When Babies Dream Read online

off my shoes and crying. Then I lose one of my shoes right before it’s our turn for pictures, and Mema can’t find it. The projector freezes with me posing for a picture, and I only have one shoe on.

  The movie skips a few weeks all together, and it’s Memorial Day, and I get to go on vacation with Jim and his family again. We go to Arizona, and I get to ride in an airplane! I can’t believe how high we go, and I keep finding clouds out my window and shouting for Jim or Mema or Papa to look. The clouds look like cotton candy.

  The first day I’m there, I walk in front of another little girl on a swing, and Jim and Mema have to take me to the emergency room to get my jaw x-rayed.

  A couple days later, we all drive to Disneyland, and I get to celebrate my third birthday there. For a few days, my life is filled with princesses, parades, and rides. Before we leave, Jim builds me a stuffed animal, a cat, and he puts a special recorded message inside.

  When I press the cat’s paw I hear Mema say, “Happy birthday, Ciara, love Mema and Papa,” and then Jim says, “Happy Birthday, Ciara, I love you.”

  I go into Jim’s thoughts again from when he was recording that message. He thought it was amazing to carry me around on his shoulders in Disneyland and to have played with me so much on vacation that I fall asleep in his arms every night.

  I can’t help but go into Mema’s thoughts, too. She loves me like a real grandkid. She loves that Jim has me, just as much. Back home, she has a picture frame that holds four photos, and says grandkids are for memories, and I’m in one of those slots.

  When vacation ends, my movie stops playing, and the windows floats away, and I search for what will be my last window.

  Some of the things I’ll see out of this window will be hard to look at. When a bay window with a sitting bench floats by, I choose it because then I don’t have to stand and watch. As I sit on the bench and look out the window, I take in a deep breath.

  Jim and I are bike riding. Jim has a kid’s seat on the back of his bike. We’re on a bike path we’ve used dozens of times since the weather turned nice. I still don’t talk much, but I can say some words, and when we get to the end of our bike ride, I shout, “Jim, Ice cream!” because there’s an ice cream shop across the street from where Jim parks.

  “I know, Ciara,” Jim says to me, and we ride over to the ice cream store.

  Jim gets me strawberry ice cream, my favorite, and he gets chocolate chip.

  “You get to see Mommy for two days tomorrow,” Jim tells me. “And I’ll pick you up after dinner on Sunday.”

  Watching that bike ride from my bay window, I realize I have a court date coming up, and I’ll probably go home then. Judges always let Moms have their kids for weekends right before they go home for good.

  “We go swimming, Jim?” I ask him. I don’t understand what not living with him means.

  “No, Ciara, that’s what we do at Mema’s house. You’re going to Mommy’s house,” he tells me, trying his best to sound happy for me. “Maybe Mommy will take you swimming.”

  When I notice how sad Jim’s eyes look, I bow my head from inside my window and close my eyes. I can’t help but see Jim’s thoughts. He’s losing his someone to love. He can’t believe how I went from the little girl he was afraid to take to the little girl he can’t stand to lose. He can’t control me leaving, though. He hasn’t had a weekend without me for almost eight months now, but all he wants is more time with me.

  Until this week, our weekends were spent bike riding and swimming at Mema’s. We have campfires on Friday nights and go to church on Sundays. We always have a birthday party or cookout or graduation party to go to. Now Jim will have to do those things without me.

  The next few weeks pass far too quickly. Jim and I go bike riding every night after dinner, mostly sticking to the streets by his house so we can ride to Mema and Papa’s place.

  A Tuesday comes and it’s time for me to go home. That’s why Jim took the day off from work. If he hadn’t, Jim would have dropped me off at the babysitter, and that’s how he would have said goodbye, and someone from the county would have picked me up, later.

  Instead, the night before, Jim took me for my last bike ride to Mema and Papa’s house. Papa was on a trip so he wasn’t home. Mema hugs me longer than she ever has before and tells me, “I love you, Baby C. Your Mommy better take good care of you.”

  I drift into Mema’s thoughts. She thinks I’m losing too much. She thinks Mom will only be good to me for a little while. She thinks her Jim is losing too much.

  My last memory of Mema is her waving to me as Jim and I ride down her street. I’m crying, but I always cry when I leave Mema’s house.

  Jessica, my social worker, didn’t call Jim until Tuesday afternoon. He wanted to take me on one more bike ride before I went home, but he just couldn’t do it.

  Jim packed all my clothes and toys in his car the night before. As I left his house, I didn’t know it was for good, but it looked like I had never lived there, except for pictures of me on the walls.

  Even as Jim drives me to the courthouse, I do not know this is the end. Jim is quiet and doesn’t say anything. I’m the first person to talk, gesturing at the ice cream place we stopped at so many times before.

  “Ice cream, Jim?” I ask from my car seat.

  “No, Ciara” Jim says, but he’s crying.

  Jim fights back the tears somehow and even manages to look happy for me as we pull into the courthouse.

  My mom runs up to Jim’s car like she’s won the lotto. She’s so happy, I can’t help but be happy, too, as she opens my door and takes me out.

  “My baby, my baby” she repeats.

  Jessica is there, too, and so is Mom’s new boyfriend. They empty Jim’s car of all my belongings as quickly as they can.

  Mom has enough compassion to let me say goodbye to Jim, but I still don’t know he was leaving. I hug him, but Mom is carrying on so much I pay more attention to her.

  Jim whispers to me, because if he talked, he would cry, “Thank you, little girl. I love you so much!”

  Then Mom takes me into her arms and holds me so tight I can’t move, and I see Jim, and he’s standing there, alone.

  I bang on the glass of this bay window with my fists and shout, “Don’t go, Jim! Who’ll ever love me like you did? I want to keep you.” But no one can hear me from inside this tornado, least of all Jim.

  The streaks of red and blue swirl out of my tornado. Then my tornado turns from purple, back to grey, and then it closes up completely.

  Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night wiping away tears. I never explain why I’m crying, but I have a name for those kinds of tears. I call them my baby tears, and they only come when I dream about him.

  ####

  Thank you for taking the time to read When Babies Dream. If you enjoyed this story, I kindly ask that you share your experience with others and encourage them to read it.

  If you would like to know more about this story or about the author, please visit me at https://whenbabiesdream.blogspot.com/