The Cheesecake Cherub

HAVING DISCUSSED the price of cheesecake earlier that day, we decided to enter the bakery stall that we found on the second floor of the Boylston Street Garage. We had been combing most of the stores in the Garage, looking for a birthday present.

"How much does your cheesecake cost?" we asked the young woman behind the counter.

"$9.50 per cake," she answered with a smile. "But...it weights 51/4 pounds and you can buy it by the slice."

"Thanks," we laughed and turned to leave.

"Wait!" she said to our turned backs. "You can have a taste for free."

We turned in our tracks and in a few seconds we were standing at the old-fashioned glass-topped counter, eating cheesecake with plastic forks from paper plates.

As we stood there, I noticed the face of a baby printed on the front of the saleswoman's yellow T-shirt. It was a big green baby face that stood out under her long brown hair.

"Is that a special baby on your shirt, or is it just any old baby?" I asked.

"This," she flexed her biceps, "is Baby Watson."

"Oh?"

"And that is Baby Watson." She turned and pointed to a huge black and white photograph of a baby sitting on a shiny floor in a white dress. Baby Watson, it seems, was born last year in Vermont. He is now ten months old and will always be ten months old. The sales girl pointed to a wooden sign lying on a countertop, the name "Baby Watson" carved into its grain.

"Like Oskar in The Tin Drum?" we asked her. But she was not familiar with Oskar.

"Why will Baby Watson always remain ten months old?"

"Because that's his way."

"So what's Baby Watson's message?"

"It's not simply a message, but rather a whole way of living and thinking. It's just not that simple."

"Oh, so that's it," we said, determined to be cynical in the face of her stubbornness.

She leaned back and folded her arms under Baby Watson's silk-screened chin. "You'll be hearing from Baby Watson!" she told us.

"Oh?"

"Just listen to WCAS and WGBH radio. He'll be on the air."

Having long since finished our samples of the cheesecake more expensive than its weight in gold, we left the stall.

I haven't heard from Baby Watson on the radio, but then I haven't listened very much. A friend whom we alerted on the subject found an ad for Baby Watson cheesecake in the Real Paper, but there was no word on the Watson Way of Life.

I returned to the bakery five days later, but it was morning and an iron grating barred entry to the stall. The wooden sign now hung over the doorway. A few leftover baked goods lay on glass counter tops, and the huge photo portrait of Baby Watson, the mystical money-maker, still stared out over the deserted stall, a strange combination of Guru Maharaji and the Gerber Baby Food cherub, the latest formula for the alchemist's gold of advertising.