The Perfect Mother

by Aimee Molloy

  The power is cut, silencing the air-conditioning, cutting the lights; a ghostly quiet settles over the car. Colette feels the shift around her as people turn to their cell phones, as she does, knowing she won’t have service.

  I have to get home to Poppy.

  The door at the end of the car skids open. “You didn’t think this was coming?” The guy wears jean shorts and a thin white tank top revealing wiry, muscular arms. He walks briskly through the car toward the door at the opposite end, weaving between the people standing in the aisles. “You didn’t think we’d see a suicide bomber in New York, with this jackass as our president?”

  The panic builds in her chest. She sees Poppy’s face, how she looked in the middle of the night, nursing, her deep blue eyes naked with love, staring up at Colette. Colette is incredulous, still, that she can feel a love this bottomless, like the abandoned quarry she was too afraid to jump into as a child, the one that later swallowed up a boy from her high school, his body never found. She takes her phone from her lap and types a text to Charlie. She won’t be able to send it without service, but if someone finds her phone, if it survives the explosion . . .

  I love you more than anything. Poppy. Please let her know—

  The lights flash back on, and then the jolt of the AC hits. “Ladies and gentlemen, this is the conductor. We’re going to open the doors in the front car. Make your way forward to exit. Be as quick and orderly as you can.”

  Colette stands, entering the silent stream of people making their way down the crowded aisle. In the next car, a teenage girl is sitting alone at a window seat, holding her phone in her hand, a tear sliding down her cheek. She wears argyle tights, with a rip in one knee, and a gold stud glitters at the bend of one nostril. Colette touches her arm, and the girl looks up at her.

  “I need to call my mom, but I don’t have any service.”

  “Come on,” Colette says, taking the girl by the arm. “Walk with me.” She keeps her hand on the girl’s elbow, guiding her forward. When they get to the first car, she’s relieved to see that the front half is in a station; they won’t have to walk along the tracks. She waits her turn to exit, and then she and the girl begin to run with the rest of the crowd, down the platform, through the turnstiles, and up the stairs. The girl disappears in a swarm of people, and Colette sprints away from the subway entrance. On the next block she sees someone exiting a cab and dashes toward it, stepping in front of a man about to climb in the back seat.

  “I’m sorry,” she says. “I need to get home.”

  She slams the door against the horrible names the man is calling her, the sound of his fists banging the window. “Brooklyn,” she says to the driver, giving him her address. “Please hurry.”

  She closes her eyes, and it seems like hours have passed when they arrive at her building. The sky is drained of light, and her legs are weak as she goes inside, approaching the doorman’s desk. “I need Sonya’s apartment number.”

  On the second floor she tries to compose herself, and then knocks gently on Sonya’s door. There’s no answer. She keeps banging, so hard her fists ache.

  “Hello? Sonya?” The door across the hall opens. It’s a man in his late twenties, a small dog nipping at his heels behind him, classical music playing in the background.

  “What are you doing?” he asks, easing the dog back into the apartment with a bare heel.

  “She’s not answering her door. She has my baby. I live upstairs.”

  “She left.”

  “Left?”

  “Yeah, I heard her go out. You can hear everything through these walls.”

  “What time?”

  “I don’t know. Twenty minutes ago?”

  Twenty minutes? Did Charlie have milk to leave her? Did he give her the sunscreen? Colette doesn’t know this woman’s phone number. She’s not even sure of her last name.

  She turns and runs up the stairs, taking the steps two by two. She’ll call Charlie, disturb his meeting, demand he come home and help look for the baby. She hunts for her phone in her bag and enters the key into the lock.

  Charlie.

  He’s there, lying on the floor next to Poppy, who is reaching for her toes on the play mat at his side. Colette drops her bag and rushes to the baby, lifting her from the mat, kissing her face so eagerly, Poppy whimpers with annoyance. Charlie’s breath is raspy; he’s fallen asleep. Poppy nuzzles the warm skin of Colette’s chest, rooting for milk. Colette feels the full weight of her exhaustion, the room shifting around her. She closes her eyes, imagining lying down next to Charlie, curling against him, and telling him everything. About what happened on the subway, about losing the job. About the terror she’s been feeling, the desperate need to know that Midas is still alive. She wants to tell him about her guilt over being away from the baby, about how hard she’s been working trying to hold it all together. She wants to wake him up and tell him she can’t wait three months until Poppy’s next appointment to start worrying. She’s already terrified.

  But she’s too afraid. Afraid that if she begins, she’ll start to cry and never stop, that she’ll be swallowed by her sadness, her fear, how overwhelmed she is, how certain she is that everything she has is slipping away.

  “Do you have to do that right here, in front of me like that?” The sound of Charlie’s voice sends a jolt through her body. He’s awake.

  “Do what?”

  “That. Be all over her.” She doesn’t say anything. She doesn’t have the words to respond. “It’s not easy watching how affectionate you are with her when you pull away every time I touch you.”

  “Charlie, no. Please. I thought—you have the—”

  “I didn’t go.”

  “Why?”

  He stands and walks down the hall toward his office. “I knew how upset you would be if I left the baby. I didn’t want to do that to you.”

  She follows him, reaching for his arm, but he pulls away. “Not now, Colette. I need some time.”

  “Charlie. I’m sorry. Listen, there’s some things—”

  But he’s already closed the door.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Day Eleven

  To: May Mothers

  From: Your friends at The Village

  Date: July 15

  Subject: Today’s advice

  Your baby: Day 62

  We’ve all had a few particularly frazzled days, even moments of feeling sad and overwhelmed. Those feelings should be lifting by now as you and your little one settle into a routine. But if you—or someone you love—are beginning to wonder if what you’re feeling is more than the baby blues, don’t let embarrassment or pride keep you from talking to your doctor. Getting help for yourself can sometimes be the best thing you can do for your baby.

  Francie strolls slowly through the narrow fiction aisle in the bookstore at the back of the Spot, Charlie’s debut novel in her hands, trying to convince herself that everything is going to be fine, that Nell will get through this. Francie had no idea about any of the things the newscasters were saying about Nell. She wasn’t even aware of the scandal—the presidential candidate who dropped out of the race after having an affair with a twenty-two-year-old State Department intern. Francie was sixteen when it happened, and her mom wasn’t the type to expose her family to political sex scandals (or anything to do with a Democratic politician, good or bad).

  And then there is Token. The way he roughly led her out of his apartment two days ago without offering any explanation of his arrest, raising only more questions.

  The worst, however, is what happened this morning. Francie walks to the front of the store to pay for Charlie’s book, feeling another wave of queasiness as she envisions the moment. Barbara was sitting on the sofa, watching television, waiting for Francie, who had offered to make Barbara the runny egg sandwich she ate every morning. Francie was doing her best to tune out her mother-in-law, who was going on about gossip from back home. How her friend’s niece just had her fourth child, a darling little girl. How there was
a new nail salon that opened in town, where Barbara had gotten her nails done for the trip. How it was staffed by four women who were probably in the country illegally. Orientals.

  Francie heard Colette’s name just as the toaster popped. She turned to look at the TV, seeing Colette on the screen, jogging down the sidewalk near her apartment building, red-faced and breathless. “Leave me alone,” Colette said, hurrying past the cameras, her arms shielding her face. “I have no comment.”

  “Colette Yates is the daughter of Rosemary Carpenter, the well-known women’s rights activist,” the reporter said. “She’s also romantically involved with the novelist Charlie Ambrose, with whom she had a child two months ago.” Colette was one of the women with Winnie at the bar that night, the reporter went on to say, and while a source reported that Colette was close to Mayor Shepherd, he wouldn’t comment on the story. And then suddenly they were talking about her—Francie. They even had a photo of her, one from the night at the Jolly Llama, her face pressed against Nell’s.

  The reporter added that Francie was a stay-at-home mother, and the moment that Lowell walked into the kitchen, Francie heard Barbara’s gasp. “Her husband, Lowell Givens, is one of the principal owners of Givens and Light Architects, a young Brooklyn firm.”

  “This is awful,” Barbara said, ignoring Francie, looking straight at Lowell. “What is this going to mean for your business?”

  Francie hands the money to the clerk, knowing she shouldn’t be buying Charlie’s book, that she should have waited to get it from the library. But the library doesn’t open until noon, and her apartment is so small, and she needed to get out, away from Barbara and the look on her face. The judgment. The disappointment.

  Francie takes her change and turns to look for a table. And then she sees her, on the sidewalk outside.

  She wears sunglasses and a long, shapeless jacket, and her hair is tucked under a baseball cap, but Francie knows it’s her.

  “Winnie!”

  The word escapes Francie more loudly than she expected, silencing the crowd waiting for their coffee. Francie careens through them, running out the door, out onto the sidewalk. “Winnie! Wait, Winnie!”

  Pressing Will against her chest, she jogs awkwardly after Winnie, who is walking quickly up the hill. “Winnie, wait, please!” She doesn’t understand why Winnie isn’t stopping. Will begins to whine as Francie breaks into a run after her, reaching her just before she arrives at her building. Winnie is scrambling inside her bag for her keys. “Winnie, please. I need to talk to you. I’ve been so worried.” Francie tries to catch her breath. “Have you gotten my messages? I’m so sorry we—”

  A car screeches to a halt, the two front tires veering onto the sidewalk a few feet away. A short, overweight man wearing a fedora and plaid shorts jumps from the driver’s seat, grabbing for the bulky camera around his neck. “Gwendolyn! Look this way. How are you? Gwendolyn!”

  Winnie rushes to insert her key into the door, and Francie follows her, stumbling over the step and into the cool, darkened foyer. Winnie presses the door closed on the man’s fists, and Francie trails her up the four marble stairs and down the hall, the flash of his camera lighting the walls. Thick silk curtains are drawn in the living room, and Francie is overcome by the staleness of the air and the stench of decomposing food. Winnie wrenches open the curtains on the terrace doors, and it takes Francie a minute to adjust to the shock of sunlight. Two large rugs are rolled into coils, propped up against the far wall. Packing boxes are piled haphazardly in the corner. Food containers are scattered on the table and floor; an empty bottle of wine lies on its side near the doors to the terrace. Francie can’t help but notice the two wineglasses nearby, next to a pink silk robe, discarded in a ball.

  Winnie removes her jacket. She looks skeletal. “I’ve gotten your messages. I’m sorry. I haven’t had the energy to call you back.”

  Francie stands in the center of the room, patting Will’s bottom, trying to catch her breath. “Winnie. I don’t know what to say. Are you—are you moving?”

  “Moving?” Winnie says.

  Francie gestures at the rolled-up rug, the packing boxes. “The boxes—”

  “Oh.” Winnie’s eyes flit around the room. “The team of detectives did all this. In the days after . . .” She allows the thought to trail off. “I saw what happened to Nell. And now you and Colette. You’re in the news.”

  “Us? Don’t worry about us. How are you? I can’t—”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Fine?” Francie has trouble finding any other words, stunned by how different Winnie appears. So gaunt. Hollow. Nothing like the woman Francie admired so much, just a few months ago, when Francie first noticed her walking across the lawn toward the willow tree, ripe with pregnancy. Nothing at all like the beautiful, kind woman who’d sat across from Francie that day at the Spot, or the fresh-faced girl in the Bluebird DVDs Francie has watched again and again.

  “What do you want me to say, Francie?” Winnie says. “My baby is gone. There’s nothing I can say to describe what I’m going through.”

  Francie feels the tears beginning to well in her eyes. I understand, she wants to say. More than you know, I understand what it’s like to lose a child. But she doesn’t dare. “Is there anything I can do to help? Anything you need? Do you have any idea what happened?” The words are tumbling out too quickly.

  Winnie turns toward the terrace doors. “Of course I don’t know what happened.”

  “I’ve been giving it a lot of thought,” Francie says. “I can’t believe how much the police have screwed this up. At first I was sure it was Bodhi Mogaro. I believed them, you know. And then I began to think about other possibilities. Like that guy you were talking to at the bar.”

  Winnie turns to look at her, a glimmer of something, Francie can’t place it, in her eyes. Or maybe it’s her face, and the way she’s speaking. It seems so stilted, empty.

  “The guy at the bar?”

  “The one who came up to you that night. The one who you— The one you had a drink with.”

  “I didn’t have a drink with anyone that night.”

  Will settles, resting his head on Francie’s chest, and she has to battle an urge to leave. Why is Winnie lying to her? “Then where were you? After you left the table?”

  Winnie avoids Francie’s eyes, and then appears not to hear what she’d said. Instead she turns and walks to the kitchen, returning with a bottle of wine and two plastic cups. She pours the wine, handing a cup to Francie. Francie accepts it, but she doesn’t move, seeing Winnie at the last May Mothers meeting in the park, her lips in Midas’s hair, waving away the wine Nell offered. No thanks. Alcohol doesn’t always agree with me.

  “I went to the park,” Winnie says.

  “The park? Why?”

  “To visit my mom.” The cup trembles in Winnie’s hand.

  “Your mom? But Winnie, your mom is dead.”

  Winnie shoots Francie a look. “Thank you, Francie. I’m aware of that.” She takes a drink of her wine. “There’s a dogwood tree there that my dad and I brought from our property upstate. We planted it in the park one night, at my mom’s favorite spot, near the long meadow. It’s this secret thing I’ve always had, a place to feel close to her. I went there that night.”

  “Why?”

  “I miss her.” Winnie opens the door to the terrace and steps onto the wide balcony. Francie follows. The shrill laughter of children playing in a sandbox in the backyard of a day-care center a few buildings down pierces the heavy air around them. Pots of dead herbs line the rail. “It’s not a great alibi.”

  “Alibi? What do you mean?”

  “That I was at the park. Nobody saw me. I know what people are saying. I know where—” She takes another mouthful of wine. “I would never hurt my baby.”

  Francie remembers the cup in her hand and takes a sip, trying to swallow, despite the growing lump in her throat.

  “I thought the worst thing that would ever happen was losing my mom. I wa
s wrong.” Francie reaches for Winnie’s arm, but she moves away. “I don’t want any more questions. I can’t think rationally, linearly. Time is running in circles.” Her face appears to harden as she notices something in the distance. Francie looks and sees a woman standing on a small balcony across the backyard, a baby resting on a blanket on her shoulder, watering a box of pink zinnias. The woman places the watering can on the ground and prunes some of the plants before stepping inside, closing the door behind her.

  “Mothers and babies. You’re everywhere. I hope you appreciate everything you have.” Winnie tips back the cup of wine, swallowing the last of it, and then peers down at Will. “I don’t want to be rude, Francie, but I can’t really deal with—”

  Francie is flooded with regret. Why didn’t she think of this? Of how selfish and insensitive it was to force Winnie to see Will. How difficult it must be for Winnie each day, surrounded by the sight of mothers with their children. She understands now why Winnie ran away from her outside the coffee shop.

  “I’m sorry, Winnie,” Francie says. “I should have been more considerate.” They walk inside, and Francie closes the terrace door. Winnie’s back is turned to Francie as she ascends the stairs.

  “You can let yourself out.”

  “If there’s anything you need—” Francie pauses. “He’s alive, Winnie. I can feel it. Please. Don’t give up hope. I haven’t.”

  Winnie turns the corner at the top, disappearing down a hall.

  Francie walks unsteadily through the living room, past another stack of moving boxes—saddened by the idea of strangers combing through Winnie’s house, their hands on her possessions—and opens the door to the sidewalk. She walks, unsure of where she’s going, becoming aware of the sound of steps running toward her. The guy in the fedora is rushing from the corner, his camera covering his face. “Hey! Mary Frances! What did Winnie say—” The shutter of his camera clicks relentlessly, and he yells out questions, but Francie pays him no attention as she keeps walking, her head bent toward the sidewalk, her arms shielding her baby, her mind foggy.