Kiko’s Baby

The day before they went to the zoo, Ian Dressler sat in his leather Lazy Boy and watched his wife and their five-year-old son. Alex bounced up and down before Maggie, his arms waving eagerly in the air. She curled her lips up in an awkward smile and rubbed the top of his head before stepping around him. For twenty minutes Alex followed her in and out of every room of their home doing this. Sometimes her fingers would linger in his brown hair or she would cup her palm around his shoulder and squeeze, but that was all. Early that same day, Ian came home from his job at Ryce Incorporated, a marketing firm in Chicago, to find that Maggie had stripped the nursery bare. The baby’s things—garbage bags full clothes, boxes of Fisher Price and Baby Einstein toys and nursery room decor, the unopened Diaper Genie, Alex’s old bassinet and crib, and Cosco packages of diapers and baby wipes—had been piled in the corner of the garage near the door to the utility room. A sign with the words “for yard sale,” scribbled in big swooping letters, was taped to the Diaper Genie box.

Heart rushing erratically in his chest, Ian moved quickly through their house, stepping over and around Alex’s strewn about toys and piles of dirty clothes. He jogged up the carpet-covered stairs to the second floor of their home. The nursery door, located directly across from the master bedroom, was closed, as it often was these days. As Ian flung the door open, fumes from fresh paint burned his nostrils, and the mail, once gripped tight in his hand, slipped from his fingers and fanned across the floor beside his brown loafers. Chest tight, eyes burning Ian stepped into the empty nursery. The once lavender walls glistened with tacky white paint that left smudges against his fingertips. He walked around the small room, unable to really grasp what had happened in the past eight hours.

Just yesterday he and Maggie talked about when the right time to take down the nursery would be. He had put Alex to bed early and met Maggie in the living room because she refused to meet in the nursery. She was nestled against the oversized beige cushions of their Sleeper Sofa, her brown hair pulled back in a loose pony tail. She was playing with her left eyebrow, running her middle finger slowly over the arch, tugging at the hairs, feeling the outer edges where stubble was growing. Her eyes were a vacant wash of green, staring at some distant place, unblinking. She wore his sweatpants low on her hips and one of his Northwester University t-shirts that billowed away from her slender body. Between her delicate-looking fingers she held a NU mug of peppermint tea. As he stepped up to the sofa, her vague, contemplative look vanished and her eyes sparkled with joy.

They sat on opposite ends of the sofa and listened to the quiet house settling with the night; neither wantinh to speak the first words of their already long-drawn out conversation. In the silence Ian could hear classical music playing from Alex’s bedroom upstairs; he thought about their son’s request that Maggie come kiss him goodnight and how he’d lied and said that she’d be in soon. Alex would be asleep within minutes and wouldn’t remember that Maggie had never stopped in—at least Ian hoped he wouldn’t remember. When Ian shifted across the couch so they were sitting hip to hip, Maggie spoke with clear, firm words.

“I want my office back.”

“It’s too soon,” Ian said. She blinked her long sweeping eyelashes and returned her attention on her tea. She blew against the rising steam and he felt it wash over his face. He wanted to take the mug from her hands, put it aside, pull her against his chest, and press his face to the soft loose tendrils of hair at her nape. He tried to do exactly that that the night before, and for two minutes he felt as if he were hugging a piece of driftwood.

“Maggie, please look at this rationally, okay? I think we need to keep the nursery up for a little longer,” he said. “We haven’t even processed, you haven’t….”

“I have.” Maggie said. Her eyes flickered back and forth as she stared at his face. She pressed her hot hand to his arm; her fingernails were nibbled short and she had little nicks around her cuticles from where she’d chewed the skin away. Before he could reach for her she pulled away and sank back into the cushions, tucking her arms close to her sides. Her lips puckered as she blew over the rim again causing the surface of the tea to ripple.

“I don’t think it’s going to do either of us good to have a reminder staring at us from across the hall,” Maggie rubbed her ear against her shoulder as if the sound of classical music bothered the follicles. Her eyes flickered to him and then moved away. “We don’t need it anymore, Ian. I need my office.”

He rubbed the back of his neck and scratched his head. He needed it—he couldn’t turn away from this like she could. “I need a few more days, Maggie, maybe a week or so, okay?”

“Fine.” She left the room holding up one side of the sweats and disappeared upstairs to their bedroom. Ian went to the nursery and picked up the fluffy white teddy bear he’d bought a month ago and held it between his hands. His eyes had moved over the individual wooden letters on the wall above the crib: L-A-C-E-Y.

Now, he stood staring at the blank walls, trying to imagine how things had been arranged before she stripped everything—the crib below the pastel letters, the changing table on the wall near the door, the rocking chair near the window, a little end table with a pink lamp and white shade near the rocker, a bookcase full of picture frames and toys and books, the Diaper Genie by the changing table, stacks and stacks diapers, and Alex’s bassinet. No, the bassinet belonged in their bedroom on Maggie’s side of the bed. As he stared at the empty room, Ian imagined what it would be like had things gone right three weeks ago. How different he’d feel—how these white walls wouldn’t seem so dark.

Closing the nursery door behind him, Ian went downstairs to the kitchen where Maggie was making lasagna. She was still wearing his sweats, which were covered in splatters of white paint that also spotted her brown hair and lightly tanned skin. She glanced over her shoulder when she heard the bottoms of his shoes scraping against the tiles. Her smile, small and brief, disappeared the moment she returned her attention to the food before her. Her hands were buried to her wrists in a mozzarella, parmesan, and ricotta mixture; lasagna noodles had been strained and waited for her in the sink, and two jars of meat sauce sat unopened near the toaster. An egg shell teetered close to the edge of the counter; Ian pushed it away from the edge and leaned against the refrigerator.

“Maggie.”

“I’m making your favorite!” she beamed at him. “This will take about an hour,” she said rubbing her chin on her shoulder, “and I forgot bread—can you run to the store?”

“Maggie, the nursery….”

Her words were clipped and final. “We don’t need it.”

“Yes we do!” He stepped back as adrenaline pumped in his chest. For the first time in weeks he didn’t want to be gentle, understanding, or patient, he wanted to shake sense into her, wanted to drag her back to Green Meadows Cemetery, wanted to force her to look—to feel. “We both need it, Maggie.”

As he spoke he stared at the cheese, globs squeezing erratically between her fingers. When she didn’t respond, Ian tugged at his brown hair and then smoothed the strands back in place. He turned away from his wife, grabbed his keys from the counter, and headed toward the utility room.

“French loaf!” Maggie cried as he stepped into the garage.

Ian avoided the piled boxes and garbage bags like the plague and rounded Maggie’s Dodge sedan and stepped through the open garage door. He unlocked his Camry parked at the curb near their mailbox and climbed in. As the door slammed, Ian considered banging his head on the steering wheel. He gripped the leather until his knuckles turned white and stared at silver logo above the airbag until it blurred. After a few minutes, he wiped his face, rubbed his palms against his pant legs, and slipped the key into the ignition. As he pulled his seatbelt across his chest and clicked it into place, he noticed the white teddy from Lacey’s crib on the passenger’s seat. The soft synthetic fur tickled his palm as he wrapped both hands around the bear’s bulbous belly. He glanced to the house and saw Maggie standing in the bay window of the den. He could see her form clearly: her baggy clothes, her paint-flecked hair, the yellow striped dishtowel twisting in her hands. As she turned away from the window, Ian placed the bear back on the passenger’s seat and started the engine. Twenty minutes later he returned home with a warm, loaf of French bread tucked into the crook of his arm. He left the teddy bear in his car.

When Maggie was fifteen she found herself pressed against the worn leather seats of nineteen-year-old Scott Masterson’s hunter green Ford 150. She was thrilled to be being asked out by a boy who had already graduated from high school. Maggie was tired of being a straight-edge, tired of not taking risks, tired of feeling alone. At a quarter past midnight, on a chilly October night, Maggie put on the pink sundress Scott told her to wear and opened her bedroom window, which screeched with each slight movement. Stepping down between the alpine currant bushes growing up around her window, she pushed the window closed, heart clamoring as the grinding became louder and louder on descent. She ran through the wet grass to the street where Scott was parked with his headlights off. He was smiling at her with his big white teeth as he leaned over the bench seat to push open the door. The smell of beer was overpowered by the piney fragrance from the Christmas tree hanging from the rearview mirror and the splash of Calvin Kline on his collar. His deep-blue eyes swept over her body before he hooked his fingers around her nape and brought his mouth against her with a punishing force.

“Hey babe,” he said. The beer on his breath and the hazy look in his eyes made her heart kick adrenaline. As she touched the silver handle of the door, Scott locked his arm around her waist and tugged her to the middle of the bench seat. He pulled away from the curb, and Maggie’s house became a small dot in the side mirror.

Scott talked about the Boyett High versus Perry High football game as he drove through the streets of her neighborhood, Summer Glen, with his lights off. He waved one hand with animation as he gave her play-by-plays, while the other hand rested on her thigh, his fingers moving in small circles. Each pass of his skin to hers caused the muscles in her leg to spasm, but he didn’t seem to notice and she was glad for that. She didn’t want him to think of her as inexperienced. Scott took her to Zuckerman Park, a heavily wooded area with a small algae-filled pond, three different swing sets, a tornado slide, and monkey bars.

He parked near the pond and killed the engine. He turned to her, ran his fingers up her thigh, and smashed his mouth to hers. In the short time it took for the windows to fog, the intensity of his mouth against hers, the cold squeeze of his fingers, and the cool air touching high on her thighs all increased. Scott laughed when she drew back and asked to be taken home; he leaned against her, pressing her to the cracked leather seat that smelled of chewing tobacco and sweat. The inside of her lips rubbed against her teeth leaving a coppery taste against her tongue; Scott didn’t mind. He didn’t mind her squirming. He didn’t mind her tears or her screams.

Scott didn’t speak on the way home. He parked the truck in front of her house, and when she pushed open the door, he grabbed her by the elbow, fingers biting into her bruised skin, and told her that what happened wasn’t what she was thinking.

“You came to me,” he said, his eyes narrowed. “You consented, Maggie.”

Her thighs stuck to the seat as she scooted across to the door. Once on the sidewalk, she watched his truck pull away, weaving like a snake up the street until it turned a corner. Maggie stood on the sidewalk until a warm hand cupped her shoulder. Her mother, wrapped in a big terrycloth robe, her hair frizzy from sleep, her eyes half closed, opened her mouth to ask a question and then stopped her eyes widening with sudden understanding. Maggie opened her mouth to explain, to lie, but her mother only shook her head and put her arm around Maggie’s shoulders.

“We’ll fix it,” she had whispered. As they walked through the front door, the light overhead flicked on. Maggie held up the torn sleeve of her dress and squeezed her eyes shut against the blaring light. When she opened them she saw her step-father Chris standing before her in blue plaid pajama bottoms and a white t-shirt. He crossed his arms over his broad chest and glared at her. Maggie leaned against her mother’s side, trying to hide behind her like she had as a small child. He reminded her of a bear, a big, strong, dark and growling bear. His eyes moved up and down her body and shook his head.

Like always, his voice was short and his words final. “You get pregnant, you’re having an abortion.”

Three months later he took her to the clinic himself.

“This is what you did,” he said to her as she sat on the exam table, the protective paper crinkling beneath her bare bottom, staring at posters of fetal growth stages while holding together the flimsy white gown they’d made her put on the moment she stepped into the exam room. Chris ignored the young nurse’s frown and appalled eyes, and said, “This is your fault, Maggie.”

The nurse came forward and laid her warm, dark fingers on top of Maggie’s clenched fists. She spoke with a soft alto-toned voice, laced with a southern accent, “Look, Hon, this procedure is risky.”

Maggie dropped her gaze from the woman’s honey-colored eyes and stared at the name badge clipped to her voluptuous chest—Lacey Collins. “These things can be difficult Maggie—and scary. The procedure could affect future pregnancies—we just don’t know all the repercussions. Has the counselor told you about your options? Do you have questions?”

“This is her only option,” Chris barked as he pushed Lacey’s hands off Maggie’s. “She’s fine. Don’t coddle her cause it’s her fault.” His beady brown eyes narrowed with a sudden idea. “Can she see the fetus?” he asked. Maggie’s stomach began to burn; she looked at Lacey, silently imploring that she wouldn’t have to look at the fetus. “I want her to see what she did.”

Lacy looked away from Chris and brought her sympathetic eyes back to Maggie as she said no. She took Maggie’s hand and held her fingers until the doctor came into the room. He assessed Maggie with a single look that brought her to tears. He smiled briefly then showed her the needle he would used to numb her body for the procedure; he brandished it like a weapon before her eyes.

Maggie’s scream could be heard throughout the small adjacent exam rooms and in the lobby where a few who were waiting got up and left the clinic.

In the depths of his sleep Ian heard Alex crying for Maggie. His cries, filtered through the adjacent wall, muffled and powerful, drew Ian away from his dreams of laughing children, jumping and dancing around the old Maggie. The happy Maggie. Groggy, but becoming more alert, Ian pushed the blankets down his knees while rolling onto his side. His eyes drifted to the red digital letters on his Timex alarm: 3:15am. He sat motionless for a moment staring at the wall with his sleepy legs dangling on the side of the bed, and tired to organize his thoughts. He pushed himself up just as Alex’s sobs turned into screams. As Ian walked around the bed he noticed Maggie sitting up, her slender arms hugging her knees to her chest; her wavy, sleep tousled hair creating a small window to her pale face. Her chin was pressed in the crevice created by her knees and her eyes looked closed, though he knew they weren’t. He knew she’d woken to Alex’s screams—she always was the first to wake and the first to go to him.

“Maggie?”

“Alex is crying,” She responded.

“I’m going to get him,” Ian said as he took a step to the door. He paused and looked at his wife. “Are you okay?”

She looked over at him. Her eyebrows turned down and her forehead wrinkled. “Are you going to get him?”

“Yes,” Ian said as he left the room.

Alex’s bedroom was hot and smelled acidic, like urine. He was sitting in the middle of his bed clutching Padma to his chest, screaming into the fur between her ears. Ian sat down beside his son and turned on the fire engine lamp on the nightstand. As he drew Alex into his arms and held him close, Padma sandwiched between, his eyes vaguely caught the large wet circle in the center of the bed. Ian pressed a soft kiss to Alex’s cheek and patted him hard between the shoulder blades. He whispered all of the appropriate things and eventually Alex’s screams became moans and then soft sighs. Ian could feel the dampness of Alex’s pajamas bottoms seeping through the leg of his own, but ignored the feeling and he held his son tighter. Finally, Alex pulled his head back from Ian’s shoulder and blinked his damp eyelashes.

“Mommy?”

Ian looked over his shoulder and found Maggie standing there clutching the wooden door frame between her fingers. Alex pushed his palms against Ian’s shoulders, Ian released him. Alex was not half way off the bed before his mother said something about clean sheets and a fresh bath, and disappeared down the darkened hallway, leaving Alex in the middle of the room watching after her.

Ian sat on the toilet lid while Alex showered and watched Maggie flutter about cleaning up after Ian’s accident. She sprayed the plastic mattress liner with a diluted bleach mixture and scrubbed it for several minutes, put the soiled bedding in the wash, and placed clean sheets and blankets warmed in the dryer onto the bed. By the time Alex was in fresh pajamas, Maggie had finished his bed and set Padma against his pillow. She was waiting in the room when they arrived. Alex ran to her and wrapped his arms around her knees. Maggie’s eyes flickered away from Alex. She bit her lower lip and hesitantly ran her fingers through his damp hair, smoothing the locks that curled at the ends.

“Time for a haircut, buddy,” she said giving him a pat before unwinding his arms from her knees. “Into bed, okay?”

Alex did as he was told and climbed beneath the sheets. He watched her with hopeful eyes that dropped down to Padma when she walked away from him. Ian tucked their son into bed and spent a few minutes talking to him about how bad dreams were only bad dreams. He left the fire engine light on as he stood.

“Hey, maybe we should go to the zoo tomorrow?” He turned to look at Maggie who was still in the doorway. “It’ll be nice—we can get out of the house for a few hours.” Alex’s face lit up with excitement as he curled up on his side.

Maggie turned out the light as Ian approached her; she was watching Alex, whose eyes seemed to glisten under the pale red light from the lamp. Ian moved around his wife and took a step toward their bedroom, and stopped when Maggie didn’t follow him. Ian stepped up behind her, hesitant to touch her in anyway, but too selfish not to. He put his hand on her arm and watched goose bumps flare across her skin. Leaning in, he pressed a kiss to her hair and scratched out a droplet of white paint from the thick strands.

“Why don’t you go sit with him until he’s asleep?” Ian suggested. Maggie turned her ear toward the sound of Ian’s voice. Her fingers moved against his before she stepped around him and returned to their bedroom. Ian looked in at Alex again and followed Maggie. She was already in bed, pretending to sleep, when he stepped into the center of the room.

“So, you’ll come to the zoo with us?”

She shifted in bed and nodded her head.

“Thank you, Maggie.” He walked toward the bed and reached out to touch her, but she shifted away. “I’m going to go watch some TV or check my email—I’m too awake to sleep right now.”

Maggie nodded again and hugged her pillow.

As he walked out of the bedroom he noticed that the office door was open wide. He paused in the doorway, smelled the lingering paint fumes, and then closed the door.

Of the many things Maggie could have looked at as they approached the entrance of Richmond Zoo—the bustling crowds of mothers with their young children, the spouting oval fountain placed centrally in the piazza-like entrance, the happiness of her own child as he threw a handful of coins from his father’s pocket into the fountain—she found herself staring at the bronze statue of a roaring lion perched fifteen feet in the air on a large, white marble pillar. Sunlight, reflecting off the finely constructed edges of the lion’s mane and sharp teeth, caused the metal to sparkle as if parts of it had been dipped in gold. It was staring at the sky, back concave, claws buried in the marble as if it were as soft as dirt, haunches lowered as if ready to pounce and strike, its mouth stretched wide, teeth bared. It was a magnificent statue that Maggie stared at until they stopped at the end of one of four ticket window lines.

“What’s that?” Alex pointed at a woman in front of them.

She was around Maggie’s age, 29 or 30, wore her black hair pulled into a pony tail that she wore low at her nape. She was wearing jeans and a blue button down shirt, and although her clothes hung off her body, Maggie could see that the woman was plump around the middle. The woman smiled at the two little children she was pushing in a stroller, and wrapped her arm around a blue tie-dyed baby sling where a six-month old was nestled against her belly. Maggie felt as if two invisible hands were clenched around her neck. She turned sharply, bumping Ian who put his hand on her hip to steady her. She gripped his arm, gesturing to some location in the distance, and walked away before she had to explain. Maggie moved around the pillar until she could no longer see the woman with the sling and stared at the fine details of the statue—its fierce expression in it’s bronzed eyes. Stepping into the pillar’s shadow, Maggie rubbed the bridge of her nose and glanced at the parking lot. Ian’s Camry was parked in 10-B, about four hundred feet away, soaking up sun at an alarming rate, making the leather seats fire hot to the touch. It would take very little to tell Ian that she wanted to go home, and he would go too. He didn’t fight with her much lately. She wanted a fight though—she wanted him to scream at her. Do something to get her back. But that wasn’t Ian’s way.

When she met him seven years ago his passivity had turned her off. He was nonchalant—almost too laidback and uncaring. He seemed disinterested and unimpressed—said he was pleased to meet her, but that pleasure never quite reached his eyes. Had she not been paying close attention while admiring how the ends of his brown hair swooped upward in a soft curl, how there were green flecks in his brown eyes, how the solid frame of his body towered over hers when he slipped off his barstool on the way to the bathroom, and the delicate way he gripped his beer mug she wouldn’t have seen the subtle way he glanced to the side to watch her talk to Gracie, their mutual friend. She wouldn’t have seen him chuckle at something she said or him blushing when their eyes met briefly over Gracie’s shoulder. Had she not been paying attention, Maggie would have missed the way his fingers lingered a bit too long on hers when he shook her hand goodbye.

After they began dating, Maggie learned that Ian wasn’t always passive and aloof—he just picked his battles with delicate care and didn’t force matters on her. He often let her win arguments because he didn’t feel like dragging things out, but would find little ways to show her that he was right in the end. He never played an I-told-you-so card; but his silence said enough. From the very beginning Ian could read her like an open book. He spoke to her differently—touched her differently. She was certain that he knew every torrid detail from her past, every painful secret, just by looking at her. So when she told him about the accident in the park a year after they’d been dating she hadn’t expected a reaction. Ian had stopped watching the blizzard billowing snow against the windows of his Chicago apartment where they’d been trapped for two days and turned his full attention to her. His body, which had been resting warmly against her side tensed, his hand held her thigh a little tighter, and his breath began to rush from his lips as if he’d run a mile. His eyes jerked about as he stared down at her and his lower lip trembled.

“Are you serious?” he demanded.

She felt silly for telling him the story—for drudging up the insignificance of her past, so she shrugged, “It was just an accident—”

“Um, no, Maggie,” his tone made her shudder; his fingers squeezed her a little tighter. “You were raped!”

It was the first time that the accident was ever acknowledged in such away.

“N-no, Ian… it was an accident. Not… not what you said,” she stammered.

“You’ve got to be joking,” Ian cried. “You were raped, Maggie!”

He said that word over and over and over like a scratched record. When he was done saying it, she climbed out of their little cocoon of blankets and went into the bathroom where she locked the door behind her. Maggie expected him to leave her alone, like he normally did, but a second later he knocked, and then he knocked again, and again. And then he pounded. When she opened the door he didn’t demand details, didn’t yell, didn’t demand, and didn’t say the word again; he just took her cheeks between his fire-hot palms and told her he wasn’t going anywhere.

It was another year and not until after they were married that she told him about the abortion—about her irregular periods, about the possibility that she might never have a baby. Alex was born the following year and she remembered the joy in Ian’s face, the pride and love he had for their baby—for her. She remembered how he cuddled their son and cried over his blue blanket—gently stroking Alex’s puffy little cheek.

Then, during a vicious thunderstorm five years later, Maggie felt stillness within her swollen belly. She dismissed her feelings as being overly worried, which was silly of her. Alex had been still for several hours toward the end and he was fine. So, unlike the time before, she told Ian when he came home from work, and ten hours later she found herself pushing lifelessness from her body and no one could explain why. This time when Ian held their baby he didn’t cry—he stared with vacant, sad eyes that didn’t quite connect with anything. And after he looked at Maggie and she looked away he didn’t come to her side. Four, maybe five, different people asked her in different ways if she wanted to hold the baby. But this was her fault, after all, and holding the baby seemed like a special thing to do—a luxury—so she refused.

Suddenly, jostled by a gaggle of running children tearing past her for the wishing fountain, Maggie stepped closer to the pillar, so close she could press her cheek against the cold marble.

“What were you thinking about?” Ian asked as he approached carrying Alex in his arms. Maggie shrugged her shoulder—she couldn’t remember her thoughts, not completely. Her mind was off like that lately; disappearing to random, dark, unfortunate places that she’d rather forget.

It was suffocating at times, memories always choking her down, shoving her into an immobile state. She ignored Ian’s worried look and smiled at Alex who had his arms locked securely around Ian’s neck, three golden zoo tickets clutched between his fingers.

“Maybe we can ride the train today!” She said as she ruffled Alex’s hair.

The joy in his face didn’t touch her heart as she knew it probably should; it flickered against her skin and gave her goose bumps, but that was all. Rubbing her arms, she took her ticket from Alex and led the way toward the entryway turnstiles. She hoped they would see the big cat exhibit first. The lions or maybe the black leopards; she remembered the last time she was there, how the big female slowly stalked the thick plastic walls of her habitat, claws clicking the cement surface, breath fogging the clear panes, eyes seeking and craving. But Ian said something about monkeys—grunting and screeching at Alex in the process—so they took the left path at the first fork in the road and headed in the opposite direction of the big cat exhibit.

Primate Jungle, the outdoor African ape habitat, stretched one hundred feet long and wide, and consisted of two large islands surrounded by a murky moat of brown water. The 20-foot tall chain-link fences lined along the top with electric wires, kept a thin barrier between the apes and the zoo visitors who pressed themselves against the metal, eyes darting about anxiously. Ian led Maggie and Alex toward an open spot where a man had just ushered his family away. Ian’s eyes began scanning the terrain, his heart quickening in his chest. On the island nearest to them, before a small building that likely housed the apes in bad weather, were four trees with bare, robust branches chopped bluntly at the ends and trunks more than three feet wide. The amputated branches reached out from the base of the trunk and moved upward at different levels before forking off at the tops. Thick, three-strand ropes had been tossed from tall

branches to low and low branches to tall, and were twisted in tight knots. The ropes swung in the breeze like snakes sprawled out with unsupported bellies. A young female ape sat near the tree across from where they were standing. In her long, black fingers she gripped the end of one of the ropes and shook it vigorously while screeching at the ape that was using the twisted knot at the other end as a pillow. He rolled his annoyed deep-brown eyes away from the sky and looked down at her baring his brown, gummy smile before looking back up at the sky.

“This is cool, huh?” Ian asked as he kept his eyes peeled for the fifth missing ape.

“Yeah, let’s go see the other monkeys—the chimps,” Alex said as he wiggled in Ian’s arms. Ian set him down on ground.

“Well, we haven’t seen all the apes yet,” Ian said. “There’s one more—somewhere.”

“How do you know how many there are?” Alex asked as he pushed his forehead against the chain links and stared at the female ape closest to him. Ian glanced over at Maggie who was standing a few feet away watching with her fingers curled around the twisted metal pockets of the fence.

“I read an article about them last night,” Ian answered when Alex poked his leg. He glanced at Maggie again and saw that she was craning her neck, like others around her, trying to see something in the distant corner. Ian put his hand on the top of Alex’s head and let out the breath he had been holding. “Let’s just wait here a few more minutes—I want Mommy to see something.”

Ian glanced at Maggie as he spoke. Like the older woman beside her, she had pressed her forehead to the fence to get a better look at the apes.

The most difficult moment of Ian’s life had occurred when he stood beside Maggie as she delivered Lacey into the arms of Dr. Ronnie Nayman, who then passed her off quickly to a nurse who carried her like an over-flowing pot of gold to the corner where Lacey was placed under warming lamps. The delivery room was silent save for the shuffling of slipper-clad feet and the soft whispers in the corner as nurses cleaned Lacey. Five years before, Ian had pressed his palms over his ears, laughing with Maggie as Alex’s shrill screams bounced off the delivery room walls. Alex’s birth had been chaotic—so much activity, so much laughter. With Lacey’s birth, all he heard was Maggie’s short gasps and the occasional tinker of tools on the metal tray that was being rolled toward Dr. Nayman. Maggie had stared into the circular lights positioned above her trembling body, shaking her head in little jerks, blinking rapidly. Ian went to her, took her limp fingers in his and said her name. Maggie turned away, but left her fingers twitching against his skin. It seemed torturous to make her go through it—to be told that there was no heart beat, to be forced to deliver because it had to be done, to go through the motions without receiving the award.

Ian had grieved more for his wife at that moment than he did his child, until Lacey, bundled in a blanket, was pressed to his chest. Ian could remember the warmth, stillness, and the gentle weight of her little curving body in the crook of his arm. He memorized every inch of her face, the soft button nose, tiny pink lips, little chin, a little birthmark near her right eye—a mark just like Maggie’s. He touched a damp curl of brown hair poking out from beneath the cap, touched her warm cheek, and then looked at Maggie and found her watching him. She turned away and draped her arm over her eyes. That was the only time he saw her chin tremble, the only time she made any sound that indicated that she was in pain. He wanted to go to her, to bring Lacey to her, but he couldn’t move. He watched his daughter and turned to Dr. Nayman.

“Isn’t there anything you can do?”

She said so many things that didn’t make sense—sudden antenatal death, preeclampsia, chromosomal aberrations, placental abruptions, umbilical cord accidents. Jumbles of medical speak that didn’t register in Ian’s mind. Dr. Nayman quietly gave him statistics, as if reciting from a script that was read to one in 115 parents just like him. She then said they could have all the time they wanted—that they wouldn’t be rushed. Ian tried to lay Lacey in Maggie’s arms, but she pushed his arm away and shook her head.

“Hold her, Maggie,” Ian whispered tears burning his eyes.

Maggie asked to be taken to her room—she demanded it.

Ian always regretted not forcing Maggie to hold Lacey, to tell her then and there that there was nothing any of them could do that it was no one’s fault. Above all, he had wanted Maggie to hold her, just for a moment, to have a connection, to know that it was okay to cry, to be upset to scream about how unfair it was. Maggie didn’t do any of those things; she was simply rolled from the room. She didn’t look at or touch Lacey, not even at the funeral—this was the time she stopped touching Alex as well.

He didn’t know what to do for her then and he wasn’t even sure that her seeing this now would do any good.

“Dad, why is that lady crying?”

Ian followed Alex’s pointing finger and saw that the woman beside Maggie, an older woman with soft gray hair poking out of her drooping hot pink sun hat, was sobbing into her hands. Maggie was watching her with curiosity and stepped away as the woman buried her face against the chest of a man that Ian assumed was her husband and wailed even harder. The woman wailed harder and turned away from Maggie and buried her face against the chest of a man that Ian assumed was her husband. Maggie watched them walk away and then looked over her shoulder at Ian her eyes wide with confusion. As she turned back to the habitat there was a collective gasp.

Ian watched the midnight-black ape, her straight black fur glistening violet-blue in the sunlight, moving slowly across the island toward a tree. Each step seemed calculated and exact, as if she were balancing on an invisible beam. She stalled a few times, glanced over her shoulder with deep sparkling eyes, and then moved on. Ian watched, slightly horrified, as the baby ape sprawled across the gorilla’s shoulders slid down the slope of her back and landed in a twisted clump, his little black body contrasting against the vivid green grass. Maggie saw this happen and gripped the fence a little tighter. She looked over her shoulder at Ian her eyebrows were turned in, and her lips pressed together. When she turned her attention back to the ape that was starring at the baby, waiting for him to get up and climb back on. After a minute the ape turned in three steps and sat down beside the baby; she dropped her chin to her chest and knocked at the baby with her knuckles. The motionless body shifted, untwisting to lay flat, his cheek pressed to the grass. As the ape sat there tapping her baby, the playful one who had been shaking the thick rope danced across the grass on her knuckles, grunted, and reached for the infant. The mother reacted instantly, lifting her chin from her chest, she shrieked and swung her arm violently through the air knocking the other ape upside the head. She then stood, towering over her baby, roaring and growling as the other ape ran screaming across the island and launched herself into a tree. Soon, breathless and agitated, the mother sat back down and picked up her baby. She held it between her hands, her thumbs gripping its slender black arms, her lips touching his small and delicate hands that were turned up toward the sky, and peered at it with curiosity. As the baby’s head slowly lolled back, his mouth falling open, Maggie turned away from the fence, walked up to Ian, and slapped him across the face.

Maggie covered her mouth with her stinging hand and stared at her husband. He blinked several times before looking away. He didn’t move after it happened, he didn’t acknowledge the shocked gasps and looks around them; he stood there, his jaw working, his lips pressed together. Never in Maggie’s life had she slapped anyone, and it wasn’t that she wanted to slap Ian for any particular reason—he was just there, watching her, and she felt this uncontrollable need to lash out. She took a step forward and then stopped, blinking away tears that were stinging her eyes. Ian turned back to her and sighed. Maggie didn’t know what to do. How could she apologize for this? As they stood there, staring at one another, Alex ran to Maggie and threw his arms around her legs.

“I’m sorry!” He wailed. He went on and on apologizing for everything he could think of. He was worry for leaving his toys around the house, for peeing in his bed, for staining his new shirt with juice, for hugging her too hard when Lacey was inside, for taking her to the zoo when he knew she didn’t want to go. As he apologized, Maggie dropped down to her knees and wrapped her arms around his trembling body.

“It’s not your fault, Alexander,” she said. “I’m sorry I did this—I didn’t think. I’m not upset with you or with daddy. I’m sorry.”

As Alex put his face against her neck and held her more securely around the neck, Maggie felt her body giving in. She slumped forward in his arms causing him to stagger under her sudden weight. She tried to hold herself upright, bracing her palm on the cement, but couldn’t find the strength to keep herself from toppling over. Unable to hold her weight, Alex sank to his knees, straddling her lap. His breath warmed on her shoulder, and his hair smelled of sunshine and sweat; she breathed the scent deep into her lungs. Maggie could feel the hum of his trembling body and the feel of his little fingers playing in the ends of her hair—those soft, delicate touches fueled something deep inside of her, something she hadn’t felt in such a long time.

As the onlookers began to shuffle away, having seen their fill of a dead gorilla baby, Maggie sat in the middle of the sidewalk and held her infant. Held him, rocked him, and whispered soft words into his hair as she stroked his back and arms. She looked up at the gorilla that was holding her baby in the palm of her hand as she slowly crept back and forth across the island.

“Don’t do it again,” Alex whispered as he stared at her.

“I… won’t,” Maggie pressed her lips together. She ran her fingers through Alex’s hair and kissed his forehead. “I promise.”

The mourning ape now sat near a lush green bush, the baby tucked in both hands.

“Kiko has been carrying him around like since he died three days ago,” a zookeeper was telling the crowd nearby. “In the wild they can hold them for several weeks. We don’t want to separate Kiko from her baby just yet—we want her to let go naturally, as she would in the wild.”

Maggie closed her eyes and held Alex even tighter. He sighed against her skin, squeezed her neck, and murmured a soft “I love you” into her hair. Maggie watched Ian as he approached them from where he had been sitting. He helped Maggie up and shook his head when she tried to apologize. He put his arm around her waist and led her back to the fence. Together they watched as Kiko, who was pressed up against the leafy branches of a flowering bush, her infant lying in the grass before her black-soled feet, gently stroked the baby's back. Kiko’s eyes were downcast, her fingers buried in the grass on either side of the baby. After a moment she looked up and scanned the line of the fence where people stood watching, a few snapping pictures. Maggie leaned against Ian and watched as Kiko rocked forward, her big palm stretching out to scoop the baby up. She slung the infant over her broad shoulders like a dish cloth, and glanced back at him, maybe to see if he had come around yet. She stared at the baby for a minute and then turned her head forward and began walking, moving slowly, purposefully around the bushes and out of sight.

A/N: This is a story that I wrote for class--thanks for reading it! I know I'm neglecting my other stories... this week my goal is to manage my time A LOT better so I can get a few hours of "fun" writing done. Please feel free to leave me your comments about this story; I look forward to hearing your thoughts.