“You kick me one more time, and I’m not going to feed you”, Keerthi snapped at the six month old on her lap.
The grinning crying/screaming copy of Vikram only let out gurgles of laughter, having his feed in the meantime, kicking his mother’s tummy.
Keerthi winced when she felt a sharp jab on her lower abdomen, tears pricking her eyes at the pain. She cupped her tummy, placing Rahil on the bed next to her. Even though she got her stitches removed a few months back, it still hurt when her son kicked too hard.
It took her three minutes for the pain to become a dull throb. She glared at the about-to-wail child.”You scream one more time, that’s it. I’m giving you to your grandparents.”
“Stop being dramatic Keerthi”, Keerthi heard her husband, as he entered their room, locking the door shut.
“You are twenty minutes late.”
“Wow. You learnt the art of checking time.”
“No need for that much sarcasm”, Keerthi mumbled, placing Rahil in his crib, murmuring,”Please don’t cry”, in his ear.
Keerthi felt her husband’s arms around her waist, a soft smile playing on their lips as they looked at their child, laughing when their moment broke, courtesy Rahil, restless in his crib.
Keerthi slapped away her husband’s wandering hand from her butt,”Are you serious?”
“Excuse me?”, Vikram forced a straight face,”I came to check on my son. You are the one that’s standing in between us.”
“Us?”, Incredulity was evident in Keerthi’s tone. She rolled her eyes, giving space for her husband to kiss their son.
At times she wondered if her son was weird, or she was just crap at mothering. Even though he was six months old, Keerthi couldn’t shush him all that easily. She sometimes didn’t know why he was crying even, was he hungry, pooped his diaper , or was he just bored.
But Rahil’s dynamic with his father was different, Vikram knew exactly how to deal with his son, which made Keerthi wonder, Did Vikram know their son better or did she not learn the children wailing vocabulary.
She snapped out of her trance when she heard the water running.
She hummed, walking towards her son, scowling when she saw him asleep.
She fumed in anger, irritated with her husband.
“”Are you serious!”, Vikram heard his wife snap when he sat on the bed, having showered and changed.
“Keep it low”, Vikram snapped back,”Rahil is sleeping.”
“Exactly. Why the hell would you even put him to sleep now?”
Vikram gave his wife a bewildered stare,”Stop getting hyper. What’s the big deal.”
“Right. Entertain him when he wakes up at midnight and refuses to sleep till early morning hours.”
“Ahh”, Vikram acknowledged,”But it’s okay, I guess.”
Keerthi saw red. She didn’t have a peaceful sleep since she gave birth. And if Rahil went to sleep at 6 in the evening, he’d wake up by 11 and play till 4 in the morning.
“Right. It’s okay. So feel free to take your son and sleep in the guest room today”, she teased.
“You are the mother.”
“It’s not a gender role.”
“I didn’t say it was.”
“What the hell does ‘You are the mother’ mean?”
“I didn’t mean that. Children are comfortable with their mother in younger age. If I could breastfeed him and put him to sleep, I wouldn’t have minded doing it”, Vikram snapped.
“Whatever. We’ve had this same argument at least twenty times, and you still do this. What does it have to say about you then?”
“For fuck’s sake, stop annoying me. I literally just came home. And you already want to piss me off .”
Keerthi sighed, closing her eyes shut when she heard Rahil crying. She felt like crying herself. After nursing him and looking after him for almost the entire day, she felt drained. The baby became a full time job. She only hoped she would learn to manage her responsibilities with time.
Vikram’s gaze softened when he read his wife’s face. He picked the crying child into his arms,”I’ll be with him. Why don’t you get a coffee for the both of us?”
Keerthi was relieved when she got out of the bedroom. Even though it was her own son, her own flesh crying, she couldn’t handle it. She just couldn’t handle crying babies, that’s what she had learnt about herself after she had given birth. But weren’t mothers supposed to love their children unconditionally? So why was Keerthi different then? Why did she want to get away when her child cried, but at the same time couldn’t stay away from him too. She just didn’t understand motherhood. She loved her son with everything in her. But did she only love him when he was playing and sleeping and not like him when he was crying and whining? Were mothers even programmed like that. She had to love her baby no matter what.
Was it too early?
Was she still emotionally not ready for a baby?
Keerthi could feel a headache forming at these thoughts, nauseous.
What kind of a mother she was, wanting to not deal with her crying infant.
She felt a tear escape her eyes, she was a terrible mother. No mother in history was probably like her. Who even ever gave the crying baby to the husband.
She wanted to screech in frustration.
She loved her son, there was no doubt.
She pushed the door open, her thoughts haywire, when she entered, their coffees in her hand.
A smile formed on her lips automatically, chuckling softly, seeing her husband, and son sitting on the floor with a cushion behind his back, Rahil’s stomach out in the cute baby position, cackling with laughter as he played peek-a-boo with his father.
The curve of her lips widened when she saw her son crawling towards her, trying to grasp the hem of her pajama with his small hand, another on the floor, as he gave her a toothless smile, silently asking her to pick him.
Keerthi placed the coffee mugs on the side table, cradling her son in her arms, the doubts and the gap in her heart vanished as she held her baby boy in her arms, looking at him with all the love she felt for him, making her want to laugh at all the doubts she just had.
Vikram smiled, walking to his wife, wiping the tear that leaked her eyes, planting a soft kiss on her forehead as he wrapped an arm around her shoulder, laughing when their son jumped in his mother’s arms, wanting to play another game.
She turned to her husband, giving him a small apologetic smile for snapping at him earlier, placing a small kiss on his lips, the familiar movement of their mouths against each other calming her down instantly, breaking apart when their son slapped both their cheeks, smiles on their faces.
In the safety of her husband’s arms around her and their baby, Keerthi felt like she found everything in life. She tilted her head up in prayer, to become the best mother, wife, but overall, a better person. Her eyes closed in gratitude to the higher power, that she found everything she wanted and more from life, the curve of her lips permanent with life’s blessing.
Her eyes snapped open when her laughing son cried, again.
But this time, she only smiled, shushing him, cradling him into her chest.