In A Child's Drawing

by Leah Presser

Six-year old Jimmy wanted so much for his mother to smile today. Late last night, after a scary dream, he'd tip-toed into her bedroom. Always before she would be asleep in her big, soft bed and he would crawl under the covers and sleep the night away safely.

But last night when he entered her bedroom, she was sitting on the edge of the bed, bathed in the soft glow of the light on the night table beside her, her head in her hands.

"Mommy?" he ventured, not sure if she would try to send him back to his own bed.

At the sound of his voice her back stiffened and she sucked in a loud breath. A wrinkled tissue fell from her hands as she wiped at her face with her pajama sleeve.

"Jimmy, honey," his mother turned to him and stretched out her arms. Relieved, he ran across the room and into her warm, comforting embrace. She held him tightly until they were both snoring softly.

When he awoke, he remembered how sad his mother had looked the night before. He wanted to be the one that made her feel all better, like she had done for him so many times. Finally, it came to him. He would draw a happy picture for her! She would love it dearly because it had been made by him. She would look at him with bright, smiling eyes and give him a big hug and probably a wet kiss on the cheek, which he would tolerate if only it would bring the laughter back into her face.

He headed to his art box for his markers – no crayons for this big kid – when he heard her calling him from the kitchen for breakfast.

"Jimmy, for Pete’s sake, get in here,"

Three-year old Chris was already on his second helping, while Baby Janie threw milk-soaked Cheerios from her high chair onto the window. The Cheerios stuck for just a moment, then slid down, leaving a slimy trail on the glass.

"Now, don’t you make me stand in here cooking all morning, Jimmy," his mother scolded. "You come get breakfast when it’s ready." She placed a plate full of warm pancakes with lots of syrup, the way he liked, and sausage, in front of him.

He ate in a hurry. In his mind he was already drawing the picture, imagining how grand it would look.

The phone rang. While his mother was on the phone, he finished his breakfast and slipped back to his room. Oh, she would just stop right in her tracks and claim how beautiful the picture was, wouldn’t she? Yes, she would. He selected a fat purple marker and drew a rectangle with a triangle on top and some squares for door and windows.

Chris came barging in. "Wanna watch Power Rangers?" Jimmy could smell the maple syrup still sticking to Chris' face and hands.

He debated a minute. Power Rangers were very cool. Everybody knew they played a new episode on Saturday mornings. With a promise that he would absolutely, positively come back and finish his mother's drawing just as soon as Power Rangers was over, Jimmy carefully put the lid back on the purple marker and closed the door to his room to keep the wandering Janie out.

********

"Oh, Tess, that’s just awful," his mother was saying on the phone. Jimmy and Chris were parked a few feet away on the living room floor with a passel of action figures and the Power Rangers blaring.

Jimmy wrinkled his nose at Tess’ name. They didn’t see Aunt Tess much, which was just fine with him because she never knew how to play any games and smelled funny to boot.

As promised, as soon as the show was over, he dashed back to his room. He grabbed a brown marker and began to outline the trunk of an enormous tree next to the house. Just as he was about to reach for the green marker to make the leaves, his mother entered the doorway. In one arm she held Janie happily chewing a fistful of her mother's hair, and with her other arm she pulled Chris along.

"Get dressed, Jimmy," she ordered. "We’ve have to go to the store."

"Aw, Mommy, I don’t want to go to the store!" he whined, not wanting to stop working on his picture again a second time.

"Too bad, kiddo, we have to go, so get dressed." She turned to chase Chris, who had squirmed free from her grasp and was running, shrieking like a maniac, down the hall. Sighing, he sat the green marker on top of the paper and got dressed for the store.

After they returned and had some lunch, he eagerly hurried back to his desk to finish creating the tree.

"Whatcha doin’?" Chris poked his nosy face over Jimmy’s shoulder.

"None of your business!" Jimmy hollered, frustrated because he knew Chris would want to draw now too.

"Oooh, can I draw too?" Chris hunted for paper.

"No!" Jimmy told him. This was his special project.

"All you can do is squiggles,". Then he got a brilliant idea. He didn’t want to do it, but just this once, and only for his mother.

"Wanna play my Gameboy?"

Chris’s eyes grew huge and he jumped up and down. "Yeah! Gameboy!"

Reluctantly he handed Chris the toy. "Now don’t go messing it up," he warned.

"I won’t!" Chris clutched the toy and wandered off.

Jimmy was finally able to return to his most important mission, the picture.

********

The leaves on the tree had turned out too big, taking up twice as much space as the house. Jimmy frowned at this. Suddenly, he knew what to do. He took a blue marker and behind the smaller first house he drew a second larger house, so that it fit better with the tree. How clever!

The rest of the afternoon he drew and colored the picture. He only stopped when his friend Tommy came over to play and again later when his mother begged him to please take Chris out back to the swing and play with him so she could have some peace. Throughout the day, he added to the picture -- fluffy blue clouds, a bright yellow sun and craftily drawn birds gliding through the sky. He was very careful to color within the lines, outlining everything in a heavy black marker and making sure not to smudge the black into the other colors.

As he worked, he caught snippets of his mother's phone conversations. She argued with a mechanic over the "outrageous" cost of repairs to their van. Later, she argued with his father over something called a court order.

In his picture there were no broken down vans, no court orders; no long lines at the grocery store to make his mother clench her teeth, and no bills in the mailbox to make her press her hand to her forehead and sigh.

He ran to the kitchen, holding the picture carefully so as not to bend or crease it. He stopped right behind his mother, who was stirring dinner on the stove. She took a step backward to look at the clock and crashed right into him. "Jimmy!" she said, exasperated. "Scoot back now. I’ve got to open this oven."

He retreated to the other side of the kitchen while his mother took rolls out of the oven. Without looking at him, his mother told him, "Go get your brother, please. Dinner’s ready."

Still holding his picture, still being very careful not to ruin it in any way, he found Chris downstairs in the play room and told him to come up and eat.

He was about to take his picture to his mother when Chris rushed over to her first, clinging to her leg like a monkey when she tried to walk across the kitchen to get the boys their plates.

"Oh, Mommy, Mommy, Mommy," Chris pleaded, "Hold me!"

His mother pried his spindly arms from her leg and shooed him away. "Go sit at the table, Chris. I have to get this dinner on the table."

This wasn’t going at all like he had planned. By now, his mother should have seen the picture, should have laughed and smiled and hugged him and maybe even started humming a song like she used to.

He took a few hesitant steps toward her. "Mommy?" he whispered. She didn’t turn around, continuing to spoon food onto their plates.

"Mommy?" he said a little louder.

"What is it Jimmy?" his mother asked, still not turning around, still not looking at him.

"I . . . I made you this," he offered the bright yellow drawing with the red birds in flight through drifting blue clouds.

This is it, Jimmy thought, holding the drawing in his outstretched hand. This is when she will turn around and all the lines will smooth out of her face and her beautiful smile will fill the room like sunshine.

His mother did turn around. After she set the spoon on the counter and wiped her hands on the towel, she finally, finally reached out and took his drawing in her hand.

"What’s this?" his mother's voice was light. Her eyes turned soft and the corners of her mouth began to tilt upwards ever so slightly. "Well, Jimmy, thank you! It’s beautiful! It’s --"

The family cat came streaking between her legs, dripping a plateful of smashed peas and potatoes from its fur.

"Oh, my goodness," his mother exclaimed. She set Jimmy’s drawing on the counter and took off in a mad dash to catch the dazed feline before it flung peas and potatoes all over the house.

"All over my freshly mopped floor too!" his mother lamented. She caught the cat and toweled it off.

"Here kids, sit down and eat," his mother told Chris and Jimmy as she set their plates on the table. Then she went back to the kitchen.

Would she go get the picture now and put it in its rightful spot on the fridge? he wondered. Would she be back with a hug and a kiss shortly?

His mother walked back into the kitchen, but she headed the wrong way. Instead of gazing in wonderment at his beautiful picture, she grabbed a wet dish towel from the sink and began to sop up the mess on the floor. The picture lay forgotten on the countertop, hidden halfway under the microwave. Jimmy's belly felt empty but he didn’t feel hungry. His feet dangled like lead and his chin hung all the way to his plate.

She had almost smiled, hadn’t she?

Now her eyebrows were furrowed and her mouth just a thin crease as she wiped the floor on her hands and knees.

She had said it was beautiful, hadn’t she?

He could hardly remember. From where he sat he could see only half of the picture, the half that was not buried under the microwave, the half with the stupid little house, too small next to the giant ugly tree. Naah, she probably hadn’t said it was beautiful at all. Graceful red birds turned into violent, swimming Vs and fluffy clouds melted into blue blobs as tears welled in his eyes.

********

Later that night, Jimmy awoke terrified from another nightmare. He crept to his door and peeked out the hallway. He tensed, ready to make a mad dash for his mother's room. A sniffling sound drew his attention towards the other end of the hall, where a light was glowing through the kitchen doorway.

He tiptoed up the hallway, turned the corner and stood blinking in the bright light of the kitchen. His mother looked up at him, and though there were tears in her eyes, her smile was so wide that he forgot all about his bad dream. He rushed forward into her arms.

She laid his beautiful picture on the table and gave him the biggest, warmest hug he could ever remember.

THE END

Copyright 2002
by Leah Presser