When Frankie Came

This one was born out of a writing forum – a half-hour write based on something about the "ogbanje" (you'll have to Google it if you really want to know!).
I then developed it into a piece to enter into a flash-fiction contest.

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Mumma said Frankie was an angel, but I knew she was wrong.
He didn’t have golden curls and he didn’t have any wings.
He looked like a baby, but sort of wobbly and covered in slimy goo.
At least, it looked slimy.
I never touched him. I couldn’t bear to think what it would feel like. Jello, maybe, or marshmallows with something sticky poured overtop of them.
He came to me at 1:07 in the morning.
I know because I looked at the clock when I heard my name.
“Maggie, Maggie.”
This was not a normal thing to hear at 1:07 in the morning, but I wasn’t scared. Mr. Bear was right beside me, and Mr. Bear made night better.
Even the really bad nights, like the one when Pete went away. It was the night Mumma started out all giggly and happy, when her and Pete sent me to my room so they could talk. I knew what that meant, and there wasn’t much talking about it. There never was on those nights.
Usually I just heard the bed squeak, and sometimes the trailer wall rattled. There was no squeaking that time, though. I listened, but all I could hear was Mumma’s voice, that voice she sometimes used when I thought she was gonna cry but didn’t.
And Pete, he yelled a lot. The whole trailer shook when he stomped off.
Mumma started to get fat after that. I thought she’d hate it. She used to like it when Pete put his hands around her waist and told her she was tiny as a girl.
But she didn’t hate her belly at all.
Once she told me about Frankie — we picked the name together, me and Mumma — we’d sing to him and read him stories and sometimes even pet him. I liked it when he kicked, the way it made Mumma jump a little bit and giggle.
We got Frankie his own bed, a white basket with a blue ribbon, and we put it at the end of my bed. I decided, when he came home with Mumma from the hospital, I’d put Mr. Bear in the basket with him.
Only it didn’t happen.
Mumma came home by herself, with her belly smaller and her eyes very sad. I heard her telling Gramma talking about a cord and choking and doctors.
To me, she just said Frankie was an angel.
I knew she was wrong that night I heard him whisper.
“Maggie, Maggie.”
I wondered for a second if Mr. Bear had spoken, but I knew that was stupid. I
turned on my ballerina lamp to see.
There he was. Wobbly, slimy baby Frankie, sitting on the floor beside my bed.
“Frankie?” I said.
Even though I knew it was.
He sort of nodded.
“Why’d you give away my bed, Maggie? I wanted to sleep here.”
I didn’t tell him how the bed had made Mumma cry.
“You died.”
I thought I’d better tell him that, in case he didn’t know yet.
He nodded again.
“But I want to sleep here, Maggie. I want to be with my family.”
I didn’t know much about death and heaven and stuff. I didn’t go to church or Sunday school or anything. But I was pretty sure this was a bit strange.
“Why?”
Frankie moved across the floor, a little closer to me. He didn’t walk or crawl. It was more like floating.
“You’re my sister, Maggie,” he said. “Don’t you want me here?”
His voice was shaky, and I felt pretty bad for making a dead baby sad.
“Of course I do, Frankie.”
I wasn’t sure if that was true, but I didn’t want him to cry.
He seemed happier, but he kept staring like he was waiting for me to do something.
Then it struck me.
“I know!”
Frankie just waited.
“I could make you a new bed.”
I got out of bed and took my socks out of the bottom drawer and shoved them into the top one with my underwear.
Then I folded up my fuzzy blue blanket and tucked it into the drawer with Mr. Bear.
“There,” I told Frankie. “You can sleep there.”
He looked at me, and I think he wanted me to pick him up.
But I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t touch him.
When I got back into bed, Frankie got into the drawer himself, in that floating kind of way.
Then he went to sleep.
He was gone in the morning.
He never came back.
I didn’t tell Mumma he’d been there.
When she asked me how I’d gotten my blue blanket all sticky, I didn’t say.
And I didn’t tell her that angels snore.