Hush

"Jack-Gordon," I say, "hush." Little boy throws a fuzzy duck up at the ceiling, plucks its orange legs out of the air.

"Ok." He flops ducky side to side, "Quack-quack. Quack-quack." He makes him fly and bomb, "Quack-quack. Quack-quack."

"Hush," I cuddle Rosie a little closer. Unflappable girl nurses away.

"Quack-quack. Quack-quack."

"Gordon, you said you would hush."

"Oh," he waggles ducky wings.

"What did you think I meant?"

He tilts his head, "I didn't know what you meant." He zooms ducky into the school cabinet. "But I did know I love Momma. That what I meant."

"Oh. Hush means quiet."

He totters scruffy duck into the step-stool, buries him in blankies, snaps the step closed. "There." He thumps little boy feet through the kitchen, trundles down stairs.

"... in all that he does he PROSPERS," Lulie recites from the table between mouthfuls of boiled beans.

I hear the swell of little boy feet pound back upstairs. He rounds the corner, an encyclopedia of snakes tucked under one arm. "This should be quiet," he splays the book open belly down on the rug and reads the pictures.