Lucy is pretty good at the Virgin Mary, doing a fine job of pretending she is NOT seven years old going on eight, no, she is the mother of an immaculate conception type baby and she is doing a fine job of pretending that baby is Jesus and NOT a plastic girl doll with a stark-eyed expression and real eyelids that shake loose at irregular intervals, flying open and slamming shut in an alarming manner, suggesting shock and outrage and giving me palpitations and a strange guilty feeling. Lucy is doing a fine job but I avoid looking her way or at the terrible doll, I gaze at the floor of the manger instead, trying to keep my cool and my face hidden, because I am thinking about Harriet’s angel act and an unseemly roar of hilarity is rising within. I wonder what would happen if one shepherd suddenly fell apart and had a fit of hysteria bang in front of the Little Lord Jesus, would he get carted off to a place where there are other mad shepherds dressed in white jackets tied up at the back, wandering a field, going in for wild bursts of laughter and maybe muttering in a demented fashion about angels and lost sheep? Or would it seem realistic, and forgivable therefore, this shepherd simply overcome by awe and ceremony, the hard work of bearing witness and so on, the sheer weight of it all, which is kind of how I am on special occasions, my birthday, anyone’s birthday in my family, an outing with Mum, a game with Jude, Christmas night, how I am kind of crazed and slap-happy due to festivity, lying awake to linger over the marvels of the day until I have this desire to leap out of bed in a flap of blankets and check on every Weiss, and sit up in their beds and review the day in all its marvels, as if by staying up and talking the day over, I can stop this thing a while, a feeling close to pain and sickness I do not understand.
Now we join hands and face front and swing our arms to and fro in an embarrassing fashion while singing that endless song, wishing everyone a merry Christmas and ha-ppy New Year, etc., a song to which I am to move my lips ONLY on orders from Music Nun, orders I do not require, seeing as she has put me off singing outside my own household for all my days, and I worry now about my shoebag, and where I left it, and will it get mucky, and is Jude out there with Mum and Dad, gazing at me up here in a silly old dressing gown and a dishcloth on my head tied up with elastic, elastic that was not even invented in Bible times, and I decide I am ready to turn my back on Nativity. I am ready, Ben. Next year, I will ask for a note.
Kindly excuse my daughter Jemima from Nativity. She has just about had it with Nativity. Thank you. Sincerely, Mrs Yaakov Weiss.
‘Don’t say manger or the Little Lord thing,’ whispers Harriet as I take her place in the queue for Gus, rolling my eyes at her before composing myself, trying not to think about embryos and how early embryo fish, early chicken, early pig and early person are no great shakes to look at and resemble each other much too closely to boot, seahorses, fish-hooks. I also try to forget about that picture of the human embryo a Few Weeks Before Birth, all tucked up and upside down and feeding off the mother by way of a cord, quite like those nice bendy straws Mum buys, straws with little curlicues at the top end for bending purposes, so you can drink and read at the same time, no little adjustments necessary, no interruptions, and that is exactly what I am trying not to think about, this nonstop feeding business, this emptying of Mum.
Mum looks fine, though, not worn out or empty at all, and Gus is lovely, more like a baby in a painting than a regular baby and regular babies, in my opinion, are often a bit dodgy in close-up, squirmy and cross with squeezed shut eyes and clenched fists, gearing up every few minutes for great displays of the singlemost skill babies are born with, the howling and screaming skill, a sound that fills me with doom and panic, though I note that grown-ups largely find it amusing and delightful, which goes to show there are different rules for babies regarding howling and screaming and other matters. The howling and screaming skill is not generally encouraged in a kid, and in a grown-up, unless they are in horror films, it is definitely not recommended and also quite rare. I look around at school, in shops, in parks and museums and I just never see it, grown-ups howling and screaming. I am on the lookout always. The fact is, once a person can speak in full sentences and listen to reason, he is not supposed to rely on howling and screaming for communication purposes except on special occasions like blood situations, world war or physical calamity in the dwelling place, i.e. damage by collapse, fire, flood or air raid, etc. That is to say, screaming and howling over the age of four or so is not delightful and amusing, it is a call-out for emergency services.
‘He can’t see you. Not yet,’ Mum says.
That’s another thing. A baby is born more or less blind but this is not a case for panic and blind person accoutrements, such as white sticks, golden retriever dogs, dark glasses and books with bumpy writing. Braille. No. Everything is OK, and it seems to me a wise plan for a baby to be born blind when every single thing in his field of vision is a new thing to him and too much surprise might tip him over the edge into howling and screaming. Furthermore, a person needs sight for self-defence. He needs to see the enemy approaching. What use is that to Gus when he cannot put up a fight yet, or run away, even? He might as well not see the enemy. It will only be depressing. And a person needs sight for navigation, so as not to bump into things or have crash landings. Gus is not going anywhere at the moment, not solo anyway. We are right here. There are six pairs of eyes looking out for Gustavus until he is ready for sightseeing and ruffling up newspapers and wandering about the Earth.
Gus is very pretty and he is also quite bald with fine blond hairs on his crown like the little feathers on a bird breast. I want to touch him there but I remember Ben telling me how the skull is not fully formed in a baby, having a hole on the top or something, reminding me of Harriet’s broken eggs, and I don’t like it. Maybe Gus should wear a hat for a while, I don’t know.
He makes barely any noise, definitely no howling, just a soft blowy sound like someone riding a bike and getting out of breath, and this is probably due to lung size in Gus and how a tiny scoop of breath for him is same as a deep breath. One puff and that’s it. Empty. Start again. It’s hard work, I can see that. I can hear it. Every breath for Gus is a deep breath. No. There is no deep for Gus. When you have been alive only a day or so, there is no such thing as deep or far, what with his beginning so close to his end and no spare room for anything but the important parts, his organs and little bones all wrapped up in a fine covering of pale skin with the blue veins showing through, like the first spray of snow in winter, how it makes you see the ground in a whole new way, frozen blades of grass and stones and earth sparkling for my special attention, showing up cold and clear and kind of marvellous and delicate, stopping me still because I don’t know where to go any more, I might break something. I don’t touch.
‘You can come closer.’
Mum hikes Gus up a bit for my viewing pleasure and the pink blanket slides down so I can see his heart bleating right there in his chest in a map of blue and white, and I want to touch it but I don’t want to hurt him, worried my light touch in the heart region would feel to him next stop to reaching inside and holding his heart in my very hand. I don’t touch. Maybe tomorrow, maybe later.
‘Hey, Gus,’ I say, real shy, stuffing my hands in my pockets. ‘Hey there.’
I glance up at Mum and my dad and I want to say, Well done, Mum! Good work, Dad! and, That’s enough knights! Now we are seven, our number is up, I know it, this is the real start of everything, like we are born on this day Gus came home for the first time. I am born, that’s how I feel, and I want to make an announcement or hand out nice certificates, something formal