... and he sleeps

I lay my head on his chest. His little four year old chest. I listen to his heart beat. He coughs and I feel his tummy rise and his heart's rhythm accelerate. I look into his eyes and let him study my face. He points to each part and names it. "Nothe. Eyeth. Cheekth. Hair. Mouth." He touches my pimples. Plays with my hair. His hand is a car and my head is the track. "Vroom vroom". I pucker and he gives me a kiss. "I love you Carter." Big smile. I close my eyes and rest my head for a while. He holds me close with one arm, dallies in my hair with the other. I look at him again. His free arm is bouncing on his head, helping him to relax. I soak him in. His hair that won't lay down, the color of dry sand on a beach. I look close enough to see the soft invisible down growing on his cheeks. A soft blush there. Always. His eyelashes are SO long. Dark at the base, blonde at the tips, like mine. I love the curvature of his nose, just like a cabbage patch baby. I watch his lips pump in and out as he sucks his tongue. It soothes him. He moves my hand to where he wants it. On his forehead, on my cheek, on his chest. He keeps it there, holding it down, to remind me to put plenty of pressure on it. He covers our heads with the blanket for a moment, shielding us in homemade twilight. He looks beautiful in the twilight. He hungers for a gasp of light again and out we come. His breathing slows. I listen. Every once in a while his nose whistles and his mouth pops open. His hand slowly drops from his head and slides to his chest, resting on top of my hand, firmly and obediently in place. It takes longer for his tongue to stop. I lay with him, not daring to breathe. It is these moments that we wait for, we mothers. This is why we do what we do. I thank our Lord silently for his child. For letting me borrow his sweet little package of boundless love, perfect in spirit, wrapped in his own set of strings. Electric blue strings. Strings that somehow attached themselves to my heart before I knew they could. I thank Him for his trust in me. Because this gift is precious. I thank Him for this moment. For the quiet. For the chance. And then I draw my hand away, slip my arm out from beneath my boy, and he sleeps. Like a cherub, he sleeps.