly she said: “Love you.”

  I don’t always make good food choices for my child. Or parenting choices. I could have this all wrong, but as far as bedtime goes, I’m awfully proud to have created this routine.

  Don’t tell the admissions director she looks like a young Sophia Loren. She knows she doesn’t. Julianne did this and the director was all “We don’t use pop culture references here. And we frown upon character backpacks.”

  Don’t send gift baskets from Neiman’s or offer your Truckee condo. All of them have been bribed.

  Don’t give directors the first degree, especially during a tour with other parents. Ask them questions that will make them shine.

  Definitely write a thank-you note to the admissions director after the tour. And write the head of the school. But don’t go overboard. Maeve wrote a thank-you to the janitor for opening a door. That was noted. It completely ruined her.

  —Advice given to a mother on getting her child into preschool. Overheard at Cow Hollow Playground

  At this moment what scares you the most about raising your child?

  I try not to bother with fear and hysteria, but I do have concerns. I’m concerned she may feel rejected by her father, but I was rejected by my father and I put it to good use. I’m concerned I won’t be able to give her everything she wants, but you know? Tough shit, Ellie belly.

  At this moment if I had to be afraid of something tangible, then I’d say I’m scared that she won’t get into preschool. Yes, it’s driving me a bit batty. I’ve done my research and have applied mainly to the ones that didn’t require a visitor’s fee. A visitor’s fee—like the school is some kind of museum of stick-figure art. I
also applied to co-ops, not knowing how I’ll afford the seventeen-thousand-dollar tuition that most of these schools seem to ask for. How will we make it out of this city alive? That scares me: poverty. And I’m not, like, a poverty type of person. Sometimes I see the suburbs beckoning, but I won’t look them in the eye. I’m not ready, I tell them. Let me try.

  So I’ve been proactive, going on tours. My first was a co-op in the Outer Sunset, Way Outer. It seemed like a school for the last kids on earth who survived an epidemic. The parents formed a line outside, and I found myself counting them, figuring one of every three had hep C. I don’t know why, the thought merely came to me, perhaps inspired by the sight of blond dreadlocks. I won’t apologize for that. One can’t control one’s thoughts, only one’s words, and I didn’t say shit out loud.

  So we walked around looking at preschool stuff, my thoughts drifting toward venereal diseases, when I felt something on the back of my upper thigh. Was it swollen? Did I bump into something? Have I already caught a human papilloma virus in this wretched place? I touched the spot, surprised by the softness, and then I felt the bump move—it began to slide a little toward my calf. When it reached the back of my knee I realized what was happening. What was happening was that I had to get my daughter into preschool in San Francisco, which is like trying to find a feminist in a polygamist community, and having dirty underwear balled up into the leg of my jeans wasn’t a good start, because that’s what the bump was—dirty underwear—and it was slinking toward my ankle.

  “This is the climbing wall,” the director said. “Volunteers worked all weekend to put it up, and the kids are just crazy about it.”

  I prayed my panties wouldn’t make it down to my ankle, especially since I was wearing cropped jeans. I wondered if they were granny panties or lacy, sexy panties, and which would be less awkward to have fall out of my pants. The tour began to move from the climbing wall, and I tried to keep up with an inconspicuous slow walk, but I’m sure I looked like I was trying to scratch an itch in an unfortunate, private place. Joke’s on me for thinking bad thoughts about the others, meanwhile they all probably thought I had a yeast infection. The whole situation of trying to keep my panties in my pants reminded me of when I used to pad my bra with those silicone falsies and sometimes my bra would come unlatched and I’d have to use my biceps and elbows to keep the fake boobs in place until the situation could be corrected. Once at a club, one of the boobs popped out on the dance floor and a guy picked it up and said, “What’s this!” I snatched it from his hands like I was CIA and the booby was top-secret, like a bomb or the womb of an alien. “It’s nothing,” I said. “Just move along and get crunk.”