Baby Love (26 page)

One funny thing is, she’s just three months old but she already has a tooth. And even her one tooth isn’t quite right. It’s coming in all slanted so it cuts into her bottom lip a little, which makes her look like she’s been in a fight and lost.

Still it feels sort of nice to cuddle her, especially considering the mood Sandy’s in, after the fight with Mark. And Mark Junior has never wanted too much hugging and kissing. He wants to keep moving. Even when he was a tiny baby he used to wrinkle up his nose and sneeze if you’d nuzzle up against him for too long. But Melissa seems happy just lying in Sandy’s arms. She isn’t smiling exactly (it’s almost like her muscles aren’t strung tight enough), but her eyes are open, and even though there’s a cloudy film over them, Sandy’s sure Melissa’s really looking at her. A few minutes ago, when Sandy set Mark Junior down on the floor with his Ivory Snow study board, and he started yelling, the way he always does, and waving his fist at the baby in the picture, Melissa made a little noise too, like she wanted to play. But then her eyelids dropped down again and this little trickle of drool came down her chin and she didn’t make any more noises. Like she remembered all of a sudden how tired she was.

Ann has begun to learn the bats’ timetable. During the day they mostly sleep, or at least rest. Then right around dusk they begin swooping down from the eaves, bumping around in the attic, crashing against the windows. Why they do this she doesn’t understand. The ones inside want to get out. The ones outside try to get in. The worst part is the sound of their toenails scraping against the panes.

They do that for about an hour and then they’re quiet again. Until about 1 a.m., when they begin to shriek. It’s two-thirty now and they have just stopped.

The odd thing is, Ann was almost calm, listening to them. Even though there must have been a hundred bats scratching against the attic walls, flapping against the windows. Even though her neighbor’s wife found her today in her neighbor’s arms. Even though that TV show about the blood spatters is the kind that usually gives her nightmares.

Now she’s sitting in her rocking chair with a glass of Kahlua, listening to Dolly Parton at full volume. She’s still wearing her bath towel, and she has covered her body with powder. She has one hand under the towel. She is watching Simon asleep on the floor. It looks as if he’s dreaming of chasing a weasel. Every minute or so he makes a little snorting noise and moves his legs as if he was running.

She should be upset by what that man said to her. She should have called her friend Patsy in Brattleboro and said, Can I come stay with you for a few days? She should have told him, If you ever call me again I will report you to the police.

But she is just sitting here, rocking. Thinking: Things will not just be this way forever. Something’s going to happen. It doesn’t even matter what.

Of course this wasn’t the first time that Val’s mother has grounded her. When she found out the sleep-over party at Casey’s house on Long Island was coed, and Casey was a boy, that was one time. When she came home early from the ballet because Baryshnikov wasn’t dancing that night after all, and she found Val fixing piña coladas with the special rum she brings back every New Year’s from Haiti, that was another. Also, when Val’s geometry teacher called to say, “I’m surprised you signed Val’s report card, with that F I gave her.” And Val’s mother said, “F—what F? I thought it was a B.” Val was grounded for two weeks for that, and she couldn’t even listen to records. Her mother threatened to have the phone in Val’s room disconnected too, but she never went through with it.

This time all that happened was Val said she’d be home by one, and then she didn’t get back until three. Well, just a little after. It’s hard finding a cab at that hour. Anyway, Val’s mother must be pretty dense to think she’d make it home by one, when the movie only started at midnight. It was called
Eraserhead
, about this guy whose head is shaped like an eraser. Much better than
Rocky Horror Show.
There was one girl in the audience who had smeared vomit all over her hair. People said it was vomit anyway. Val had a feeling maybe it was just that instant papier-mâché they used one time in art class.

The real pisser about being grounded at this particular moment is her friend Zoe’s parents are flying out to L.A. this weekend and Zoe has finally figured out where her father keeps his video cassette of
Story of O.
She’s going to have a party with all the coolest guys, and it will probably turn into an orgy. Zoe has been on a diet for a week, in case they play strip poker.

Of course there’s nothing to stop Val from going anyway. Her mother (who’s out shopping at the moment) doesn’t have her chained up or anything. She could just take off after therapy or something. Only she’d have to come home sometime (her records are here, among other things). And when she did, the shit would really hit the fan. No point going through the entire summer with no clothing allowance, all because of a party. If she’s going to have to make do with her old horrible bikini, at least she should have a really fantastic time first.

Too much stress. One of these days she is going to get an ulcer, and will her mother ever be sorry. Val could use a vacation. Someplace where there aren’t any hassles.

That’s when it hits her: she’ll go visit her art teacher, Mr. Hansen. Greg. She even has his new address in New Hampshire printed in the back of her yearbook, because the Walker School believes in fostering ongoing student-teacher relationships. They keep telling you: don’t lose touch. Let us know how things are going. Well, she will do better than that. Zoe won’t believe it when Val tells her. And Mr. Hansen is very cute.

So what she does is, she empties a bottle of aspirin into the toilet and flushes them down, leaves the empty bottle in her mother’s medicine chest, where she is sure to go for it when she finds Val gone. Nothing too obvious—just enough to leave her feeling worried.

Then she takes eighty dollars out of the blue Tupper-ware box her mother keeps in the freezer. She stuffs the money in her overnight case, along with a couple of tops and her diaphragm and her curling iron (she’s growing out her bangs, and they’re at that impossible length). She changes her shirt three times, also takes off her jeans when she decides not to wear underpants. Then she locks up the apartment, lurches past the doorman (in case her mother talks to him later and says, “Did you notice anything about my daughter?”) and hails a cab. She gets out at the Ninety-second Street entrance to the FDR Drive. Slings her overnight bag over her shoulder (regretting having chosen the one with YSL printed all over it) and sticks out her thumb.

It is a little after midnight when the idea comes to him. It’s always like this, with Wayne’s best plans. He will just be lying on his bed or sitting looking out the window and then a voice inside his head tells him exactly what to do. “Wayne,” says the voice, “that woman in the toll booth is meant to be yours.” “Wayne, that baby inside her has to go.” “Wayne, there is a girl named Ann sitting alone in a house and she is just waiting for you. Now I am going to tell you how to get there.” It must have been this way for Joan of Arc. Maybe David Berkowitz too.

He slips on his paper slippers. (Regrettable that he has no regular shoes. He will go barefoot before he puts on those Hush Puppies Charles wears.) He pulls his T-shirt over his head, checks his hair in the mirror. There’s nothing he needs to take, except the picture of Loretta.

Charles sits at the orderlies’ station, eating cheese puffs and a Twinkie. There is a biography of Bruce Springsteen open on the table, but Charles is not reading. Wayne guesses he is probably stoned. So much the better.

“Nice evening,” says Wayne. Charles drops his cheese puff.

“Catching up on your reading, I see,” says Wayne.

Charles says Bruce Springsteen comes from my same town in New Jersey. He’s older though. You know you aren’t supposed to be out on the ward this time of night.

“You know what you aren’t supposed to be doing?” says Wayne. He can hear that young kid down the hall, banging his head against the wall again.

Charles says, “Huh?” He relaxes a little. Now Wayne’s going to give one of his health food lectures about how cheese puffs just pollute your body, tell him do you know what the inside of your large intestine must look like?

“I’m talking about pills,” says Wayne. “I’m talking about all those little red pills in that lunchbox of yours. Wondering what Dr. McAlister would say.”

Charles sags back in his chair. There is no point trying to fight whatever is coming now. He will simply sit here and wait to see what Wayne has in mind. More free dope probably. Well, Charles will not even wait for Wayne to ask. He reaches into his pocket.

“Do you think I want more of that poison?” says Wayne. “Why do you think I took it in the first place? I’ve just been gathering the information, that’s all. Compiling data, as Dr. Poster would say. Names, dates, transactions. In case someone might be interested.”

Charles just sits there. Even if he weren’t so stoned, he wouldn’t know what to do now. Might as well ask Wayne. He will know.

“But suppose,” says Wayne, “that the person who had all this data escaped? Suppose he wasn’t around to tell Dr. McAlister?”

Charles does not have to point out that there are two guards downstairs, and another one patrolling the grounds. He already understands that of course Wayne will take his uniform and ID. The only question left is what to tell them in the morning, when they find him sitting here wearing Wayne’s pajamas. He will lose his job, naturally. But that’s better than a drug charge.

He is stripped down now, except for his shorts. Even at a time like this, he feels embarrassed to have Wayne see his body. Wayne is in such good shape.

“You know what you need?” says Wayne, zipping up Charles’s white pants, which are too short, of course. “Brewer’s yeast. And stay away from that refined sugar. It’ll kill you.”

M
RS.
R
AMSAY’S IDEA WAS
, she would give the mother one more chance. Show her a couple of the photographs, say do you really want me to give this to a judge? Even Perry Mason couldn’t win this case for you. So just sign the paper and give Baby to me. Or don’t sign the paper. Just put Baby in my arms, and remember there are more photographs where these come from.

But the mother was not home. And then who should she see but the other girl, the one with the little boy, sitting on the steps of the apartment building across from the Laundromat with the little boy in her arms and Baby Susan in the stroller next to her.

Baby Susan did not look well. She was an odd color, and her head kept rolling around. The little boy—Mark is his name—was holding a rattle and smiling. And Baby Susan was just sitting there with her mouth open and her eyes shut. The girl, Baby Mark’s mother, did not seem to be paying attention. She appeared to have been crying, in fact. Maybe she had just heard the news about Michael Landon and his wife getting a divorce. Mrs. Ramsay has been upset about that all day. That, combined with talking to the girl who is going to the clinic where they kill babies, and taking the disgusting photographs, and having to speak with that young man and give him the eighteen hundred and twenty-six dollars, and reading in the
Star
that the character of Linc Tyler is about to be written out of
All My Children.
So many bad things, Mrs. Ramsay’s head was spinning.

But she knew she had to get that baby right away. “Why don’t I just take Baby home with me,” she said to Baby Mark’s mother. “I am the grandmother, you know. I will let Baby’s mother know that she’s with me.” The girl looked as if she wasn’t even paying attention.

“Oh,” she said. “Sure. I just changed her, but she wasn’t even wet.” Muttered something about maybe the baby’s a little dehydrated. Then Mrs. Ramsay wheeled the stroller down the street. It was that simple.

Of course, when the mother comes to pick up Baby, they will not be there. Mrs. Ramsay has finished loading up the car with everything she needs. She will go to that place in New York City where they have the breast-feeding machines for adoptive mothers first. Then she and Baby Susan will visit Disney World in Orlando. She will take a picture of Susan and Mickey Mouse together, with her new Polaroid camera. She has heard that everything at Disney World is very clean.

There is just one more thing she has to do first.

It has been a rougher trip than Val expected. First she had to wait almost two hours for a ride and she wished she’d worn something besides her Hawaiian print shirt, which is short-sleeved and very punk, but not all that warm after sundown.

The first man that picked her up was around her father’s age, and not fat but kind of saggy. Going to a convention in Bridgeport. Said he sold industrial cleaning fluids. Going to a cleaning fluid convention evidently.

He kept wanting to talk about sex. How much things had changed from back in his day. How it used to be the only girls that would do it were the kind that you’d have to worry about giving you a disease. Kept talking about the Pill like it was big news and he was so hip. When the truth is, most of Val’s friends have IUD’s or diaphragms. Val thinks the Pill is very sixties.

The man said he’d heard girls were getting so aggressive these days that all these young boys were suffering from impotence. Wished the girls would just back off. Also, they were so used to getting it all, they didn’t know any of the preliminaries anymore. The man said he heard they were giving this course at some Princeton fraternity on how to make out. “If that’s what they’re studying now at college, I would be a Ph.D.,” he said. “If I was only young.” He said that three times.

Nothing happened with him, but she was still glad when they got to Bridgeport. “Am I supposed to do something or what?” said the man just before he let her out of the car.

Val said, “No, you aren’t supposed to do anything.” Unbelievable.

The next guy was really obese. So fat he spilled over the bucket seat and the stick shift dug into his leg. Val had to squeeze right up against the car door to keep from pushing up against him. That would have really grossed her out.