Edith has an expectant expression on her face. She’s said something and is waiting for a response.
“Sorry, repeat that?”
“I said Gary’s a friend of mine.”
“Who’s Gary?”
“The MRI tech.”
“Right.”
“I can sit in the booth during the scan, if you want. Keep you company.”
“Yeah, okay. Thanks.”
“One more thing.”
“What?”
“You don’t know how to put on a hospital gown.”
Ginny laughs. “I guess not.”
“I’ll tie you up the back.” Edith puts her hands on Ginny’s shoulders and turns her around. Her touch is light, but Ginny can feel the pads of her fingers through the gown’s thin material. When Edith brushes the nape of her neck it feels like every tiny hair on her body has come alive.
“You’re cold. Let’s get you in there quick.” Edith reaches for the last tie, but Ginny keeps her grip on the bottom of the gown. Her hand won’t open. It can’t. For a second it seems Edith will stop and leave the last tie loose. Then Edith closes her palm over Ginny’s clenched hand. Her fingers are warm and firm. Ginny says a silent prayer Edith won’t notice her underwear and lets go.
* * *
—
The MRI machine, a big white box with a long tube at its base, sits in the center of a starkly white room. Her whole body has to fit inside that narrow tube. Edith waves behind the glass in the observation room. The window is tinted, making her appear like she’s in black-and-white.
Gary tells Ginny to hang the locker key from a little hook on the wall, and explains how the MRI will work. He says how long each scan will take, describes the loud beeping and rumbling noises she’ll hear, and points out the bulb she can press if she starts to feel claustrophobic. The noise inside the machine is so loud, Gary says, they won’t be able to hear her during the scans, even if she screams—that’s the purpose of the bulb. But he’ll talk to her through a speaker between scans. She has to be careful not to move, and she must keep her head in the same position the whole time. He says swallowing is fine but she should avoid blinking too much. Most people find it’s best to keep their eyes closed.
He helps her onto the platform and puts a blanket over her legs. From the observation room, Edith smiles and puts her thumbs up. Gary straps a plastic helmet-shaped cage over Ginny’s face. He hands her the bulb, and presses a button and her body glides slowly backward into the tube. She keeps her eyes open, and this is a mistake. She feels a rising panic as the outside room…slowly…disappears. Her breath is hot against the walls of the tube, only inches from her face. It’s like being trapped in a coffin. That’s what Gary should have said: “It’s going to feel like you’re being shut inside a coffin.” She closes her eyes tight.
Words and phrases intrude her thoughts:
tumor
Noah
got to buy new underwear
where else does Edith have freckles?
a mass in my brain
Noah
Her breath grows hotter, like there isn’t enough air. She’s not going to be able to do this. She wants to press the bulb. She can feel it in her hand—all she has to do is squeeze. Then she hears Edith’s voice, loud and tinny, coming from a microphone somewhere behind her head. “You okay in there?” Edith asks.
“Yes,” she says, trying to respond in a way that moves her face as little as possible.
“Try not to say too much, so the scans come out right. But if you need something, tell me. Or squeeze the bulb.”
There’s a pause, and it feels excruciatingly long. Ginny doesn’t want to think about the walls of the tube pressing against her arms, or the lack of air, or the word tumor, so she thinks about the feeling of Edith’s fingers on the back of her neck.
Edith finally returns. “Gary’s still getting the scan set up. That was a tough case the other night. You know, I looked him up afterwards. Robert Kells. He’s some kind of famous philosopher. Did you know that? Wait—don’t answer. Gary needs you to be really still.” There’s a short pause, and then Edith’s voice is back. “What else can I talk about. The fog’s been crazy, right? I just about drove my car into my neighbor’s front porch this morning.”
Edith’s voice is calming. More than Gary’s, that’s for sure.
“Crazy weather makes me think of the time my house in Tennessee got flooded. Did I ever tell you about that? I bet you’re wondering if the house had a big front porch, and if I sat out there drinking iced tea in a rocking chair.” She laughs. “I did have rocking chairs on my porch, but I never had time to sit in them. I worked the whole time I was in nursing school. I lived with someone then, and we bought a house together and planned to—”
There’s a pause. “We’re ready for your first scan. It’ll be three minutes. Get ready for some loud beeps.” She says this like the beeps are something funny she can’t wait for Ginny to hear.
A rumble begins near her left ear. It sounds a lot like she’s on an airplane, in a window seat, resting her head against the plane. A vibrating thrum. Then six throbbing gongs followed by six clacking beats. The sounds are kind of funny. As long as she doesn’t think about how she’s listening to them from inside a coffin.
The noises stop and Edith returns. “You’re doing great—just stay as still as you can. Anyway, we bought the house together and we were going to fix it up. Then Lisa adopted this dog—”
Ginny blinks, and tells herself, Stop blinking. She knows Edith is gay, but Edith has never mentioned Lisa, or any other girlfriend.
“—and it all kind of went to hell. She spent all her time walking the dog and training the dog. We had started painting our bedroom this really pretty yellow, and it just stayed half-painted for months and months. I couldn’t finish it because of my schedule. I mean, I couldn’t paint the room when Lisa was sleeping in it.” Edith laughs, but Ginny can hear the hurt in her voice.
“And then Lisa—” There’s a click and Edith’s voice disappears for a second. “We’re ready for the second scan. Two minutes, okay?”
This time the beeping and clacking is on the right, and it sounds like her head is inside an eighties-style synthesizer. This strikes her as funny too. Her nose twitches and she has to concentrate to keep her face still.
“I like dogs, you know, but this dog Lisa got was a big, surly rottweiler.” Edith’s voice is back. “He never liked me. I would come home, dead tired from work and school, and he’d growl at me when I tried to sit on the couch next to Lisa. I mean, you want to be able to sit down on your own couch, you know? Wait—okay, this next one’s three minutes.”
After more electronic beats Edith returns. “So then Lisa goes off to a dog agility championship. I mean, what is that even? I think it’s dogs competing over who can catch a Frisbee or jump over boxes…While she was gone, we had four inches of rain in two days and our backyard got flooded. The water was up to the back steps and I didn’t know what to do. I ended up calling my dad and he drove all the way from Memphis to help me. That’s a five-hour drive. I was so pissed at Lisa because she wouldn’t come home early.”
Edith sighs into the microphone, and then there’s a pause. “Gary’s setting up the last two scans now.”
Ginny tries not to move inside the tube.
“So where was I…Oh, the flood. So my dad helped me put sandbags up against the foundation of the house, to keep it dry. We basically spent the entire weekend covered in mud.”
There’s a click, and a long pause.
She wants to know what happened with Edith’s flooded house. She wants to hear more about Lisa and the dog. She has a picture of Edith in her mind. She stands in a half-painted bedroom wearing a sundress. She’s barefoot and her toes are painted bright red. Who would choose a rottweiler over Edith?
“
We’ve got one more scan to go,” Edith says.
The airplane thrumming returns in her left ear, and then the noises stop. She feels her body moving again, sliding out of the machine.
* * *
—
Back in the dressing room, away from Edith’s voice, she pulls on her scrubs with a sense of dread about what the scans will show. She could duck into the MRI observation room and take a look herself—she doesn’t need to wait for radiology. But she doesn’t want to scroll through the images of her brain with Gary standing over her shoulder. She’ll drive down the street to her office and read the scans on the hospital’s internal server instead. At least then she can be alone with the bad news.
Outside the fog is dense and it smells like wet leaves. Rain mists her cheeks. She tells herself she’ll feel better once she has all the facts, whether good or bad. She passes her new neighbor—she can never remember her name—who smiles and says hi as she moves slowly past, her hands on her large, pregnant belly.
It starts to rain harder. Edith stands at the end of the path under some large cedar trees, hazy with mist. She wears a bright blue jacket with a large hood that partially covers her face. “Hey,” she says. “I brought your scans.” She holds open her jacket; she’s tucked the envelope inside.
“Thanks.” Ginny’s voice sounds leaden. She holds out her hand for the envelope, although now it’s come to it, she doesn’t want to look inside.
Edith keeps hold of the folder inside her jacket. “They’ll get wet if we stay out here.”
“My car’s just there.” Ginny motions a few yards away.
“Great,” Edith says and walks that way.
They climb inside Ginny’s Acura in the doctors’ parking lot. The air inside the car is chilly but dry. It smells of leather and the dregs of her morning coffee, left behind in a paper cup.
As soon as they shut the heavy doors, the tapping of the rain becomes a muffled patter. Edith is very close. Her jacket crackles and sends flecks of water against the dashboard as she settles her tote bag on the floor of the car.
She hands the scans to Ginny. “There’s nothing in there.”
“Nothing at all?” Ginny tears open the envelope.
“See for yourself.”
Ginny flips through the scans, quickly at first, and then slowly and deliberately. Edith’s right. She feels intense relief. She reaches for the steering wheel, runs her fingers along its stitching. She’s completely fine. Noah won’t grow up without a mother. Her life will continue, just as it is.
She waits for a rush of gratitude for all the good, solid things in her life. But it doesn’t come. Her life will continue just as it is. She’ll go home and figure out what to make for dinner. She’ll have a glass of wine, feed the cats, and talk with Mark about what to do if school is canceled next week. She’ll iron a shirt for clinic tomorrow.
Inside Edith’s hood a few pieces of wet hair cling to her neck, dark red against her pink, freckled skin. “I’m not sure what you thought you’d find.” She leans closer to look at the scans and blinks her translucent lashes. “There’s nothing there but a healthy brain.”
Ginny closes her eyes. She doesn’t want her life to continue just as it is. Her life can’t stay the same, because she’s not the same. She’s full of wanting when she wasn’t before.
She hears Edith’s soft breathing, and when she opens her eyes, Edith’s face is full of…what? Concern? She doesn’t want her concern. She pushes the hood away from Edith’s face, sending droplets of water everywhere. Edith’s hair is a frizzy tangle in her fingers. Her breath is humid and sweet. Ginny pulls her warm mouth over her own.
II
Counterfactuals
TWELVE
TODAY LEAH DOESN’T want to be rocked or nursed. She hates her swing, slow or fast. Even when Cass bounces her in her arms, she’s red-faced and angry. But if Cass stops bouncing, she turns from angry to enraged.
Cass moves through the house, jogging Leah in the air, and Bear follows close behind. She tries to put the baby down on different surfaces, and then quickly picks her back up again. A blanket on the floor, her car seat, a laundry basket full of clean towels. Leah doesn’t like any of them. Cass paws through boxes, sweating, looking for something, anything that might help. A different-shaped binky? No. A vibrating bouncy chair? Good for about five minutes. A bath in her baby bathtub? Hates it.
Dear Amar,
The baby’s crying again. And you’re not here. Remember when you said you wanted a big family? And I said maybe? Well, Leah is it. No more. One and done.
Love,
Cass
She considers the car again. She could drive in circles around town, go past Robby’s house—it’s not that far away—and see if his car is in the driveway. But when she looks out the window the cul-de-sac has transformed overnight. A dense white fog covers everything—trees, houses, grass, road. She can’t imagine driving through that again. She’s so tired her eyes feel pasted open. She’d probably run off the road, like the car she saw last night on the side of the highway.
She continues her search. She’s pulling a violet baby wrap from its bag when the doorbell rings. Leah stops crying. She looks around, a quizzical expression on her face. The silence opens up, cool and empty, better than anything. Bear doesn’t even bark.
When Cass opens the door it’s Noah, Mark and Ginny’s kid, and she feels a ridiculous relief at seeing another person. An image flashes through her mind—of herself, handing Leah to Noah, and running, hard and fast, out the cul-de-sac and down the street.
But then another image replaces it—of Noah’s dad, Mark, in the woods, a wild look in his eyes.
Bear wags his tail and tries to get past Cass.
“Hi.” Noah looks at his sneakers. “I don’t have my key.”
“Oh no. You should come in,” Cass quickly steps aside, and Bear crowds the doorway and licks Noah’s hand.
“That’s okay. I just wondered—”
Leah starts fussing and Cass bounces her, but the bouncing does nothing.
“Mrs. Bloom, who used to live here—” Noah pets Bear on the head. “She had a key, and I thought maybe it was still there.”
Leah’s cries grow shrill and Cass reaches, experimentally, to press the doorbell. At its buzz Leah stops. Again, she looks around. Again, her red face softens and her eyes turn quizzical.
Noah laughs. “Does your baby like the doorbell?”
“That’s literally the only thing she likes today.” Cass transfers Leah to her other shoulder and waves him inside, out of the fog. “We’ll look for the key.”
“It used to be above the cabinet in the kitchen,” Noah says once they’re inside.
“Why aren’t you in school?”
“There’s mold.”
“Oh.”
“And your parents are…”
Noah’s face changes. “My mom’s at work.”
Cass wants to ask, Where’s your dad? But she doesn’t. She pulls a step stool from the pantry and tries to unfold it with one hand.
“I can hold her,” Noah says. “I’ve held my cousins before.”
“Why don’t you sit,” Cass says. “It’s easier. She can be wriggly.”
She settles Noah on the couch and he knows how to position his arms like a cradle, so she lays Leah in them. Leah looks up at his face and grimaces, but she doesn’t cry. Bear settles on the floor at Noah’s feet.
“What’s her name?” Noah asks. “I think my dad…” He pauses. “I think he told me but I forget.”
“Leah,” she says. “If she starts crying, we’ll ring the doorbell again, okay?”
Noah smiles.
She climbs up the step stool and feels around on the top of the cabinet. But when her fingers brush something cold and hard she hesitates. She looks down at Noah and the baby, and she can�
��t do it. It’s only 11:00 A.M. The day stretches out before her, long and loose, exactly the same as yesterday, punctuated only by bouts of crying, vigorous rocking, dirty diapers.
She climbs down. “Sorry, it’s not there.”
“That’s okay.” Noah holds Leah out for Cass to take her. “I’ll just go hang out in my backyard until my mom comes home.”
“No,” Cass says quickly. She doesn’t take the baby. “You should stay. Leah likes you. You can watch TV, or whatever you want—”
Noah eyes the door. “Are you sure?”
“Absolutely. Your mom would be upset if she knew you had no place to be.”
“Yeah…”
“I’ll get you something to eat. Are you okay holding her a little longer?”
Cass and Noah watch half a movie on the Disney Channel in blissful silence, the baby content in Noah’s arms. When Leah gets hungry, Cass takes her upstairs to nurse, and leaves Noah with a PB&J and a glass of milk. She settles in the rocker and watches Leah’s face, smoother and calmer now, her cheeks pink rather than red. At first she’s hungry, determined, and then her eyelids begin to droop. Cass can’t believe it, but her eyes close and stay closed, even when she lowers her to the crib, even when she tiptoes out of the room and down the hallway.
When she goes downstairs she brings the violet baby wrap with her. “Do you think you could help me figure this out?” she asks Noah. She tugs the wrap from its bag and it slithers to the floor. It’s a long stretchy piece of fabric, the color of a spring crocus. Just fabric, no buckles or straps or snaps.
“What is it?”
“It’s a baby carrier. Infants are supposed to like it.”
Noah’s eyes are on the TV. “Can I finish this episode? I’ve never seen this one. I only get to watch an hour of TV a day—”
“Oh, should we turn it off? What would your mom say?”
“No. She’s not here. You’re in charge.”
She leaves it on and finds the instruction booklet for the carrier. There are six different wraps you can do with the fabric. She starts reading the directions for the “Easy Wrap,” but soon her eyes grow heavy. She rests her head against the back of the couch, lets the booklet fall from her hand.
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