By Matt Doran, Assistant Features Editor

You will have a son. He will grow inside you for almost nine months then arrive unannounced but most welcome.

From his first solo pee, he will furiously assert his Lilliputian independence. His father will try to fake his age so your son can prematurely start playing little league. Your son will resist, profess a love of singing and proclaim himself God’s gift to musicals. Your husband will not be pleased.

You will come home one day to find your son in your heels and pearls with red lipstick smudged across his face singing Ethel Merman’s “Everything’s Coming Up Roses.” You will laugh and take pictures, but after a few shots you will realize how well your son sings. You will be forced to sit down, so in awe of his sonorous soprano will you be. You will think, “Perhaps he is Broadway bound” but then smother that thought. You will love your son too much to want to share him with the world. Not yet.

Your son will start kindergarten. He will learn American history, how the pilgrims came to the New World and shared a big meal with the locals. Your son will be inspired and will convince his teacher to stage a Thanksgiving musical. The teacher will be reluctant, but your son will be too charming and insistent. The St. Raymond’s Kindergarten Thanksgiving Musical will be born.

Your husband will be surprisingly supportive. “At least he’ll be holding a rifle.”

“Oh no, Daddy, I’m playing Pocahontas.” Your son will have no interest in playing John Smith, the striking, gun-toting leading male. Pocahontas needs someone with a dark complexion and a high E, your son will say. Your husband’s support will rapidly wane, replaced with blatant disapproval. Your son will want his father to be proud, so he will tell his father he will put a tomahawk in his belt. This will satisfy your husband’s archaic sense of machismo.

Your son will rehearse. He will solicit you to make him a costume. He will prance around the house singing the lines he helped pen, all while your husband reminds him to flaunt the tomahawk, flaunt the tomahawk. Your house will have never been filled with so much life, and you will fear the day that energy packs up and goes to college.

The day of the play arrives, and you will be more nervous than your son. He will allay your worries with a fleeting kiss on your cheek as he runs up the steps to the backstage area. You and your husband will sit and talk. He will drone on about his fantasy football league at work, and you will pretend to listen. A boy will walk past you wearing a T-shirt that reads, “It’s true, I’m a ninja.” You will ponder the absurd state of youth apparel. Suddenly, you will hear the boy shout, “Ow. What the hell did you throw an apple at me for?”

“You’re not a ninja,” a smaller boy who you can’t quite see will say. “A real ninja would’ve caught that.” You will see the smaller boy run away and recognize the back of his head as your son. You will chase after him, catch him, and immediately spank him five times in front of everyone.

“How dare you!” you will say after that fifth spank. “What’s gotten into you?”

He will start to cry, and you will suddenly realize this is not your son crying. You will turn him around and see a strange boy looking back at you. His mother will run toward you and scoop her son away before you can enforce any more corporal punishment. You will never have been more embarrassed in your life.

You will look around for help but will be met with only condescending glares. A man will come and stand next to you and put his hand on your shoulder. He will not be your husband, but you won’t care. You will just be happy someone is at your side.

“I thought he was my son … ” you will say.

The man will shift his weight, fart, turn to face you and say, “Yeah, that just happened.”

Your mouth will hang open in shock, but because everyone is still staring at you from the mistaken identity spanking, they will think you are also the guilty flatuletor.

Your husband will finally rush in to whisk you back to your seat. Thankfully, the lights will dim and the show will start. You will slink into your chair in your lingering embarrassment, but you will perk up when your son takes the stage and his voice thunders throughout the gymnasium. You will have forgotten your embarrassment and imagine yourself sitting next to your husband at The Met and watching your famed son regale the audience with tales of melodramatic Italian romance.

The audience will rise to their feet as the curtain closes, and you will know it is all for your son. The lights will come back on, and by the sneers on some mothers’ faces, it will be clear you won’t be invited to join the PTA anytime soon.

The air will be so thick with reproach you will go outside. You will sit on the stone steps and lament your rash and public castigation, but then you will laugh at yourself and remember tonight is about your son and his big debut.

You will go back inside with pride and a smile. Your husband and son will be waiting for you under the basketball hoop. Your son will run up to you and jump into your arms. Your arms will take root in each other’s backs. He will eventually let go and recount every second of his performance. Your husband will rave about your son’s dexterity with a tomahawk for years. That night you will dream of long distance phone calls to New York where your son will be studying at Julliard.

—Matt Doran is a creative writing graduate student.

—This piece of fiction does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Daily Aztec.