The Perfect Mother

by Aimee Molloy

  “Oh, please. Let’s be real. We’re here tonight for her. So she can unwind, get a break. Staring at the baby doesn’t qualify as either of those things.” Nell reaches down to put Winnie’s phone in her purse. “It’s fine. It’s for her own good. It will take her two minutes to reinstall it if she wants to.”

  Colette is aware of a growing ache behind her eyes—the music, the crowd building around them on the deck, what Nell just did. She’s ready to go home.

  “At least give me her phone,” Francie says. “Her key’s in there. Let me hold it until she comes back to the table.”

  “I got it. Relax.” Nell turns her back to Colette and leans toward the women on the other side of her. “What are you guys talking about?”

  “My sister,” one says. “She’s thirty weeks and just found out she has a prolapsed uterus. It sucks. She has to get a labial hitch.”

  “What on earth is a labial hitch?”

  “I know,” Nell says, a little too loudly. “You stick it in your vagina. There’s a hook on the end, for pulling the stroller. Makes grocery shopping and trips to the Laundromat easier.” She rattles the ice cubes in her glass and swallows the last of her drink. “I’ll be right back.” She stands, singing under her breath, and walks toward the bar. “I want more, more, more. More more more.”

  10:04 p.m.

  “I think she needs less, less, less,” Francie says to Colette, waving away a cloud of smoke from people lighting cigarettes at the deck railing, in front of the No Smoking sign. She waits as long as she can bear before peeking at her phone inside her bag. It’s been twelve minutes, and Lowell still hasn’t responded to the text she sent him. The night is only growing more humid—a heavy humidity unlike anything she experienced in Tennessee—and her head is beginning to throb. Day three without caffeine, and she’s feeling it. She’s been dying for even a sip of coffee, but she can’t do it. Everything she’s been reading says the very best thing to do if your milk supply is decreasing is to give up caffeine. Will’s been so irritable and unhappy these past few days. He’s never been an easy baby—the nurse who answers the nonemergency line at the pediatrician’s office keeps telling Francie it’s a classic case of colic. That it will pass around the fifth week. But Will is seven weeks and two days, and it’s only getting worse. It’s not colic, she’s decided. He’s irritable because she’s run out of milk and is starving him. Certainly she can give up caffeine if it will help.

  She decides to text Lowell one more time, knowing he’ll tell her to stop obsessing about the baby and have fun. But she hasn’t been able to stop thinking about Will since she left the apartment, sure he’s spent the last two hours screaming inconsolably, the way he sometimes does in the evenings, making himself sick.

  Everything okay? Did you get my last few messages? She hits send and feels immediately relieved to see the three dots signaling that Lowell is responding. She waits, clutching her phone.

  Do you want the good news or bad?

  A blast of fear courses through her body. What happened? She sends the message and waits. Lowell, answer me. What’s the bad news?

  Three dots. Nothing. Three dots. The Cardinals suck.

  She exhales. Don’t do that please. How’s the baby?

  That’s the good news. Sleeping. Took the bottle and passed out.

  Francie feels a twinge of worry. She told Lowell to give Will the bottle of formula she’d prepared only if the baby was upset. It was Will’s first time ever having formula. She’s been setting her alarm the last few mornings, hoping to wake before him to pump extra milk, but she’s gotten hardly anything, not even half an ounce.

  She types Does that mean he was very upset, but then someone sits on the chair next to her. She looks up, hoping it’s Winnie returning to the table. But it’s Colette.

  “I just did a quick round of the bar,” Colette says. “I can’t find Winnie.”

  Francie drops her phone into her purse. “It’s so strange. She can’t still be talking to that guy.”

  “Why not?” Colette asks. “She is single. Maybe she went home with him.”

  “Went home with him? She wouldn’t do that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because she wouldn’t leave without her phone and key. And because she has to get home to Midas.”

  “I don’t know. The others are beginning to leave. I kind of want to go too.”

  “We can’t leave without her,” Francie says, looking increasingly concerned. “And now where on earth is Nell?”

  A group of young women comes noisily onto the deck, lighting each other’s cigarettes off a shared lighter, planting themselves on the laps of young men claiming the chairs left vacant by the May Mothers who’ve since gone home to their babies. “I’m going to look for her,” Francie says.

  Inside, she circles the bar, checking the side room, weaving her way around dancing couples, the beat of the bass thudding inside her chest. Winnie isn’t there. She isn’t by the bocce ball courts either, or on the sidewalk out front, or, as far as Francie can tell from peering under the stalls, in the bathroom. She pauses at the mirror; two glasses of champagne have left her lightheaded. She sponges a wet paper towel along her neck and returns to the table, nearly bumping into Nell on the way.

  “There you are. Where have you been?” Francie notices a wobble to Nell’s step, a darkness in her eyes.

  Nell holds up a glass. “Getting a drink.”

  “This whole time? Were you with Winnie?”

  “Winnie? No. I haven’t seen her since, well, you know.”

  “No, what do you mean? Since when?”

  “Since before. When I saw her.”

  Francie takes Nell’s elbow. “Come on.”

  Colette is alone at the table. “Where is everyone?” Nell asks.

  “Everyone left. It’s time to go.”

  “Already?”

  “Yes,” Colette says. “Can I have Winnie’s phone?”

  “Her phone?” Nell sits down. “Right. Her phone.” She lifts her purse but then drops it, the contents spilling onto the floor. “Shit,” she says, dropping clumsily to her knees. She tosses a scuffed wallet and a travel pack of wet wipes back inside. “This bloody purse. It’s too big.”

  Francie crouches down and retrieves a sunglasses case. “Is it in there?”

  “No,” Nell says. She pinches the bridge of her nose. “I wish they’d turn the music down. My head is killing me.”

  “Call Winnie’s number and see if we hear it ringing,” Colette suggests as Francie and Nell rise to stand, Nell holding on to the table to steady herself.

  “She didn’t come back here and take it, right? One of us would have seen her.” Francie looks around the room again. “Do you think she went home? That would be such a bummer. I really wanted her to have a fun night.”

  “Winnie told Alma she’d be back by ten thirty,” Nell says. “She has a one-year-old and doesn’t like to babysit at night.”

  The waiter approaches. “Another round?”

  “No,” says Nell, waving him away. “No more drinks.”

  “We’re all still walking home together, right?” Francie says. “I know it’s not far, but I don’t want to walk home alone.”

  “I’m ready,” Colette says. “I’ve had one too many, and I have to work tomorrow.”

  A phone rings from inside Nell’s purse. “Oh thank god,” Francie says. “Is that Winnie’s phone?”

  Nell is again fishing inside her bag. “No, that’s mine.” She closes one eye and squints at the screen. “That’s weird. Hello?” She puts her finger to her ear. “Slow down, I can’t hear you.” Nell is silent, listening. And then something changes in her expression.

  “What?” Francie asks. “Who is it?”

  Nell is nodding slowly.

  “Nell,” Francie says. “Say someth—”

  But before she can finish, Nell opens her mouth, her voice strangled with terror, the sound coming out like a moan. “Noooooooo.”

  10:32 p.m
.

  “What do you mean, Midas is gone?”

  “I don’t know. That’s what Alma said.”

  “Gone where?”

  “I don’t know. Gone. He’s not in his crib.”

  “Not in his crib?”

  “Yes.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I don’t know. She went to check on him, and his crib was empty. It was hard to understand her. She’s a mess.”

  “Is Winnie there? She must have gone home and taken him somewhere.”

  “No. Alma called her, but it went to voice mail. Where the hell is her phone?”

  “Did Alma contact the police?”

  “Yes. They haven’t arrived yet. She’s there, waiting.”

  Francie grabs her bag. “Come on. Let’s go.”

  10:51 p.m.

  The sound of their feet beating the pavement and their gasps for breath echo through the streets, which are uncharacteristically deserted, everyone away for the holiday weekend, or gathered along the river, collecting overtired children and empty coolers of beer, having waited longer than they’d expected for the fireworks to begin.

  “Up here,” Colette yells, steps ahead of Nell and Francie. “One more block.”

  She stops in front of an ornate Gothic building on the corner. The address plate, No. 50, throbs red and blue from the flashing lights of a police car parked nearby. “Is this her building?” Francie asks.

  “Number fifty?” Nell’s out of breath; her words are slurred. “That’s the address she asked me to give Alma.”

  Colette climbs the L-shaped stoop to the front door. She searches for a row of buzzers. “There’s just one doorbell. What is her apartment number?”

  “Wait, look.” Francie is pointing and then running around the corner to a landscaped path that leads to a red door, left slightly ajar, on the side of the building.

  Colette and Nell are close behind as Francie steps quietly into an entrance foyer. A dozen oversize Rothkoesque paintings hang on the pale gray walls, the ceilings are at least twenty feet high, and four wide marble steps lead to a hallway, down which they can hear someone sobbing.

  “Oh my god,” Nell says. “This entire building is her house.”

  They follow the sound, making their way down the hall and into a large chef’s kitchen, off which is a skylit staircase. A uniformed police officer, his name badge reading Cabrera, stands on the steps, listening to a crackling radio attached at his shoulder.

  “Who are you?”

  “Winnie’s friends,” Colette says. “Is she here?”

  “Get out,” he says, visibly annoyed.

  “Can we just—” Francie says.

  “Out,” he says, probing his pockets for his ringing cell phone and turning abruptly to rush up the stairs. “This is a crime scene.”

  They ignore him and continue on into a large living room. When they enter, they see her.

  Winnie has curled into herself on a chair in front of a wall of night-blackened glass, her arms wrapped around her knees, a blanket the color of cream draped over her shoulders. Her eyes are vacant as she tugs at her lower lip. A detective is sitting a few feet away, writing in a notebook, a forgotten takeout coffee on the floor beside him.

  “It was the pasta,” Alma is saying from the other end of the room, out of earshot of Winnie, her words stuttered by sobs. She sits on a soft leather sectional, clutching a rosary in one hand, pausing every so often to close her eyes and wave a handful of crumpled tissues at the ceiling, offering a prayer in a Spanish none of them can understand. She ate too much of the baked ziti she brought from home. It made her lethargic, and she took her phone to the sofa to say good night to her baby, at home with Alma’s sister. She must have fallen asleep—that’s so unlike her, she insists, throwing a shamefaced glance at Winnie, but her daughter was up four times the night before, teething. When she woke up, she checked the monitor. The crib looked empty.

  “You heard nothing?” a second detective is asking. His scruffy gray eyebrows threaten to take over his forehead, and he wears a college ring on one of his thick fingers. An NYPD badge with his name in block letters—Stephen Schwartz—dangles from a thin chain around his neck, swinging back and forth, just barely, like the pendulum on a dying clock.

  “Nothing,” Alma says, and then starts to sob again.

  “Nothing like footsteps? No crying?”

  “Nothing. No crying.” Schwartz takes the box of Kleenex from the table and extends it to her. Alma pulls, sending a poof of tissue dust into the air around his face. “The monitor. It was right there.” She wipes her eyes and points to where the detective is sitting. “Right there where you’re sitting. The whole time.”

  “And the monitor was on?”

  “Yes.”

  “You didn’t turn it off?”

  “No. I didn’t touch it, except to check it a few times.”

  “What did you see when you checked it?”

  “The baby. He was sleeping. It wasn’t until I woke up that I realized he was gone.”

  “And what did you do when you first noticed?”

  “What did I do?”

  “Yeah. Did you check the window in his room? Did you look around the house? Check upstairs?”

  “No. I told you. I ran back here for my cell phone. It was on the table. I called Winnie but she didn’t answer.”

  “And then what?”

  “And then I called Nell.”

  “Did you drink anything?”

  “Drink anything? Of course not. Other than the iced tea Winnie made for me.”

  “She made you iced tea,” Schwartz says, writing something in his notebook. He lowers his voice. “And where did you say the mother was again?”

  “Out.”

  “Out, right. But did she tell you where, exactly?”

  “I forget. She wrote it down. Out drinking.”

  He looks up, his eyebrows raised. “Out drinking, you said?”

  “Final warning, ladies,” says the police officer named Cabrera from the stairwell, walking past them with a woman in a police jacket. “Find your way out. Don’t make me tell you again.”

  “We’re going,” Colette says. Francie and Nell follow her back down the hall, back into the foyer, back out onto the silent sidewalk. But not before they all walk over to Winnie, squeezing her hand. Not before they hug her so long they bring home the scent of her shampoo. Not before Francie kneels down to take Winnie’s face in her hands, their eyes inches apart. “They’ll find him, Winnie. They will. We’ll all have Midas back. I promise.” And not before they stand at the rail of her terrace, gazing out across Brooklyn at millions of windows, behind which babies sleep, safe and sound—the inhabitants possibly looking back at them, three shattered mothers, their hair whipping in the hot July wind, their hearts full of dread.

  Chapter Four

  Day One

  To: May Mothers

  From: Your friends at The Village

  Date: July 5

  Subject: Today’s advice

  Your baby: Day 52

  How many times have you heard this advice: sleep when the baby sleeps. We know it might seem tiring (ha!) to hear it, but it’s true. Some moms find it difficult to relax when the little one does, so here are some tips: Avoid caffeine and sugary drinks. Practice some of the breathing exercises you perfected in preparation for giving birth. Try a glass of warm milk, a square of cheese, or even a little turkey breast before bed—these foods contain tryptophan, which will help encourage a good night’s sleep.

  Francie stands in her tiny kitchen, lost in front of an open cupboard that’s shaded pink with the rising sun, resisting the urge to drink the errant Diet Coke she spotted in the fridge. She can’t have slept more than two hours last night, between finally falling asleep on Lowell’s shoulder, and waking up in a panic. She dreamed she’d left Will in the grocery store, asleep in his stroller by the yogurt case. It took her so long to choose from among the eight types of yogurts, all the different flavors, and
by the time she realized what she’d done, she was halfway home. She raced back to the store, her muscles weak, her clothes damp with sweat. When she lifted the hood of the stroller, it was empty. Will was gone.

  The dream jerked her upright, and she lurched toward the cosleeper. It was only after she pressed her palm to Will’s chest, feeling the soft rise and fall of his breath, that she could trust it was a dream. Will was still there, asleep beside her. But the commotion had startled him awake with a cry so desperate she doesn’t know how Lowell slept through it. It then took two hours of walking him around the living room, up and down the narrow hall, shushing him, rocking him, nursing him through the pain in her right breast, before he finally fell back asleep, rotating a slow circle in the baby swing, his fingers curled like parentheses around his eyes.

  She, meanwhile, was wide awake. For the last two hours, she’s been pacing the living room, seven steps back and forth, ice cubes melting in one of the baby’s washcloths on the back of her neck, seeing Winnie’s face as she spoke to the detective the night before. Francie is still trying to piece together the events of the evening and make sense of what happened. Winnie arrived. She seemed quiet but not unhappy. Francie suggested she tell her birth story, and then she and Token went to the bar for a drink. Winnie was talking to that guy. And then, suddenly, she was gone.

  Francie is plagued with guilt. If only she hadn’t lost sight of Winnie. If only she hadn’t handed Winnie’s phone to Nell. She’s furious with herself for trusting Nell with that phone—Nell, who was clearly drunk by the end of the night. Francie couldn’t have been the only one to notice the way she spilled the french fries on her lap, the cloudiness of her eyes, never mind the fact that she brought wine to the May Mothers meeting last week.

  Francie opens the refrigerator for the eggs, and searches for the green pepper she swore she bought. Lowell is always telling her to stop with the what-ifs, but what if? What if she had insisted, like she’d wanted to, on keeping the phone? What if Nell hadn’t been able to delete the Peek-a-Boo! app? Francie would have kept the phone on the table, right in front of her—she’s sure that’s what she would have done. And then maybe the movement in Midas’s room would have sprung the screen to life, and she would have seen Midas in his crib, and then a person standing over him. She would have told Nell to call Alma, which would have woken her up. She would have called the police. Midas would still be—