Come and Play
Soft voices flow down the hallway into my bedroom. Pockets of laughter sprinkled with babbling baby talk as Danny chatters away to his crib of stuffies. I try to picture the scene in my mind. Bears all lined up in a row getting a how to do from their pint sized commander in chief. I can see his little chubby finger wiggling at each one as he reads out orders and organizes their play time to his advantage.
The image in my mind has me so intrigued I slip out of bed and softly pad down to his bedroom, using all my hard learned stealth tactics to make sure he can't hear me. I'm not disappointed. His star-shaped nightlight, courtesy of our last trip to Ikea, bathes the room in a subtle hue, casting shadows across the walls and over his crib.
The stuffies are on the floor, scattered in a haphazard way that tells me Danny has given no care to where they landed. Even Loki, his beloved one eyed teddy seems to have taken the fall. This can not be good, the commander has lost control of is army it seems.
Danny, dressed in his favorite all-in-one bunny pajamas, is sitting cross legged just below his pillow, arms stretched out in front of him like he's reaching out for something. "Ome pay."
Come and play? I know my Danny speak.
Slipping through the door I hide in a shadowy corner of his room and watch intently. There's no one there, and yet he's definitely holding a one sided conversation with someone. Imaginary friend? Heck it could be an invisible alien with all the crap we've gone through over the years, nothing is out of the realms of the impossible anymore.
"Ome pay?" Danny throws his head back and lets out a hearty giggle his fingers wiggling in a come-hither motion. "Ook Ja'k."
He can see me? No, I was quiet; there was no way he saw me come in the room.
Obviously I was wrong. Slowly Danny's head turns towards me, his eyes not searching at all, picking me out from the shadow like he knew I was there the whole time. This kid can be darn freaky at times.
"Ome pay, Ja'k?"
"Shouldn't you be asleep?" There's little point in denying my presence when he had me pegged from the start. "Who you talkin' to, buddy?"
Danny cocks his head to the side and smiles. "Arlie," he says pointing to the end of his crib. "Ome pay?"
Charlie?
The End
