Cursed Be the Child Read Online Free PDF Page A

if the temperature had drastically dropped, the house had new insulation, less than two years old, the real estate agent had told them, a real energy saver, part of the extensive renovation done by the previous owners. “They didn’t have kids, you see, and so they kind of treated the place like their baby.” They had central air conditioning, a new furnace, modernized plumbing, new wiring, dropped ceilings, paneled basement family room and no-wax kitchen floors.
    But Missy’s bedroom was freezing, and, as usual, Missy had waged her nightly war with the covers. They lay in a heap at the side of the bed, Winnie-the-Pooh face down on top.
    Vicki went to set things right.
    “Mom?”
    The stuffed bear fell from Vicki’s hand. Then she smiled as a giggling Missy popped up like a jack-in-the-box and swung around to dangle her bare legs off the bed. Missy hated pajamas and insisted on sleeping in her underwear. A thin child and pale—she never tanned—she seemed almost ethereal, as though with blonde hair cascading down her back, she had just slid down a moonbeam from a fairy tale land to the Earth.
    Vicki said, “And why are you awake?”
    “’Cause I’m not asleep.”
    “Hmm, that makes sense.”
    Vicki sat down beside her, slipping an arm around her narrow shoulders. “Aren’t you chilly, honey?” Even as she said it, Vicki realized the room was not cold anymore. Then she thought she understood. She had been awakened from sleep by the call for “Mama” she thought she’d heard, and so it took awhile for your circulation to get going, for your internal thermostat to adjust.
    “I’m not chilly,” Missy said. “I’m horny.”
    The word jolted Vicki. Oh, it wasn’t as bad as the Ugly Awful “F” word that Missy, with her first grade reading skills, had learned from a public washroom wall a year ago, but it wasn’t anything Vicki wanted her daughter saying.
    Quietly, Vicki asked, “Do you know what that means?”
    “What? Horny?” Missy tapped herself on the forehead. “Like I have a horn or something, I guess.”
    “Wrong.”
    “I don’t know. This kid was yelling it in the playground today. He’s a big, fat slob. He’s in fourth grade.”
    “I see.”
    Missy said, “So what does horny mean, Mom?”
    Every book Vicki had ever read on how to raise happy, normal, gifted, intelligent, sensitive, well-adjusted, non-homicidal-suicidal children offered virtually the same advice about these situations-tell the truth. Then in terms the child could understand, you explained that certain words were considered vulgar by many people and why they were not to be used.
    Vicki, however, had her own way of dealing with this, one with which she was much more comfortable. “Never mind what it means. It’s a dirty word. Don’t use it.”
    “Why?”
    “Because I said so.”
    “You never explain anything to me.”
    “Check back with me in twenty years. I’ll explain then.”
    “That’s a long time.”
    “Okay, forty years.”
    “Mom!” Missy squeaked in outrage.
    Vicki said, “How about I tuck you in and you go on back to sleep?”
    “Uh-uh,” Missy said. “I’m really a whole lot awake.” She tugged at Vicki’s sleeve. “Mom, you want to hear a joke?”
    Vicki was used to a seven year old’s way of changing the subject. In a three-minute conversation, Missy was likely to cover a half a dozen subjects.
    “Is it a good joke?”
    “Awesome,” Missy said. “What’s green and throws rocks?”
    “A green rock-thrower?”
    “No. Give up?”
    “Sure do.”
    “A lawn. I lied about the rocks.”
    “That’s some joke, all right,” Vicki said. “That’s a fine note of comedy for you to go to sleep on.”
    “Hey, I learned a new song. Want to hear it?”
    “They taught you a new song at school?”
    “No. Not at school. Listen!”
    Missy followed an elastically flexible melody set to no fixed rhythm. Her voice was as thin as she was but oddly plaintive.
    The song of a lost child, Vicki found