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I'm a Mummy!!! I'm a Mummy!!! Daddy, I'm a Mummy!!!

I looked up in no little consternation from the spreadsheet I was playing with studying intently.

It was mid-afternoon and I was hard at work. By hard of work, I mean just chillin, like a gangster but with less guns and ho's.

What do you mean, you're a Mummy?!?

I tried not to sound vexed as if I were attempting to insert one of those big spongy insoles into an unwilling shoe.

I'm a Mummy, Daddy!! I'm so happy and proud!! Are you happy for me? It's amazing!!

I swivelled on my chair so as to give her a proper hard look.

Had she become demented? Had her brains turned to mush with all this lockdown nonsense?

Had she somehow gotten into my old locked guitar case which lived deep in the eaves of the Attic, reachable only through a narrow and confining crawl space which was guarded by unseen monsters from the deep dark and found things there which she had decided to sniff?

That might be a hard one to explain to the Good Lady.

What are you talking about lass? Is this a pretend sort of game?

I tried to sound all jovial whilst getting a right good look at her pupils to make sure they hadn't gone all cat in the night'y.

No, Daddy. I'm really not pretending. I am a Mummy now.

She looked at me ever so earnestly.

I felt my stomach lift up and then drop, crashing through my balls and then straight through the floor into the depths of the earth before coming out in Australia somewhere, startling one of those big giant rabbits they have that keep their babies in a messy purple pouch on their tummy like a mitten made out of chopped liver and hair.

A Mummy?!?!

I scanned her for bandages, there were none.

A MUMMY?!?!

SHE WAS ONLY FUCKING SEVEN YEARS OLD?!?!

WHO DID THIS?!?! I WILL KILL THEM. THERE WILL BE BLOOD!!!!

There was a buzzing noise in my head like a million bees or a chainsaw grinding through flesh and bone.

I opened my mouth and prepared to breathe fire and flame out at the world like that Volcano that ruined people's holidays back in 2010 that literally nobody could pronounce the name of, not even the locals.

So Daddy... Do you want to come and see my babies?

The Little Lady smiled at me sweetly and innocently.

I paused and opened my mouth slightly as if I were seductively blowing smoke rings at a drunk donkey in a dress.

See your babies? Like, you actually have them to see? More than one?

I babbled, slightly relieved and even more slightly incoherently.

Of course Daddy. They're downstairs. So cute!!

She ran off leaving me to follow, anxious about what I was to find.

By the time I got to the bottom of the stairs I was feeling less like an over-protective psychopath and more like my old jokey self.

Lol.

I laughed out loud to myself at me earlier over-reaction.

The door of the lounge had closed over. I gave it a gentle shove.

See, Daddy!!! My BABIES!!!!

My blood turned to ice.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOO....!