Mom Ninja

I open the door a fraction of an inch at a time, trying to not make the handle and jamb creak as I open it. I tiptoe on the pads of my feet into Paige’s room, tempting fate to put a pile of clothes away in her dresser while she sleeps. The low hum of the small tower fan in the dark circulates the hot stale summer air of her room, masking any creaking of the floorboards. She has the smallest bedroom in the house, like a glorified study. She sleeps like her dad, quick to fall asleep but easy to wake up.

I put the clothes on the top of Paige’s dresser, a small version of the full sized one in her sister’s room. It will be too small for her growing sizes soon… I push the thought from my head, it’s not a concern right now. I ginerly place the small clothing pile on the dark mass on top of her dresser. I’m not sure what the mass is, but I can make out a hairbrush, a stuffed giraffe, and a dress I haven’t rehung in her closet. As long as nothing falls and wakes her, the fact that these clothes are in her room and not mine is all I need.

“What are you doing?” Bob hissed as I closed the door behind me, silent as I could be. I walked back into our room before I answer, not tiptoeing but also not talking in the hallway.

“I didn’t want her clothes in here,” I replied.

“But she’s sleeping! They’ve been in here for days, and you think now is the best time?”

“Well you didn’t move them either, so don’t complain to me,” I snap.

He grins. “I love you, baby,” he coos, making an air kiss my way.

“Damn right you do,” I say, relaxing as fast I snapped. I couldn’t stay mad at him. Damn that Jinks charm.

His panic amused me. My mom ninja skills were higher than his dad ninja skills.

You couldn’t pay me to go into Charlotte’s room. Don’t wake the toddler!

Paige was our second child, I wasn’t afraid. She was a baby, I could pick her up and rock her back to sleep if I had to. Or hit the floor to lie still as a rug, she can’t see me past the cotton mesh animal printed crib rail liners along her mattress.

I’d already spent nights in the wooden rocking chair in the family room, kicking toys out of the way of the rails. I could do it. And I had Bob for backup, he didn’t work in the morning and could sleep in until 6 a.m. If I had to take Paige in the night he could take Charlotte in the morning.

I sneak back out of Paige’s room, now a three year old toddler, and close the door behind me, exhaling in the dimly lit hallway.

Mom ninja skills, level 1000. But Bob died last year, and I have no one to brag to.

I walk quietly back to my room to continue emptying suitcases from a trip we’d taken 2 weeks again. It’s 11 o’clock at night, and I’ve finally had enough of looking at the half full suitcases on the floor in front of my dressers. I’m a night owl, and think how I’ll regret this fact in the morning when the girls wake me up tomorrow. I used to clean my room at night when I was in high school, when I got my second wind. What better time to redecorate than 10 p.m.?

Digging through the kids’ shared suitcase I realize I forgot a pair of Paige’s socks. Dammit. Dare I tempt fate twice?

I resign myself to fate- I don’t want to leave 2 pairs of tiny rolled socks for the morning when all her other clothes are in her room.

I find myself wishing they could become Charlotte’s socks, but they are too small. Charlotte sleeps like me, sideways across the mattress under a mess of half tucked blankets. She would sleep through a tornado, if tornadoes were a thing in central New York (luckily they aren’t).

“For such a small person you take up so much room,” Bob lamented as I spread out over our new queen sized bed. The first thing we bought as a married couple. Goodbye over 20 year old hand me down full sized mattress!

“It’s a gift,” I sigh as I snuggle between the warm and clean flannel sheets.

My toddler now sleeps like her dad- easy to fall asleep and quick to stir. And once she’s up, she’s up. She hasn’t become the overly cheery morning person Bob loved to annoy me with in the mornings as I blearily groped for coffee, but she doesn’t want to hang out in her bed with her posse of stuffed animals and dolls. It’s much more fun to yell for me from her crib, she’s got the Jinks’ vocal talents too.

I ease Paige’s door open and tiptoe inside, socks in hand. Just as I add them to the pile and turn to leave, I hear from her bed, “I’m sisrty.”

Dammit.

Mom ninja level back to zero.