Ben There

Chapter 13
Late April; Pretending and Movies

Chapter Description: Benji decides he needs to pretend more often.

Late April; Pretending and Movies

Benji had given his eyes several two-fisted rubs and already yawned very wide on Sunday morning before he realized where he was. He’d also tasted his thumb and spat out the awful tasting thing before he recalled why he was there, and then he hid his head under a pillow and wrapped his thumb in the sheet before putting it in his mouth again.

When the shower next door shut off, he realized it had been on, and he knew soon either his daddy or mama would be coming in. He started to sit up, because he really wanted to see either one of them a whole lot. Then he started to run to his room, because he really wanted neither one of them to see him a whole lot. This ambivalence froze him with his head under the pillow.

It was Benji’s sense of smell, not sight, that told him it was his mama in the bathroom, and soon she came in in a bathrobe and said, "Yay, you’re awake; good morning, sleepyhead. You’re the very last one up today. Even Vicky has already had breakfast."

Benji didn’t know how she could tell he was awake; he had been being real still. He said, "Arrrrgggghhhh," and tried to get further under the pillow and deeper into the mattress.

His mama sat on the bed and rolled him over, letting him keep his head hidden, then she slipped a finger under the leg of his night pants and said, "Still dry. I didn’t really think you’d need them, but better safe than sorry, right, puppy? I have juice for you just as soon as you want to take your head from under there."

Benji didn’t answer. There may, however, have been an inaudible moan only perceivable by dogs, mamas, and expensive scientific equipment.

His mama saw the spot on the sheet where he’d been sucking on it and said, "Oh, Benji, you know better than to do that, honey. Think of all your new little teeth, baby, and your passie is right here by the pillow."

Talking about his pacifier right after his dry pants was not something Benji wanted to do. He said, "I turning into baby."

"No, you aren’t. Come here, ostrich boy, crawl into my lap."

"Don’ wanna," Benji said keeping his head well hidden.

Actually, he did wanna, he wanted to badly, but he didn’t wanna wanna. His mama may have understood this, because she picked him up and put him on her knees and hugged him, and he didn’t resist because now it wasn’t his fault he was there.

She was swaying from side to side as she held him, and she said, "You are not turning into anything. You are the very, very same sweet, sweet boy you always, always have always, always been, just in a slightly smaller package for a little while, puppy." She held the pacifier to his mouth, and he took it (so the rest of his conversation was mumbled, but she had no trouble understanding him.).

"But I gotta wear diapers now and use passies and people do stuff for me and ..." His voice trailed off. There seemed to be way too many things to list.

"Well, puppy, maybe you’re right about one thing," his mama said, "You are pretty big to be using a pacifier, I guess, but we know it’s because of your special teeth, right? That’s the reason you need it and only till next weekend. But, Puppy, if you like it and want to use it after that, I see no reason you shouldn’t, and I don’t see any reason you should be embarrassed about having very, very special teeth! OK?"

Benji nodded because he did like his passie now, though not as much as his thumb, but no one here was talking, or thinking, about thumbs.

"So that isn’t really something for babies because of the reason you use it, is it? And you can even take it to school and other places if you want to."

"Nuh-uhhhhh"

"Why not, sweetheart? The only people that would say anything are the dummies, because they don’t know about you, or your special teeth, or how wonderful you are. You always worry about that stuff way too much and almost always have, honey."

Benji thought about that real hard. The only things he worried about were things that were scary, but he wasn’t a scaredy-cat, not at all.

"And, the second thing, puppy, those aren’t diapers. They are just night pants in case you have another accident. Lots and lots of little boys and girls have to wear them to bed."

"But I gonna be sixteen on my bird-day."

"I think this is more about your body’s size than your age, sweetie. Don’t you? But there are kids your age, all of fifteen and eleven-twelfths, or even older, that still need them too. Enough that they have these pants for them in stores. And I don’t want you to be ashamed of that either. It’s just accidents. Now, is there anything else making my baby think he’s becoming a baby."

"Uh-huh."

Benji’s mama chuckled, and then she put her finger in his bare navel and said, "Like what, baby? Is this the talk button?"

Benji giggled in spite of himself and said, "Like even Kathy trying to do stuff for me, like pour juice and open lollipops and stuff, and Maggie saying I can’t pour stuff now anyway. And just everyone ... things..." Words didn’t fail Benji so much as simply fade away.

"It’s even worse than that, isn’t it, puppy? Everyone always wants to brush your hair for you, especially now that it’s so curly. When walking places with you, I halfway expect a stranger to come over and say, ’Can I brush his hair, please?’"

Benji giggled again, but now he liked it when Vicky and Danielle and Amber and even Kathy brushed his hair.

His mama said, "And Kathy is just wild crazy about you and always has been. Did you know that?"

Benji nodded; they had always been a bit of a team within the family, even back when he was big.

"She loooooves to be able to do things for you! -- But, yes, baby, we all do baby you; Kathy, Vicky, me, even your daddy and Maggie, but that’s because we all know that it won’t be all that long before you are all big again, and we won’t be able to anymore. But being babied, even liking being babied, doesn’t mean you’re becoming a baby, little puppy. I hope you aren’t all spoiled rotten when you get back to being big and huge, but I don’t think you have it in you to get spoiled. I really just don’t. So, don’t be mean to Kath when she tries so hard to be nice, OK?"

He didn’t want to be mean to Kathy, she was too nice and always got too happy when she did things for him; it was just it made him feel weird.

"Puppy, you know how you pretend you are Vicky’s baby brother?"

"I only pretend to be little brother, not baby!"

"Well, that’s the same thing to her. Why don’t you just pretend to be a good, sweet little boy for other people sometimes too? Because you are little for a little while, and you have always been very, very sweet and good, and it’s going to be a couple of years at least before you’re not a boy, no matter what sixteen year olds tell each other. And it might just make it a little bit easier to do some of the things you have to do because of your size just right now. Can you see that, puppy? I don’t want you to get all worked up about these kinds of things all the time, baby."

Benji could see how that might work. He said, "You mean just pretend I am little, ’cuz of all the fifteen an’ eewven-twelffes things I can’t do no more?"

"Yeah! If you are pretending to be little then you don’t have to be embarrassed and worried about all the little things that happen just because you’re little. Can you do that, puppy dog? For me? For just a little while. I know this ’shrinkin’’ thing is hard on my little guy."

"’K. ’Guess, ’can."

"OK. Now, aren’t you starving? It’s almost nine, and you haven’t had anything in daaaays, little boy."

Benji suddenly realized he really was hungry! It hadn’t been daaaays, but it had been since last night’s supper and that was a long time ago, and he said, "Yeahhh."

"Then let’s get going! Do you need to go potty? You can just pull those pants down while you teetee and then back up, since they’re still dry."

Benji didn’t even notice the vocabulary his mama had used just then, and he also had to go number two as well as teetee, so he pulled the GoodNites all the way down, but they held his ankles too close together and he took them all the way off and went back into the bedroom with nothing on.

"Why did you take them off, puppy dog? They were still clean," his mama said.

"I don like ’em, and I don’ wan’ Kaffy and Vicky to know I wear ’em and that I wet the bed."

"Well, that’s something little boys don’t have to worry about, isn’t it? And, sweetie, half of that boat has sailed. I don’t mind you going downstairs naked in the mornings, baby, but today I think you should wear those pants."

Benji hadn’t thought of going downstairs naked, just of getting real clothes on, but the boat metaphor confused him, and he said, "Huh? Whatcha mean?"

"Well, what do you think the very first thing Kathy did this morning was, puppy? She went to see if her very favorite-ist brother was awake, of course. And when she saw there weren’t any sheets on his bed, she knew why, and of course she told Vicky. Do you think either of them cared one little, tiny, itty-bitty, spinky-winky, teennyweeny wittle bit? Of course not! Except that they both knew you would feel bad about it."

She retrieved his padded night pants from the bathroom floor, and she lightly pushed him onto his back on the bed so she could put the pants back onto his bottom.

"But I never gonna do that again. I don’ gotta wear these any more."

"Baby, we need to be careful. What would Carrot say if he were the one going to the cleaning hospital? He gets grumpy, doesn’t he?"

Benji giggled, he liked being silly when he was worried about things now, and he said, "Yeah. Sometimes. ’Guess."

"So we will wear these for a week or two just to be careful. And when those underpants are dry you can just take them off, but when they are wet, you need to get someone to help you clean up and put powder down there so it doesn’t get all itchy-yetchy, OK?"

"I’as just sick last night. It won’t happen any more, mama."

"But just in case, do you know the rules for wet days? I usually wake you up, but if you get up early and are wet, find someone, OK?"

"Kay, but it not gonna happen ever ’gain."

His mama smiled at him, kissed him, and said, "OK. But now you lie there and drink up your juice while I get dressed, and then we will get some breakfast into your tummy-tum."

So he started on his cup of juice, lying on the bed, and just as his mama walked into the bathroom, he said, "Guess what. Geoff’s already seen "Rio"."

"Oh, and did he like it?" She left the door open so they could talk, and Benji said, "Yeah! He said it was really funny and scary parts too." Then he proceeded to tell her almost everything about the movie they were going to see that afternoon.

When she got back into the bedroom, she said, "Now I think, since you’re pretending to be a little boy now, and aren’t going to be embarrassed by silly stuff any more, you should march downstairs in those night pants, and just dare those two big sisters of yours to say something about your accident or wearing them."

When she said the word ’march’, she started swinging her arms with her elbows bent and walking in place with real high knees, and Benji thought it was so funny he wanted to do it, and he walked right into the kitchen just like that in just his padded pants. And neither of his sisters ever did say any thing about his accident or his underpants, but they did try to hold him even more than usual. And that can get real annoying, even if you are pretending to be a good little boy.

**************************

"Hey, it’s my favorite boyfriend!" Amber hollered as soon as her spot in the queue finally got inside the door.

Benji was taken totally by surprise because his back was to the door while Kathy fixed the straps on his bright red overalls. He turned around with one shoulder still undone and yelled, "Ambar!" and he ran over to her - well there wasn’t enough room or distance to run, so he sort of lunged over to her - and hugged her, and then he remembered where he was, in a movie theater’s very crowded women’s room and his eight year old sister had been helping him with his clothes; his sense of propriety caught up to his pleasure at the unexpected meeting, and he stammered, "My mom makes me go into this place."

Amber said, "I don’t blame her. I would watch you all the time too, Benji."

Benji was completely flustered, muddled, discombobulated, and he said, "She doesn’t watch me!" He pointed to the ladies’ room stalls and added, "I go in those!"

All the women and bigger girls in line laughed, and Amber chuckled and gave him a new hug, and he decided (again) that all girls were just weird.

Amber fixed his second overalls hook, and Kathy came over and stood behind him, with her arms around his chest and her head bent down onto his shoulder, and glared at Amber (who she’d only met once before at the Doucet’s).

Benji said, "Are you going to see "Rio" too? It’s real, real good."

Amber said, "I know! Geoff told me all about it. Hi, Kathy. Are your mom and Vicky here too?"

Kathy said, "Mama’s getting popcorn; Vicky’s in there, but it’s then now for her, so she’s taking forever." (That statement didn’t bother Benji; just another example of girl language.)

Vicky yelled from inside a stall, "Don’t believe anything they say, Amber! Did your ’rents drag you here too?"

"No; just Danny. He missed going with his gang yesterday and can’t get too far behind."

Benji said, "I gonna sit with you, OK, Amba?"

Kathy started pulling on Benji’s shoulder straps real, real hard and said, "Com’on, I got to wash our hands."

Amber said, "Maybe we can all sit together, Benji."

Kathy and Benji put their hands in the sink together, and he let her rub his because she likes to. Benji said to Amber across the room, "I can’t wait to see that chase part, can you?"

Just as she entered a stall, Amber said "Wow! I know, BB! After what Geoff said about it."

A girl Benji’s size that neither of them had seen before said, "I want to see where they go to the dance place."

"What’s that?" Benji asked her. What it was was a plot element that Geoff hadn’t found memorable, but the little girl filled everyone in.

Vicky finally got finished and said, "Bye, Amber. We’ll look for you in the lobby."

Benji said, "Where’s Danny? Can I see him?"

"He’s probably right outside the door, being a noid, by now."

When Benji saw Danny, he hollered, "Hey, Danny."

And Danny hollered, "Ben, my man!" and held his hand up over his head just high enough for Benji to have to jump to give him a high five, and Benji laughed, because, even though Danny was so much younger than him, he thought Danny was real cool.

Amber came out and started talking to Vicky and his mama, so Benji and Danny edged away from all the girl talk and over to an uncrowded area with some backless, late-modern benches.

Benji said, "You gotta come to my house again real, real soon. I got a race car ramp now, and I can get the cars to jump like way, way across the room, and I got new Legos to build alien ships with, but the cars are the really best, and you know what? I went salamander hunting and caught four, and Maggie calls me Bwana now."

Danny was kneeling on the same bench that Benji was climbing all over, and he said, "Have you started to like her better yet? She’s pretty neat, huh?"

"Yeah, she’s ’K, but she always forgets how old I really am. But she’s ’K almost mostly."

"I can see how she could forget that, I guess. You did get littler, ya’ know."

"Yeah, and sometimes I got to pretend to be a little boy too, and things, but you hav’n’t forgot, ’av ya’."

"Na-uhh. A’ course not. Amber is always telling me you’re her boyfriend, so how could I?"

Benji got a big grin, because sometimes he thought she only said that to him. "Yeahhh, and this summer I get all big again, and maybe I can drive you to the park, and we can hunt salamanders all day long when I’m all big."

"Sure, that’ll be real neat," the now twelve year-old said, "I haven’t done that in a long time."

A man that had been hidden by a fake tree while looking out the window for his date suddenly appeared, and he was laughing. He said, "Wow, that’s some elaborate game you two have there. So he’s really the oldest, huh."

Danny said, "Yeah. He’s gonna be sixteen next month and get his own car this summer."

The man said, "Good on him! Those are some imaginations you both have."

Benji said, "But it’s true!"

The laughing man said, "I believe you. I do."

Just then Benji’s mama called, "Com’on, boys. They’re ready to let us in the theater."

Benji whispered to Danny, "Uh-oh! I’ not suppose’ to talk about that to people."

Danny put his arm on Benji’s shoulder and said, "I don’t think you need to worry about that any more, little buddy."

The movie was really good. And Benji got to sit between Amber and his mama. Well for the opening part he did; when Blu was getting captured, he moved into his mama’s lap, and then he sat in Amber’s lap some too. And he whispered to her, "It’s funny to have your boyfriend in you lap, huh? Soon I’ll be too big, and you can sit in my lap, ’K?"

Amber said, "I think its sweet having you here, and I’ll sit in your lap anytime, BBB (that stands for ’best boyfriend, Benji.), but not when it will squish you."

He also sat on Vicky for a part of the movie and shared a seat with Kathy some. And he tried both ways with Danny some too, but they were too big to share, and Danny wasn’t quite big enough to sit on. When it got to the real, real scary part and the chase scene, Benji got fidgety, and he wanted to move back to his mama’s lap. She took a pacifier from her purse and whispered, "It’s OK for you to use this because you’re just pretending to be a little boy."

And he took it, and when Amber saw it she grinned and kissed his cheek right there in the theater, so Benji knew even his girlfriend didn’t care about passies either.

When the show was over and the audience was shuffling out, Benji still had his pacifier in his mouth, and some woman said, "He’s too old to be using a plug, you know? Gonna ruin his teeth."

And Benji’s mama picked him up and said to the woman, "You have no idea how much too old he is for them. But you also don’t know that he is using it right now because of a problem with his teeth, do you? Or that his dentist recommended it? You just like to talk without any information at all and try to make children feel bad about things they have to do."

And the woman just moved away from them. Benji patted his mama on the back, and then he tried to kiss her with a passie in his mouth, which can’t be done, and that gave both of them the giggles.

****************

The rest of that week went much better than the week before. Benji still had to get shots Tuesday morning and Friday afternoon, but Danielle was going that way just then both times, and it was nice to have company (and someone to tie his shoes). And he didn’t cry at all either time; well, he might have sobbed a bit, or huffed and gritted his teeth, but nobody seemed to notice.

After that one accident on Saturday he didn’t need those special night pants again until Tuesday night, and for three bedtimes he begged his mama to let him stop wearing them, but Wednesday morning, which was just the day after Growl and Henry came home from the cleaning hospital, he was real glad she hadn’t listened to him. And when he needed them three nights in a row the next weekend, and his mama wanted to put powder and oil down there at bedtime every night as well as in the morning so he wouldn’t get a rash, Benji never complained; mamas obviously know about that stuff.

On the Monday after they went to the movie, his mama took him to school early, and she talked to some of the teachers, and they decided it would actually be a good thing for him to bring his passies to school and would make him less distractible. He could have one during solo work and quiet reading but not all the time. When some of the kids asked about them, Benji explained about having trouble with his teeth, and they didn’t bug him about it any more.

On Wednesday morning he asked one of his favorite teachers about why he hadn’t had any homework at all the night before, and she said, "Wow! You know teachers always like to be asked for more work! Are you just trying to butter me up, Benji?"

"Na-uh. I just want to get smart, is all."

"Well, I think we have all been thinking you are going through a lot, with you teeth problems, and, you know, getting smaller for a while, so we have been taking it easy on you. I’ll tell everyone to cut that out, OK?"

"Yeah, not too much. I don’t want to get too smart." And he did get a little bit of work to do that night, and some of it was hard too.

On that Friday he was asked to do the weirdest thing he’d been asked to do in the junior school. He had to go into one of the little kids’ rooms and help out with rest period there. His job was to set a good example by lying on the floor and being very quiet for forty minutes. And the teacher said he did it real well.

That same night he finally no longer needed to paint yucky stuff on his hands to keep his fingers out of his mouth, all his new teeth were in and in the right shape, but he still kept a few passies handy for going to sleep and for when he needed two hands sometimes.