The Brown Spot

Truong left early this morning to catch a flight to Walnut Creek. Taede by some miracle was still asleep at 6:45am, and the big kids were still quiet in their room. It was my lucky morning. I heard the big kids open their bedroom door and braced myself for giggles and warm bodies climbing into bed with me.

Instead, I see only Kael as he stuck his head in my door with a very concerned look on his face.

Kael: Mom! I didn't pee out and I didn't poop in bed! But there's a brown spot in my bed and Malia stuck her finger in it and her finger didn't get brown! What is it???

I'm still in a sleep stupor. I'm hearing the words but not comprehending it. I'm not fully firing all my pistons.

As I look at his face, I review what he just said.

1) I didn't pee out.
OK. That's good.

2) I didn't poop in bed.
Even better. Thank god for that.

3) But there's a brown spot in my bed.
What the...? Brown spot?! What brown spot? A brown spot can only mean one thing! Are you sure you didn't poop in bed? In your sleep? And not know it?! Oh man!! Why does this kind of thing always happen when Truong's not around??!!

4) Malia stuck her finger in it.
WTH!!! What do you mean she stuck her finger in it?? She stuck her finger in unidentified brown stuff?? You don't stick your finger in things you don't know!! Where's that finger now? In her nose? In her eye? Did she wipe it on her bed?? CRAP!!

5) Her finger didn't get brown.
I don't know what to think about this comment. I'm still stuck on Malia sticking her finger in what could very well be poop.

So I leap out of bed and march down the hall to their bedroom, mentally bracing myself for whatever it is I will encounter in his room. His bedsheets are thrown off his bed and Malia is peering intently at... well, a dark brown splotch on his bed, near his pillow.

My first thought: Man, he must have been sleeping in a really weird angle if this is what I fear it to be.

My second thought: Oh good, it's not a bedbug. (I've got to stop watching Animal Planet.)

Upon closer inspection, it turns out the brown spot is... blood. I looked at Kael's face and it turns out his lips are super dry and cracked from breathing through his mouth. So cracked that they bled a quarter sized spot of blood. I could still see dried blood on his lips.

I breathe a sigh of relief.

Then I think: Is it wrong of me to be relieved that my child bled at night?