There Was a Little Girl: The Real Story of My Mother and Me by Brooke Shields Page B

herself.

    Mom put so much time into my costumes I began to expect to win the contest at the gymnastics space, Sokol Hall, where we’d attend their annual party. Because we lived in an apartment building, trick-or-treating was easy and I could go alone with a friend. I’d invitea school buddy and we’d begin on the penthouse floor and work our way down. It took hours, and our pumpkin-head buckets would be overflowing by the time we got to the lobby apartments. This was the height of the razor-blade-in-the-apple panic, and I was never allowed to eat any of my loot until after Mom had done a thorough check. It was always fine because we knew every inhabitant in the building. I never actually ate all the candy I got. It usually got stale before I finished even half the bucket.
    Another story I love was about my doll, Blabby. Blabby was a doll similar to the amazing Baby Tender Love dolls of the seventies that I adored, but she was more unique. She used to make a sound like a baby cooing when you squeezed her rubber stomach. I took her into the bath with me so many times, however, that the coo soon turned into a bark. Later, with my kid scissors, I cut off almost all her hair. She looked rather punk and ahead of her time, but soon, because of the baths and the brushing, it all fell out.

    Blabby went everywhere with me. When we traveled by plane, Mom would strap her in with me in the seat. The seat belt went around us both and was fastened only when Blabby gave a “nod” that it was tight.
    When I was around six years old, Mom and I had a layover in some city on our way back to New York. I had left Blabby in the terminal while waiting for our connection and playing some Pac-Man–type game. We hadn’t noticed until Mom was strapping me into my seat and realized Blabby wasn’t on my lap. The plane had begun its taxi on the runway when my mother suddenly and frantically called for the flight attendant. She told me not to say a word and then looked straight into the stewardess’s eyes and calmly and emotionally, but deadly seriously, said, “We must get off this plane! It is a matter of life and death.”
    This was way before 9/11, and security was much more lenient. The flight attendant must have been alarmed enough, though, so she went to the cockpit and they stopped the taxi and returned to the gate to let both of us off. Mom and I deplaned without saying another word and I went directly to the game I had played before boarding the plane. Blabby was not there, so we tried lost and found. We reported Blabby’s physical profile and had been waiting for over an hour when, from a distance, we saw a male airline official walking toward us, holding something behind his back. He was hiding my doll with an air of embarrassment and was, no doubt, relieved to returned her to me. Well, he could not have been more relieved than I was. I knew my mom would fix the situation.
    I still have Blabby. But because she is bald and now has a large split down the middle of her head, my girls say she is “creepy.” I don’t agree. I have never before, nor since, seen a doll similar to her. Mom had given her to me, and after she died I put her necklace on Blabby. Creepy or not, she still sits in my room and reminds me of the time my mother stopped a 747 on a runway to retrieve my baby doll.
    Mom probably loved the fact that she could wield that type of power. She always said that as long as you remain firm in your opinions and in their delivery—even if you’re not telling the entire truth or you’re not completely clear—you’d be surprised at what you can achieve.
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    Mom has been an unconventional person her whole life, and she wasn’t about to change just because she had become a mother. She continued to take me to bars even as I got older. I remember when she taught me to shoot pool from behind my back. I couldn’t have been older than eight and I learned fast. When I’d excitedly called my father and said,