Bloodchild (8 page)

In fact, the pressure was so strong that it seemed to her he was drawing out the very marrow from her bones. Even though there was nothing painful about it, she did experience a momentary sensation of fear because it felt as though her whole body were being sucked out through that nipple. The baby was consuming her. In her wild imaginings she saw herself deflate like a balloon and then sucked through his lips until he was left with a swollen, red stomach lying on her nightgown.

The image continued to frighten her so much that she cried out, but the baby went on feeding. She brought her hand to the back of his head and felt his neck muscles working, rippling like the thick body of a python as it ingested and then digested a rat. She couldn't pull her breast from his lips. She could only lay there and wait for him to be satiated once again. She closed her eyes and let it go on.

When she had come into the bedroom, she had left the door open, and now, under the baby's grasp, she forgot about it. In fact, she never heard Harlan come to the door. He started in, coming up to see what she was doing and why she wasn't joining him and Jillian downstairs. As soon as he made the turn into the room, he stopped and stared.

The baby was on its stomach right beside her, his head up, his lips tugging on her right breast. She opened her eyes slightly, the eyelids fluttering, and looked at Harlan. He didn't move; he didn't speak. Then she closed her eyes again. He watched in fascination for a few more moments and then left the room, chased out by the sight of the baby making such dramatic and powerful demands on Dana's body.

He was still flushed when he reached the living room. Jillian looked up from the newspaper expectantly.

"Where is she? What is she doing?"

"She's… feeding him."

"Again? Harlan, that's not normal." He shrugged and Jillian got up.

"Don't go up there," he said. "Leave her."

She stared at him. "Why?"

"We'll talk about it later. Please, Jillian. Let's not pressure her just yet."

She thought for a moment, looked up toward the stairway, and then shook her head.

"All right," she said. "But there's something wrong here, and it's more than postdelivery blues. Everything that makes me a mother tells me that," she said. "I'm sure it has something to do with the dramatic events of the past week, but still…" She looked up again. "I'm worried about her, Harlan. She's different; she's terribly different."

She turned back to him and he nodded.

"I'll get her to go to the doctor this week," he said. "It'll all be all right, I'm sure."

Jillian stared at him a moment and then sat down again. They waited silently for Dana, but she never came. Colleen, who had been in her room talking on the phone, came down to say good night. Afterward Harlan went up to see about Dana again. This time he returned smiling.

"It's such a cute scene," he said.

"What is?"

"The two of them on the bed. She has the baby lying on her stomach, its head just under her breasts. Dana's fast asleep."

"And the baby?"

"He's lying there so peacefully. When I stuck my head in the door, he looked right at me; he had such an expression of contentment on his face. Face it. Your grandson is something special," he said, but Jillian didn't smile. She just looked up at the ceiling as if she could see through the walls and view the scene he described.

Then she shook her head. "I'll feel better after you've taken her to see the doctor," she said.

He shrugged. "Mothers. They're a breed unto themselves," he said, and turned on the television set. Not long afterward Jillian went upstairs to go to sleep. Before going to her room, she looked in on Dana but found that Dana wasn't there.

She turned and looked at the baby's room. The door was closed. She went to it and turned the knob, but the door was locked.

"Dana?" she called.

After a moment Jillian heard her whisper through the door. "What is it?"

"What are you doing?"

"Putting the baby to sleep. Go to sleep, Mother. I'll talk to you in the morning."

"But—"

"Go to sleep," Dana repeated.

Jillian turned the knob again to confirm that the door was indeed locked. She stood there for a moment, dumbfounded. Then she turned away and reluctantly went to her room.

Fear and anxiety did not have an easy time settling themselves in the likes of Jillian Stanley, but this night they had their way.

Jillian was already downstairs in the kitchen having coffee when Harlan and Colleen appeared the following morning. She looked up expectantly. She had her hair pinned back neatly and wore a bright blue ankle-length housecoat. Harlan could see that his mother-in-law had not slept well. Rarely, if ever, was the skin under her eyes as puffy, and she usually put on a little lipstick before greeting people, even in the morning. The natural flush in her cheeks that bespoke of her healthy vibrancy was dimmed. She slumped a bit over her coffee cup, inhaling the aroma as though it were medicinal.

"Morning, Mom," Harlan said. He went directly to the pot of coffee.

"Morning, Jillian," Colleen said cheerfully. She opened the refrigerator and took out the orange juice. She had already showered and dressed and tied her hair into a pony tail. She was wearing her black-and-gold school sweatshirt and a pair of stone-washed jeans. She and her girlfriends had burned the telephone wires last night, planning the way the student body should celebrate the team's victory in school. Part of that celebration was the wearing of black and gold, the school colors.

Jillian didn't respond immediately. She looked from Harlan to Colleen and back to Harlan, as though they were both crazy.

"Morning," she said finally. "I imagine Dana is still asleep."

"Like a mummy." He laughed at his own pun and Colleen smiled. "Don't you get it, Mom?"

"I get it, I get it. You guys want eggs? I'll make you some."

"Sure," Harlan said.

"I'm just having some cold cereal today," Colleen said.

Jillian went to the refrigerator and took out the eggs. Harlan noted that she moved abruptly, without her usual grace.

"Scrambled?"

"Right, Mom." Harlan sat down with his coffee. He resisted saying more, even though he sensed that Jillian was very tense. Instead he sipped his coffee quietly and watched Colleen pour her cereal into a bowl. Harlan wasn't one to seek a confrontation or draw out unhappiness from people. He was like his father had been—an avoider—and often, as his mother used to say of his father, one who goes around with his head in the sand: "Mr. Ostrich."

Jillian began beating the eggs vigorously, almost angrily.

"So," he said to Colleen, who seemed either oblivious to Jillian's mood or absorbed in her own thoughts, "school going to have some kind of rally today?"

"There's talk of it. The coach hates them, though, until the season is completely over. We've got the title game to prepare for now. He says rallies before big games put the jinx on."

"Who do we play?"

"Pine Bush. They're undefeated."

"Should be a great game. Maybe I'll be able to—"

"Am I crazy?" Jillian said, spinning on them suddenly, "but you two act as though nothing happened last night."

"Pardon, Mom?"

"What do you mean, Jillian?" Colleen asked. She held her cereal spoon frozen in the air.

Jillian looked incredulously at both of them. "You never heard anything? Neither of you?"

Harlan looked at Colleen and then they both turned back to Jillian.

"Heard what, Mom?"

Jillian stared at them again, as if to confirm that they really meant what they said. Both continued to wear expressions of confusion. Then she turned to the stove and poured the scrambled eggs into the hot pan. She watched the eggs sizzle for a moment before turning back to Harlan and Colleen, both of whom sat back patiently.

"Dana must have been up all night. I had finally fallen asleep when I awoke to the sound of her talking in the hallway, so I got up and looked out. She was walking with the baby. I called to her, but either she didn't hear me or didn't want to. I saw her go downstairs, so I went back to bed, but I couldn't fall asleep."

"I didn't even hear her get up," Harlan said, and looked at Colleen. "But that's nothing. I usually don't."

"I guess I was in a deep sleep, too, this time," she said.

"What do you mean, this time?" Jillian asked with the speed and thrust of a prosecutor.

"I heard her night before last. She did the same thing."

Jillian looked at her thoughtfully. Then she remembered the eggs and put them on a dish for Harlan.

"Thanks, Mom. So Dana was up with the baby—what's so unusual about that?" he asked, reaching for the salt and pepper.

Jillian sat down again across from them and clasped her hands on the table. She looked like someone making a difficult effort to remain calm. Her lips trembled slightly before she began to speak.

"As I said, I didn't fall asleep. I never heard Dana come back upstairs, so I finally got up and went down to see if everything was all right."

"And?" Harlan said, taking his first forkful of eggs.

"The house was totally dark. She hadn't put on a light."

"You're kidding." He looked at Colleen, who shrugged.

"No, I'm not kidding, Harlan. I called to her, but she never responded. At first I thought she might have come back upstairs and I hadn't heard. So I went back up and looked in on the baby's room. The baby wasn't in his crib. Really worried now, I went back downstairs and put on the lights."

"So?" he said after her long pause. He continued to eat, but he looked like someone eating before a television set, engrossed in a suspenseful movie.

"She wasn't anywhere in the house, Harlan."

"What?" He smiled skeptically. "Where was she?"

"I don't know. I thought you would say something about it this morning, but you didn't even hear her get up, and for a moment there, I thought I might have dreamed the whole thing."

"Come on, Mom. You've got to be wrong. Where would she go with an infant in the middle of the night?" His smile widened and he went back to his eggs, as if dismissing the whole thing as Jillian's dream.

Jillian just shook her head. "You'll have to ask her. She wouldn't tell me. I went to the front door, of course, and looked outside, but I didn't see her anywhere. Eventually I put out the lights and went back upstairs, where I lay awake for hours." She leaned forward on the table, her eyes widening. Harlan stopped eating and held his breath. "I said for hours, Harlan. It was nearly morning before I heard her again. The sunlight was just coming over the horizon.

"I got out of bed quickly, but by the time I stepped into the hallway, she was going into the baby's room. Naturally I followed her and watched her put the baby back in his crib. Then I asked her where she had been."

"What did she say?" Harlan asked quickly.

"She said she had been nursing the baby and she told me to go back to sleep. She was very short with me, Harlan. I didn't want to wake you and Colleen, so I just returned to my room. As tired as I was, I couldn't fall asleep, so I got up early and came down to make the coffee."

"Doesn't make any sense, Mom." He shook his head vigorously, as if that was all he had to do to end the mystery.

"You're telling me?"

"Well, when she wakes up, you'll ask her again. I'm sure she'll have some sensible explanation." He started to smile hopefully.

"I don't know how any explanation could be sensible," Jillian said.

Harlan nodded and finished his eggs. "I'm giving an exam to my nine-o'clock class today," he announced, "so I gotta get moving. I feel bad about rushing out like this and leaving you with such worry."

"It's all right. I'll be all right," Jillian said, but it was obvious that she wasn't happy with Harlan's reaction to what she had told him.

"You want me to call you during my lunch hour?" Colleen asked. "Teddy and I could drive over if you need anything."

"No, honey. I should be able to take care of things here. You just enjoy your day. Maybe Harlan's right—maybe there's some sort of sensible explanation."

"Sure. Did you check the bathroom down here? She could have been in there," he said, gulping down the rest of his coffee.

"No, I didn't. But why didn't she put a light on? You'd think she would be afraid to carry an infant in the dark like that."

"Maybe she had it on and then turned it off, not wanting to wake or disturb the rest of us. Dana's usually very thoughtful." Jillian nodded, but he saw that she was still not satisfied. "I'm going to call Dr. Friedman today and make her appointment," he added.

"That's good," Jillian said.

"Okay." Harlan stood up. "I'm on my way to sift out the goof-offs," he announced. He tugged Colleen's hair gently.

"Typical cruel teacher," Colleen said. Harlan laughed and then started out. She watched him go and then turned back to Jillian.

"You spoke to her the night before last when she was up during the night?" Jillian asked, her voice so low that she was nearly whispering.

"Yes," Colleen said.

"How was she?"

"Like you said… short with me." Colleen looked down and then up quickly. "She accused me of spying on her."

Jillian's eyes grew smaller as she thought intensely for a moment. Then she sat back in her seat, bringing her right hand to the bottom of her throat, as if she were about to hear the most terrible news.

"Then what did she do?"

"Like you said… she went downstairs. I went back into my room and I didn't hear her until much later, but I was afraid to look out to see what she was doing. I don't know if she had the lights on or not."

"Something is different about her," Jillian said sadly. She shook her head. "You sense it?"

"Yes," Colleen said, "but I just figure it has something to do with all that's happened. Harlan thinks so." Worry seized Jillian's face and seemed to age it in moments: Her forehead wrinkled, her eyes dimmed, and the corners of her mouth dipped. Colleen felt very bad for her. "It's going to take a little time yet," Colleen said. "Don't worry. She'll be all right after a while, I'm sure."