Page 50 of The Baby-whisperer and the Brute
I sighed in defeat. “Okay, well I can’t play in a dress. Let me go up and change. I’ll be right back.”
A few minutes later, I returned to the living room in a t-shirt and yoga pants. Sully and the girls stood barefoot on the colorful plastic mat waiting for me. I took my position opposite him with Skyla to my left and Claire to my right.
Sully, who was the referee for this round, reached over and flicked the plastic spinner. When it stopped spinning, he called out the first move. “Right foot on red.”
Each of us followed the instruction—or tried to—placing a foot on the nearest red circle. For Sully that meant stepping all the way across the mat to my side. Skyla and Claire had only to move a foot a few inches to reach a red circle, but Claire was confused as to which foot was her right.
“I said to my mind to write it down, but I forgot,” she said.
Skyla laughed. “You don’t even know how to write.”
“Yes, I do,” Claire replied, the indignation clear in her tone. “I can write a “O” and a “T.”
The game was going to be hard if the girls were unsure of which was their left and right. I had an idea. “Claire, which letter does ‘right’ start with?”
“R?”
“Yes! Very good. I think I know something that will help. Hold on a second.”
Leaving my spot on the mat for a minute, I went to the girls’ craft area and selected a pink washable marker from one of the bins. I returned to the mat, knelt down in front of Claire, and drew a large letter R on the top of her tiny right foot.
She giggled. “That tickles.” I smiled up at her and asked for her hand, drawing an R on the back of the right one as well.
“Now you’ll be able to remember which is which.”
In my peripheral vision I noticed Skyla hovering. Turning to her, I asked, “Would you like me to write on your hand and foot as well?”
She shifted from one foot to the other. “I don’t need it. I know which one is which... mostly. But I do like that pink marker.”
“How about this? Want me to draw a pink flower on your right hand and foot?”
Skyla lifted her little chin and made an obstinate face. “No. A heart.”
I smiled. “Okay, give me your foot.”
After I decorated her right foot and hand with pink hearts, the game resumed. Another spin. Another call.
“It says left hand on green,” Sully said, sounding a bit worried.
Once again, the instructions didn’t require much of a stretch for the girls. Sully on the other hand had to practically do a backbend to put a hand on a green circle behind him while maintaining a foothold on the red circle across the mat.
The call required me to bend forward, stretching as far as I could to reach a green circle with the fingertips of my left hand.
Which put my face inches from Sully’s uplifted crotch.
I turned my head as far as it would go to the opposite side, averting my eyes and tryingveryhard not to think of the scene I’d read about seventy percent into the book. While reading it hadn’t taken me all night, I’d barely slept, imagining that scene—and others—happening with Sully in real life.
“Skyla baby, can you spin it this time?” he said through gritted teeth. “Daddy can’t reach it.”
“Okay Daddy,” the little girl responded, oblivious to our awkward positioning.
“Great. Hurry please.”
She twirled the spinner. “Left foot on yellow.”
The call required me to execute a move that wasn’t impossible but was certainly embarrassing. I ended up with my legs spread and my butt sticking up in the air.
Turning his head to survey the mat, Sully lifted his eyebrows and twisted his lips to one side. “I’m not sure I can do this.”
