“How do you know?”
“I heard them talking.”
“How’d she get it?”
“It’s not like it’s contagious. She got it from being pregnant. It’s taken too much out of her. She’s not exactly young, you know.”
“Is she going to be okay?”
My sister nods and takes another sip of Diet Coke. On average she’ll finish two six packs of diet soft drinks plus the fountain kind she picks up in drive thrus per day.
“She just needs to see the doctor more until the baby comes.”
“She’s carrying it low.”
“So?”
“They say high if it’s a girl, low if it’s a boy.”
“Who’s they?”
“I learned it in health class,” I lie. Truth is I listened to Mrs. Lincoln and Miss Marks, the teacher’s aide, talking softly after we came in from lunch recess, when we were supposed to have our heads on our desks, taking a rest. “Besides,” I add. “Men Dad’s age have a low sperm count. All he has left are the male swimmers.”
Rhea seems disinterested, maybe even a little disturbed by what I’ve learned.
“I want another sister,” mine says.
In shame I look out the window, even staying quiet as we pass the prison, because I know she means it.
To waste time while my mother is in the doctor’s office, I play Frogger, a miniature electronic arcade game. She has been in there long enough for me to reach the third level, one I’ve never gotten to before. The digital logs shoot out fast, and there are no lily pads to jump onto for safety. Within a few seconds I’ve let two frogs drown before my finger even presses the “hop” button.
Finally, my mother appears while I’m on my last frog life. The doctor has escorted her to the waiting area, which I know is a bad sign. Usually that job is left for one of his assistants. Dr. Simpkins is old, long past retirement age, probably in his early seventies, and I imagine his age shows the most in his hands. At this stage in his life they’re meant for simple tasks like holding onto a fishing pole off the Florida Keys or pulling down the handle of a slot machine in Laughlin, Nevada. They’re no longer meant for something as delicate and urgent as reaching into a woman’s body to help guide out a new life.
The game beeps indicating the loss of my last frog life, and quickly I turn it off.
My mother’s hands cover her face and her body heaves so hard from crying that her shirt rides up. Something slick and gooey is visible on the bottom of her belly.
Without thinking, I leap out of my chair at Dr. Simpkins.
“What did you do to her?”
Yelling at an adult is wrong, but sending my mother into hysterics isn’t right either.
Awkwardly, with her belly between us, she holds me by the shoulders.
“Don’t raise your voice, Paula.” Her reprimand is weaker than her touch. The last thing I want to do is upset her even more, so I listen. Purposely, after I retrieve my game from the chair, I wedge myself between her and Dr. Simpkins.
He hands her a slip of paper, a prescription order, probably a new medication to treat her diabetes.
“They’ll be expecting you at seven in the morning on Monday,” he informs her.
Dr. Simpkins pats her on the back, a swift show of consolation before closing the door and moving on to his next appointment.
As my mother stares at the slip before stashing it in her purse, I’m able to make out enough of the doctor’s scribbling to see it’s not a prescription for medication. Instructions are written down for the hospital’s technician to Check for demise of fetus.
“He’s dead?”
This comes out before I consider what it will do to my mother. I’m only thinking of myself, my own hurt, how my little brother, and I’m sure it’s my baby brother, might be gone before I ever get a chance to meet him. My father and I have big plans. In a couple years, when he’s old enough, he’ll fill the third seat at all the Angels’ home games. I will teach him how to throw, how to catch and how to bat like Rod Carew and heavy hitter Brian Downing. I think of my mother and how she’s spent her entire pregnancy decorating his room in yellows, not just because it’s a neutral color, but also because it’s a cheerful one. I think of how it took my father half a day to figure out the directions to put together the new crib. Just yesterday my sister helped my mother string up the safari mobile—little stuffed zebras, lions, and giraffes hanging by invisible string. The changing table is equipped with baby powder, cloth diapers, and Baby Magic lotion. Our home smells and feels like my baby brother already lives in it.
Her strength has returned because my mother hugs me hard.
“We don’t know yet. Dr. Simpkins couldn’t hear a heartbeat. He said it’s a possibility.”
“So he’s making us go home, not knowing?”
“There’s nothing more he can do.”
There’s plenty more he could do. He could admit her into the hospital. They could run the test right now and find out. Sending her home, not knowing if she’s carrying around a dead baby, is cruel.
By the time we reach the car, my mother stops crying, and even insists on stopping off at 7-11 for my favorite dinosaur egg jawbreaker as my reward for having to wait so long at the doctor’s. When we get home, my father is still at the office, and she secludes herself in their bedroom where she’ll rest until dinner.
My sister and I are in charge of making it and she actually comes out of her room without threat or force. I boil pasta for spaghetti and my sister chops tomato, carrots, and red cabbage to make a salad. Something stops me from telling her what happened at the doctor’s, how our brother or sister may be dead. Guiltily, I like making dinner with her, and if I say anything she’ll want to comfort my mother and they’ll freeze me out.
Tonight, instead of eating in the dining room, we set up at the kitchen table. Before my father has a chance to finish his salad, my mother breaks the news that Dr. Simpkins couldn’t hear the baby’s heartbeat.
My father refuses to believe it. In his line of work, there’s almost always a catch, a way out.
His reaction is exactly what she’s expecting and her face visibly tires.
“He tried a couple of times, Paul.”
“Well, he didn’t try hard enough.” My father stuffs a forkful of pasta in his mouth, ignoring the rest of his salad. “That deaf old man probably couldn’t hear his own heart with a stethoscope.”
Nobody else at the table seems so convinced, though my mother lets it drop.
