ANOTHER SUSPECT

AINA

***

I led Sophia away and she followed me, her tiny hand clutching onto me tightly.

I took her to my room and sat down on the bed with her in my lap. I put her small hand on my tummy.

“I have a baby in my tummy now.” I said and her eyes widened in surprise and childish delight.

“You swallowed a baby?” She asked incredulously and I burst into startled laughter.

“Oh! Heavens no! I can’t swallow a baby, I’m not a cannibal. The baby is growing in my tummy.” I said to her and there was a look of childish wonder in her eyes.

“Babies grow in tummies? I thought they were sent from heaven by storks, I watched that in a cartoon. All the animals were on a train and when it was time for them to have babies, the birds carried the babies in white cloth and dropped them off one by one in the mummy and daddy’s cages.” Sophia said and I laughed again.

I definitely wasn’t having the talk on where babies come from with her. It had been awkward when my own mother had ‘the talk’ with me, and I wasn’t