by Ellie Monago
“Did you have fun at the party?” she asks.
“Definitely.” I try to convey the enthusiasm I felt before I saw that welcome mat. “It was so great of all of you to do that for us.”
“Honestly, we were going to have a block party anyway. It’s just great to have an excuse. And we are extremely psyched to have the three of you here.” Her hair is loose around her shoulders today, and she shakes it back from her face, smiling brilliantly. “Don’t you just love when everything comes together like that? That’s what life’s all about, synchronicity.”
I try to agree heartily. I worry that I’m undoing all the good work I did at the party, that I seem awkward and strange, and my awareness of that only enhances it. Best to remove myself from this conversation as quickly as possible. “Sadie’s in the car already,” I say. “I should probably run.”
“Oh, sorry. I’ll talk fast. There’s a girls’ night out on Thursday, and we want you to come.” She must see the question in my eyes because she begins to enumerate on her fingers: “Gina, Raquel, June, Yolanda. And Andie. We invited Andie for you.”
Whoever wrote the note is wrong. They do actually like me.
“Sorry about the short notice,” Tennyson says. “We all thought someone else had already mentioned it to you at the block party and just realized no one had. It’s like Kitty Genovese. You know who I mean, right? That woman who got stabbed in her courtyard with, like, thirty people watching from their apartments and no one called the police? The more witnesses, the less likely anyone is to call the police.” She must see the WTF in my eyes because she adds, “Bad example. Anyway, once a month or so, we ditch the husbands and the kids. We just get to be women, you know?”
“Sounds fun,” I say. “Let me check with Doug.”
“Check with him? Just tell him.” She touches my arm gently. “We really want you there. Make it happen, OK?”
I smile. “OK.”
As she starts to cross back to her side of the street, she calls over her shoulder, “Don’t forget the rule, though: no talk about kids!”
It’s a rule that instantly scares the crap out of me. I’m not sure what else I have to fall back on at the moment. But I’m almost certainly going to find out. If I turn down this invitation, I might never get another.
When she’s out of sight, I squat down and retrieve the cardboard. I toss it facedown on the passenger seat and turn the ignition with my shaking hands. This is an opportunity, I tell myself. Tomorrow, it’s Andie and Nolan, and Thursday, a bunch of potential new friends. This is why we moved here.
“It’s going to be OK,” I tell Sadie, using that lilting tone that she likes. But I can’t hear any sounds in reply.
I wish car seats weren’t rear facing so I could see her right now. She was asleep when I carried her out. It never ceases to amaze me what she can sleep through or what will wake her up. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to it.
I can’t stop myself. I reach over the seat and push back the fabric canopy that veils her. Spot-checks make it more likely that she’ll wake up prematurely and be fussy when we get to our destination, kind of how every time you change lanes, you increase the odds of an accident. But in my present state of mind, I can’t resist. I’m solely responsible for the welfare of this helpless, delightful, occasionally infuriating person. OK, not solely responsible, but primarily. Doug leaves the house at seven thirty and doesn’t get home until seven o’clock most nights.
The college generously allowed six full months of maternity leave (and Doug’s parents have subsidized it financially, with strings attached, as per usual), but I’m down to the last two, the home stretch. I need to start visiting day cares, figuring out where Sadie will be safe, where she’ll be loved, in my stead. It’s a painful thought, and maybe that’s why I’ve been dragging my feet, despite the fact that procrastination goes against my nature.
Many times, I’ve questioned whether I’m equal to the challenge of motherhood. Her continued existence depends on me. How could anyone not be daunted by that, at least a little?
Sadie had been sleeping, but with the sudden increase in light, she startles and cocks her head back to look at me. A spiderweb of drool spins toward her onesie. Then she starts to howl.
“It’s OK, sweet girl,” I tell her. I move to stroke her hair and her face, but she’s having none of it. It’s like she knows that this awakening was completely unnecessary, and at my hands. She doesn’t want my ministrations.
So, after a few minutes of trying, ineffectually, to soothe her, I reach into the diaper bag, remove the pacifier, and thrust it in her mouth. She sucks as loudly and contentedly as that baby on The Simpsons. I just hope she doesn’t suck for as long. That show must be pushing thirty seasons by now.
I used to fear that Sadie would become a pacifier addict, wearing one on a chain around her neck at college like she’s at a perpetual rave. At first, I said I wouldn’t use them at all, then I said that it was just for when she needed to sleep. Now, all bets are off. It seems like I reverse myself all the time since she was born. When I used to say, “I’ll always do this” or “I’ll never do that,” it was because I didn’t yet know how intolerable her distress would be for me, that it would shape my every action and reaction. I had no idea she’d be able to control me with her pleasure and—maybe even more so—her displeasure. The threat of her unhappiness hangs over me all the time, my own sword of Damocles.
Trader Joe’s is only a few minutes away, and I drive extra slowly, gathering myself. I manage to find a parking space close to the entrance. I decide that instead of using a cart, I’ll snap Sadie’s car seat into the stroller and just fill up the mesh bottom underneath. That’s the quickest way.
Shit, where’s the list? I forgot it, and that was before I found that note. That’s just my normal mommy brain.
I hate that expression, mommy brain. It’s so insulting. But, in my case, accurate.
I remove Sadie’s stroller from the trunk and then lift her car seat into it, waiting for the reassuring snap that tells me I’ve done it right. I wish life had more reassuring snaps, just a split second of limbic soothing: “Correct, now proceed.”
I take a few deep breaths and then we cross the parking lot. Sadie’s still sucking on that pacifier, a baby crack pipe, but I can’t worry about that now. She’s a baby. College is almost eighteen years away.
I’ve got more immediate things to worry about.
No, I don’t. It’s just a scrawled note on some cardboard.
But it wasn’t scrawled at all. It was in a neat, even script, carefully printed rather than written in cursive. The person was taking her time. It wasn’t the heat of the moment. It was a considered act—two considered acts—and that makes it much scarier. Twice is a pattern. Someone’s holding a grudge.
This is about trash, literally. How seriously can anyone take it? I will not take this seriously. I will not.
The double doors slide open at our approach, and Sadie and I glide inside. I don’t have my list, but my brain is working just fine. She’s moved past rice cereals and loves the purees I make. I started with a small amount, just an experiment, so I’m ready to make a big batch, frozen in the special ice trays with their eco-friendly green lids, designed for just this purpose. I like having things match their purpose.
I look around at the organic fruits and vegetables, hoping for sweet potatoes, since those are her favorite. I’m trying to smile at all the people who are smiling at Sadie and me―much more at Sadie, really―though it feels so unnatural, so counter to my emotions, that I hope it’s not coming across as a pained grimace.
I put my head down and focus on the produce. If I don’t see their smiles, then it’s not unfriendly when I don’t smile back.
I hum “Apron Strings,” a song I love and, fortunately, one of Sadie’s favorites, based on frequency of leg kicks. I toss a bunch of organic apples in a bag. Just fine, we are just fine.
“Hey, Katrina!”
I nearly jump. When I
look up, it’s Fanny (dammit, I forgot to ask Doug her name), beaming. Sadie is smiling back, around her pacifier.
“Oh, hi!” I say with an extra-wide smile that I hope appears genuine rather than clownish.
“Did you have fun at the party?”
“It was the most amazing block party I’ve ever been to. Everyone’s so welcoming and so kind.”
She nods, like she’s heard it many times before but it never gets old. “I knew you and your family would be a great addition.” She beams again. “And how are you settling in?”
“It’s coming along,” I say, trying to act normal. Do you ever seem less normal than when you’re trying to act it?
She adopts a sympathetic expression. “Moving is just about the most stressful thing there is. And with a little one? Even one this precious.” She’s doing sort of a baby-talk thing on the last sentence, directing it at Sadie, which Sadie seems to appreciate.
“Yeah, it’s been pretty stressful.” Made more so by some neighbor who chooses to remain nameless. Would Fanny have a guess who it is? No, I can’t tell her. She might wonder what I did that was so un-neighborly to begin with. “Well, I should finish the shopping. I need to get Sadie home and down for her nap.”
“That’s it,” she says with approval. “Stick to a schedule. It’s the thing that keeps you sane!” She pauses to cast an adoring look at Sadie. “I raised my girls in this neighborhood and watched it change around me. But only in good ways.”
“What ways?”
“The property values have gone through the roof, obviously, but it’s just stayed so—accessible, I think that’s the right word. If anything, it’s only gotten friendlier. People truly want to know each other.” Another pause. “Everything about each other.” Her face turns so thoughtful it’s nearly grave. “The AV is a very special place, Kat. You’ll see.”
I try to tell my tightening chest: that wasn’t a warning; it was a promise that there are good things to come. I’ve arrived.
Before I can think of a proper response, she’s walking away. “See you soon!” she says gaily.
Sadie and I get through the rest of our shopping trip without interference. Once we’re home, I decide to take the old advice: nap while your baby naps. But I’ve never been able to do it when she’s in her crib; I need her flush against me.
We lie together on the love seat, my feet dangling just a little off the edge (good to be only five four when you can’t fit a full-size couch). Sadie is pancaked to my chest, and we breathe together, slowly, deeply, hypnotically. Doug and I talked about having Sadie nap only in her crib so she’s used to being on her own, but I’m just not ready to be on my own at the moment. Doug would understand if I told him about my morning, about getting a second note.
But I’m not going to tell him. Better to let him be my distraction, to let his spirit of optimism and his presumption of a world worth trusting suffuse me.
“Crudité again?” he asks that night as he drops into a kitchen chair, grabbing some of the cheese I’ve cut up and sticking it on top of a cracker. He doesn’t actually mind, or if he does, he’s never said it.
I didn’t only cut up cheese but some vegetables, too. It’s a balanced meal, sort of.
I’m a lot better than I was earlier. After our nap, Sadie and I took a bath together, read books, listened to music, and I don’t even know what else we did, but the hours passed and most important, we didn’t have to leave the house. It was just the two of us.
Even when it’s good with Sadie, even when she’s not having any of her outbursts, there’s a pressure I feel: to keep things good, for her to remain happy. It’s a low-level hum, the pressure, like having a bug burrowing in your ear canal. Listening to that all day can suck the life out of you, though I never want Sadie to feel my lack of energy. If she did, then how could she stay happy?
When Doug comes in, the bug dies, just like that.
Sadie’s in her high chair, and I’m feeding her the last of the puree cubes. I’ll have to make the new batch tomorrow, no excuses.
My breasts are heavy with milk. I missed my last pump session. It’s not that I was sleeping or that I forgot; it’s that I just plain didn’t want to hook myself up to that god-awful machine. It doesn’t hurt anymore―my nipples are inured―but having to occupy Sadie in some way for fifteen whole minutes while I’m indisposed, holding the breast shields to my nipples, seemed especially onerous today.
“How was Mommy and Me?” Doug asks.
“I didn’t go.”
“Why not?”
I shrug. That’s not the same as lying. “I was tired.”
“You skipped class for no reason?”
“You say ‘skipped class’ like I was going for my PhD. It’s Mommy and Me. We were going to sing ‘Old MacDonald.’ I’ll go next week. I think I’ll be able to catch up.”
He pops another cracker in his mouth. “Someone’s touchy.”
“Just tired.”
“You know what might help? Some relaxation.” He drawls out the word, and I know he’s not thinking what would help me, he’s thinking how long it’s been since we last had sex.
I play dumb. “After we put Sadie down, you want to start a new show? We could have a Netflix marathon.”
“Whatever.” His tone is mild.
I want to tell him about the notes.
I can’t tell him about the notes.
Because either they’re about the trash, in which case I’m to blame, or they’re about something else, where the question of blame is much more nebulous.
No, they’re just about the trash. I have to believe that. And soon, the writer will get a new hobby and leave me alone, and no one will ever have to know the rest. Not even Doug. Especially not Doug.
Session 1.
“You’re a doctor, right? So you can prescribe medication?”
“I have a doctorate in clinical psychology. So yes, I’m a doctor, but no, I can’t prescribe medication.”
“I was told you’re an expert in trauma. Are you?”
“It’s one of my specialties, yes.”
“What are your other specialties?”
“Would it help you to know that answer, or do you think maybe you’re a little uncomfortable being here and you’re trying to delay? That’s a perfectly normal thing to do in a first session. It’s a perfectly normal thing to do, period. No one likes talking about their pain.”
“I’m not perfectly normal.”
“I imagine you want what we all want. To be valued. To connect. I know you’ve been through a lot, but you have the same needs and desires as everyone else. It’s all about how we fulfill them.”
“That sounds profound.”
“Are you being sarcastic? It’s OK if you are.”
“So, everything’s OK in this room?”
“Emotions are OK in this room. You just need to learn the healthiest ways to express them. My job is to make this a safe place for you. But I need you to tell me how to do that.”
“I can’t tell you that. I can’t even tell you the whole story.”
“I know from your intake form that the trauma happened when you were a child.”
“I’m not even sure it’s a trauma.”
“Let’s take a step back. Slow down and start over. What brings you in today?”
“I want to feel better. I need to get over what people have done to me.”
“That was then, and this is now. You didn’t have control then. You have it now. You just aren’t convinced of that yet.”
“And your job is to convince me?”
“No. It’s to cede control to you. We go at your pace. You pump the brakes when you need to. You tell your story the way you want.”
“Why do I feel like you’re doing some Jedi mind trick on me?”
“Let’s take a step back. Slow down and start over. What brings you in today? Why now?”
“My whole life is a mess. I thought I’d gotten away from my past, but it just keeps shadowing me. If I’m
not careful, I’ll fail out of school, and I can’t seem to be careful. I just can’t seem to care.”
“Yet you care enough to be here. That’s huge.”
“It doesn’t feel huge.”
“How things feel isn’t necessarily how they are.”
“Are you always going to talk in riddles?”
“That wasn’t a riddle. That was as straightforward as it gets.”
CHAPTER 5
It’s 3:23 a.m. Doug hasn’t built my desk yet for the nook, so I’m huddled over the laptop, which is open on the coffee table. I’m studiously ignoring the affront to my sense of order: book boxes that still need unpacking, the pictures and coat hooks and mirror that haven’t yet been hung on the walls. And that’s just the living room.
Instead, I peer at my screen, where I’m logged into Homestore, and right next to it, our credit card. Homestore received my return three days ago, but the refund hasn’t shown up on our Visa yet. We could use that $107.46. I’ve turned off auto-pay on all our bills because I need to keep a strict eye on what’s going out right now. In more than ten years of having a joint checking account with Doug, our balance has never been anywhere close to this low. It frightens me to look at it.
So I stop looking.
I click on my “To Do / To Build / To Install” file, taking note of the satisfying check marks beside what’s already done, though I haven’t entered a new one in days. I also keep a tally of when backordered items should be arriving, as well as replacement parts. Every time I go into Sadie’s room, my eyes involuntarily travel to the half-built dresser. Doug can’t finish it without Part C.
I’m pretty much obsessed with Part C. It’s become a running joke with Doug and me. “When’s the messiah coming?” he asked the other morning. “You know, Part C?” I laughed, but he could never truly understand what it means to me. He grew up in comfort rather than chaos, in attention instead of disregard. Part C is a repository for all my anxiety, a symbol of my great desire for Sadie to have better than I had—for her to grow up in a home that’s childproofed in every sense of the word, with someone thinking of her well-being first, always. Things half-built, haphazard, disorganized, or dirty remind me of how I was raised. Doug certainly doesn’t know everything, but he knows that much.