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Nighttime
Yanli thought that she and A-Xuan were done with wrangling A-Ling’s sleep schedule for the foreseeable future. The dentist had warned her that there was one more fly in the ointment, so to speak, what with A-Ling’s final and largest baby molars yet to emerge, but their little family had fallen into a pleasant routine with naps and night time sleeping.
A-Xuan had even purchased a new toddler bed, hoping to set it up before their next baby arrived. A-Ling’s current crib – also from Restoration Hardware – was a system that converted from a crib to a toddler bed, but Yanli worried that perhaps some transition time would be needed for A-Ling to get used to his new sleeping area. Perhaps A-Ling would be excited by the prospect of sleeping in his own bed like mama and baba, and it would awaken some hitherto slumbering instinct to protect and defend as opposed to… well, pillage and destroy. Normal things for a toddler.
It is therefore an unwelcome surprise when, before A-Xuan can even set up the new bed, A-Ling starts to act up around his nighttime routine. He requests all sorts of things as they try to convince him to get into bed.
“Cuddle mama!” A-Ling demands, sprawled on Yanli and A-Xuan’s bed. He compliantly lifts a foot though, so that A-Xuan can finish putting on the duck socks A-Ling has chosen himself. Yellow ducks with a blue water design on the toes, heels, and ankle cuffs. They clash horribly with his bright purple pajamas. A-Ling is still the cutest thing she’s seen.
“Quack quack!” A-Ling adds, wiggling his toes and distracting himself from his new routine of begging before naptime. He enjoys the sensation of raising and lowering his feet over his head, quacking loudly the whole time, then refocuses. “Cuddle mama!”
Yanli makes space, moving the arms of her pregnancy pillow to allow for a toddler-sized hole, just as A-Ling flings himself into the opening. He beams up at her, chubby cheeks taking over his whole face as his eyes squish into crescent slivers. “Cuddle mama!”
Yanli nestles him close, taking deep breaths into his neck as he does a delighted shimmy. He hasn’t smelled like a newborn for more than a year, but she still presses her nose into his hair, hoping for a tiny whiff of that heady combination of bread-milk-rice. Sometimes she swears she still smells it, though realistically, it’s the remnants of his post-dinner snack.
“Comfy?” A-Xuan says, smiling at her.
“Very,” Yanli agrees, cuddling A-Ling even closer. She’s reminded of that Pixar short, the one where the mother stuffs her baozi son into her mouth to keep him close, and even though Yanli would never keep A-Ling from reaching his full potential, she can understand the impulse. He tolerates the closeness for a heartbeat, then flails his arms in protest, launching himself out of the pregnancy pillow nest and over to his baba.
“Cuddle baba!”
Yanli stays in the same place, smiling as her two favorite people slip under the covers as well. This is part of their usual nighttime routine: singing songs, brushing teeth, then maybe reading a book before bed. They’ve read several books today already, after an hour outside at the nearby playground, so Yanli is hoping that A-Ling will be more tired than usual.
A-Xuan’s voice breaks out into a lovely melody, and Yanli closes her eyes in contentment. The trials of being in her third trimester of pregnancy, anxiously awaiting their high-risk little girl, are somewhat balanced by the gift of being horizontal and pampered when her back acts up. A-Xuan is a competent, if somewhat coddling, husband and father, and she can rest easy with him around.
The song crescendos into its final refrain, and A-Ling chirps along with reasonable accuracy of pitch, if not linguistics. Her little boy has an excellent sense of rhythm and tone. Perhaps she should sign him up for music lessons; she suspects her mother would be more than happy to take him to classes while helping Yanli recover postpartum, and A-Ling adores his doting grandma. Which reminds her, she wouldn’t mind some ginger milk curd tomorrow…
“More song!” A-Ling demands, “hai yao hai yao!”
It’s hilarious to watch him string together words from different languages. His multi-lingual Montessori daycare emphasizes vocabulary building at the moment, and sometimes it takes her and A-Xuan a moment to figure out what he’s asking for.
A-Xuan ruffles A-Ling’s hair before starting the second song.
He barely finishes the first verse before A-Ling interrupts. “Nainai? Nainai?”
“You want to call your Nainai?” A-Xuan asks indulgently. It’s a rare request; A-Ling is usually too active to sit still during phone calls during the day.
“Yeah okay!” A-Ling shouts. The bed shakes as he thumps his limbs excitedly on the mattress. “Yeah okay!”
From her cocoon, Yanli listens as A-Xuan dials his mother. She picks up on the first ring, clearly confused why she is being summoned at this hour, but audibly melts as A-Ling greets her.
“He wanted to talk to me?” she asks. There’s a lurch on the bed, probably A-Ling grabbing the phone.
“Nainai! Nainai! Nainai!” A-Ling shouts, followed by a semi-intelligible gargle of vowels and consonants.
“You want… baozi?” A-Xuan’s mom asks in her familiar accented Mandarin. “Okay, I will make you baozi first thing tomorrow. Anything else, A-Ling?”
“Suannai! Lanmei! Uvas! Binggan!”
Yanli laughs. A-Ling is listing off his usual breakfast favorites. He’s so food-motivated, this one. Back when he was an infant, perhaps only three months old, she’d dreamed that he’d looked her in the eyes and said “Mama, I want more milk!” And besides “mama” and “baba,” his first words were all related to food. She rubs her belly. Hopefully her next one will be as easy to raise. All she wants is a healthy baby girl, but asking for her to eat and sleep well would be an additional blessing. Maybe even liking to eat vegetables. Her little one is currently the size of an eggplant…
A-Ling shouts “Nainai!” a few more times before A-Xuan wrestles the phone back from him. “Okay A-Ma, thanks for understanding. Yes, see you tomorrow. Good night!”
There’s a tinkle of laughter, A-Xuan’s mother saying goodnight in return, telling him to take care of Yanli, and then back to silence.
Two breaths, in out, in out, and then—
“Shua ya?”
A-Xuan snorts. “Hao, shua ya.” He climbs out of the bed, and Yanli hears an echo of toddler feet running after him towards the bathroom. The faucet turns on for a second, and then they’re both back, A-Ling’s dog-themed toothbrush probably in A-Xuan’s hand.
“Dakai zui,” A-Xuan says, and then there’s the sounds of a tiny wrestling match, so presumably A-Ling has not opened his mouth. There’s more giggling, more shaking of the bed, and then the dry rustling sound of bristles on teeth.
“Wider,” A-Xuan says, and then there’s no more fuss. A-Ling used to hate getting his teeth brushed, but at his last dentist checkup, he’d been complimented on his teeth, and it really feels like A-Ling somehow internalized that even though Yanli didn’t think he understood what was going on, given all the sobbing at the time.
“Kuaile,” A-Xuan says, and only a few more seconds later, A-Ling shouts “All done!”
Yanli feels the bed move as A-Xuan probably reaches to put the toothbrush on his nightstand. She wants to tell him that there’s no point because A-Ling will demand it back so that he can take a turn brushing his own teeth. But she’s so tired and comfortable, and A-Ling knows how to advocate for himself. Sure enough, she feels kicks on the bed as A-Ling sits up. “Mine! Mine!”
There’s sounds of happy mouth smacking noises – A-Ling likes the minty toothpaste flavor, which is both cute and a little worrying, something about too much fluoride maybe – but then A-Xuan nestles close to her while A-Ling is occupied. She feels a gentle kiss on her forehead, the lightest stroke on her hair.
“I’m awake,” she says into the gap between her pillow and mattress. “Still want to shower, for my back.”
“Okay,” A-Xuan agrees. “We’re almost done here,” he adds optimistically. “The sound of the shower will probably lull A-Ling to sleep.”
Yanli nods, then crawls her hand up and out through the tangle of sheets and blankets to pat A-Xuan’s hand. “You’re doing a great job.”
He squeezes her hand in acknowledgment. A-Ling is still gnawing on his toothbrush, so A-Xuan rubs her lower back with his other hand while they wait for him to grow bored.
Soon enough, A-Ling informs them that he is all done. A-Xuan’s warm palms retreat from her body, and the cool air hits Yanli’s hand. She retracts it back under the blanket.
“Okay, kiss mama goodnight,” A-Xuan’s voice says, and Yanli opens her eyes, turning her face so that A-Ling can give her a kiss on each cheek. A-Xuan scoops him up into a happy giggling bundle, then hoists him over his shoulder.
“I love you, A-Ling,” Yanli says.
A-Ling is already distracted, so A-Xuan taps him to turn around. “Say ‘I love you, mama,’” he prompts.
“I love you mama,” A-Ling obediently says into A-Xuan’s shoulder. There’s a trail of drool going from his mouth to A-Xuan’s sleeve. Yanli loves them both so much.
“Tomorrow, we’ll play together sooo much,” A-Xuan says, continuing their routine. Yanli closes her eyes again. Just another minute.
“Soooo much,” A-Ling parrots back.
A-Xuan’s feet retreat down the hall. Yanli hears the blinds being drawn, A-Ling’s loveys being handed to him, then the sound of running water for his humidifier.
“Okay, good night,” A-Xuan says softly. His voice carries down the hallway; Yanli hears A-Ling’s echoing whisper before the door closes and A-Xuan’s footsteps return.
She doesn’t move. She knows better.
From A-Ling’s nursery, a loud “Agua!” is heard. There’s a loud sigh from Zixuan, and then A-Ling’s voice demands water again, voice rising in frequency and pitch before bursting into sobs.
“He’s playing you,” Yanli says, smothering her smile into her pillow.
“Like a fiddle,” A-Xuan agrees, and goes back into the nursery anyway.
Yanli shifts in bed as A-Xuan goes back towards the nursery, then picks up A-Ling and carries him downstairs to the kitchen for his toddler cup of water. It’ll take her some time to actually get out of bed, now that her weight is all unevenly distributed, and the last time she sat up too quickly, she got lightheaded, threw up, and then had a migraine. Slow and steady, the doctors said.
This time, A-Ling is surely well watered before he is placed back in his nursery. The door doesn’t even close before she hears his little begging voice. “Goodnight please?”
She knows he’s asking for the song they sometimes sing him, shamelessly altered from Ms. Rachel’s repertoire of toddler songs. A-Xuan says “Yes, goodnight,” clearly not understanding, and A-Ling starts to cry. “No no, goodnight please!”
Yanli laughs a little, starting the song off. “Good night, A-Ling,” she sings from the bedroom, knowing they can hear her. Sure enough, A-Xuan’s voice joins in once he realizes the nature of the request.
It’s a very short song. A few moments later, he reappears in their bedroom.
This time, he makes it all the way to their bed. A-Xuan gingerly sits on their bed, both of them hardly daring to breathe. Perhaps tonight-
No, there’s another heartrending sob. A-Ling is starting to sound tired though. Tonight’s battle will be a short one.
“Want me to check on him?” Yanli offers, moving to twitch back the covers. “I can pop into the shower afterwards.”
“No, no,” A-Xuan says, already at the door. “You watched him all afternoon. Take it easy, I’ve got it.”
Sexier words have never been spoken.
Yanli stretches one more time, then slowly lifts the blanket and pokes her feet out. She hoists herself up with her arms, then swings her knees out together. She focuses on her breathing, giving herself time. She notices that A-Ling’s crying has stopped, but she hasn’t heard the door to the nursery close yet.
A-Xuan reappears as Yanli’s toes touch the floor. “His lovey fell out of the crib,” he says, “And also I think his night light is broken?”
“There’s a spare in the linen cabinet,” Yanli says, tilting her head towards the guest bedroom.
“Right,” A-Xuan says. “He sounds really tired; I think this will do the trick.”
“Good luck,” Yanli says as he rushes off, eager to solve this hopefully final problem.
She waddles to the shower, turning it on and cranking up the heat. The door to the nursery closes; A-Xuan reappears and gives her a quick peck on the cheek as she waits outside for the water to heat up and to undress.
“Enjoy your shower,” he says. “A-Ling’s down; I’m going to pop by the store to grab some snacks, plus we’re nearly out of protein shakes. Do you want anything?”
“Lemonade,” Yanli says.
“And?” A-Xuan says.
“No, just lemonade,” Yanli says. The last time she asked for chips, he had come back with a huge assortment of chips, chocolate, and cookies. She had eaten them all, but that isn’t the point.
“Okay,” A-Xuan says, unconvinced. Yanli suspects he’s going to bring home more than just lemonade for her, but she can’t find it in herself to argue. She’ll have precious little time to feel pampered after their second one comes.
“See you soon,” Yanli says. “Love you, drive safe.”
A-Xuan smiles at her. “See you soon, love you.”
There’s already steam in the shower by the time she opens the glass door. The water is scorching hot at first, but almost immediately, it feels perfect as she steps all the way in.
She perks up her ears as she enters – even with the water running, A-Ling is audible if he cries – but no, there’s blessed silence. She imagines him in his crib, each hand clutching a lovey, hair already sticking out in every direction. If she had her phone on her, she’d double check the baby monitor, but it’s too far away at the moment and the shower is everything she’s dreamed of.
She can relax.
Naptime
“Agua,” A-Ling cries as he’s being carried to his crib. “Red agua,” actually; he’s specifically demanding his red toddler cup, as opposed to Yanli’s pink floral tumbler which he likes to steal (“pink agua”), or his purple thermoflask that his jiujiu bought him, for when they go on car rides (“purple agua”).
“No agua,” A-Xuan says firmly.
“Galleta? Queso?”
“You’re definitely not hungry,” A-Xuan replies. Yanli knows this is true; they just watched A-Ling scarf down eight dumplings, in addition to one and a bite of his nainai’s baozi, finishing with half an orange and a cheese stick, all washed down with a full cup of water.
She’s curled up with her pregnancy pillow on the floor mat by A-Ling’s crib. A midday nap sounds perfect, and she’s been wondering if perhaps A-Ling just misses having nap buddies from daycare. She knows A-Ling hasn’t spotted her yet; he’s too busy thinking up more reasons to stall.
“Here are your loveys,” A-Xuan says. “Let’s get a nice long nap, okay?”
“Song?” A-Ling’s voice pipes up. “Good night?”
A-Xuan laughs. “Kan, there’s mama.”
Yanli had been hoping that the game would last a little longer, but she can’t be too upset when A-Ling’s little voice goes “Oh, mama!” in a rapturous tone of voice.
She looks up and smiles at him. “Hi, A-Ling.”
“Mama mama!” He beams at her, allowing himself to be set down in his crib.
A-Xuan tilts his head at A-Ling. “Did you still want your agua?” His voice is teasing; Yanli wonders how much A-Ling understands of their unspoken dialogue. Probably more than she expects.
“No!”
“What about your galleta? Or queso?”
“No! Xiexie! Byebye baba!” A-Ling waves goodbye at A-Xuan, laying himself flat down in his crib and turning so that he can grin at Yanli.
A-Xuan laughs as he closes the door to the nursery.
“Good night, A-Ling,” Yanli says. “Mama loves you, let’s nap together okay?”
A-Ling doesn’t respond, continuing to stare at Yanli with pure joy while kicking his feet.
Yanli snorts. There’s no way either of them will fall asleep like this. She reaches out to stroke his cheeks and hair between the bars of his crib. “I love you,” she says again, before turning to face away from him. It’s a slow process; both of them shift on their respective mattresses, getting comfortable. When Yanli is finally laying on her other side, she stills her limbs and breathes slowly and deeply. She’s setting a good example for A-Ling, and falling asleep first certainly won’t hurt her.
And finally—
“Love you mama,” he whispers, and then his feet fall silent and his breathing rounds out.
Life is good.