The Dead Don't Dance (2 page)

God, I love my wife.

From shorts to shirts, pants, dresses, skirts, maternity bras, nursing bras, six-month underwear, nine-month underwear, jackets, and sweatshirts, the fashion show continued. As she tried on each item, Maggie stuffed the “eight-pound” pillow inside her waistband, put her hand on her hip, leaned forward on her toes, and looked at herself in the mirror. “Do you think this makes me look fat?”

“Maggs, no man in his right mind would ever answer that question.”

“Dylan,” she said, pointing her finger, “answer my question.”

“You're beautiful.”

“If you're lying to me,” she said, raising her eyebrows and cocking her head, “you're on the couch.”

“Yes, ma'am.”

Leaving the dressing room, Maggie shone in full, glorious, pregnant-woman glow. Three hundred and twenty-seven dollars later, she was ready for any occasion.

Life had never been more vivid, more colorful, as if God had poured the other end of the rainbow all around us. Rows of cotton, corn, soybean, peanuts, and watermelon rose from the dirt and formed a quilted patchwork, sewing itself with kudzu along the sides of the old South Carolina highway. Ancient gnarled and sprawling oaks covered in moss and crawling with red bugs and history swayed in the breeze and stood like silent sentinels over the plowed rows. Naïve and unaware, we rumbled along the seams while Maggie placed my hand on her tummy and smiled.

At twelve weeks we went for the first ultrasound. Maggie was starting to get what she called a “pooch” and could not have been prouder. When the doctor walked in, Maggie was lying on the table with a fetal monitor Velcroed across her stomach, holding my hand. The doc switched on the ultrasound machine, squeezed some gel on her stomach, and started waving the wand over her tummy. When she heard the heartbeat for the first time, Maggie started crying. “Dylan,” she whispered, “that's our son.”

At sixteen weeks, the nurse confirmed Maggie's intuition. Maggie lay on the same table as the nurse searched her tummy with the ultrasound wand and then stopped when my son gave us a peek at his equipment. “Yep,” the nurse said, “it's a boy. Right proud of himself too.”

I hit my knees. At twenty-nine years old, I had looked inside my wife's tummy and seen our son. As big as life, with his heart beating, and wiggling around for all the world to see.

“Hey, Sport.”

That started my conversations with Maggie's stomach. Every night from that day forward, I'd talk to my small and growing son. The three of us would lie in bed; I'd lift Maggie's shirt just over her tummy, press my lips next to the peach-fuzzy skin near her belly button, and we'd talk. Football, girls, school, farming, tractors, dogs, cornfields, friends, colors, anything I could think of. I just wanted my son to know the sound of my voice. After a few days, he started kicking my lips. Before I told him good night, I'd sing “Johnny Appleseed,” “Daddy Loves His Sweet Little Boy,” “The Itsy-Bitsy Spider,” or “Jesus Loves Me.”

Sometimes in the middle of the night, when the baby kicked or pushed his foot into the side of her stomach, Maggie would grab my hand and place it on her tummy. She never said a word, but I woke up feeling the warmth of my wife's stomach and the outline of my son's foot.

Toward the end of the first trimester, while rummaging through a yard sale, I found a rickety old rocking horse that needed a lot of glue, some elbow grease, and a few coats of white paint. I brought it home, set up my woodworking shop in the barn, and told Maggie to stay out. A week later, I brought it inside and set it next to the crib. Maggie looked at it, and the tears came forth in a flood. I think that was my first realization that new hormones had taken over my wife's body and mind.

Pretty soon the cravings hit. “Sweetheart.” It was that whispery, seductive voice again. “I want some fresh, natural peanut butter and Häagen Dazs raspberry sorbet.”

I never knew it would be so difficult to find freshly churned natural peanut butter at ten o'clock at night. When I got back to the house, Maggie was standing on the front porch, tapping her foot and wielding a spoon. As soon as I got the lids off, we plopped down in the middle of the den and started double dipping. When she'd polished off the sorbet, she said, “Now, how about a cheeseburger?”

At the end of her second trimester, she became pretty self-conscious. The least little thing really set her off. One morning, while studying her face in the mirror, she screamed,
“What is that? Dylan Styles, get in here!”

Usually when Maggs calls me by both names, it means I've done something wrong. Left the toilet seat up or the toothpaste cap off, not taken the trash out, not killed every single roach and spider within two square miles of the house, or tried something sneaky and gotten caught. The tone in her voice told me I had just gotten caught.

I walked into the bathroom and found Maggs up on her toes, leaning over the sink and looking down at her chin, which was just a few inches from the mirror. Holding a magnifying glass, she said again,
“What is that?”

I took the magnifying glass and smiled. Studying her chin, I saw a single black hair about a centimeter long protruding from it. “Well, Maggs, I'd say you're growing a beard.” I know, I know, but I couldn't resist.

She shrieked and slapped me on the shoulder. “Get it off! Right now! Hurry!”

I reached into the drawer and pulled out a Swiss Army knife and slipped the little tweezers out of the side with my fingernail. “You know, Maggs, if this thing really takes off, we might be able to get you a job with the carnival.”

“Dylan Styles,” she said, pointing that crooked finger again, “if you want any loving for the rest of your life, you better quit right now.” Maybe I was pushing it a little, but Maggs needed a perspective change. So I handed her the shaving cream and said, “Here, it's for sensitive skin.”

Thirty seconds later, she had me balled up in the fetal position on the den floor, trying to pull out what few chest hairs I have. When she had adequately plucked me, she raised her fists like a boxer ready to start round two. “Dylan Styles, you better shut up and pull this evil thing off my chin.”

Underneath the bathroom light, I pulled out the single rogue hair, placed it on her outstretched palm, and returned to the kitchen, laughing. Maggs spent the next hour poring over her face in the mirror.

Soon after, she lost sight of her toes. The baby was getting bigger and growing straight out like a basketball attached to a pole. Maggs stood helplessly in front of the mirror with an open nail polish bottle and wailed, “I'm fat! How can you love me when I look like this?” Then the tears came, so I did the only thing I could. I took her hand, sat her down on the couch, poured her a glass of ice water with a slice of orange, stretched out her legs, and painted her toenails.

When she was seven months along, I came in after dark one evening and heard her sloshing in the bathtub, talking to herself. I poked my head in and saw her holding a pink razor, trying to shave her legs. She had already cut her ankle. So I sat on the ledge, took the razor, held her heel, and shaved my wife's legs.

Somewhere around seven and a half months, I sat down to dinner—a dinner Maggie insisted on cooking—and found a package wrapped in brown paper. Untying the ribbon, I peeled open the paper to find a green T-shirt with
World's Greatest Dad
sewn on the front. I wore it every day for a week.

Getting heavier and feeling less mobile every day, Maggie nevertheless sewed the bumper for the crib and tied it in. The pattern featured stripes, baseballs, footballs, bats, and little freckle-faced boys. I bought a Pop Warner football and a Little League baseball glove and placed them inside the crib. On the floor beneath I clustered Matchbox cars, a miniature train set, and building blocks. When we were finished decorating, there was little room left for our son.

In the late afternoons of her last trimester, Maggie tired more easily, and I tried to convince her to take naps. Occasionally she'd give in. Two weeks before her due date, which was August 1, her legs, hands, and feet swelled, and her breasts became sore and tender. A week away, Braxton Hicks contractions set in, and the doctor told her to keep her feet up and get more rest.

“Try not to get too excited,” he said. “This could take a while.” For some reason, and I'm not sure why, I had thought that as Maggie's tummy grew larger and she got more uncomfortable, she'd have less affection for me. I mean, physically. It only made sense. I had tried to prepare myself by blocking it out—
Don't even think about it—
but that time never came. Just three days before delivery, she tapped me on the shoulder. . . .

A week past her due date, the first real contraction hit. Maggie could tell the difference immediately. She was walking across the kitchen when she grabbed the countertop, bit her bottom lip, and closed her eyes. I grabbed The Bag and Huckleberry and met her at the truck. I was driving ninety miles an hour and honking at every car that got in my way when Maggs gently put her hand on my thigh and whispered, “Dylan, we have time.”

I pulled into the maternity drop-off, and a nurse met us at the car. When I found Maggie on the second floor, the doctor was checking her.

“Two centimeters,” he said, taking off his latex gloves. “Go home; get some sleep, I'll see you tomorrow.”

“See you tomorrow?” I said. “You can't send us home. My wife's having a baby.”

The doctor smiled. “Yes, she is. But not today. Go get a nice dinner, then take her home. And”—he handed two pills to Maggie—“this will help take the edge off.”

Helping Maggie into the truck, I said, “Your choice. Anywhere you want.”

Maggie smiled, licked her lips, and pointed. A few minutes later we were sitting in the Burger King, where Maggie downed a Whopper with cheese, large fries, a cheeseburger, and a chocolate shake. I ate half a cheeseburger and two French fries.

That night Maggie slept in fits, and I slept not at all. I just lay there in the dark, watching her face and brushing her Audrey Hepburn hair out of her Bette Davis eyes.

At six o'clock Maggie bit her lip again, and I carried her to the truck.

“Four centimeters,” the doctor said as he pulled the gown over Maggie's legs. “It's time to walk.”

So we did. Every floor. Every hallway. Every sidewalk.

Walking through the orthopedic ward six hours later, Maggie grunted and grabbed the railing, and one of her knees buckled. I grabbed a wheelchair, punched the elevator button, and tapped my foot down to the second floor.

The doctor was on the phone at the nurses' station, but he hung up quickly when he saw her face. We stretched her out on the bed, strapped the fetal monitor over her stomach, and I cradled her head in my hands while the doctor listened.

“Okay, Maggie, get comfortable.” Then he pulled out this long plastic thing and asked the nurse to cover it with gel. “I'm going to break your water and start you on Pitocin.”

While I was thinking,
You're not sticking that thing in my wife,
Maggie sighed and gripped my hand so hard her knuckles turned white.

“That means two things: it will bring on your labor more quickly, and”—he paused as the fluid gushed out—“your contractions will hurt a bit more.”

“That's okay,” Maggie said, while the nurse swabbed her right arm with alcohol and inserted the IV needle.

Fifteen minutes later, the pain really started. I sat next to the bed, holding a wet towel on her forehead, and fought the growing knot in my stomach. By midnight Maggie was drenched in sweat and growing pale. I called the nurse and asked, “Can we do anything? Please!”

Within a few minutes the anesthesiologist came in and asked Maggie, “You about ready for some drugs?”

Without batting an eye, I said, “Yes, sir.”

Maggie sat up and leaned as far forward as her stomach would let her. The doctor walked around behind her and inserted the epidural in the middle of her spine just as another contraction hit. Maggie moaned but didn't move an inch.

God, please take care of my wife.

Breathing heavily, Maggie lay back down and propped her knees up. After one more contraction, the epidural kicked in. Her shoulders relaxed, and she lost the feeling in her legs. At that moment, if I had had a million dollars, I would have given every penny to that man. I almost kissed him on the mouth.

The next two hours were better than the last two days together. We watched the monitor, the rise and fall of every contraction—“Oh, that was a good one,” listened to the heartbeat, laughed, talked about names, and tried not to think about what was next. It was surreal to think our son would be there, in our arms, in a matter of moments. We held hands, I sang to her tummy, and we sat there in quiet most of the time.

About one-thirty, the lady next door had trouble with her delivery, and they had to wheel her off for an emergency C-section. I've never heard anybody scream like that in all my life. I didn't know what to think. I do know that it got to Maggie. She tried not to show it, but it did.

At two o'clock, the doctor checked her for the last time. “Ten centimeters, and 100 percent effaced. Okay, Maggie, you can start pushing. We'll have a birthday today.”

Maggie was a champ. I was real proud of her. She pushed and I coached, “One-two-three . . . ” I'd count and she'd crunch her chin to her stomach, eyes closed and with a death grip on my hand, and push.

That was two days and ten lifetimes ago.

chapter two

T
HE SMALL, PRIVATE ROOM THEY PUT US IN WAS
dark, overlooked the parking lot, and sat at one end of a long, quiet hallway. The only lights in the room shone from the machines connected to Maggie, and the only noise was her heart-rate monitor and occasionally the janitor shuffling down the hall, rolling a bucket that smelled of Pine Sol over urine. Somebody had shoved Maggie's bed against the far wall, so I rolled her over next to the window, where she could feel the moonlight. By rolling the bed, I unplugged all the monitors, setting off several alarms at the nurses' station.