If I Tell

CHAPTER seventeen



I ran up the front steps of Mom’s house and unlocked the door. “Mom!” I shouted, flicking off my running shoes on the front doormat.

Muffled baby cries wailed from upstairs like an alarm. My heart thumped, and I almost wished I’d never picked up her phone call so I didn’t have to deal with this. Sure, I was worried about her, but I knew she wasn’t dying. I also knew she wasn’t okay.

“Mom.”

There was no answer. The baby shrieks didn’t stop, so I dashed up the stairs, following the noise to the baby’s room.

I stopped in the doorway. Mom sat hunched over in her rocking chair beside the crib, her hands covering her ears. Her hair was greasy and dirty. It hung down in her eyes as she rocked herself back and forth as if she was in a trance. The baby lay in his crib, screeching and clearly unhappy at being ignored.

“Mom?”

She didn’t even look up. My heartbeat echoed louder in my ears.

“Shouldn’t you do something about the baby’s crying?”

She rocked harder. She didn’t make eye contact with me but just shook her head back and forth, faster and harder.

I tiptoed to the crib and peered inside. The baby’s face was scrunched up and angry, his tiny mouth wide open, his eyes shut tight like my mom’s. The wails coming out of his little body were loud, annoying, and broke my heart.

I looked into his pissed-off little face. “Shh, baby, shhh,” I whispered, looking back at my mom for encouragement.

She kept rocking.

With sweaty palms, I reached in and poked the baby’s still too skinny belly. I touched his soft yellow sleeper and he cried. I tentatively reached down and placed a hand under his little body. I remembered about making sure to support his head with the other hand and then lifted him. The crying continued.

His tiny body weighed almost nothing, but he thrust his body back and stiffened, pushing against my hands with surprising strength. Instinctively I cuddled him closer to calm him, and I started to rock back and forth.

“There, there,” I whispered. “It’s okay, baby.”

His face relaxed for a moment as if he were searching his memory banks for my voice. As the wailing subsided, I blew out a breath and glanced over at my mom. She didn’t look at me but kept rocking. Back and forth, back and forth.

The baby seemed to understand something was wrong. His mouth opened again, and the siren started up.

“You hungry?” I asked him.

He shuddered and hiccuped. I shushed and cooed, and for a moment, his screeching stopped. I pulled him closer, and his tiny body warmed my arm like a little furnace. My heart melted a little more despite his racket.

“Mom?”

I glanced at her. Her eyes remained unfocused, gazing at the floor. She’d wrapped her arms around herself.

Her mouth moved a little. She shook her head back and forth mouthing, “No. No.”

I crept closer, cradling the baby. With one hand I grabbed my mom’s shoulder and shook. She shrank back as if my hand had scalded her. Her head snapped back and forth, faster and more violently. A wail emanated from deep in her soul. It started softly but intensified, reminding me of a wounded animal.

I froze, listening to her moan. As if he sensed everyone’s distress, the baby began to shriek again, not a timid, shy sound. My mom’s voice got louder, competing.

My forehead and underarms were slick with sweat. “Shh…there, there,” I said out loud, my eyes alternating between the baby and Mom. Neither calmed down.

“Mom? What’s wrong?” I called over the noise.

Her guttural shrieks stopped, but she rocked harder in her chair and wrapped her arms around herself as if trying to squeeze her insides out.

“I can’t. I can’t. I can’t,” she chanted softly.

I swayed and shushed the baby while my mom repeated the words over and over. The baby hiccuped and then quieted again, his little eyes beginning to flutter with sleep. I stopped swaying and crept toward my mom, but his eyes flew open, and the cries resumed.

I really wanted to hand the baby over and run from the room.

“Mom.” I swayed the baby again, trying to calm him. “You can’t what?”

She was supposed to stop the crying, not me, but she continued to hug herself, repeating her words over and over and over.

“I can’t. I can’t. I can’t.”

The baby’s eyes closed and his body stilled to a quiet breathing rhythm, but I didn’t dare stop swaying.

“Do this,” she said. “I can’t do this.”

“What?” I didn’t know what she meant. She was freaking me out. “What can’t you do?”

She lifted her arms and swept them upward, gesturing around the entire room. “This. I can’t do this.” She ground her teeth together and began rocking again, shaking her head and muttering, “No. No. No. No. I can’t. Can’t.” Her voice sounded dead, as if she’d cut out her emotions.

“I’m going to call Grandma. Okay, Mom?”

She didn’t stop rocking. “Take the baby away.” She wailed again, uttering a wounded cry that was barely human.

Panic pooled in my stomach. A bead of sweat dripped from my forehead onto the baby’s yellow sleeper, but it was quickly absorbed by the fleece.

She wasn’t okay, not at all. “I’ll be right back, Mom. Will you be okay?”

She didn’t answer or look at the baby. Her motions didn’t stop.

I carried my brother from the bedroom and closed the door behind me. As I hurried down the stairs, he started whimpering again. It intensified my feelings of inadequacy. I didn’t know how to look after a tiny baby.

“Are you hungry?” I asked, hoping by some miracle that he’d grasp speech really, really early and tell me what he needed. “Do you need a clean diaper?”

At the bottom of the stairs, I lifted him in the air the way I’d seen Mom do. “You are so going to hear about this when you’re a teenager.” I sniffed at his tiny butt. Nothing foul.

I spotted a pacifier in the baby’s playpen in the middle of the living room. I hadn’t noticed what a mess the place was when I’d rushed in, but now the chaos struck me as odd. Usually my mom was the neatest person around. Baby or no baby.

I balanced my brother in one arm and reached inside the playpen for his pacifier. When I held it up, he stopped fussing and wrapped his lips around it. His little body quivered and shook, but he began to calm down.

“There. That’s better, isn’t it, buddy?” I looked around. “Okay, I’m going to phone Grandma and see what we should do.” I went to the couch and sat, settling him in my arm and managing to dial the phone at the same time.

Grandma picked up. “Tara?” she said, sounding angry. “What now?”

“No, it’s me,” I shifted the now contented baby in my arms.

“Jasmine? What are you doing there? Aren’t you supposed to be in school? I don’t want you missing more classes because of your mom.”

“Mom called me at school. She was freaking out.” I peered into the baby’s innocent face, wondering if he’d remember any of this. I hoped not. “Something’s wrong with her. She’s acting really weird. It’s bad. I think you should come over.”

Grandma made a clucking noise. “She’s fine. She just needs to take some responsibility. She wants everyone else to do the work for her. It’s not easy, but this time she can look after the baby herself. She’s thirty-three years old. I’m too old to raise another baby.”

“But she’s really freaked out, Grandma. I don’t think it’s normal.”

“She’s a drama queen. She hasn’t even named him yet, for goodness sake. Leave her with the baby. Go back to school. She’ll handle it if we make her.”

She was wrong about this. I felt it. “But I don’t think she can. I don’t think I should leave her alone.”

“No buts. It’s her son. She’s a big girl. You’re contributing to the problem by running over there whenever she calls. I want you to go back to school,” Grandma ordered.

“She called me and said she was dying.”

“I mean it. Go back to school. I’ll see you at home in a few hours.” She hung up the phone without saying good-bye.

I shook my head, angry with both of them now. “Welcome to our world, little brother,” I whispered to the sleeping baby.

I carried him back up the stairs and peeked inside the baby’s bedroom door.

“Mom?”

Her face looked pale and drained. She hadn’t stopped rocking.

“Why don’t you try and have a nap? I’ll look after the baby for awhile, okay?”

Mom’s eyes filled with tears. “I can’t sleep. I can’t. I’ve tried. But I can’t.” Her voice buzzed with desperation.

“Well, you need to rest at least. Go lie down. I’ll take care of him.”

Mom nodded, looking relieved, like a little girl afraid of getting in trouble. “There’s formula downstairs,” she whispered. “Could you feed him?”

“I thought you were breast-feeding?” I asked.

“I can’t.” Mom wailed, her eyes wide with panic. “I’ve tried and tried. I’m a terrible mother. I can’t do it.” Her voice went up, and she started to cry again. “Everybody says I should be able to do it, but I can’t.”

“Mom, Mom, it’s okay. I just thought you were. It’s no big deal. It’s all good.”

She sniffled and tried to calm herself.

“It’s okay. What do I need to do?”

“There’s sterilized bottles and nipples in the sink. And pre-made formula in the pantry. Give him seven ounces. Don’t forget to burp him.” Her voice sounded methodical but almost normal.

“Okay, Mom. Go lie down. I can handle it.”

I waited as she shuffled out of the nursery looking older than Grandma and moving slowly down the hallway. She disappeared into her bedroom.

“Thanks,” she whispered before closing the door behind her.

I stared at the door until the baby spit out his pacifier, and a low-grade wail started.

I studied the little unhappy face. “You’re hungry?”

We went downstairs to the kitchen, and I fixed up a bottle. I took him to the couch and started to feed my baby brother for the first time. Gradually, with his lips still on the bottle, he fell asleep in my arms. I stared at his sleeping face. I tasted my love for him. And bitter fear.

I got up and placed him down in his playpen crib, like I’d seen Grandma do, and tiptoed up the stairs. I opened the door to Mom’s room, hoping she was sleeping.

She lay on her back, her eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling.

“Mom?”

“I should never have had this baby,” she said without looking at me. “Who did I think I was? He’d be better off without me.” She crumpled her body up in a fetal position, squeezing her eyes shut.

I stepped inside her room, my heartbeat speeding up. “Mom, that’s crazy. Come on.”

She didn’t answer.

I walked to the side of the bed, leaned down, and touched her forehead. It was clammy and sweaty.

“Mom? You okay?”

“No,” she whispered. “I can’t do this.”

I patted her shoulder but knew how she felt. I didn’t think I could handle it either. “I’m going to call Simon.”

She didn’t protest so I left the bedroom and hurried downstairs to the kitchen phone. I dialed Simon’s cell number, but voice mail picked up.

“Simon, when you get this message, call home. Mom’s acting really, um, weird. I’m here, but I’m worried. Really worried.” I hung up and went to check on the baby.

I picked him up, toting him with me to the couch. I sat holding him in my arms and wishing I could protect him from whatever was happening.

“I’ll look after you,” I whispered. “I promise.”

Probably half an hour later, a key clicked in the door. It opened, and Simon barreled down the hallway into the living room.

His eyes immediately went to the baby, and the tension in his face relaxed a little. “I was on my way home when you called,” he said. “What happened? Is he okay?”

“He’s fine.”

He sat beside me on the couch. Worry lines were etched into his features. He looked older. “Where’s your mom?”

I nodded toward the stairs. Simon bent down to kiss his baby on the forehead and then stared at me as if he wanted me to tell him what to do.

“Go.” I ordered. I declared a silent truce with him. My mom needed him, and right now, so did I.

He broke out of his trance and got to his feet and slid off his shoes. “You think she’s going to be okay?”

What the heck did I know? I was a seventeen-year-old kid. I nodded. “She’ll be fine,” I said to convince both of us.

He bolted up the stairs two by two and closed the bedroom door behind himself. My mom cried hysterically, but eventually she quieted down, and I heard the low murmur of their voices talking.

I focused on my brother, willing his tiny chest to keep moving up and down while he was blissfully unaware of the drama going on around him. I stood and took him to the playpen, where I placed his little sleeping body back inside and covered him with a blanket. My heart ached for him.

Simon finally slipped out of the bedroom and dragged himself down the stairs. I waited, my hand on my throat.

He plunked heavily on the couch beside me. “She’s been acting weird all week. Your grandma thinks she’s just being dramatic. I think she’s in trouble.”

I nodded. “Me too.”

“God. I want my mom,” he said, and then he leaned over and grabbed the phone book from the magazine rack beside the couch. “I’m calling the hospital. Screw your grandma.”

I hid my shocked expression behind my hand and then listened while he spoke with a nurse and explained Mom’s increasingly irrational behavior. Reality hit hard. There was something really wrong with her. Concern echoed in his voice, but I also heard his commitment to helping my mom with her mental well-being. He wasn’t running away. He was dealing.

He sighed when he hung up, leaned back against the sofa, and breathed deeply in and out. I needed to hear what they’d said, but I dreaded hearing his voice telling me the facts.

“They think it’s postpartum depression,” he finally said, his chin dropping to his chest. “They want me to take her to the ER. They said she needs to see a psychiatrist, and that’s the quickest way to get one.”

My heart thumped. The room spun, but I focused on his face. “She’s not crazy, is she?”

Simon scratched his head. “I don’t know.” His eyes welled up. “She’s been talking about dying, and the baby and I being better off without her.” He closed his eyes. His face crumpled as he tried to fight off tears. “I don’t know what else to do.”

“Go,” I told him. “Take her. I’ll stay. I’ll look after the baby.” I tried not to ignore the overwhelming fact that I knew nothing about babies. I’d never even baby-sat in my life.

He rubbed at the short hair on his head. “It’ll probably take hours at the ER.”

“Go. I’ll be fine.”

“You sure you’ll be okay?” He massaged his forehead, his expression uncertain.

“I can handle it. You have to take her. She needs to go. ”

Upstairs Mom’s bedroom door opened. Simon leaped to his feet as Mom shuffled down the hallway, peeked down the stairs, and then took a step toward us. Her hair was still dirty and messy, and she had on no makeup, but she’d put on an old pair of sweatpants and one of Simon’s big T-shirts. Her face looked calmer, accepting of her fate.

“Jaz is great with the baby,” she called out softly to Simon. “Better than I am.”

“Mom,” I said. “That’s not true.”

She took another step down. “I love him.”

“I know,” Simon said.

“No. I was talking to Jaz,” she said softly.

“I know you love him,” I said.

Her eyes watered. She wrapped her arms around herself. “You were right. I’m the worst mother in the world.”

I remembered what I’d said to her at the restaurant. “Oh, Mom. You’re not. I never meant that. I was just being awful, trying to hurt you. You’re a good mom.” I blushed. “You’re sick. Go with Simon. I’ll take care of the baby. It’s okay. You need to get looked after too.”

She grabbed the railing on the stairs and whimpered. “Everyone else always has to take care of my babies.”

Simon bounded up the stairs, and when he reached her, she folded against him for support. He helped her down the stairs. Her pale, makeup-free face bothered me almost as much as her behavior. When they reached the bottom, she let go of Simon and tiptoed to the playpen.

“I’m sorry, baby,” she whispered, stroking their son’s fingers. “I love you. I do.”

She wiped away her tears and struggled to gain control, and then she turned to me. “Joe,” she said.

She glanced at Simon. He nodded.

“His name. Joseph Simon Peacock. Joe for Grandpa.”

I wiped under my eyes as she gave me instructions on the proper way to change diapers and how often to feed him. Simon wrapped a coat over her shoulders and moved her toward the front door.

“Look after Joe,” he told me.

“I will.”

My mom shivered, and he led her away and left me all alone. In charge of my baby brother’s life.