by Ian Mcewan
‘Laura and the baby will take your room, Kate,’ their mother said. ‘You’ll have to move in with Peter.’
Kate nodded bravely.
‘Is that all right with you, Peter?’ his father asked.
Peter shrugged. There didn’t seem to be much choice.
And so it was arranged. In fact, Peter looked forward to Laura’s arrival. She was the youngest of his mother’s many sisters and brothers and he liked her. She was dangerous and fun. He had once watched her at a country fair leap off the top of a two-hundred-foot crane attached to an elastic rope. She had come hurtling out of the sky, and just before she was dashed to pieces on the grass, she had gone shooting up into the air again with a long scream of terror and hilarity.
Kate moved into Peter’s room, bringing her newest game, a box of magic, with a wand and a book of spells. She also brought along a small detachment of thirty dolls. The same day a mountain of baby gear appeared in the house – a cot, a high chair, a playpen, a pram, a buggy, a push-cart, an indoor swing and five large bags of clothes and toys. Peter was suspicious. Surely one small person shouldn’t need this much stuff. Kate, on the other hand, was crazy with excitement. Even on Christmas Eve she had never been this far gone.
The children were allowed to stay up late to greet the visitors. The sleeping baby was carried to the sofa and settled there. Kate knelt by it, as if she were in church, gazing into the infant face and occasionally sighing. Laura sat on the other side of the room and lit a cigarette with trembling hands. Peter could tell at a glance she was in no mood for fun or danger, unless, of course, you counted smoking. She replied to their mother’s gentle remarks and questions with short answers, and turned her head sharply at right angles to blow her smoke into a corner where no one sat.
Over the next few days, they saw very little of Laura and rather a lot of baby Kenneth. Peter marvelled at how one small person could take up so much space. In the hallway were the pram and the buggy, into the living-room were crammed the playpen, the swing, the push-cart and a great scattering of toys, and in the kitchen, the high chair blocked the way to the cupboard where the biscuits were kept.
And Kenneth himself was everywhere. He was one of those babies who are so good at crawling they gain nothing by trying to walk. He lumbered across the carpet at alarming speed, like a military tank.
He was a baby in the bloated style, with a great square jaw supporting a fat damp face of furious pink, with bright, determined eyes, and nostril wings that flared like a sumo wrestler’s whenever he did not immediately get what he wanted.
Kenneth was a grabber. If he saw an object within his reach which he could lift, his hot wet fist would close about it and transfer it to his mouth. It was an appalling habit. He tried to eat the pilot who belonged in the cockpit of the model air- plane Peter was gluing together. Kenneth also bit the wings. He ate Peter’s homework. He chewed the pencils, the ruler and the books. He crawled into the bedroom and tried to munch the camera Peter had been given for his birthday.
‘He’s crazy!’ Peter yelled as he wiped his camera dry and his mother carried Kenneth away. ‘If he could get us in his mouth, he’d eat us all.’
‘It’s only a phase,’ Kate said wisely. ‘We all used to do it.’ This calm, know-everything tone she had adopted since Kenneth’s arrival was also getting on Peter’s nerves. She had copied it from their mother. Surely no one could deny that this baby was awful. Meal times were the worst. Kenneth had a way of turning food into muck. He mashed and squelched it until it dripped like glue, and smeared it over his arms, face, clothes and high chair. The sight turned Peter’s stomach. He had to eat with his eyes closed. And conversation was impossible because the baby yelled at the top of his lungs at almost every spoonful.
The baby had taken over the house. There was not a corner into which his yells, smells and mad hyena laughter and grabbing little hands did not reach. He emptied cupboards and bookcases, tore up newspapers, knocked down lamps and full bottles of milk. No one seemed to mind. In fact, everyone, Peter’s mother, his aunt, his sister and his father, cooed with delight at every fresh outrage.
Things came to a head one late afternoon after school. It was midsummer, but it was raining and cold. Kate lay on her bed reading. Peter was kneeling on the floor. A marble craze was sweeping through the school and he was a keen player. The day before he had won from another boy the finest marble he had ever seen, a Green Gem. It was smaller than most and seemed to shine with its own light. He was using it now, rolling it across the carpet towards the large marmalade marble he always used for target practice. Just as the Green Gem left his hand, Kenneth’s fat bald head appeared round the door. The marble rolled straight towards him, and he barged forward eagerly.
‘Kenneth, no!’ Peter shouted. But too late. The baby scooped up the marble and put it in his mouth. Peter started to scramble across the floor, intending to prise Kenneth’s jaws apart. Then he stopped. It was horribly clear what had happened. The baby sat perfectly still. For a second his eyes bulged and a look of puzzled irritation passed across his face. Then he blinked, and blinked again, and looked at Peter and smiled.
‘No,’ Peter whispered. ‘He’s swallowed it.’
‘Swallowed what?’ Kate said without looking up from her book of spells.
‘My Green Gem, the marble I won yesterday.’
Kate put on her calm know-it-all voice. ‘Oh that. I wouldn’t worry. It’s very small and smooth. It won’t do him any harm.’
Peter glared at Kenneth who sat contentedly staring at his own hand. ‘I don’t care about him. What about my marble?’
‘It’ll be fine,’ Kate said. ‘It’ll come out the other end.’
Peter shuddered. ‘Thanks a lot.’
Kate closed her book of spells. She leaned down and tick- led Kenneth. He laughed, and crawled towards her bed. She pulled him up and sat him beside her on the bed. ‘Do you know what I think?’ she said.
Peter said nothing. He knew he would be told.
‘I think you’re jealous of Kenneth.’
How irritating his sister could be. ‘That’s so stupid!’ Peter said. ‘That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. How could I be jealous of that thing?’ He glared at the baby, who stared back with simple interest, his huge head wobbling.
‘He’s not a thing,’ Kate said. ‘He’s a person. Anyway, it’s simple. He’s getting all the attention now instead of you.’
Peter looked at her suspiciously. ‘You didn’t make this up yourself. Who said it?’
His sister shrugged. ‘It’s true anyway. You aren’t the youngest boy in the house any more. That’s why you’re so horrid to him.’
‘Me horrid to him? He’s the one who ate my marble. He’s a lunatic. He’s a nuisance. He’s a monster!’
Kate’s face was flushed with anger. She stood up and lifted Kenneth to the floor. ‘He’s a dear little thing. And you are awful. It’s time someone taught you a lesson.’ She snatched up her book of spells and left the room in a hurry. The baby lumbered after her.
Half an hour later, Peter wandered downstairs. Kate was slumped in an armchair in the living-room with her book open on her lap. Kenneth was on the floor, peaceful for the moment as he chewed his way through an old magazine.
Peter took a chair on the far side of the room. He wanted to continue the argument. He wanted to know where Kate had got her ridiculous ideas from. But he wasn’t sure how to begin. His sister was frowning at her book, and fiddling with the black magic wand that came with it. Kenneth had noticed Peter at last and crawled towards him. Using Peter’s leg as a support, the baby hauled himself upright until he stood unsteadily between the older boy’s knees.
Peter stared over the baby’s head at his sister. She did not look up. She was still angry with him. It was just as well the magic set was nothing more than a toy. He looked down at Kenneth again. The baby was staring deep into his eyes, and frowning, as if searching for something in his mind, a memory, a lost clue to another life.
‘Gaaaaa,’ Kenneth said quietly.
‘Gaaaaa,’ Kate repeated from the other side of the room. She was pointing the wand at Peter.
‘Gaaaaa gaaaaa,’ Kenneth repeated.
‘Gaaaaa gaaaaa,’ Kate echoed and drew a circle in the air. The room began to brighten and turn floor-over-ceiling, and grow larger and larger until it was the size of an enormous hall in a palace.
Peter was on his feet, swaying as he struggled to keep his balance. He clutched at a pillar. But it was alive and warm. It was a leg, a gigantic leg. Peter lifted his heavy wobbly head and tried to direct his unreliable gaze on the owner of the leg. He glimpsed a face, but it slipped from his view. He moved his huge head back and saw it again, a giant version of himself in school clothes, staring down at him with unconcealed disgust. Numbly, Peter looked down at his own clothes – a ridiculous jump-suit patterned with teddy bears and stained down the front with orange juice and chocolate. Terrible, terrible! He had swapped bodies with Kenneth.
In his surprise, Peter let go of the leg and fell back on the floor into a sitting position.
‘Oops!’ he heard a musical voice say for him.
This was awful, this was unfair, this was frightening. He was on the edge of tears, but he could not quite remember what it was that had upset him. His attention half drifted, half swam from one thing to another.
‘Help me someone!’ he shouted. ‘Someone do something!’ But what came from his lips was a succession of clumsy ‘shhh’ sounds. His tongue wouldn’t go where he told it, and he seemed to have only one tooth.
Tears were pouring down his face, and he was just drawing breath to fill his lungs and bawl out his sorrow when something powerful clamped under his armpits and he shot fifty feet into the air. His mouth hung open, he was dribbling in his amazement. He was staring into his Aunt Laura’s face which was as sheer and colossal as a cliff. She looked like one of those American presidents carved out of a mountain.
Her voice, as rich and musical as a symphony orchestra, thundered about his head. ‘Five o’clock. Teatime, bath-time, and bed!’
‘Put me down, Aunt Laura. It’s me. Peter.’
But what came out was, ‘Aaa, agooo amama.’
‘That’s right,’ she said encouragingly. ‘Tea, bath and bed.
Did you hear him?’ she said to someone far away. ‘He’s trying to talk.’
Peter began to kick and struggle. ‘Put me down!’ But now he was flying across the room at terrifying speed. Surely he would be smashed to pieces on the door frame. ‘Eeeek!’ he squealed. Just in time they changed direction, and he was whisked through the kitchen and tipped into the high chair.
Afternoon sunlight pouring through the garden trees made shifting patterns on the wall of such beauty that Peter forgot all else.
He pointed and shouted, ‘Aark!’
Aunt Laura was humming softly to herself as she tied a bib around his neck. Well, at least he was in no danger of falling to the ground now. He would be able to inform her that he was the victim of a cruel magic trick. So, he said in his most reasonable voice, ‘Ing ing eeen,’ and he would have said much more if his mouth had not been suddenly stoppered by a spoonful of boiled egg. The taste and smell, the colour and texture and squelching sound overwhelmed his senses and scattered his thoughts. Egginess exploded in his mouth, a white and yellow fountain of sensation shot upwards through his brain. His whole body lurched as he tried to point at the bowl Laura held. He had to have more.
‘Aark,’ he shouted through his mouthful, spraying his arm.
‘Aark, aark, aark!’
‘Yes,’ his aunt said soothingly. ‘You like egg.’
Until the egg was finished, Peter could think of nothing else. When it was done, and before he could remember what he was meant to be talking about, a beaker of orange juice distracted him with its itchy tangy noisy taste. Then mashed banana started arriving in his mouth. This food was so good he was proud to wear it in his hair, and on his hands and face and chest.
Finally he reeled against the side of the chair. He was so full he could hardly blink. But he knew he had to speak out. He took it slowly this time, using the tip of his tongue to press against his single tooth.
‘Aunt Laura,’ he said patiently. ‘I’m not actually your baby, I’m Peter, and it was Kate who …’
‘Yes,’ Laura agreed. ‘Agoo agoo is quite right. Look at the state of you. Head to toe in egg and banana. Bath time!’
Now Peter was in Aunt Laura’s arms and flying up the stairs. On the landing they flashed by Kate.
‘Waaah!’ he shouted at her. ‘Waaah waaah!’
‘Cooeee!’ she called back, holding up the magic wand.
Minutes later he was sitting in a bath the size of a small swimming pool, wavelets of warm water lapping round his chest. He knew he should be talking to his aunt, but for the moment he was more interested in smacking the surface of the water with his open palms. How intricate and unique each splash was, with droplets separating out as they rose in the air, and tumbling back to make patterns and ripples. It was so wonderful, so hilarious.
‘Wow, look at this,’ he found himself shouting. ‘Eee ink aark!’ He was so excited that his arms and legs shot out straight and he tumbled backwards. Aunt Laura caught him gently with a cupped palm behind his head.
Shocked to his senses, Peter remembered that he had to let her know who he was. ‘Awaba …’ he started to say, but suddenly he shot upwards out of the water, like a missile from a sub- marine, and landed in a white towel as large as the back garden.
He was dried, powdered, wrapped up in a nappy, buttoned into pyjamas, carried into the bedroom and set down in Kenneth’s cot. Aunt Laura sang him a lilting, interesting song about a black sheep who was holding back on certain bags of wool for people he knew.
‘Encore!’ he shouted. ‘Unga!’
So she sang it again. Then she kissed him, raised the side of the cot and quietly left the room.
Peter would have panicked if the song had not made him so happy and sleepy. Early evening sunlight played against the drawn curtains which stirred mysteriously. Birds trilled their impossible songs. He listened intently. What was he going to do? What if Laura went back home and took him with her? He tried to sit up and think, but he was too tired to lift his huge head from the mattress.
He heard the door open and footsteps crossing the room. Kate’s face appeared between the bars. She was smirking.
‘Kate,’ he hissed. ‘Get me out of here. Go and get the wand.’
She shook her head. ‘Serves you right.’
‘I’ve got to do my homework,’ Peter pleaded.
‘Kenneth’s doing it for you.’
‘He’ll mess it up. Please Kate. I’ll give you all my marbles. Anything you want.’
She smiled. ‘You’re much nicer like this.’
She put her hands through the bars and tickled his belly. He tried not to laugh, but it was hopeless.
‘Night night, fat baby,’ she whispered, and then she was gone.
The following morning, groggy from a sleep which seemed to have lasted six months, Peter was carried downstairs to the kitchen. Blearily, he looked down at his family from the high chair.
They waved and sang out cheerily, ‘Morning Kenneth.’
‘Wark,’ he croaked back. ‘Wark ork. I’m not Kenneth. I’m Peter.’
Everyone seemed happy with his reply. It was then that he became aware of the boy at the far end of the table. Kenneth in Peter’s body and Peter’s school clothes. He was staring at Peter with a look of such loathing and disgust that it made dark ripples in the air.
The boy looked away. He pushed his plate aside, stood up and left the room. Peter felt a cold jolt of rejection. Immediately he began to cry.
‘Oh, wassa matter den?’ various people in the room began to say.
‘He doesn’t like me,’ Peter tried to tell them through his wails, ‘and it makes me feel terrible. Aaa waba lama waa!’
His tears
were wiped away, Kenneth and Kate left for school, his parents dashed off to work, and half an hour later, newly dressed for the day in fresh pyjamas, Peter found himself sit- ting on the living-room floor, imprisoned in the playpen while Laura was busy upstairs.
Now at last he could plan his escape. Somewhere in the house was Kate’s magic wand. If only he could wave it over his head …
With his fat weak hands gripping the bars of the playpen he managed to pull himself upright. The bars rose another few inches above his head. There were no footholds, and he was not strong enough to climb over. He sat down. He would have to be lifted out. He would have to bring Laura down.
He was just about to shout out to her when his attention was caught by a bright yellow brick near his foot. Yellow, yellow, yellow, it sang out. It vibrated, it glowed, it hummed. He had to have it. He lunged forwards, his hand closed round it, but he could not really feel it, not enough anyway. He raised it to his mouth, and with his sensitive lips and gums and tooth he explored the woody, painty, yellowy, cubey taste of it, until he understood it all.
Then he saw a red plastic hammer, so red he could feel the heat of its colour on his face. With his mouth and tongue and saliva, he travelled round its ridges and angles and folds.
This was how Aunt Laura found him ten minutes later, contentedly chewing the foot of a toy kangaroo.
The day passed in a blur of entertainments, meals, and an afternoon sleep. Occasionally, Peter would remember that he ought to be looking for the wand, and then his thoughts would be trapped by the brilliant taste of food so good he wanted to sink his whole body into it, or he would be tickled by songs with strange ideas that needed all his attention – a woman living in a shoe, a cow leaping over the moon, a cat in a well; or he would see one more thing he needed to get his mouth round.
In the late afternoon Aunt Laura brought him downstairs from his afternoon nap, and put him down on the floor, out- side the playpen this time. Refreshed by sleep, Peter decided to make a new start. The wand was probably in the kitchen. He was crawling towards the door when he noticed to his left a pair of feet in familiar shoes – his shoes. His gaze travelled up the legs to the face of the boy in the armchair. He was scowling.
