Is this your first?

When you are a young lady growing up in a large family it begins to become tiring that in this society almost every young girl with a child in her arms is assumed to be a single mother. Even as young as 12 can make you suspect, especially if you are tall and look as if you could be in your early teens as my oldest soon learned.

Aimee would often assist me while out getting groceries by either pushing the cart, or more often by holding the current baby. After all, cuddling a little love bug is infinitely nicer than pushing a cold metal cart that is slowly growing heavier and harder to push. She was only 12 when Noah, the 7th baby, was born. Still, she was tall for her, age possibly as tall as I am ( all of 5' 3") and sometimes she would be dawdling behind me as she carried Noah. She would feel embarrased when she could see older women trying to catch a glimpse of her ring finger on her left hand and then sometimes tut tuting. Others would be forward enough to ask; "So is this your first...."

Finally one day, tired and angry with people assuming such a thing of her when the next fellow shopper, someone Aimee described as actually quite a tiny and sweet dottering old lady came up to her and peered at her through heavy lenses and smiling asked her - "Is this your first, Dear?" Aimee dead panned her with:
"No, its my sixth...."
and she waited while this registered. As the poor old woman gasped and grabbed at her chest, Aimee relented and sweetly smiled - "Sibling, my sixth sibling."