it’s very late and you’ve been tucked into bed by daddy and i pop my head into your room and feel your unsettledness and so i lie down next to you, and you tell me that sometimes you feel scared at night and you ask for sam who is still watching a movie with daddy and so i ask shall i stay with you while you fall asleep? and i reassure you that sam will come to bed soon and for now claudie-audie-the-super-undie-man is with you, and you explain that he isn’t really real and i say that i think that he’s rather special with his super undies and i giggle about his tail at the back of him and you get the joke and say the p-word as i laugh and try to pop my hand over your mouth so that the word comes out all squishy, and we lie side by side in our happiness and i rub your back in gentle circles and tell you that i love you so much and you say that you love me more and i say that i know. so we lie there, and i breathe you in and stroke your back and all of a sudden your whole body relaxes as you tuck claudie into the crook of your elbow and wrap up in the cotton sheet that came from granny’s place and your breathing lengthens and your face sweetens and i brush the wisps from your forehead, the same blonde wisps that you wanted to cut off tonight, and i nip out and grab the camera and sneak back in to flash a quick snap

and you have already slipped into slumbering depths and don’t even stir, and i think about tomorrow morning which will be welcomed by your vigour and bounce cos you’re always the first one to arise and you'll come and lie side by side with me and daddy in our bed and you'll talk us awake just as i talked you to sleep tonight.