I don't want to grow up.

I don't want to grow up. Matty said he wants to. He said he's going to be a fireman and rescue people and run with the dalmatians. He told me he was going to buy a house and sleep in a different room every night and watch all the Batman movies in a row. Matty said that when you're all grown up, you can do anything you want.

I told Matty he was wrong.

He laughed. Everyone else laughed too, and said that, of course growing up is really important and of course grown ups can do anything they want.

Matty was mad at me for a while, but then he started telling me again how he was going to stay up until midnight and sleep in as long as he wanted when he was grown up. He laughed at all the little kid stuff I told him I still like to do.

He said playing with Barbie dolls and plastic trucks is something only babies do anymore.

I'm not a baby.

Matty said I was if I kept doing that. He said big kids don't do that. Big kids do grown up things, like the sitting thing, and talking over drinks of coffee.

I told Matty my parents don't do that.

He laughed and said all parents do.

They don't, I insisted.

He got mad then, and I was quiet. I don't like it when Matty gets mad at me.

Matty kept telling me about how great being not a kid was going to be. I listened. He talked. He's good at that.

But I still don't want to grow up. I want to be a kid forever. If I ever grew up, even a little bit, I wouldn't fit in the hole under the stairs at home.

It's where I go when the stinky man visits.

The house gets all hushed up, and he starts screaming big, ugly words at nothing. Mom doesn't start screaming until he finds her hiding spot.

She's too big to fit under the stairs.

And he never thinks to look here for her.

I wish she did, though. I don't like the screaming.

It makes my ears hurt. And when he's gone, the air smells funny, like the toaster got left on too long again.

Mom always cries about being grown up. If she doesn't like it, I don't think I will either.

I want to stay a little kid.

Matty doesn't understand.

It's safer.