Last night, about an hour before bedtime, Six quietly told the Chaplain he didn’t feel good, and curled up on the sofa. A few minutes later, he was asleep.

An hour later, as we were putting everyone to bed, the Chaplain lifted Six off the sofa to transfer him to his bed. He found Six was burning with a fever a shade under 104. We feared he wouldn’t go back to bed, but after a dose of children’s acetaminophen, he snuggled willingly into bed and went back to sleep.

Three hours later, the Chaplain and I were reading in bed when I heard a cry coming from the room Six shares with his older sisters. I paused to make sure I had heard him. There it was again. As I walked into the room, Two made a dramatic pronouncement along the lines of, “If he does that all night, I’m going to die.”

After debating for a moment about how to handle things, I rolled Six up in the mat he sleeps on, and heaved it up to carry into our bedroom. In the hallway on the way there, I thought I heard a giggle escape from the bundle. I couldn’t be sure. I told myself he was probably crying again.

I settled him down in the corner. He was still warm, but his fever had come down. I gave him a glass of water and tucked him back in, then climbed back into bed with my book.

A moment later, I heard what was definitely a giggle. Followed by a one-person, two-way conversation. It involved engines and colors, and was sprinkled with a type of belly laugh we rarely hear from Six.

The Chaplain and I exchanged glances. Was he delirious? The conversation he was having with himself was imaginative, but it made sense. It was the giggles we found confusing. Six can be a bit of a tortured soul, and giggling with abandon isn’t typically his M.O. It was so infectious that we found ourselves laughing along with him, simultaneously afraid he would escalate the laughter and refuse to settle back down. He never did, and gradually the giggling died down and he fell asleep.

Of all our kids, Six has challenged me the most. He has caused me to fear for his life more than any other child in our family. He is unreasonably demanding, challenges my last shred of patience, and drives me nuts almost every day.

Last night, I found myself thinking about what a difficult child he has been so far,  and yet how fun and funny he is at the same time. I don’t think I could call him our class clown – too many of his tricks are infuriating rather than silly. He regularly destroys things that don’t belong to him. He is pesty and is at the center of many a conflict. Many afternoons end with everyone shutting him out of their rooms, tired of the destruction. Yet he is also fiercely loving at times.

I don’t know what sort of person he will become. I often wonder how long this Difficult Phase will last, and know that it’s entirely possible that it will stretch out in different forms for the remainder of his childhood.

He did get up later that night, wailing progressively louder, until I woke up enough to crossly admonish him and send him back to sleep.

But the strange humor of the unexplained giggles remained.