“No!” I know what she’s going to say—that if the baby isn’t mine, she’d understand if we parted, but that’s not what I want. For the first time since I slinked into Simpkins’s office with my bottle of Macallan, I feel good, hopeful, desirous to stay alive. What’s to be gained by a paternity test? Nothing. Having gone so long without a child, I don’t want to risk throwing away my chance to be a father if the test proves negative. Ignorance has its virtues. I’ve wandered through half my life not really knowing everything that goes on around me. Why should I change now?
Laurel’s teeth chatter. She rubs her hands together, crosses her arms. “I’m cold.”
“Hey, shouldn’t you still be in the hospital?”
Laurel winces. “The doctors said I’d be all right. That’s what they said.”
“They did?”
“Trust me. It’s better I’m not there. They can’t even sew up an episiotomy right. Can you bring me a blanket?”
I bend to my knees, and placing one arm around her shoulders and the other behind her knees, I lift her from the rocking chair. She’s lighter than she ought to be, and though she claims to be cold, a feverish heat rises off her. She’s a frail little bird, a plush toy of a new mother, someone who, in her inimitable unspoken way, is frantic and scared. With her in my arms, I walk toward the bedroom. I’m not muscular like that blond-haired guy in the photo Simpkins showed me, but aided by adrenaline and the wish to bring peace to this roller-coaster night, I carry her effortlessly. During our honeymoon, Trish refused to allow me to lift her into my arms and carry her across the threshold of our hotel suite, and although I tried not to let her denial bother me, I think of that moment as the first indication Trish was never prepared to fully give herself to me. Crossing from the hallway into the bedroom, I slide Laurel into bed, roll the quilted comforter over her. By the time I fluff up her pillow, she’s fast asleep but sweating profusely.
Chapter Twenty-Nine LAUREL
Shivering and wet, I’m melting away into nothingness. I must have fallen asleep hours earlier. Jimmy must have carried me into bed. There’s a damp washcloth on my forehead dripping water onto my face, and though three blankets wrap around me, I’m trembling when I awaken on the bed in my apartment. Knowing Zerena’s missing, I feel empty. Moonlight dapples the river outside the bedroom window, the light glistening on the water, but I’m woozy and achy. What presses upon me is darkness and peril. It’s five a.m., an hour when no one should be awake. I’m scared and desperate, childless and alone in this apartment that still feels new to me, and because it is new to me, it feels like I’m a snowflake who doesn’t belong here, an interloper, a temporary lodger who’ll soon be told to pack her bags and take a hike. Hearing footsteps approach the bedroom, I duck under the covers. A hand plops on my shoulder, tugging me.
“Laurel. Please.”
Peering out from underneath the blankets, I see Jimmy’s insistent face. He sets a glass of water on the nightstand and shakes out a couple of capsules from a bottle onto his palm. Because he was not in bed when I awoke, I assumed he had gone away again, like he always does.
“Have you been here all night?” I ask.
“There’s no place I’d rather be than here, sweetie, taking care of you,” Jimmy says. Though his feet are bare, he’s dressed in the same suit he’s worn since yesterday. Shadows hang beneath his eyes. If I were to bet, I’d guess he had no sleep whatsoever. I’m oddly emotional, knowing he’s been here all night. We’ve never shared a full evening together. When he checked us into fancy hotels, he’d duck away before midnight each night to return home to Tricia. I told him I understood—he didn’t want to unnecessarily anger his wife—but I felt second-class, cheap, and slutty, knowing he didn’t want to wake up and find me sleeping beside him. After making love, I’d rest my head on his shoulder and inhale his Acqua di Giò, his deodorant, and the musty tang of his perspiration. He’d hold me for joyous, satisfying moments and say he wished he could spend the whole night with me, and I never knew if he was telling the truth about this or not. Was our love situational? Was that all it was? I’d watch him gather his trousers, his jockey shorts, his black dress socks from wherever he’d thrown them before getting into bed with me.
“Jimmy? Can I ask you a question?”
“Sure.”
“Where do you live? With Tricia?” This had bothered me ever since the hospital security officer made me feel like a fool for not knowing it.
To my surprise, James tells me the address—somewhere in Georgetown—and because he willingly tells me this address, I realize he trusts me. Or at least figures I can’t possibly inflict any more harm on his marriage than I already have. When I repeat the address, committing it to memory, he nods. Sometime soon, whenever I’m with my cell phone again, I vow to look up that address to get a greater glimpse into his life.
Now, Jimmy hands me the glass of water. “Take these, okay?” he says of the two capsules in his palm.
“What are they?”
“Ibuprofen. To bring your fever down. Are you sure doctors didn’t give you any other medicine when they discharged you?”
Perhaps it’s out of concern for Zerena or perhaps because he’s worried about my health that he chose to spend the whole night with me, but I’d like to think he’s turning over a new leaf, finally ditching Tricia so we can live together. My throat is so dry I can barely swallow the ibuprofen capsules, but I swell with emotion. Through the fog of my happiness, I hear something thump against the front door, the sound distant and cloudy like a handclap heard when swimming underwater.
Jimmy cocks his head. “Newspaper,” he announces. “They just delivered it. That’s what the sound is.”
“Do you think they published a story about Zerena’s disappearance?”
Jimmy’s head pops up. The possibility hadn’t occurred to him before I mentioned it, but now that I have, he bounds out of the room to fetch the paper. I hear him open the front door and then close it. Moments later, he returns with the newspaper tucked under his arm and slides into bed beside me. His cold feet brush against my calves, sending icy shivers all over me, but for a moment it’s easy to imagine we’re an old married couple lazing away the early hours of a Saturday morning reading the newspaper in bed. Jimmy holds the paper so we can both read it, but no article about Zerena appears on the front page. Washington being a national and international city, stories of local interest go underreported in the Post, but it’s impossible they’d overlook a sensational nugget about a newborn’s disappearance from a local hospital. Jimmy sighs. Against my hot face, his breath is cold, icy like his toes are against my feet. We search the entire front section. Jimmy picks up another section and rifles through the pages. “There’s got to be an article about her somewhere.”
But there isn’t.
“Nothing,” Jimmy says. “How can that be? You’d figure there’d be an Amber Alert on her by now. Don’t newspapers mention Amber Alerts anymore?”
“Maybe we should put out a reward to find her? Let’s call the police and tell everyone we’re offering—I don’t know—ten thousand dollars for Zerena’s return. We’ll offer enough money so people take notice.”
“We should offer money?”
We’ve rarely talked about money, and I’m acutely aware of the financial imbalance I bring into this relationship. I’m the penniless damsel, and he’s my knight in shining currency who’ll open up his checkbook to rescue our little princess. “I meant, maybe you can offer a reward. Even if she’s not really your daughter—”
Jimmy presses his fingers over my lips. “She’s my daughter. I love her too.”
I squint at him. How could he now be so sure he’s Zerena’s biological father?
“Laurel. In order to be lucky, you’ve got to think lucky. Right now—and I swear, for the rest of our lives—I’m thinking lucky.”
His words send a shiver of warmth all over me. I am so lucky. That’s what I’m thinking. The sun is beginning to rise over the Potomac. Daybreak had been one of the things I’d been looking forward to enjoying in this apartment.