Later, I had to explain that Mosey hated her sweater, so I’d cut it off. I did not explain about the glowing wings, steaming heat, or my almost overwhelming urge to release our cat to the forces of nature and hope that she found her way to the coyotes in the nearby wetlands.
Kris had stopped taking her old azithromycin prescription after seven days. Despite her earlier trust, she’d done her own Googling, which had triggered a stream of fear-inducing Facebook ads. The symptoms had vanished within a week, and my wife had figured she was safe. Without mentioning it, I took the remaining three days of doses for myself and hoped for the best.
Relations between the cat and me have not improved. She no longer wants in my lap, and I’m fine with that. I shoo her away from Tommy whenever Kris is out of sight. Mosey goes out of her way to evict poor Sam from whatever bed he’s in, and he’s lost claim to his favorite spot on the couch by the front door. The cat increasingly cozies up to Kris, which makes Kris happy. However, it always seems to me that Mosey surreptitiously sniffs at my wife’s belly whenever she’s being pet, as if sniffing at meat. When Kris notices this, she does the whole “awww” routine, which inspires Tommy to throw his arms around the cat and his mom for a big group hug.
“Are you ready to have a baby sister?” she’ll ask Mosey. “Madison can’t wait to meet you, too.”
If Madison had seen what I’ve seen, I bet she could wait.
January 9
The cramps started around mid-afternoon. I remember because I had John on a call, with him coaching me on what questions to ask my 4:00 SME interview. It was the senior technical marketing manager, who had the ear of the VP who controlled the quarterly budget, and I needed to keep this guy happy. Never mind that I’d been trying to reach him since early December. Now it was urgent.
Kris appeared in my office doorway, pale and doubled over. Sam stood at her side, tail between his legs. I rushed John off the phone, which he definitely noticed and was none too pleased about.
Kris and I tried walking. We tried laying down. The contractions were only getting stronger, and they were coming about every twenty minutes. We called the hospital. The nurse said to wait and see.
I asked Kris what I could do for her, and she said P.F. Chang’s. God knew the next time we’d be able to go out, and she had a craving for Chinese. My brain did the thing: $50, or $60 with a decent tip. I smiled and nodded.
After placing our order at 3:50, I called John from my car and told him I would miss the call because Kris was probably going into labor. I asked him to fill in for me and please record it. He didn’t explode as I expected. Instead, after a very long silence, he told me he’d get Eric Vandenburg to write the piece and hung up.
That white paper was worth $3,000. It was almost half of the revenue I’d expected for the month.
I could barely think. My hands shook as I gripped the wheel. I tried to take deep breaths and couldn’t. When I reached the restaurant, I pulled into a parking spot, turned off the car, and stared at the steering wheel for several minutes, hands balling into and out of fists.
My phone rang. It was Kris. I said hello, hoping she couldn’t hear the trembling in my voice.
“Hey, have you left there yet?”
I said I was just getting back to the car.
“Could you grab some extra of that Mongolian barbeque sauce?”
I told her no problem.
She thanked me, and I thought my wife was about to hang up when she said, “Dan, you are the best thing to ever happen in my life. I don’t know where I or the family would be without you. I love you so much, honey. We’re all gonna be fine.”
My throat closed up. I managed to swallow through the tightness, just enough to say, “I feel the same way, honey. I’ll be right home.”
I hit the end button, then the tears came all at once, sudden, wracking, and overwhelming. For what felt like a very long time, I was powerless to stop. I wondered if I ever could. I didn’t even cry like that when my dad died.
Eventually, the spasms passed. My breathing calmed. I wiped my face dry. When I finally had myself under control, I knew I looked like hell. Fortunately, the restaurant was dimly lit. I avoided all eye contact, and no one seemed to peer too closely.
I arrived home with a large bag of food, feeling drained. No…I felt vacuous, as if there was nothing left in me but fumes. I couldn’t have shared my thoughts with Kris then, even if I’d wanted to. This was her moment, her pain and transformation and triumph. I couldn’t steal that from her. This time, I would do it right. I had at least that much power.
We spent dinner alternately feeding Tommy and making phone calls. We let the hospital know we were down to fifteen-minute intervals, and they said to come in when we were ready. We double-checked the bags we’d prepped for the hospital, including my laptop, just in case there was down time. We packed Tommy’s and Sam’s bags, as we were dropping them at the Allens on the way. We topped off the automatic pet food and water feeder we’d bought a month ago for this occasion. We called Kris’s mom in Idaho, because we’d never hear the end of it if we didn’t.
I helped Kris into the passenger seat, belatedly realizing I’d left a formidable collection of balled up tissues in the driver-side door’s bin. For the moment, she didn’t notice them.
My heart started to race as I strapped Tommy into his car seat and the time for leaving drew close. I’d grown up as an only child, but now I would be a father of two. I didn’t know how to do that, any more than I’d known how to be a father to one. I knew that the odds of infant mortality in the U.S. were nearly six in every thousand, and maternal mortality rates were twenty-four in every hundred thousand. We were nearly broke and increasingly in debt. And, I realized as I glanced down the street, it was garbage night. If I didn’t deal with it, Kris would only worry about it stinking for another week and potentially drawing Mosey into it.
“Honey,” I said, “do we have two more minutes? I need to get the garbage out.”
Kris nodded through another contraction, face contorted. “Just be quick. And get Sam.”
Jesus, I’d forgotten about the dog. How was that possible?
I jogged to the side of the house and pulled the large blue bin down the driveway, jamming it into place along the curb. Through the front door, my first stop would be the main garbage in the kitchen, and I’d use the space in that large bag to round up all the smaller cans in the house. As I lifted out the kitchen bag, I heard a loud thump upstairs.
“Sam, we gotta go!” I called. “Come on!”
Another thump, and this time, faintly, I caught a whimper.
My first couple steps were uncertain, and then, as fear took hold, I dropped the bag and broke into a run. As I reached the landing, I called out, “Sam? Sam?”
The whimpering grew louder and more frantic.
Tommy’s room. I sprinted down the hall and through the doorway.
At first, I didn’t understand what I was seeing, and while my brain tried to make sense of it, the acrid smell of scorching hair assaulted my nose.
Sam was on the floor, back legs swiping frantically. Mosey straddled the back of his neck, and her wings wrapped around Sam’s face. I could only see one of his eyes, wide and rolling with terror, pleading with me. The bones in Mosey’s wings glowed with a dull scarlet.
I ran to Sam and swiped down at Mosey. My hand struck glancingly across her back, but it only seemed to increase her resolve. Her legs and claws gripped Sam’s neck tighter. The dog’s legs whipped at the air, and he threw his head from side to side, trying to shake off his assailant. Mosey hissed.
I grabbed the cat’s collar and yanked. The clasp snapped, and I fell back. Fortunately, the force had been enough to dislodge Mosey. One more frantic toss from Sam and the cat arced up and onto Tommy’s bed.
Sam whined, pawing at his face, and ran from the room. I faced Mosey, my mind a blank of panic and rage. The cat studied me and hissed again, claws out and ready. That had been no cuddle. The cat was trying to kill Sam, my son, my
life.
In the distance, I heard the car’s horn blare twice. Come on.
Kris was in labor. We had a baby girl coming. A defenseless newborn who would need me. My child.
Hell no.
Hell. No.
I rushed the bed. Mosey saw me coming around the side and leaped from the footboard. Her wings spread, and she glided the several steps from the bed to the door.
For an instant, I could only stare. She landed on the floor, back legs first, and darted around the corner.
I know I yelled, because my throat hurt later. I don’t remember the words. My next memory is of barreling after Mosey into my office. I arrived at the doorway just in time to see her halfway across the floor, wings spreading again. Her head and shoulders hunched, and I immediately understood her intention. She would fly through the window, right above where Kris waited in the driveway.
I pursued, hand outstretched. With a wide sweep of her wings, Mosey jumped.
It might have been the hard laminate floor that saved me. I heard the quick scritch of nails, unable to find purchase. Her body stretched long as she sailed upward through the air, fully committed, dead center toward the window’s middle where it would be weakest.
Mosey’s front paws struck first, then her head. It sounded like someone had hit the window with a rock.
Her body crumpled into the glass, then fell. The window held, although a single jagged line now ran across the center pane.
Mosey lay on her side below the windowsill, dazed. Her wings and legs moved without coordination, and she blinked repeatedly, unable to focus on me.
I took one second to survey my office. There was no careful thought to it, no weighing of morality or consequences. I was overflowing with fear and adrenaline. In one moment, the coffee mug was in my hand. In the next, it was shattered, shards spinning across the floor, and Mosey’s neck was broken. I was on my knees beside her, staring at her open eyes and gaping mouth. As I struggled for breath and reason, her wing bones cooled from ruddy orange to brown and then black.
When I emerged from the front door a minute later, I had Sam’s leash in one hand and the drawstring of our white plastic kitchen garbage bag in the other. I held onto Sam as I trotted down the driveway and stuffed the garbage bag into the blue bin. As I pressed down, my hand found something soft and still warm, a dark bundle barely visible through the plastic.
I loaded Sam into the back. I’d brushed the singed fur from his face, and I thought he appeared normal enough to pass a casual inspection. Another few seconds might have done substantial damage, but I’d reached him in time. Barely.
“Did you get lost?” Kris asked as I slid into the driver’s seat. “And what is that smell?”
“Sam was in the garbage,” I said. “Don’t worry. I took care of it.”
January 10
Nine hours of labor and three hours of pushing. Seven pounds, six ounces. My baby girl.
I won’t tell you I was wiped out. My job had been to stand there and shovel an ice chip into Kris’s mouth whenever she turned her head toward me. I knew what to expect from Tommy’s birth. She’s not a screamer. She goes into a quiet place of intense concentration where she can try to contain the pain as her body rips apart.
One benefit of working from home all these years has been seeing firsthand what my wife endures to be a mother. I’ve seen every accident, demand, doubt, struggle, and aftermath. Anyone who disdains a woman who sacrifices an easy paycheck in an office to raise a family has no clue what they’re talking about. Mothers have the hardest, most thankless job in the world, and every day I live in awe of Kris’s strength. She performs feats of patience and endurance I could never match.
Madison was born with her umbilical cord wrapped around her neck. The nurse said not to worry, that it was common. Her Apgar score was low because her heart rate was slow and her feet and hands were bluish. However, after several minutes and an only partially successful attempt at breastfeeding, the delivery staff decided to send Madison to neonatal intensive care. Kris had maternal chorioamnionitis, a possible infection of the umbilical cord during labor which could then spread to the infant.
It would be fine, everyone said. Just a precaution.
My brain tried to do the thing, guessing at bigger numbers. I wouldn’t let it. I focused on Kris and Madison. My wife could barely hold her eyes open.
“I got this,” I said as I squeezed her hand. “You rest. She’s beautiful, and you’re amazing.”
“Don’t leave her,” she murmured.
I kissed my wife’s forehead. “Never.”
Thirty minutes later, we were in a room with six incubators, each filled with a baby bathed in otherworldly blue light, flanked by sensors and readouts. Two of the babies cried and strained at their swaddling. One of these was mine.
Where were the other parents? I wondered. It didn’t matter. I was here.
The attendant nurse guided me through taking Madison from the incubator to the changing table. Sure enough, the smell of meconium confirmed that she needed to be changed. No missing that. The nurse supervised and stopped me before I made the cardinal mistake of wiping from bottom to top. That only works on boys, turns out. Makes sense when you think about it, but it simply hadn’t occurred to me, and I couldn’t help but feel that the nurse’s stern expression carried judgment.
Would Kris have made that mistake? Of course not.
I got her changed and back into clean swaddling. The nurse beckoned to the empty incubator, but I glanced at one of the room’s empty chairs.
“Just a couple minutes?” I asked. “I want to meet my baby.”
The nurse pursed her lips and studied Madison’s face, but she agreed.
We sat together. Apparently, my swaddling skills need refreshing, because she managed to wriggle one hand out of the folds. I could already tell her color was improving. She blinked at me, lumpy, wrinkled face reminding me of a Shar Pei puppy. I grinned like a helpless idiot as she gripped my index finger and squeezed.
When she released me, I stroked the dark-brown wisps of hair back from her forehead. “I got you, baby girl,” I whispered. “My beautiful little Madison.”
Her face crinkled as she started to fuss. I rocked her in the crook of my arm.
“Shh-shh-ssshhhh,” I soothed. “Shh-shh-ssshhhh.”
Her discomfort intensified.
“She probably needs to sleep,” said the nurse. “Let’s try giving her a break.”
Worried but willing to follow the nurse’s suggestion, I tucked Madison’s arm back into the blanket and carried her to her incubator. I slowly lowered the wriggling bundle.
My fingers brushed along her back as she settled on the little mattress. I froze. The nurse asked if I was all right.
“Yes,” I think I said, although I might have said nothing.
My fingertips explored. I knew what Tommy had felt like as a newborn. I’d put in the countless hours, whether or not anyone remembered them. I knew.
I knew the bulges of Madison’s shoulder blades were too thick.
William spends half his time writing sci-fi and fantasy and half writing content for tech companies. And another half raising kids and dogs. Oh, and another half doting on his incredible wife of 24 years. William suspects he has bitten off more than prudent, and he’s bad at math.
Find out more at williamvanwinkle.com.
23
Sashelle’s Quest
by Julia Huni
One kitten’s quest to prove herself and save the planet.
Sashelle slunk across the rough stone outcropping. Far below, trees stretched to the horizon, but anything could be hiding in that forest. She crept to the sheer edge and dropped, the loose rock digging into her belly. The sun beat down, and the smaller moon hung pale and low in the sky.
Her ears swiveled, zeroing in on the crashing, ripping, chewing sounds. She stretched forward, until her nose hung over the void. Her whiskers twitched.
There.
Humans.
Sashelle ghosted into the forest surrounding her perch. The trees were thick here, but a path wound between them allowing her to make speed. She let her subconscious identify and track the other creatures as she passed, concentrating on the fastest route.
When she arrived in the clearing, the queen lay in a patch of sunlight. She opened one eye at Sashelle’s approach. Stealth is not your strong suit.
Sashelle took a deep breath. The queen knew exactly how to get under her fur. She suspected it was a required trait in royalty.
I deemed speed more important, O Great One, Sashelle replied.
The queen sat up and groomed a paw. What is so important it must interrupt my morning solitude?
Humans, Sashelle said. Humans have infringed on the pride’s lands. They are ripping out trees to extend their dirt.
The queen’s paw dropped to the grass and her eyes flashed. You must stop them.
Me? Sashelle’s eyes went wide, and her whiskers twitched.
You. You know where they are and what they’re doing. This will be your quest. The queen turned away and leapt to the top of a large boulder. She paced across the flattened top and stretched out in the sunshine. Leave me now. Her eyes closed
But—I haven’t been out of the pride’s lands before, Sashelle protested. I don’t even know how to get down there.
The queen’s ears perked. Really?
I—I guess I can find them.
I’m sure you can, the queen replied. But no matter. There are plenty of other kittens to do my bidding.
No! Sashelle jumped up onto the boulder. Every kitten had to complete a quest to become a full member of the pride. This was her chance. I can do it!
One of the queen’s brilliant green eyes opened, pinning her with a stare.
Sashelle backed off the boulder and dropped to the ground. She rolled onto her back and tipped her head back in a submissive position and silent apology.
Hellcats: Anthology Page 37
