The Laments Read Online Free Page A

squeaked away on the linoleum.
    “Oh, Jackie, you little troublemaker. Mother thought you’d never come. Here I am, like two balloons! Mother thought she was going to burst!”
    She had been thinking all day about her baby. It seemed to her that fate had matched her up with this child. Certainly the baby she bore was meant for someone else and little Jackie was for her. Perhaps the mother of little Jackie would be better suited to the creature inside the incubator.
    “Want to run away with me, Jackie boy?” she whispered. “I think we were made for each other. What do
you
think?”
    When Dr. Underberg appeared a few minutes later, Mary smiled.
    “Well, look at you!” he declared. “You’re
glowing,
Mary.”
    “Oh, go on!” Mary giggled.
    “What a change,” said Dr. Underberg.
    “
This
baby is the best medicine,” she gushed.
    The doctor’s expression changed.
    “Yes . . . fortunately, by the time he leaves tomorrow, you’ll have your very own fellow to nurse.”
    “Tomorrow?” she replied.
    “Yes,” said Dr. Underberg. “His mother’s ready to go home.”
    After a moment’s hesitation, Mary broke into an anxious smile. “I’d like to thank her. Do you think I could? I’d
so
like to thank her,” she repeated.
    “Thank her?” said Dr. Underberg cautiously. “Well, it’s rather unusual, but I see no reason why not.”
    “Which room?” asked Mary. “I’ll just pop in by myself.”
    JULIA WATCHED A DUMPY FIGURE edge along the perimeter of the room, footstep by footstep. She had a disheveled mop of mouse-brown hair, flushed cheeks, and a loopy smile.
    “I just wanted to see the baby’s mother,” Mary said with a nervous laugh.
    “How’s
your
baby?” asked Julia.
    “Fine,” said Mary with a wilted smile. “But little Jackie’s a wonder. I
so
love him.”
    Julia stiffened, but nodded politely. Mary covered her mouth like a schoolgirl.
    “It’ll be nice to go home. I’m sure you’ll feel that way, too,” said Julia.
    Mary nodded, and swallowed. “I wonder,” she began, “if perhaps I could nurse him one last time before you go?”
    Julia was about to say no, but she checked herself. “I’ll speak to the doctor,” she said, sensing that the woman might not take her answer well. Mary rose to leave, then reached for Julia’s hand in farewell. Julia noticed the raw fingertips and the woman’s trembling lips.
    “Room 303,” sang Mary softly as she tiptoed out.
    TWO HOURS LATER , the sun was simmering on the horizon; Walter parked his car under a solitary euphorbia tree. A drop of poisonous sap dribbled down the window. He slept as a herd of giraffe crossed the road with stilted poise; their legs merged into the glittering tarmac while their heads ducked gracefully beneath the telegraph wires.
    He dreamt he and Mary were in a garden of paradise. Enormous white birds with elegantly curved beaks were crying through the trees as the couple walked along a weaving path with topiary flamingos on either side.
    “I’m pregnant,” Mary said, and this much of the dream seemed true to his memory. She
had
told him this in a garden somewhere.
    “How?” said Walter.
    “Screwing three times a day’ll do it,” she replied with a girlish smirk. That was Mary, all right: thirty-six and rude as a tart.
    “What’ll we do?” he asked, though he knew the answer. He would marry her, because that would be doing the decent thing.
    “But do you love me?”
    “I think so. I hope so. Why wouldn’t I?” he asked.
    She gave a small cry and embraced him; suddenly they were walking, man and wife, through a park in the Cape. Walter wore a straw hat and a jacket and tie. Mary held her sapphire ring up to the sun, casting rays on the stern bronze face of the Boer hero who stood, cornered by four fountains, in a goldfish pond. The pavement was scorching. Mary removed her sandals and paddled into the pool; water cascaded around her, soaking her white linen dress until it stuck to her skin. She giggled