"Mouse die!"

"Die!" Ben says, an inquisitive look on his face, backs of his hands on his hips, his upper body swaying as he speaks. "Die!"

Ben, a year and a half old, is standing in front of C, who's sitting on the toilet. "Mouse die!"

"Yes, Ben," C says, "the mouse died. It's time to let go of the mouse, Ben. Hey," he adds, turning to me (yeah, we just don't bother closing the bathroom door anymore)," maybe we should get him a mouse. Or a hamster!"

A few weeks before Christmas, I decided it was time to move the horrid old love seat somewhere else so we make space for the Christmas tree. The love seat is uncomfortable. It's ugly. It's been here since I moved in. We mostly use it as a sort of bookshelf, stacking crap on it. I hate it.

I tell the kids to stand aside and push the love seat away from the wall.

Is that mouse poop all over the floor?? Our cat, Karl, sleeps on the love seat. The kids jump on it. They kick the soccer ball at it. How the hell could a mouse live in there--especially long enough to generate so much poop?

The carpet under the love seat does indeed seem to be covered in mouse poop. Gross. I mention it aloud, which invites all sorts of questions. Yes, there was a mouse. No, I don't think it is in there any more.

"Did it die?" Max asks, crouching down to see the poop. He is curious about death lately, about what it means to die. He doesn't really understand it but for a time liked to apply the word as often as he could.

"Die!" says Ben, standing up from his own crouch, latching on to this neat new word. "Die?"

"No, the mouse didn't die," I say. "It probably left because of Karl. Maybe there wasn't even a mouse. Hey, step back from there."

I try to clean it up with our dustbuster but it isn't charged enough, and I don't want to leave Curious Preschooler and Curious Toddler alone to poke at the mouse poop while I fetch the big vacuum, so I do what anyone would do--I push the love seat back into place. What you can't see can't hurt you, right?

"Mouse die?" says Ben, hands on hips.

I text C: "When you get home, Ben will probably say something like 'Daddy, come! See, Daddy! Mouse! Mouse, die!'"

When C gets home from work that night, Ben greets him at the door. "Daddy, come! Come, Daddy! See!" He leads C over to the love seat and gets on the floor to look under it. "Mouse! Mouse die!"

Did I call it or what?

That night, C and I try to move the love seat out to the street, but it will not fit through the door. In any position. In any way, shape, or form. Even if we take the door off the hinges. I have no idea how the thing got in here.

We put it back in place again---at least vacuuming up the mouse poop first--and wait for the weekend.

Saturday morning, I get my flat bar and hammer out and systematically dismantle the thing. C feeds Ben breakfast; Max sits on the sofa watching me.

That's loud, Mommy!

A Sawzall would be more fun, of course, but I don't own one. It would be messier, anyway. I gleefully carry the pieces out to the trash cans.

I have killed the love seat. "Die!"

The love seat is gone, but the new word is not. "Die!" Ben says. He always assumes the same position: backs of his hands on his hips, almost on his lower back, insistent tone, inquisitive expression. "Mouse die!" and he points to where the love seat was, for a while, until the Christmas tree is up. Then out of the blue--I don't know what triggers it--he'll look up into my face and say "Die! Mouse? Mouse die!"

It's like living with a goth baby, sort of. And then his big brother, who's always asking about death.

I don't understand why Ben always assumes the exact same position when he says it, but he does. At least he didn't do it at Christmas dinner, earnestly looking up into my mother's face while saying, "Die!" That would have raised some eyebrows, I'm sure.


[Note: If my damn smartphone were working properly, I'd have posted some photos about the Demise of the Dreadful Love Seat. Alas, the phone refuses to release any pictures to me in any way, shape, or form. Let me just say it was blue plaid, rough material, saggy cushions.

UPDATE: Obviously: got some pics.

And of course there is this sweet face, saying, "Die!"]