The Beaver looked on approvingly. “You’re doing an outstanding job. So attentive, so in tune with your baby’s needs.”
Carrot burped and a thin stream of milk trickled from her mouth onto Sara’s already stained lounge pants. Sara dabbed at the baby’s lips with a cloth then allowed her to return to the bottle. Carrot drank greedily, grumbling between swallows.
Eyeing Sara’s pants, the Beaver asked, “Don’t you ever get time to yourself? Where is your mother?”
Sara explained that during her third trimester of pregnancy, her parents had moved to the Caribbean. “I’m happy for them, really. They’ve worked hard all their lives; they should enjoy their retirement,” said Sara, which was what she always said, and how she sort of felt.
“You would think that enjoying their retirement would mean spending quality time with their granddaughter,” said the Beaver, which was something Sara never said, but did sometimes feel.
“My parents disappoint me, too,” said the Beaver. Sara asked him how, and he described his father’s temper and his mother’s coldness. The Beaver complained about his wife, her hyper-sensitivity, and their constant bickering.
“Ben and I don’t spend enough time with each other to fight,” said Sara. It was a good talk, the kind of open-hearted truth-telling conversation that transforms strangers into friends.
They spent the rest of the day together, and when the Beaver left, Sara was sorry to see him go.
◙
On Tuesday morning, the world outside was frozen solid. The tree branches and pine needles glistened in the sunlight as if they were sealed in glass. Every so often, icicles crashed upon the roof.
In the living room, two small Beavers were playing tag.
“Mrs. Beaver has the flu, so I had to get these rascals out of the house,” said the Beaver. Before Sara could respond, he hugged her calf and said, “You’re a lifesaver.”
Sara took Carrot into the kitchen, fixed breakfast and a bottle, and turned on Free to Be…You and Me, an album Sara had loved as a child. It was nice, the crystalized world outside the window, the toasted bread smell of the kitchen, the dishwasher humming, and countertop sparkling.
“Parents are People” started playing, a song about how mommies can be anything they want to be: ranchers or poetry makers or doctors or teachers or cleaners or bakers.
Sara’s mommy had been a scientist, the only working mother on their block. She had been surprised and disappointed when Sara had quit her job after Carrot was born. Sara had explained over the phone that she wanted to stay at home with her baby, felt fortunate that she could.
“I’m just not sure it’s healthy for you, being cooped up alone in the house with a baby all day,” warned her mother.
Her father agreed, “In most societies, childcare is shared work. But whatever makes you happy.”
They had invited Sara, Ben, and Carrot to visit them on their Virgin Islands estate, a handsome terra-cotta villa built into the side of a remote tropical mountain. Their home overlooked Coral Bay, a Neverland lagoon, where rich retired Baby Boomers played with pirate ships.
But, Ben couldn’t get time off work, and anyway, Sara’s parents drove him crazy. He’d said Sara and Carrot could go without him, but Sara didn’t feel right abandoning him alone at home.
Sara heard a loud crash from upstairs, so she picked up Carrot, went to investigate, and stiffened when she saw the overturned bookcase, the picture books strewn across the nursery floor. One of the Beaver’s sons was tearing apart Where the Wild Things Are; the other was hunched over the bookcase, gnawing at a shelf.
Sara felt her face flush and her scalp tingle. She wanted to grab the little beasts and chuck them across the room.
The Beaver rushed in. “I’m so sorry. I was just resting my eyes.” He frowned at his boys. “Little buddies, what were you thinking?”
Sara took a deep breath. She told the Beaver not to worry. She put Carrot in her crib and began straightening up the room. The baby jerked her limbs and said, “Ack ack ack.”
“Just a minute, baby girl,” promised Sara, trying to keep the irritation out of her voice.
“Are you OK?” asked the Beaver.
“Sometimes, I think Carrot might be better off in daycare or with a nanny,” said Sara.
“Why? You’re a wonderful mother,” said the Beaver.
“I love Carrot,” said Sara. I just hate myself, she thought.
She didn’t really hate herself. Or, at least, not always. She was just tired. Most nights, Ben slept through Carrot’s crying, while Sara was startled wide awake.
The house glowed eerily in the dark. The nursery, so cheery and innocent by day, became haunted after hours. Sara tried to ignore the pin-eyed teddy bears and nodding dolls, the rocking horse with its muzzled grimace. Carrot’s room smelled of stale diapers and medicinal creams, and Sara imagined how it might feel to be a baby in a crib, helpless as a turtle on its back. While Carrot mouthed the rubber nipple, Sara studied her own hands—those pale slabs of meat. Deep in the night, she could hardly even feel them as they held the bottle or tapped the baby’s back. Sometimes, it was like the hands belonged to somebody else.
◙
Wednesday morning, Ben overslept and was late leaving for work. Sara and Carrot walked him to the front door, and when he opened it, the Beaver was waiting on the porch.
Sara held her breath, wondered what her husband would say. But Ben simply kissed his wife and daughter goodbye and walked out the door, as if the Beaver wasn’t even there.
After breakfast, Sara discovered a half dozen beavers in the living room. She wanted to ask the Beaver about them, but he was nowhere to be found. So, Sara grabbed supplies, and she and Carrot camped out in the nursery with the door locked.
Sara sang Carrot songs, read her books, gave her tummy time. She tried to ignore the skittering of claws outside the door. She tried not to notice the sounds of tearing and scratching.
All day, Sara waited for the Beaver to knock, to check on them. But he never came.
In the early evening, the beavers finally left. The house was a wreck. Ben was due home at any moment.
Sara put Carrot in her crib and turned on the mobile, a gift from Sara’s parents. It lit up and began rotating. Electronic organ music played. The googly-eyed monkey leered at the demented circus clown. The lion chased the pony.
Carrot stared, completely rapt, and Sara wondered if the baby was fascinated or terrified.
Sara vacuumed up the coarse dark beaver hair from the living room carpet. She reunited the cushions with the sofa. Next to the piano, the beavers had constructed a mound of shredded newsprint, broken sticks, wood chips, and toilet paper. When Sara came close to it, she gagged at the smell: like rotting worms and fish tank slime.
She stuffed everything into heavy-duty trash bags, then washed her hands for a long time under steaming water. When she’d finished, her hands looked pink and swollen—a pair of floating, boneless, hag fish.
◙
On Thursday morning, three beavers in the kitchen were molesting the Tupperware, two were wrestling beneath the dining room table, one was pleasuring itself in the bath tub, and six or seven were running around aimlessly while screaming like wild animals.
Sara found the Beaver snoring in the pantry. She wanted to stomp on his furry little head. She wanted to shake him until his bones rattled in his pelt. But then, she remembered how the Beaver had asked, “Are you OK?” with such concern.
Sara had to get out of the house. She grabbed Carrot and fled, leaving so quickly she forgot to pack diapers and formula.
Eight hours later, when they finally returned, the beavers were gone. Sara settled Carrot in front of the TV and hurried about trying to straighten up before her husband came home. How could she ever explain such a mess?
◙
That night, when Ben slid his hands under Sara’s nightgown, she imagined the Beaver’s face floating up before her, as if from the bottom of a well. She squeezed her eyes s
hut and tried to concentrate on the two human bodies in bed. But, she couldn’t clear her head of tails, claws and fur, quivering whiskers and twitching ears, impossibly rapid animal heartbeats.
◙
Friday morning, Sara and Carrot attended their first “Mommy and Me” music class. The teacher played guitar and sang songs like “Wiggly Piggly” and “Rock Around the Alphabet” while the mommies, daddies, and (mostly) nannies waltzed, skipped, and marched their babies around the room.
Sara felt silly.
Carrot appeared astonished.
One of the other mothers recognized Sara from prenatal yoga. She asked for Sara’s number and promised to call.
“That would be great,” said Sara, and it would be. A mom-friend. Her first.
Driving home, Sara planned the play date: mid-morning, a fresh pot of coffee, mini muffins. They could take pictures of the babies lying side by side on the play mat. Hopefully her friend, like Ben, wouldn’t notice the beavers. But how would Sara explain the wiry hairs, the fishy stench, the weird piles of sticks?
Back at the house, there were beavers everywhere. Paw and tail prints covered the floors, furniture, and lower portions of the walls. The windows were fogged from hot mammal breath.
Sara found the Beaver in the kitchen, squatting on the countertop, his head in the sink. He was lapping water directly from the faucet.
“There are too many beavers in this house,” she told him. He raised his head to look at her. Water dribbled from his whiskers. Before he could answer, one of his sons scurried across the countertop and accidentally overturned the knife block. Knives flew through the air, and when they landed, one sliced off the tip of his brother’s tail.
“See?” Sara shouted at the Beaver.
The Beaver ignored her, grabbed a dishtowel, rushed to his screeching son, and tied a tail tourniquet.
Sara took Carrot and her computer into the master bedroom, locked the door, and Googled “How to get rid of beavers.”
At Professional Wildlife Removal, Sara read: “There is no magic spray or device that you can use to make them go away.” On a threaded discussion board at Homesteading Today, she found much innuendo about female anatomy and several recommendations for dynamite and lead poisoning; “Alligators work well too.”
As she researched, Sara’s long hair kept falling across her face; it was driving her crazy. She left Carrot on the bed and went to the dresser to find an elastic.
As she pulled her hair into a sloppy ponytail, she heard the sickening thud of a baby hitting the floor.
After a breathless moment of silence, Carrot began to wail.
Sara hugged her daughter to her chest and walked her around the bedroom. “I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry,” she whispered to Carrot, too afraid to examine her child’s head for lumps or bruises.
What made her think she could care for an infant, she who had never even held a baby before Carrot was born? Sara walked Carrot down the hallway, shushing and apologizing. The pediatrician had warned her not to leave the baby on a high surface, unattended. What had she been thinking?
Beavers rushed by, brushing against her legs, nearly tripping her.
Why didn’t she hire a babysitter like a normal person? Why didn’t she return to work where she couldn’t hurt anybody? Why didn’t she cut her hair short like a good mother? And why were there so many Goddamn beavers in the house?
Sara went downstairs to the kitchen and picked up the phone. She intended to call her husband, but then she remembered he was in meetings all day. Sara put down the phone.
She started picking up the knives from the kitchen floor. The shiny steel blades distracted Carrot, and she finally stopped crying.
In the silence, all Sara could hear was the gnawing and thumping of the beavers in the other room.
One of the knives was crusted with blood from the tail slicing. Sara held onto that knife and, carrying Carrot, walked slowly into the living room.
The animals stopped what they were doing and formed a loose circle around Sara and Carrot. Squeezing the steel handle so tightly her knuckles turned white, Sara said, “You need to get out of my house.”
The Beaver stepped forward and asked, “Is Carrot all right? I thought I heard her crying.”
Sara glared at him and said, “She’s fine. Now, get the hell out.”
“Sara, please. Watch your language,” said the Beaver, covering his injured son’s ears.
Sara took a step closer to the Beaver, brandishing the knife.
The Beaver’s son took a step closer to Sara, brandishing ten sharp claws. Then, he leapt upward and slashed Carrot’s leg.
Sara remembered how, before Carrot was even born, the ultrasound technician had admired those beautiful baby legs.
Sara growled, low and mean.
The Beaver’s son turned to run, but before he could get away Sara sliced off the rest of his tail.
Oh shit, she thought. She had only meant to nick it, to show she meant business, to scare them all away.
The severed tail was leaking blood onto the beige carpet. It looked like a raw slab of meat, like a war offering, and Sara wondered if she should put it on ice, so that it might be sewn back on later. She tried to remember where she had last seen the Nature’s Miracle stain remover.
But, all other thoughts disappeared when Sara saw the Beavers: their eyes were hard, and their teeth were bared, and they were coming at her.
The hair on the back of Sara’s neck stood up, and the knife handle felt slippery in her slick palm.
Sara asked, “Can we talk?”
But the Beavers didn’t answer. They scratched and bit at her bare feet.
Instinctively, Sara kicked at the animals, slashed at them with steel. She sliced another tail, and the rodent squealed.
Ugh, what sort of an example she was setting for Carrot? Sara was a strict ovo-lacto vegetarian, a Sierra Club member, a Prius Driver, a Moby fan. She wanted to teach her daughter to plant beans, to like Daddy Long Legs, to recycle paper, to love Charlotte and Wilbur.
But who had time to worry about that? Certainly not Sara—the sudden target of all those tree-cutting teeth and Freddy Krueger claws.
One thing they never tell you before you become a parent is that it’s hard to fight while holding a crying baby. Sara wished she could call a brief “Time Out,” just so she could grab the Baby Bjorn carrier.
Then a sudden, sharp pain in the small of her back made Sara whirl around. It was the Beaver.
“You!” said Sara. “I’ve had it with you. You’re a terrible friend and an irresponsible father.”
“You’re one to talk. You do not give Carrot enough tummy time. You let her watch too much TV. You’re moody and inconsistent and—”
Sara was about to interrupt his rant with a deep cut to the throat, when she heard the front door open and Ben call, “Honey, I’m home.”
The beavers turned and fled—a quick moving stream of matted fur, crusted blood, and briny sweat.
Sara glanced down at her lounge pants, now reduced to shredded rags.
Ben walked into the living room and stared at his wife and baby.
“I know how this must look,” said Sara, unsure about what to do with the knife.
Ben dropped his briefcase to the floor.
Kelly A. Harmon on Shirley Jackson's
“The Lottery”
Written in 1948, Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” begins almost benignly. A small town gathers together excited (and nervous) to prepare for the lottery, a decades-old tradition intended to ensure a good harvest. The excitement’s almost party-like, and it feels as though this story is going to be about something wholesome and uplifting in rural America. Then, the lottery box comes out. One man from each family takes a slip of paper from the box to determine if his family is chosen. Then, each member of the chosen family draws from the box. The one holding the marked lot is immediately stoned to death by the community. It seems so mundane on the surface, which makes it e
ven more terrifying. What’s more horrific than knowing your friends—your family—are willing to kill you to promote their own well-being, based on the strength of an old proverb: Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon?
◙◙◙
Lucky Clover
Kelly A. Harmon
“Any idea where we are?” Mick asked. He took another drag off his Camel, turned up the Ramones on his buzzing speakers, and pushed the accelerator to the floor. The car leapt forward in a burst of speed, then settled into a noisy rumble down the highway.
Sean shook the accordion pleats out of the road map and tried to decipher how lost they were. Unfolding the map between the passenger window and the gear stick proved nearly impossible with his seat pushed so far forward. Mick’s boxes and bags filled the small hatchback to the sagging headliner. The top-left corner of the map flapped in the gale-force wind blowing through Mick’s wide-open window and didn’t help matters.
“Maryland,” Sean answered, head buried in the map. He traced a blue line south to north across the center fold. The road pitched north on the map, but Interstate 70 ran east to west. They were headed in the wrong direction.
Thanks to Mick, they’d lost at least two hours.
“Smartass,” Mick said. “We’ve been in Maryland for almost an hour. Even I figured that out.” He sucked hard on the cigarette, smoking it down to the filter, and then flicked it out the window. “This is the last time I’m taking you on a road trip,” he added, shaking his head. “Can’t take you anywhere without you getting us lost.”
Sean knew better than to argue. He already regretted having agreed to the trip. He was tired of taking the blame for all that had gone wrong. And tired of shelling out dough for everything, especially gasoline, since Mick felt he’d done his part by driving. At least, Mick bought his own cigarettes; Mick’s two to three packs a day would have bankrupted him. No wonder Mick didn’t have the cash to pay for anything else.
Deep Cuts Page 20
