“It is,” Maren said, her mouth puckering. “Abigail was passed around like a holiday ham, if you trust the black book. Father’s joy, is one meaning. Abigail.”
“And you are… Miss… do you have a last name?”
“I do. I don’t share it.”
“Oh. Sorry, I was just trying to make conver—”
“—I’m joking again. Maren Glover. It will signify nothing to anyone from your era. Say it, however, and I know you mean me.”
“Miss Glover, I hate to impose, but would you be able to watch Kenna if I…? This diaper weighs a ton, and I need to… have you had children?”
“Infants are a specialty. I can prepare them in any number of ways,” Maren said. “I won’t answer to Miss Glover again. Does it eat yet?”
“Kenna? Just milk. She can’t eat real food until… we’ll transition to formula, and then those rice flakes, and then the jars of this and that—pears and peas and applesauce.” Abby smiled knowingly.
“Carrots,” Maren said. “Try that. Break its gums and a child will stop squalling over buried teeth.”
“You can’t… the starter foods are just colored mush, really, and she’s months and months from that. She can’t eat carrots.”
“Mmm,” Maren said. “That won’t come out in the wash, you know. You were clean before, or I would not mention it. I’m working on my manners.”
“What’s that?”
“You have its scat on you. The side of your—no, other side. There. Thought you’d like to know. These days, some people get upset about a little shit on their fingers.”
“That’s disgus… God. Would you be so kind as to—? Just for a… oh, oh that’s so nasty. I don’t understand how… I taped it. Do you see the bathrooms? The building’s just… it’s fifty steps. I hate to ask.”
“And I hate to answer,” Maren said. “Fine. I’ll do it. Hand the beast over.”
“Oh, she’s… I just got her latched-up again, and… I don’t take Kenna out unless she burps-up or does a doodie, or—”
“—Put the basket beside me, then. Giddy thing. I’m doing you a favor.”
“I know, and I… it’s a car seat, so you… it folds like this, and… here, just let me… there. It won’t fall with the arm locked, but the bench isn’t very—will you help me put her back on the ground?”
“Why? You just got her lifted and locked.”
“It’s… the bench is fine, just as long as you don’t lean on… this shade slides around. Moves. It keeps the sun out of… I’ll scoot there and back. I’ll only be a minute.”
“As will I,” Maren said, her smirk lifting across orange teeth glinting with several types of metal.
Gold and silver, Abigail thought—but didn’t silver turn black? Abigail shivered despite the warmth of the day. She looked at the sodden roll of excrement in her hand; at the creamy smear in a crescent around her thumb.
Peanut butter, she thought, the crunchy kind. She would pretend it was peanut butter. Just needed to rinse her hands in the sink. Her hands, and a line on her forearm… how in the hell did it get on her hip?
Abby’s gorge began to rise, and she spoke simply to exhale. “You’re so calm. Have you had children?”
“Goodness yes. I can’t count how many. They keep me going.”
“My mother says that. I’m so tired that I don’t… I can’t always see that. Not yet. With the teething and the fever—but it gets better. I wouldn’t trade Kenna for anything. Not for the whole world.”
“Few would,” Maren said, dabbing her mouth. “Children keep us young.”
Abigail smiled, her heart suddenly as full as the diaper, her tears unexpected—they so often were, lately. “It’s a sacrifice, but it’s a small price to pay,” she managed, sniffling and snorting (she was unable to touch her face with her hands).
“I’m not one for robes and ceremony. Sacrifice is sacrifice. The gift is the same. The body and mind are renewed; the soul is sustained.”
“It’s so weird. I must be weak from… I didn’t have a fever this morning.”
“A fever does not announce itself until it is ready. Let me rummage my bag a moment. Then I’ll give the child my full attention.”
“Take all the time you need,” Abby mumbled, her shoulders hunching, both hands cradling the diaper, its weight a medicine ball in her interlaced hands.
“Do I do what I want, or do I take what I need?” Maren said, apparently to herself. “Where did I put—? Here.” She turned the sepia object in the sunlight.
“Is that a… is that real?”
“Never had a pet, Abby? A crow is noisy, but loyal. My Bessie swore like a fishwife. I recommend one, but you’ll want to teach it early that an infant’s eyes are off-limits.”
Abby did not reply with anything but an open mouth. Maren grunted, lifting her upper body with her arms to adjust her hindquarters.
“This bench is that new design you see all around. They make it to keep the hobos from sleeping someplace safe. I will say this about the anti-bum design: it works. I have lost any the sensation from my posterior.”
“Who keeps a skull?” Abby persisted.
“I do, it seems,” Maren whispered. “What remains of Bessie is compact. She travels well in a hand-bag. People think bones should be white, but I couldn’t bring myself to boil and bleach her. The rest will be at the bottom, no doubt. My purse is like that miserable fruit yogurt.”
Maren shook the bowling bag as though working a large wok. “I had a coupon, somewhere. Might’ve been for the Greek sort, but I’d like to get my hooks in lemon. That or black cherry. You’ve tried it?”
“Yogurt?”
“How many conversations do we have going? Yes, yogurt. Don’t go cheap. The low-shelf varieties taste like laboratory scrapings.”
“I’ll pick some up,” Abby said, her arms aching. The weight of the diaper was no longer possible to ignore. Nerves rumbled in her chest.
“I’ll suss that clipping once I’ve thrown your fortune… Here’s another bit—part of a wing, this was. Poor Hecksbesen. Bessie was no larger than a common blackbird. She didn’t like the treatments. Left me awful early. A little thing—but oh, she was a fighter.”
“Why keep her skull?”
“I keep all of her. The skull is merely the easiest to find. Here they are! Half of her was caught in a seam. Yes, this is sufficient—I can throw with seven.”
“Throw the… for our fortune? That isn’t necessary,” Abby said, snapping a fragrant hand to her forehead, cutting the sun’s orange glare. “I have to get rid of… it’s crazy, I know, but I’m about to drop this diaper.”
“Drop it then,” Maren said. “It is a lovely day, if you like leaves. I have collected several in my hair. Nobody much around, I notice.”
“Must be getting ready for tonight,” Abby said.
“You’d think the dogs would still need to lift a leg.”
“It must be a high fever,” Abby said, her tone pleading. “I’m… I might need help to get back in the truck. I’ll pray someone comes along.”
“Someone has,” Maren reminded her, tapping her chest with a gnarled hand, her fingernails discolored from below by a distorting fungus. “I am old, Abigail, but it is different to say that I am dead. To you, I suppose one looks much like the other. Your arms are shaking.”
“It’s the diaper. It’s heavy. Really heavy. I swear it’s more than the car carrier. I don’t understand how… I’m out of my mind, half the time.”
“That leaves half when you’re sane. Beats most people,” Maren said. “Chocolate may tip the scales.” A dented, gilded bonbon crinkled in her fingers, and Maren raised a questioning eyebrow. Abby shook her head.
Maren popped the brown sphere into her mouth, tongue sinking into the orb, saliva sawing to its center. Maren smacked her gums. “Certain? I may have another.”
“Very sure,” Abby said.
“Your loss,” Maren said.
“I have to leave. To the lavatory.”
“Take your time, and I’ll take—”
“—Thank you so much, Maren. Can I bring you anything back? A water, or a… there’s a vending machine.”
“I’m quite content. I can feel the end of October to my marrow.”
“Does it hurt?” Abigail gestured, both hands occupied with the diaper. “The arthritis?”
“Little can hurt me today. The gift is mine. I’ll run wild before the night is done, the wind kissing me cold, tightening my hanging skin. I’ll hold hands with darkness and dance with shadows, warmed by the new fire in my belly.”
Abby made a small noise in the back of her throat. “That sounds… gosh, I’d be happy with a spa day.”
Maren wagged a flopping hand. “Off with you. We have made the exchange. You have your diaper, and you’ve given the gift to me. The child and I have business. See to yours.”
Abby’s clasped her hands behind her, tendons leaping from her wrists—the diaper was leaking badly, and it was putting leverage on her shoulders.
She nodded and leaned over the car seat, her face dominated by duck lips and dimples. “Bye, my little Ken-Ken. Goodbye, sugarpop. Mommy will be right back. Stay here with Auntie Maren, angel-face.” She touched her nose against the wet tip of her daughter’s, rubbing from side to side gently. Abby turned to Maren. “If the sun—“
“—The sun will not harm your child, I do so swear. Whistle britches here won’t be burned. Babies are not rare, and yet they’re best served that way. You are dripping. Goodbye, Abigail.”
“Right,” Abby said, nodding mutely, her throat tight. If she had not convinced herself that she was entering a fevered insanity, she would have looked around for cameramen. The diaper had to be twenty, perhaps thirty pounds, and it was approaching Kenna’s size.
Lack of a sleep, and definitely a fever. To have an explanatory ailment was a relief. Abby’s throat burned; tears wanted to begin again. “I’ll be back in two shakes of a lamb’s tail,” she said.
Maren steepled her fingers and dabbed at the corner of her mouth with a napkin. “Abigail, go. I’m not as frail as you want to think,” she said, a puff of breeze yanking at her silver hair until it resembled cobwebs.
“I’ll repay you for this. If you get lonely—we do—you could come over.”
“What, to your home? Why? I have my own.”
“Oh, I didn’t mean to… You don’t live in assisted?”
“Don’t and won’t. The fastest way for an elderly person to lose their home is to be put into one. I’ve dealt with that only earlier today.”
“Yes, I… that’s one way of looking at it,” Abby said. “Gramma hated leaving her house.”
“Learn from the lesson. Be off. That burden will continue to grow.”
“Right. I thought it was me, but it…” Abigail began to move in a half-stumble, looking back as she walked, the skin of her neck tight, forearms twitching with a death’s grip on the diaper.
Maren watched Abby as she had watched the crows. The diaper bubbled on one side, and Maren considered the over-under as to when it might explode.
Abby faltered. Maren waggled her fingers in a grandmotherly wave. She tickled the bottoms of the child’s feet, its post-change socks as sheer as peeling skin.
“You would slip in these if you could walk,” Maren advised. The baby blew an invisible trumpet, splashing saliva. Maren spat into the buffalo grass.
Abby glanced back once more, smiling thinly, eyes haunted and blinking—she lumbered away, half-running.
“Never shake a hot can of seltzer,” Maren advised the infant.
The lure of the gift ached in her jaws. Maren spat between her legs again. It would be done her way. In her time.
“I won’t be a beast,” she said. “It doesn’t own me.”
The child sensed its mother fading, and Maren sang the first thing that came to mind, rocking the carrier gently. “You’re lying so low in the weeds,” she crooned, her voice cracking. Kenna began to make monkey faces that preceded wailing.
“Yes, yes, very well—but you were in the grass. You know, I sang acceptably as a younger woman, though never as well as some.” Maren exhaled.
“Uriah, now. You’ll never see a superior dancer, but she dances because there’s no competition for her in singing. No other I know can clear seven octaves. It is thanks to her I have those siren tears. It wasn’t called a dance-off—not back then—but Ligeia cracked a note that Uriah nailed. The sirens were fit to be tied.”
Kenna’s face twisted, and Maren hurried to continue before the infant could bawl. “In such company as that, I was never called first for karaoke. It gets worse as I age. I’ve lost all of my notes but one, and that is a minor issue. Are you as dull as your mother, or do you like jokes?”
Kenna blew another raspberry, snot flowing onto her upper lip. Maren grinned at the infant, surprised at how easy it was to confide in the little thing. Animals were prone to divulge secrets, but a child…
She raked her throbbing fingernails along the backs of Kenna’s ears until the child burbled with glee.
“Like that, eh? Would you take a carrot?”
Maren found an orange root so large it had split like a dry rail. She severed the hairy tip, spat it at the anthill, and snapped away a morsel for the baby.
“Crunchy as they come. Sweet as candy, too.” Maren took a bite, wincing as her jaw slid. A swat to the side of her face engaged flat molars.
“I lie, of course. Carrots are not truly sweet. Maybe if you have never tried a chocolate. But, carrots are edible, and they conserve the feminine figure. Mine wants to be too round, you see. I wouldn’t mind, but what’s the use of shoes if you can’t see them, hmm? No, a carrot is like most good food: get it young, kill it, skin it…”
The child was placated, but Maren’s baser self was immune to the calming words of a jabbering witch: her jaw dislocated fully. Misery slid under her fingernails like the flats of toothpicks.
“Did you know it was once believed that baptism poisoned the gift?” Maren wiped slobber into her fur stole. “I proved them wrong, of course. Simple minds against simple science. You can find that superstition to this day, if you look in the corners. Most humans are stupid, and we sisters come from the same herd. A word of advice, child: don’t tell them that. Your mother has made it to the water closet. Thought she’d be crushed before she got inside.”
Maren motioned with the chunk of carrot in her dirty fingers, jumping back when Kenna kicked at her hand. Kenna cackled, thrusting her head back into the cushion until she had three chins.
“Thinks it’s funny, does it?” Despite her better judgment, Maren swooped the carrot in a spiral while making an airplane sound—she snatched her hand away as the second kick launched.
Kenna didn’t care that she’d missed the carrot. She sputtered with high-pitched happiness.
“One should not play with their food, but here we are, a couple of fools. I blame your mother and my solitude. Shall we? It’s orange.”
Kenna crinkled a star with a well-placed kick.
“Outside of fruits and fungus, not many things you would want to eat are orange… but carrots pay for all.”
The beds of her fingernails oozing, Maren moved her hand over the infant’s mouth.
10
The woman in the mirror did not move as Abby did. She had initially, or Abby thought she had, but now there were subtle differences. Little delays and quirks of motion.
Abby never caught the reflection red-handed, and the woman in the mirror did not jump at her, banging at the back of the glass, which Abby had resigned herself to witness. There was no clawing at the barrier, no obvious wink or smile; no suspension of the ruse.
But it wasn’t her. Abby didn’t mind. She preferred to think it was another woman with an apple bottom, round shoulders, and a blotchy face rebounding from specially-treated glass.
Her dripping cargo halted the inspection. Abby removed the top of the trash bin with the insides of her forearms and
dead-lifted the diaper. She rolled it the last foot up the gravel-encrusted cylinder with her palms. The plastic-wrapped nightmare hit the bottom of the can like a raw turkey.
Abby wiped yellow slime and tears of relief from her eyes with her cleanest sleeve. The diaper had weighed more than her heaviest kettle bell. It must have been… forty, fifty pounds?
“Can’t be real,” she told herself, wanting to hear anything other than the fly-swarm buzz of the overhead light. The halogen tubes threw a dim, liver-sick hue over the restroom—which was probably for the best.
Says the woman who just binned a sack of filth.
Ugh. I thought you were gone.
Silence is not absence.
You and I sound as crazy as Maren. I need to break this fever. I need chicken soup and a week in bed.
What you need is to return to your child. Maren will harm her. Take her. If you lose Kenna, you will lose John. Then you will lose yourself.
I’m not talking to you.
No, and Johnny-boy isn’t talking to you, either. Not really. He knows it was your fault. He had his duties, and you had yours. No wonder he abandoned you to chase—
Be quiet, damn you.
Blasphemy? That’s new. Don’t fret. He’s not listening. Or this could be why He won’t accept your prayers. He sees more than you say. He sees your naked heart.
“Kenna needs to eat, and Maren is… please be quiet,” Abby said aloud, watching the woman in the mirror for signs of trouble. The woman was unattractive, sickly, and her hair was a disaster.
If I leave you now, you won’t hear from me again until… but you won’t listen. Not then; not now. Take off your shirt. Wash it in the bilge of the sink.
“I was already doing that.”
No, you were looking into the mirror as though it were a window. You might as well do your laundry. Maren is already… but don’t worry. Kenna isn’t alone. Her new caretaker has eyes for nothing else. And if Maren loses her nerve, I have—
“—Please. I’m asking you—me—as nicely as I can. Please let me do this. Just this one, simple thing.”
If you like, Abigail. We can talk again when it’s over.
All Hallows Page 13
