The Baby-Ladies
Aurora Lewis
How I come to meet the Baby Ladies ain’t so unusual.
Daddy used to take us down to the Amusement Park in Long Beach where we’d ride the merry-go-round, bumper cars, eat cotton candy, and walk the strip, looking at the sights. Mama always warned him not to take us to the sideshows, saying it was too much for little kids, but Daddy was stubborn, and did what he wanted most times.
I was looking up at Laffing Sal, one of those mechanical women who rocked back and forth, laughing at what seemed to be the funniest thing in the world when Daddy pulled on my hand and said, “Let’s see what’s in here.” Donny was 3, I was 6 or 7. We walked over to a tiny trailer, silver, blimp-shaped with flowered curtains in the windows. A bald-headed man stood at the door, wearing suspenders and smoking a cigar. He waved us in, whispering, “You’re about to see something, little lady.” His beady eyes were rimmed with folds of sweaty skin. He laughed, snorting like a pig, as we entered the trailer.
“Good evening,” the voice was raspy and I looked in its direction.
A baby! Except this baby had an old-lady face, and looked like a messed-up I Love Lucy, red lips, and curly flaming hair. She sat on a counter and wore a yellow dress that looked like it was meant for Easter Sunday. Her fat feet were done up in black Mary Janes and swinging while she smoked a cigarette. In her other hand, the Baby-Lady held a glass of brown liquid that smelled like the stuff Granddaddy drank after Sunday supper.
The Baby-Lady reached out, shaking Daddy’s hand.
“You sure are handsome,” she said, giving a low laugh and looking him over. Then she looked our way and said, “Well, what have we here?”
I took a step back. Donny cried and held on to Daddy’s legs.
But Daddy laughed, picked me up, and held me out to the Baby-Lady, who set her drink down, and stretched a puffy hand my way. Her polished nails matched her red lips. I pushed my hands behind me, but Daddy said to shake, which I did, but snatched that hand back so fast you would have thought I’d touched boiling water.
The Baby-Lady laughed real loud. So did Daddy. He returned me to the floor and pulled Donny up to the Baby-Lady’s hand. Donny struggled, twisting and turning until Daddy finally put him back on the floor. We clung to his legs while he talked to the baby, asking about her size, her life, even the clothes she wore. They were still chatting when the bald man appeared with another baby in his arms. This one wore the same clothes and had the same red hair, but looked even younger. She didn’t smile like the first Baby-Lady, just looked at the floor.
“I’d like you to meet my daughter.” The Baby-Lady said.
My father looked at both babies, then said, “You been married?”
“Oh, yes! More than once,” she laughed, “Zeke here is my third husband.” She looked over to the bald-head, who winked at Daddy while laughing his little pig laugh.
“Pleased to meet you, I’m Frank.” Daddy said, laughing a little too.
“Girl, tell the kids your name,” The Baby-Lady snapped at the smaller one.
“I’m Thelma,” the other said, still not smiling, looking like she might cry.
“She’s kind of shy,” the Mama-Baby said, as she shot Thelma a dirty look.
Daddy finished up talking to Zeke and the Baby-Family and finally freed us from the trailer, walking us over to the ice cream parlor, trying to explain what we’d just seen. I gulped my sundae, and knew I didn’t want to see a whiskey-drinking baby ever again, though I wondered which would have been worse, the Baby-Ladies or Jo-Jo the Dog-Face Boy.
Aurora M. Lewis lives and writes in Southern California. Her chapbook of poems is Forget-Me-Knots.
