So what happened this morning was that I got up to pee, and when I got back into bed I could tell that it was one of those nights when my husband's feet quickly scissor back and forth -- and back and forth, and back and forth -- precisely every 56 seconds. I know the interval exactly because I've timed it before. Oh yes, I've counted. I've videotaped his legs flailing underneath the sheets on several occasions, the most poignant being two nights before I had Rex when I was amped on raging pre-birth hormones and strawberry Haagen-Dazs. The next morning I triumphantly waved the Flip in my husband's face -- "There! You see?"-- but had little time to savor my victory because I was soon in labor and kicky legs were the last thing on my mind.
Fast forward to this morning, and for some reason I get the giggles while I'm laying in bed. The kicky legs churn away faithfully, rhythmically on time -- but all I can think of is the fabled character Humpty Dumpty, archly sitting atop his stone wall in my mind, his skinny legs dangling there like black licorice whips. Maybe he's just perched there, or maybe he's whistling. Whatever. But soon it happens: predictably, conveniently, even -- his pointy booted feet begin to joggle in time with my husband's kicking. The bed jounces, and Humpty's feet flail about. The bed is still, and Humpty's black boots hang limply. Looking up to his enormous solid white, shiny head, I realize that there is a creepy smile on Humpty's face. He's mocking me in his merriment. His eyes, normally as vacuous as those in the Little Orphan Annie comic strips, have taken on a judgmental glare. Go back to sleep, you petty, whiny person, he mouths. Let us get on with our kicking.
Although it's dark, I open my own eyes wide to wipe the villain's image away. I admit it takes more than a few moments. After a while I start to think about the 'real' Humpty Dumpty. First of all, I decide he must have been conceited. With a head that big? Seriously? And how did he truly fall off of the wall? I become convinced he must have been gazing down into a rain puddle -- preening at his own reflection a la Narcissis -- when the enormous weight of his egg head conspired with gravity to bring him tumbling down. I pause, imagining it. Savoring it. Then I realize that even a disillusioned cartoon-man could never bear to peek more than a few seconds into any mirror, if he looked like Humpty Dumpty looked. It couldn't have been vanity.
So maybe one of the King's Men shot him accidentally during flaming-arrow target practice (I mean, with a head like that, it was bound to happen) and pushed him off the wall to make it look like an accident. I can just hear the guilty knight now -- "I tried, Your 'ighness, I really tried, but even me and me 'orses and a shit load o' super glue couldn't put the poor bastard together again!"-- and it makes me chuckle. (By the way, I would pay a lot of money to mix medieval times with a few modern technologies and then watch it play out as the squires and maidens get their minds blown by an automatic toothbrush or glow-in-the-dark condom. None of that stuff in the thirteenth century, folks.)
I run through a few more Humpty Dumpty murder scenarios in my head as I start to drift back to sleep. It's starting to get blurry, but I'm pretty sure one of them involves Humpty gallantly sipping hemlock potion through a long orange straw after spoiling a maiden princess. There's one scenario with hot lava flowing from the castle gate and another involving a flock of feathery white chickens, but that's all I remember. In the end, it's all the same. I go back to sleep and forget about the kicking, real and imagined. Humpty Dumpty is gone.
I'm glad he's dead.
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