Chapter 4
The house didn't look different when we pulled into the driveway, and that threw me off. I thought it would. I thought the mint green nursery would have left some mark on the outside, a broken window or a police tape line, something to match what had happened inside it. But the curtains were still white and sheer and the lawn was still cut short the way Jake liked it. I sat in the passenger seat with my seatbelt across my belly and couldn't make my hands let go of the strap.
Jake killed the engine and we just sat there. My discharge papers were folded in my lap. The doctor had written "maternal cervical strain, fetal stress noted — monitor, pelvic rest, avoid contact with alleged assailant" and told us twice to rest. I hadn't slept at the hospital. I hadn't wanted to close my eyes.
"You don't have to go in yet," he said.
"I know," I said. I didn't move. Then I did.
Inside, the air was stale and too warm. The mail was stacked on the counter where Jake had left it. The nursery door was open a crack. I could see the white slats of the crib from the hallway, and the mobile hanging still. My throat ached when I swallowed.
Jake went straight to the front door and flipped the deadbolt. He was holding a small brown paper bag from the hardware store. He hadn't told me he'd stopped while I was still in the exam room.
"I got new hardware," he said. "For both doors. And the nursery has a lock now. Not to lock you in — to keep it locked when we're not in there."
I nodded. My mouth was dry.
He worked quietly. He laid a screwdriver and a new brushed-nickel deadbolt on the entry rug and knelt there and took the old one off. The sound of the drill was sharp in the quiet house. When he pulled the old lock cylinder out, a little brass key fell onto the rug with it — Linda's copy, the one she'd had since we moved in for emergencies. Jake picked it up between two fingers like it was dirty and dropped it into the paper bag.
"No more copies," he said, not looking up. "She doesn't get to just walk in."
I stood in the hallway and watched his shoulders move with the drill. When he finished the front, he did the back door the same way. Then he went to the nursery.
I didn't follow him at first. I heard him step inside. The floor creaked where the white carpet met the mint wall. He was quiet for a long time.
When I made myself look, he was standing over the crib. He hadn't touched the mobile. He'd taken a flat white sheet from the hall closet and was draping it over the whole crib, rail to rail. The pastel bears and stars disappeared underneath. The sheet made it look like furniture in a house nobody lived in.
"I can't look at it empty," I said from the doorway.
"I know," he said. "I don't want you in here."
He tucked the sheet under the mattress edge so it wouldn't slip. The framed American flag art was still straight on the wall behind it. It felt wrong, that flag, hanging over a covered crib.
He came out and clicked the new small lock on the nursery door. It was a simple turn latch, silver, not heavy. He left the key on top of the doorframe where I could see it.
"Only us," he said.
The master bedroom felt too far from the nursery and too close at the same time. I'd planned, months ago, to sleep in the glider in there the last weeks so I'd be right next to the crib. Now I couldn't stand the smell of the mint paint.
I tried the bed. I lay on my side with a pillow between my knees the way the nurse had shown me, and my belly made a hard shelf. The house was quiet except for the fridge. Jake sat on the edge of the bed with his back to me and his phone lit up.
It had been buzzing since we left the hospital. He turned it face up so I could see.
Four missed calls from Linda. Two voicemails. A text at 11:42 that just said Jake please call me. You are scaring me. Then another at 12:07, longer, Your wife is turning you against me. I was trying to help with the nursery.
Then the other names started. Aunt Carol: Your mother is devastated. Talk to her. A cousin: Heard what happened. Hope Sarah's okay but Linda loves that baby. Then Linda again: Tell Sarah I'm sorry she took it that way.
Jake's jaw worked. He turned the phone face down again. A second later it buzzed again and he didn't pick it up.
"They're all taking sides like it's a disagreement," I said. My voice was hoarse. "Like she yelled at a dinner."
"I know," he said. He rubbed his hand over his mouth. "My dad called too. He didn't leave a voicemail."
I reached for his hand. His fingers were cold.
"We said no contact," I said.
He nodded. "No contact. We have it in writing now anyway."
He meant the discharge sheet, the hospital note. It made it official in a way the red marks on my neck hadn't, somehow. I touched my throat without thinking and pulled my hand away.
"Jake," I said. "We have to call Dr. Patel in the morning. Tell the OB what happened. They said to flag the chart."
He looked at me then. "You want me to do it?"
"No," I said. "I'll do it with you on speaker. I want her to hear us both say it. That we're not having contact with Linda, that the house is locked. That if anything changes with the baby we come straight in."
He let out a breath. "Okay. We'll call first thing. I'll tell them we changed the locks."
He plugged his phone in on the dresser and set it to Do Not Disturb, except he left the sound on for the hospital number. The screen kept lighting up even silenced, little white flashes against the dark wood.
I couldn't sleep in the nursery doorway's sightline, so Jake shut our bedroom door halfway, not all the way. He got in beside me and didn't try to hold my neck or my shoulders where it would hurt. He put his hand flat low on my belly, under the robe. The baby moved once, a slow roll, and we both felt it and didn't say anything for a minute.
"We're going to stay in here," I said quietly. "Until it doesn't feel like that room is waiting to happen again."
May you like
"Yeah," he said. "We are."
Outside our bedroom, the nursery door stayed locked, the white sheet over the white crib made a pale shape under the mint walls, and down the hall his phone kept lighting up with her name.
