The Daydreamer by Ian McEwan

turned her head sharply at right angles to blow her smoke into a corner where no one sat.
    Over the next few days, they saw very little of Laura and rather a lot of baby Kenneth. Peter marvelled at how one small person could take up so much space. In the hallway were the pram and the buggy, into the living-room were crammed the playpen, the swing, the push-cart and a great scattering of toys, and in the kitchen, the high chair blocked the way to the cupboard where the biscuits were kept.
    And Kenneth himself was everywhere. He was one of those babies who are so good at crawling they gain nothing by trying to walk. He lumbered across the carpet at alarming speed, like a military tank.

    He was a baby in the bloated style, with a great square jaw supporting a fat damp face of furious pink, with bright, determined eyes, and nostril wings that flared like a sumo wrestler’s whenever he did not immediately get what he wanted.
    Kenneth was a grabber. If he saw an object within his reach which he could lift, his hot wet fist would close about it and transfer it to his mouth. It was an appalling habit. He tried to eat the pilot who belonged in the cockpit of the model air- plane Peter was gluing together. Kenneth also bit the wings. He ate Peter’s homework. He chewed the pencils, the ruler and the books. He crawled into the bedroom and tried to munch the camera Peter had been given for his birthday.
    ‘He’s crazy!’ Peter yelled as he wiped his camera dry and his mother carried Kenneth away. ‘If he could get us in his mouth, he’d eat us all.’
    ‘It’s only a phase,’ Kate said wisely. ‘We all used to do it.’ This calm, know-everything tone she had adopted since Kenneth’s arrival was also getting on Peter’s nerves. She had copied it from their mother. Surely no one could deny that this baby was awful. Meal times were the worst. Kenneth had a way of turning food into muck. He mashed and squelched it until it dripped like glue, and smeared it over his arms, face, clothes and high chair. The sight turned Peter’s stomach. He had to eat with his eyes closed. And conversation was impossible because the baby yelled at the top of his lungs at almost every spoonful.

    The baby had taken over the house. There was not a corner into which his yells, smells and mad hyena laughter and grabbing little hands did not reach. He emptied cupboards and bookcases, tore up newspapers, knocked down lamps and full bottles of milk. No one seemed to mind. In fact, everyone, Peter’s mother, his aunt, his sister and his father, cooed with delight at every fresh outrage.
    Things came to a head one late afternoon after school. It was midsummer, but it was raining and cold. Kate lay on her bed reading. Peter was kneeling on the floor. A marble craze was sweeping through the school and he was a keen player. The day before he had won from another boy the finest marble he had ever seen, a Green Gem. It was smaller than most and seemed to shine with its own light. He was using it now, rolling it across the carpet towards the large marmalade marble he always used for target practice. Just as the Green Gem left his hand, Kenneth’s fat bald head appeared round the door. The marble rolled straight towards him, and he barged forward eagerly.
    ‘Kenneth, no!’ Peter shouted. But too late. The baby scooped up the marble and put it in his mouth. Peter started to scramble across the floor, intending to prise Kenneth’s jaws apart. Then he stopped. It was horribly clear what had happened. The baby sat perfectly still. For a second his eyes bulged and a look of puzzled irritation passed across his face. Then he blinked, and blinked again, and looked at Peter and smiled.
    ‘No,’ Peter whispered. ‘He’s swallowed it.’
    ‘Swallowed what?’ Kate said without looking up from her book of spells.
    ‘My Green Gem, the marble I won yesterday.’
    Kate put on her calm know-it-all voice. ‘Oh that. I wouldn’t worry. It’s very small and smooth.