Bedtime with Maylee

Lynn finishes cleaning the last plate from dinner and sets it on the dish rack. She looks to the microwave for the time and it displays 6:44. She dries her hands, taking in a moment before starting the process of putting her daughter to bed. She’s unsure if her daughter will approach bedtime today by throwing the toys, ignoring her directions, screaming, or listening in order to earn a reward. Lynn walks to their shared one bedroom.

“Maylee. Maylee it’s 6:45. What does that mean?”

Maylee doesn’t look up from the toy animals. She’s playing with them on the floor. “Almost time to clean up.”

She nods at her daughter. “Yes. 5 more minutes.”

This time she looks at her mom. “No.”

“Maylee. You can play for 5 more minutes and then we clean up.” She sits down next to her. “And if you clean up well, we can sing 2 songs in bed.”

“Patty-Cake?” Maylee sticks a finger in her mouth smiling.

She takes Maylee’s hand out her mouth. “Yeah, we can sing Patty-Cake.”

“Patty-Cake, Patty-Cake baker’s m—”

“No, no. Not now. What were you doing with the animals?” Lynn holds up the horse. “What sound does the horse make?”

“Neiiigh!” Maylee grabs the duck. “Quack. Quack.” She brings the duck close to her mom’s face. “Say hi.”

“Hi Ducky. What’s your name?”

“Mommy,” Maylee replies.

“Oh, that’s the mommy duck? Does it have a baby?”

“No. Only the bears.”

“Whoa. A bear? I’m scared. The duck should be scared.” She looks at the green clock on the night stand. “Oh—”

“Mommy isn’t scared.” Maylee has the duck quack loudly at the 2 bear cubs.

“Oh, Maylee. 4 minutes until bed.”

“Here.” Maylee gives her mom the big bear. “2 mommies.”

“Are they both taking care of the cubs?”

“Yeah,” Maylee says as she stretches out on the floor bringing the cubs and the duck closer to her face. She makes small growling sounds for the bears. “You hungry? Want to go to space?” 

She places her hands over her daughter’s hair and brushes over it. “What will we see in space?”

“Stars. All the stars.”

“How will you get there?”

Maylee sits up on her knees knocking over a cub. “And-And the moon! It’s gonna be so big.” She stands up. “Like now. The moon is so big.”

She smiles at her daughter. “The moon is big and bright.”

Maylee drops the duck and scoops up the 2 bear cubs and extends them towards the ceiling. “Whee. Space we go! Look at the moon.”

“Maylee, 3 minutes until clean up time.”

“Unnn. Unnn.” Maylee climbs on her bed and tries to reach the window. Even on her bed it is still too high for her to reach. “Moooon. Want to see mooooon.” She stretches the cubs in each of her hands, hoping they’ll help her in some way.

Lynn watches as her daughter gets frustrated with failed attempts. “How do you ask?”

“Please can I see?”

“See what?”

“The moon please.” She looks at her mom with wide eyes.

Lynn stands up. “Yes, you can.” She turns off the lights, lifts Maylee up and twirls the blinds open so they can see the moon. “There it is. Is it a circle tonight?”

“Yes.”

“No. It’s almost, but it’s not a full moon.”

“It is.”

“No. Remember a circle is all round. The moon isn’t all round tonight. It can be, though.”

“Yes,” Maylee says. “I want to go.”

“What’s a person that goes to space called?”

“Astronaut.” 

She smiles and kisses the side of Maylee’s head. “You want to be an astronaut?”

“Yeah. I can live in space.”

“Going to discover something?”

“Aliens!”

Lynn laughs. “I hope they don’t exist.”

“They do.”

“How do you know?” she closes the blinds and walks over to the light switch, still holding Maylee. “How do you know?” Lynn turns the light on.

“They do,” Maylee says with a high pitched voice.

“Oh okay.” She tucks a hair behind Maylee’s hair. “So, it’s time for bed.”

Maylee starts squirming in her mom’s arms. “No. No.”

“The faster you clean, the sooner we go sing songs. First, clean up. Then, songs.” She puts Maylee down.

“No.” Maylee tucks one cub under her underarm, then grabs the duck, mommy bear, and the horse. She lays them on her bed. She leans with her back towards her mom.

Lynn sits on her own bed and looks at the time, trying to avoid looking at Maylee. The time says 6:52. She lets out a breath. “Man, I really want to sing my favorite song, but I can’t.” she looks down at her feet.

Maylee’s twirls around. “What song?”

Lynn looks at Maylee and points to the animal bin. “Uh-uh, clean first. Then you hear my song.”

“It’s Let It Go.”

“First clean.”

Maylee pushes the animals to the floor. One at a time, she grabs the horse and walks over to the bin and drops it in. She then walks back over and picks up the mommy duck and walks back to the bin and puts it in.

“I love that you’re putting them to sleep, May.”

As Maylee is back over to the animals on the floor she says, “The bears aren’t tired yet.”

“Yeah, they are. I saw the cubs yawn.”

“It didn’t.” Maylee picks up the cub. “I didn’t see.” Maylee brings the cub over to her mom and rests it on her knee. “When?”

She yawns. “Just like me.”

“I’m not tired,” Maylee argues.

She takes the cub from Maylee and cradles it in her hands. “Goodnight, baby. Say goodnight, May.” 

Maylee just stares at the way her mom holds it.

Lynn stands up. “Goodnight, little cub.” She fakes kiss it. “Want to give it a kiss?”

“Yeah.” Maylee kisses the cubs stomach.

Lynn smiles. “Great job. Go grab the brother, so we can put them both to sleep.” She walks over to the bin.

Maylee runs and picks up the other cub. As she walks over to her mom next to the bin, Maylee whispers to the cub, “Goodnight, baby. Goodnight, cub.” Maylee kisses it twice on the stomach.

They place the cubs in the bin at the same time carefully.

“One more bear,” Lynn tells Maylee.

Maylee walks and grabs the bear. “Why does she have to go to bed?” Maylee sits criss-cross on the floor holding the bear.

“Maylee!” she sighs, trying to refrain from getting frustrated. “It’s the last bear.”

“No.”

“She has to be with the cubs.” Lynn’s voice rises anyway. “They’ll get scared!”

“They’re asleep.”

Lynn bites her bottom lip. “She’s their mom. She protects them.” 

Maylee starts making the bear climb her arm and her hair, ignoring her mom.

Lynn sighs and looks up at the ceiling. She then remembers, “Don’t you want to hear my favorite song?” she thinks of a song to come into her head. “It’s twinkle little star. We can even look out the window as we sing it.”

Maylee pops her head up and smiles. “I want to do that.”

“First, put the bear away.”

“She wants to see too.”

Lynn makes an expression, lips and cheeks tight, eyes narrow, before the word can come out. “No,” she tells her. “Put the toy away.”

Maylee stands up and walks over to the bin and drops it in the bin. She then puts the lid on.

“Where does it go?” she says referring to the bin.

Maylee pushes it next to the closet. She then goes over to her mom and reaches her arms up.

Lynn lets out a relieved breath and swoops Maylee up. “Look at the room. You cleaned up. Thank you.” She hugs Maylee. “Thank you, thank you. That makes me happy.”

Maylee giggles and puts her fingers in her mouth.

“Don’t do that.” she taps Maylee’s hand and Maylee drops it out of her mouth. “You need your mouth to sing with me.” she goes and turns off the light and opens the blinds again. “Ready?”

“Twinkle,” Maylee started. 

“Twinkle little star. How I wonder…” 

They sang twinkle little star twice. As Lynn was trying to place Maylee down, Maylee clung to her.

“Maylee. I’m putting you down.”

“No. I want you to hold me.”

Lynn taps Maylee’s back. “Time to get down.”

“Nooo.”

“Maylee, stop. You wouldn’t do this to grandma, don’t do it to me.”

Maylee doesn’t say anything. She has her head resting on her mom’s shoulder.

“Do I have to…tickle you?” Lynn tickles one of her sides. “Do I?” Lynn tickles her other side and Maylee jumps a little. “Tickle. Tickle, tickle, tickle.” Lynn tickles Maylee’s neck, underarms, and sides again. Maylee starts to laugh and squirm. Lynn places Maylee down at the end of her bed and does final tickles. “The tickles got you! They got you!” she stops and Maylee is laying down, smiling and staring at her mom.

  “You want to sing Patty-Cake?”

“No.”

“No? Then what song?”

“Baby shark.”

“Climb in the covers first.” She pulls the covers back and Maylee lays down and rests on her pillow. Lynn places the covers over Maylee and sits beside her with an arm around her pillow. “Alright. Baby…”

They sang baby shark, mommy shark, daddy shark, grandma shark, and grandpa shark. Both of them doing the hand motions for each shark.

“Again,” Maylee asked.

“No. That was 2 songs.”

“1 more.”

“No, Maylee. That was a long song.”

“1 more.”

“Look at the time. What time is it?”

Maylee sits up and turns to the green clock. She takes a second, just staring at it. “7…”

“Past 7. 7:09. Your bedtime is 7.”

“I want to sleep with you.”

“Maylee, you need to sleep in your bed.”

“With you.” Maylee throws the covers off of her.

“You’re becoming a big girl. Big girls sleep in their own bed.”

“I don’t want to.” She leans on her mom’s stomach. “With you. Please. Please, please.”

“Maylee, I’m staying up for a little bit. I have to do stuff.”

“No.” she hugs her mom. “I want to sleep with you.” She starts kicking her legs.

She touches Maylee’s legs. “Maylee.” Maylee doesn’t look at her. “Maylee, stop this.”

“With you,” Maylee shrieks. “I like your bed,” Maylee says in a high pitched voice. “With you! You! You!”

“Stop shouting!” Lynn finds herself raising her voice. “I don’t like you screaming at me!”

Maylee starts to cry. 

Lynn tones it down. “You can’t scream at me. I don’t like that.”

Maylee cries into her mom’s shirt.

She lifts Maylee’s head. “What do you say to me?”

“S-Sorry.”

Lynn looks up at the ceiling and sighs. 

“Sorry,” Maylee says again.

She looks down at Maylee. She picks her up and they climb onto Lynn’s queen size bed. She tucks them both in and says softly, “This has to stop. You have your own bed.” She yawns.

“You’re tired too.”

Lynn shakes her head. “A different tired.”

“We can both sleep.” Maylee places her hand on her mom’s cheek. 

Lynn closes her eyes and feels her daughter’s gentle hand. She opens her eyes again to catch her daughter’s eyes close and then open again. “I love you, Maylee.”

Maylee slides closer to her mom, placing her hand on her mom’s ear now. “Love you, mommy.”

Lynn lets out a breath as she watches her daughter fall asleep. She wonders how her parents handled all her difficult nights when she was a child. Feeling relieved they supported her so she can provide that same care for her daughter today.

Lynn lays there some minutes, not wanting to have Maylee stir awake and find a burst of energy. She stares at her daughters growing black hair. It’s back to shoulder length after her last haircut. Her Minnie pajamas becoming too small for her, but she knows Maylee isn’t ready to give them up. She smiles at her daughter’s calm face. It’s quiet. The light in the room comes from the open blinds and the door halfway open. Lynn catches herself becoming comfortable and blinks. She decides to slowly ease up, placing Maylee’s hand gently on the bed. Maylee doesn’t move. Lynn then continues and slides carefully off the bed until she’s standing. She tip-toes to the door and turns to check the clock. Tonight, Lynn finishes putting Maylee to bed at 7:19.