She flops on me, the wet of her diaper heavy on my leg. When Daddy Shawn sees it like that, down to her knees, he says, You ever change her, well don’t you, don’t you. But he’s not here and Mama’s not here so I take Baby by the hand down the hall to the little room and after it’s off I see the box with the diapers is empty. That’s where they went, I say, to get more diapers. She sucks two fingers and looks at me like she does and the sucking makes a squeak-squeak.
When will she talk, he likes to say, too, What’s wrong with her, aren’t you talking to her, why the fuck aren’t you talking to her? until Mama says Stop.
Morning comes and everything’s wet with pee, her pajamas, her sheets, her blankets. The yellow bus will be here soon so I start to make my sandwich but in the little cupboard there’s no bread, that must be where they are, getting diapers and bread, this is what I tell her when she cries at the window, her face red and wet. Don’t cry, I say, they’ll come. She points and says, Uck, uck. Her first word, Mama! Truck! There it is, on the gravel. When we hear his snoring from the big bedroom Baby shoots under the couch and I’m right beside her, we don’t need Mama to say Shh to go. Our hearts thump so hard they roll into each other. Will the bus wait?
He comes out after the sun is over the trees and sits at the table and when we see he’s quiet we crawl onto the couch. He doesn’t say, What’s wrong with her, doesn’t thump the table and say Fuck! FuckFuckFuck! He doesn’t say anything at all, he just goes out, starts up the truck and drives down the road, down down down the long straight road. Baby cries and pees on the couch, then on the floor by the fridge until I yell at her Stop, stop, the way Mama does, like she will break. Baby curls up like the rabbit we scared and sucks hard on her fingers.
I wake up when the door bangs. We’re in my bed. He stands over us a long time, his eyes undoing us. I want Mama here. Her eyes are soft and she gives extra bananas and snuggles and says it will be OK. After the walls shake from his meanness she still says it will be OK.
No idea where she is, he says, his eyes hard like pebbles. Don’t know where she mighta went, with no car. Been on every road in the county. No sign of her. Just goes to show, Boy. He drinks his beer in one go, drops the can and stomps it flat, then kicks it to the pile by the door and goes outside. When we hear the truck start up, Baby stops sucking and yells Uck! UckUckUck. That’s right, I say. Truck.
Astrid Blodgett is the author of the short story collections This Is How You Start to Disappear and You Haven’t Changed a Bit, both of which have been short-or long-listed for some great awards. In another life, she co-edited Recipes for Roaming: Adventure Food for the Canadian Rockies. Besides writing, Astrid loves multi-day river trips and very long walks, especially Camino Edmonton.
