"Would you like your baby?" I asked, and ran upstairs to retrieve Ugly Baby from Clara's crib. Ugly Baby holds a privileged position between Clara's stuffed dog and stuffed bunny in the crib.
I brought her downstairs and stacked some puzzles on one of the chairs that belongs to Clara's small table and chair set. Then I sat Ugly Baby on it and tied her in place with an old black fabric belt. The belt distressed Clara..."What was I thinking?" she seemed to ask me. The belt was a fashion piece, not a tool to restrain her baby. She insisted I undo it and then looped it loosely around her neck, in a very rakish way.
"Not your neck, remember? You can put it around your waist," I reminded her.
She sighed and complied. Then she went to the bin that holds all the plastic food and brought Ugly Baby a whole roast chicken and a green pepper. She tried to make her drink from a watering can.
Feeding Ugly Baby made Clara think she might be hungry, too.
"'Nack."
"Would you like a yogurt?"
"Yes."
She voiced her extreme vexation at not being able to haul both Ugly Baby and Ugly Baby's cradle up the stairs. I helped her out and, when we got to the top, she pointed at her booster seat.
"Bee-bee! Tair!"
I put Ugly Baby in her booster seat and pulled a big chair out from under the table so that it faced her. Clara sat on the big chair and tried to feed her yogurt to Ugly Baby. I got the sense she wished Ugly Baby could really ingest it, but she was also relieved she couldn't, because it meant there was more yogurt for herself.
I filled a saucepan with soapy water to scrub the kitchen floor. Clara dunked Ugly Baby into the water and mopped Ugly Baby's face with a small, articulate little hand. Then she wrapped her in dish towels and laid her somewhat ceremonially on the kitchen floor. Ugly Baby looked like she was wrapped in a funeral shroud, awaiting burial.
Clara came over to me and pointed at Ugly Baby with a sense of pride.
"Bee-bee, bash. Bee-bee, wet. Mess. Bee-bee, bash," she confided to me.
"I know. You gave your baby a bath and that is a very good thing to do. Babies can get very dirty," I replied.
"Bee-bee, bash," she agreed.
"'Nack?" she continued, after a moment.
"Really?! You just had yogurt."
"'Nack, Mommy."
"Maybe you want lunch."
Clara held Ugly Baby in the crook of her arm and offered her bits of cheese while she ate lunch. She crooned, coaxed and cajoled. She cupped one of Ugly Baby's cheeks tenderly in one hand.
Ugly Baby, alas, was looking uglier than ever. Her pants were smeared with a fresh coating of ketchup (Clara eats ketchup with everything, including cookies and cherries). She was soaked from her dip in the soapy mop water, and the diaper we had put on her the day before was sodden. (The diaper was one of Clara's, folded down for a better fit.) On top of everything, something was wrong with Ugly Baby's face. Simon sometimes treats Ugly Baby's head like a makeshift stress ball, and perhaps because of this, one of her cheeks has collapsed.
"Dipe," Clara said after lunch.
We took Ugly Baby upstairs and gave her a fresh diaper. We pulled off the ketchup-coated pants. We rooted through Clara's old baby clothes until we found a white tank top with a cupcake on it that she wore at six months. The tank top fit Ugly Baby like a dress. Clara was pleased beyond words.
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