Girls in Trouble (17 page)

“Sara?” She heard Eva. Footsteps coming closer.

“Giving Anne her bath,” Sara called. She slapped gently at the water, making waves, and Anne squealed happily, trying to slap the water with her own baby hands. She held Anne tight because everyone knew babies could drown in just inches of water.

Sara was gently washing Anne when the door opened. “Oh, what a
help this is—” Eva started to say and then she saw the two of them naked in the tub, and her mouth dropped open, and as soon as Sara saw Eva’s expression, she knew she had done something wrong. Something flickered in her belly and grew until she felt covered in shame, and she hunched over, hiding her breasts with her free hand, keeping the other about Anne.

“Oh, my God, what are you doing?” Eva’s voice rose. “Where are your clothes?” Her eyes widened. “And she’s not supposed to be out of the baby bath seat! The tub is too slippery!” Bending, Eva grabbed Anne up, drawing the wet baby against her. Water dripped down Eva’s dress, and Anne squirmed. Eva grabbed for a towel, one foot skidding on the soapy floor, and she grabbed onto the towel rack to right herself.

“I’ll clean the floor—” Sara said and Eva cut her off.

“Don’t you ever do that again,” Eva said, her voice sharp, and Sara drew back, stung. When she dared to look up at Eva, at the baby bundled in the towel, Eva was looking at Sara as if she no longer knew her.

“Come out of that tub,” Eva said, and then she strode from the bathroom.

Sara dressed. She was shaking so badly it was hard to mop the floor with the towel, harder to put on the same damp dress she had been wearing. Eva had never been angry with her like this, or disapproving, especially over something Sara had meant to be helpful. Didn’t all the baby books Eva had talk about bathing with your baby? Wasn’t it the most natural thing in the world? By the time she shored up enough courage to walk into the living room, George was just getting home, pulling his key out of the lock. “Sara, still here?” he said pleasantly. “Your hair’s wet.”

Sara touched the ends of her hair. She wanted more than anything to say something to George, to have him comfort her, tell her it was all right, but she was afraid.

“How about since I have my coat on, I give you a lift home?” He looked around for Eva. “I’ll just be a moment.”

She heard him in the kitchen, talking to Eva. She heard Anne babbling. Their voices carried.
“Getting tired of this,”
she heard.
“Not a moment to myself Needy. More work for me. Bath. I can’t take care of two babies.”

And then George’s voice.
“You shouldn’t have to.”

And then, George walked out, frowning, Eva carrying the baby behind him, and Sara flinched, waiting for him to say something, for Eva to yell at her, but instead they were silent, and it made her more uncomfortable. Weren’t they going to talk about this? Clear the air? And if they didn’t, how would things ever get back to normal?

George cleared his throat. “Sara—” he began.

“All I did was bathe with the baby,” she blurted. “I thought it would be easier.”

“It’s inappropriate,” George said.

“Why? I wasn’t doing anything but bathing her.” She searched Eva’s face.

“We don’t want you naked in a tub with the baby,” Eva said.

“Naked! It was innocent! All of it was innocent!” She looked at Eva. “It’s better for her! You shouldn’t be so nervous about it!”

“Nervous! Of course I’m nervous! Babies can drown in three inches of water! She has a bath seat! You have to be careful!”

“I was careful!”

“Look,” George said firmly. “The fact is we don’t want it happening again. The matter’s closed. Now, let’s get you home.”

As soon as they got in the car, he turned on the radio. He stared straight ahead, but even though he didn’t say anything, Sara felt the tension in the car. Hunching, she wrapped both arms about her body, the same way she had in the tub. There were a million things she could say, a million wrays she could defend herself. /
carried the baby inside me for nine months in water, what’s the difference in being in a tub with her?
But no matter what she thought to say, she kept seeing the way Eva had looked at her when Eva had first come into the bathroom. She kept feeling the same flush of shame, the first time she had ever felt such an emotion in Eva’s presence. All the words Sara wanted to say were locked in her throat. “Good night now,” George said curtly, and as soon as she was on the sidewalk, he pulled away.

* * *

Sara stayed home from Eva’s the next day, and then the next, but the day after, as soon as school was over, she rode her bike to Eva’s. Two days had passed. Surely they couldn’t still be so angry with her. Surely they might laugh about it, or at least not talk about it any longer. In any case, she had learned one thing not to do there, and she would have to deal with her anxiety about what else they might consider wrong about her.

It had been a horrible day. That morning, she had woken from a dream about Danny. He was at home, trying to call her, but something was wrong with his hand. Swinging her legs out of bed, Sara rushed to the phone, dialing his number, but no one answered. Why hadn’t he tried to contact her? Why hadn’t there even been a postcard or a call? She daubed herself with the patchouli oil he had given her, hoping it might signal him to her.

By the time she reached Eva and George’s house, she was panting. Her legs were rubber, jittering when she stood on them. She ran up to the house, ringing the bell, but no one came to open it for her.

She pressed her ear against the door. The house was quiet.

Sara looked around the neighborhood. The street was so still, it seemed to hum. What if something were wrong inside the house? Eva was so tired these days, what if she had fallen down the stairs? Sara looked around. Nothing’s wrong. Nothing’s wrong. But still she kept seeing Eva sick. She kept imagining all the terrible things that could happen. She had studied chaos theory. One little move affected all else. A butterfly flapped its wings in Africa and the next thing you knew, the stock market collapsed in Japan.

It wouldn’t hurt to check, to be careful. People kept extra keys sometimes. She checked the black mailbox, under the rubber welcome mat, under a potted plant. She was about to give up when she noticed a grey rock by the begonias. Sara went down the stairs and crouched and as soon as she touched the rock, she smiled. Rubber. Fake. As soon as she picked it up, it rattled and then a key, small and brass, fell out into her hands.

She hesitated. This had to be wrong, this had to be worse than taking an innocent bath with the baby. She started to put the key back and then an image shone in her mind. Eva hurt, tumbled at the bottom of the rickety
cellar stairs. The baby crying and hungry in her crib. What if she left and something had happened? What if she didn’t check?

The key flipped through her fingers. She told herself she’d go in for only a minute. Just to rest before she headed back home. Just to make sure everything was all right. Sara put the key in the lock, looking behind her. The street was empty.

Sara turned the key. She let herself in and then shut the door behind her, her heart knocking so loudly she wouldn’t have been surprised if the whole neighborhood heard it.

She licked her lips. “Eva?” she called. The house was quiet. She did a quick tour, even opening up the basement door and looking downstairs. “Hello?” she said.

She came back upstairs into the kitchen. She could leave now and no one would even know she had been here. She could call later, pretend she had been home all the time.

What was the matter with her? What kind of a girl was she to break in? She walked to Anne’s room and stood inside of it. There was a new oak rocker in the corner she hadn’t seen before. There was a stuffed white bear with a blue ribbon.

This isn’t your house. This isn’t your baby.
It was a drumbeat inside of her. Her good mood slid off her like a coat. She went back into the kitchen to get a drink and there on the refrigerator was a notice. “Sunny Skies Day Care.” Sara stared, stunned. A whole list of what to pack along with Anne. Bottles, diapers, wipes, food.

When had Eva and George put the baby in day care? And why? Sara didn’t want that for her baby. She’d rather quit school and take care of Anne herself than have her baby with strangers in one of those places.

She sat frozen on the kitchen chair, unsure what to do. Then she got up and walked outside. The street was empty. She could hear kids shouting but she couldn’t see them. She could hear the crack of a bat against a ball. She wondered if Eva or George would know she had been there. It felt like a risk as dangerous as telling someone you loved them when you weren’t sure how they felt about you. She closed the door and locked it. She bent to tuck the key under the rock, but at the last moment, her fingers
curled tight about the key, warming the metal, and then she slid the key into her pocket, instead.

It was ten at night. George was driving, Eva in the seat beside him, Anne asleep in back. Eva was feeling woozy from the wine. They had spent a whole lovely evening with Christine and Christine’s new boyfriend, Mark, a math professor at Tufts. Mark was funny and handsome and he couldn’t take his eyes off Christine—or Anne. Fie insisted on taking the baby from George and settling her on his lap, and when Anne fell asleep, he couldn’t stop marveling. “Give me this baby to raise,” he said, making them all laugh.

“She’s getting so big,” Christine marveled.

“Five months. And next month, we go to court,” Eva said. She didn’t tell Christine how even though it was just a formality, a sort of official stamp to the adoption, she felt scared.

“Piece of cake,” said George, putting one arm on Eva’s leg. “No wornes.

“I want to come back to work soon,” Eva said, “maybe the afternoon session.”

“Sara’s working out, then?” Christine said.

“Day care,” Eva said, feeling a twinge of guilt. When Sara was pregnant, Eva hadn’t been able to get enough of the girl, had wanted her over there every day, but now that the baby was here, everything was different. Every time she turned a corner in the house, there was Sara. Every time the phone rang, it was Sara. She began to think that maybe an open adoption could be too open, that maybe it was time to establish some limits. Especially the way things were going, how Sara was getting needier and needier. And then, of course, there was the bath incident.

“Well, good for you!” Christine said.

Mark teased a finger along her shoulder and Christine rested her head against him. The look he gave her was so charged, Eva suddenly felt like a voyeur. “We should get going,” she said, nudging George, just as Christine’s hand found Mark’s knee.

Anne fell asleep again as soon as they got her in the car seat. “Well, that was quite an evening,” George said, turning down onto their street. “We’ll put the bunny rabbit to bed and hang out.” He tapped a finger along her nose. “We didn’t even get to the dessert.”

“I want you for dessert,” she said.

George laughed, pulling the car into the driveway.

“It was great to see Christine,” Eva said. “Her new man’s pretty nice, too, isn’t he?”

“Yup. And I hate to say it, but it’s been nice not having Sara around today.” George looked encouragingly at her. “Don’t you think? You were so great with the baby tonight. And you seem much more relaxed.”

“It’s the wine.” Eva got out of the car and stretched, the night clear and cool around her. “And the day care,” she admitted. Three hours three times a week. Just enough so Eva could get everything done, so she could read, or start thinking up new lesson plans for when she went back to work. The day care center was big and bright and sunny, with two young teachers, and as soon as she had set Anne down on the floor, Anne had reached happily for one of the colored blocks. It made all the difference. It had made Eva feel competent, like she had done something right with Anne. Like she could be a great mother.

Eva bent and got the baby. Anne stirred in her arms and then fell back asleep again.

She opened the door. The house smelled of something.

“What’s that funny smell?” George said, stepping into the house.

Eva took two steps into the room and then stopped. She tilted her face up and breathed deeply, trying to figure out what was so familiar. Then she turned and locked eyes with George.

“Patchouli,” she said. “It’s what Sara wears.”

“Sara? I thought she wasn’t here today.”

Eva shook her head. “She wasn’t.”

George was quiet for a moment. “How’d she get in?”

He looked at Eva again, and then Eva handed the baby to him and went to the front door, running her hand along the lock, frowning.

“What?” George said, but Eva was going down the stairs, crouching by the flowers. She picked up the rubber rock and lifted it.

She shook the rock, but nothing jangled inside of it. There was no sound, and Eva felt something snapping off and on inside of her like a light. She felt Sara behind her, just out of sight, so close, she stood up abruptly. She looked back at George. “We told her our house is your house,” Eva said.

“But it isn’t,” George said. “It never really was.”

“I’ll talk to her,” Eva said. “I’ll get the key back.” And then she put the rubber rock in her pocket, and her fingers curled around it tight.