Waiting for Christopher (5 page)

She brushed aside a pile of dried palm fronds and jagged glass, moving them with her toe as she stepped through what had once been a door. “Isn’t this great?” she asked in a bright solicitous voice she hardly knew. “Doesn’t it make a perfect hideout?”

As she set the baby down on one seat of a cracked vinyl booth, a tiny lizard the color of new grass shot between Feena’s feet. Like the pink chameleons she sometimes surprised on the tile walls of the girls’ room at school, the lizard made a fast break for cover, disappearing under the two-legged Formica table that had collapsed at a useless angle between the seats.

“There,” she told Christopher, as if something had been settled between them. “There you are.” The soda, which she’d stashed under one of the booths, wasn’t exactly cold. But it was liquid, and the baby covered both her hands with his, pulling the can close, gulping it down.

“Mu,” he said.

There was no more. But she didn’t tell him that. Instead, she adopted a prissy maternal tone. “That’s enough for now,” she said. “We’ll get some milk later.”

“Mu,” Christopher repeated, eyeing her calmly. “Want mu.”

The way he looked at her! It was as if she were a goddess, a minor deity of some sort, who could supply his every need. As if she were everything good and beautiful in the world. When she picked him up again, she knew ahead of time how it would be, how he would collapse against her, yield himself completely.

“We’ll have more later,” she said. “Now it’s time for a nap.” She felt the dampness on her arm. “And a change of diapers,” she added, wondering how on earth she’d manage that.

She didn’t want to move him again, didn’t want to risk going back to the parking lot, where the beige convertible might now be parked, waiting. She didn’t want—she had to admit it now—to give Christopher back. Not yet. Not before she’d shown him, for just a little while, for a tiny slice of time no one else would miss, that things could be different.

So she stretched him out full-length on the seat, let him bat at strands of her hair, while she tugged off his jeans. After she’d slipped the sodden, smelly diaper from between his legs, she took off her own shorts. She stepped out of her underpants, folded them into a thick pad, then tucked them under his bottom. It was the only thing she could think to do. It was just what she’d done two years ago, when her period had started in the girls’ room at school and she’d been too embarrassed to go to the nurse.

“There,” she said again. She didn’t know if it was perverted to look at him naked. Still, she couldn’t help thinking that his penis reminded her of an extra finger, a tiny, misplaced digit. It wasn’t like the pink wilted worms you saw on cherubs in old paintings. It was standing straight up and it was pointing right at her.

In Connecticut, most of their neighbors had been elderly, and Feena had only babysat once. For a couple with twin boys. The babies had been asleep when she got there, and were still asleep when she’d left. She’d spent the whole week before, folding a paper napkin into diapers for an old doll, reading about diaper rash and colic, feeding and burping. At first, she’d been sorry she never got a chance to put her skills to the test. But later, when girls in her class told stories about baby boys who peed all over you the minute their diapers came off, she thought maybe she hadn’t missed too much.

“All fixed.” She pulled the front of her underpants between Christy’s legs and covered him up, then put her own shorts back on. Maybe it was the soda or the relief of being dry, but now the baby’s eyes shut and his breathing slowed. “That’s good,” she crooned, reaching for his jeans. “Time to sleep.”

She had slipped both his feet into the pants legs before she noticed the marks on his right thigh. There were seven tiny reddish circles arranged like the Big Dipper on his pale skin. Though it didn’t appear to be necessary, she repeated it, her voice hushed and singsong. “Time to sleep.”

When Feena was little, her father had taken her out under the night sky. “Right up there, honey. See it?” Feena had craned her neck, found the bright dots. “That’s the Big Dipper. And just to this side? That’s the Baby Dipper. See?”

But the constellation on Christopher’s leg was different. The spots were oozing and inflamed, like poison ivy. “Somebody’s been letting you walk around wet,” she told him, pulling up his jeans, covering the sores. “That is some case of diaper rash, Christy.”

He didn’t seem to mind, though. He turned on his side in his sleep, his head on one dirty arm, the fingers of his other hand still caught in Feena’s hair. Gently, she unwound each strand, then sat down beside him to think. Crickets were already thrumming in the grass around her feet, and she listened for the music coming from the amusement park. It had stopped.

There, in the quiet, it hit her: She was a kidnapper. She had snatched somebody’s child! Granted, anybody would have done the same thing, wouldn’t they? Nobody, she was sure, could watch what she had and not take action.

But now what? Maybe the woman with the sweet face and too much makeup was missing her baby. Feena pictured her: remorseful, tears and mascara streaming down her cheeks, driving back to Ryder’s. She imagined her flushed with despair, searching the empty park, then racing to the police.

The police! If Christopher’s mother had gone to the police, they’d be looking for him by now. They’d probably start at Ryder’s, then fan out, the way they did in detective stories. It wouldn’t be long before they’d find Feena’s hiding place.

She could see it all—the baby, handed by a beaming police officer back to his mother; the woman, relieved, sniffling. Then she saw another picture, a picture of what would happen when the two of them got home. “Who do you think you are, Mister?” Christopher’s mother would yell. “Just who do you think you are, running away like that?” Then Christopher would duck his head, go into his fighter’s stance, and the hitting would start.

And Feena would never see him again. Never feel his head against her shoulder. Never catch him staring at her as if she were all he needed.

She didn’t wait for him to wake up. Carefully, she scooped him up, still heavy with sleep, then picked her way through the rubble to the woods behind what must have once been the restaurant’s back door.

She’d heard about snakes in the South, copperheads and rattlers and black snakes, so she watched where she walked, staying just inside the line of trees that led back toward the Pizza Hut. The sweat poured off her, and heat seemed to steam out from the ferns below, the creepers overhead. When she was opposite the house, she pushed aside tall weeds and parched, tangled fronds to stare past the road to the parking lot. It was still empty.

Good. And better still, the Chevy was missing from the narrow driveway beside the Pizza Hut. If her mother hadn’t left too long ago, Feena would have time to get supplies. She headed across the highway as fast as she could, trying not to jostle Christopher awake.

Why were there no police cars at Ryder’s? No blockades? She wondered about the hole that was left when a little boy wasn’t where he was supposed to be. Maybe, she thought, angry and relieved at once, it was too small for anyone to notice. And the anger carried her along, like the slick, dark muscle of a wave. If his mother didn’t care, Feena decided, if the police didn’t care, she did. If no one else heard Christy cry, if no one else saw him raise his arms to be picked up, she had.

The baby continued to sleep, snoring softly against her even after she’d maneuvered the lock, then kicked the front door wide and pushed it shut behind them. She worked her way across the shade-darkened living room, nearly tripping over an open magazine lying facedown by the couch. In her room, she laid Christopher on the bed, then hurried into the kitchen.

The shopping list was missing from under the pineapple-shaped magnet on the refrigerator. That explained why the TV was off and her mother was out. Quickly, Feena raided the shelves above the sink, dumping cans of soup, applesauce, and beef stew into a paper bag. The refrigerator, as she’d expected, was nearly empty, its metal shelves skeletal, immaculate. She found a slightly brown banana and two plums in the crisper, then sat down to write a note.
Mom
. She tried to angle her script carelessly, as if this were nothing special.
At a friend’s house
. As if she were invited to all sorts of places, every day.
Back tonight
, she almost wrote but decided that sounded too specific, too intentional.
Back later. Feen
.

She stuck her note under the magnet, then went to check the bathroom for toilet paper and soap. She dropped an extra toothbrush into the bag, too, hoping she’d find a public restroom or a water fountain, where she could help Christy brush his teeth. She liked the idea of circling him with her arms, showing him how to scrub the front of his teeth up and down, the sides back and forth. “Feena, Feena,” her father had sung when he taught her, “make ‘em cleana. Feena, Feena, in betweena. Woosh. Woosh. Woosh.”

Smiling, she tiptoed back to her room, watched the little boy sprawled peacefully on her bed. She indulged, for only a second or two, the wish that she could sleep there with him, that he belonged to her. But she knew it was time to leave, to pick him up and try to juggle the bag of food and his groggy, limp body. She was actually glad when he woke. And even more glad when she saw the expression on his face. It was as close to a smile as she’d seen him come. “Mu now?” he asked, without missing a beat.

Of course! She’d promised him more soda. She put him down and grabbed his hand, leading him back into the kitchen. She opened the refrigerator again and came out with a half-f bottle of flat Pepsi. “Okay,” she told him. “Just like I said, right?”

Again he cupped his hands over hers, hugging the bottle to his chest, gulping down the fizzless cold. “Now,” she said before he could ask for seconds, “we have to go.” She held out her hand, and when she looked down at him, she saw it again. That half smile, like a new moon. He slipped his hand in hers and followed her, as if he always had, out the door.

S
he felt like a criminal, but as she took the butterfly clip out of her backpack, Feena was proud, too. Astonished that, despite the rush and confusion, her brain had been scheming, coming up with a plan. Part of her, she realized, was resourceful and independent, like Janie, Raylene’s heroine.

She made a game of it now, putting the big pink clip in the baby’s hair, showing him in the mirror she fished from under her books. “See how pretty you look?” she cooed. She adjusted the plastic ornament, raking back his long curls with it, re-clipping it like a barrette behind his right ear. “A butterfly landed on Christy, because he’s so sweet. Right?”

She kissed him on his dirty, fuzzy head, and stopped feeling clever. A wave of tenderness, of proprietary fondness, washed over her. Was this what it was like to have a child? To walk through the world assured of someone’s love?

They followed the dusty path that wound from behind her house, along a dried-up creek, until they found civilization—a public library branch, a playground, and best of all, a small strip mall. The minute they got within sight of the playground, Christopher tugged repeatedly at her hand, little animal spurts of yearning. It was late and there were only a few children on the jungle gym, intent at demolition projects in the small round sandbox. Christopher lunged happily toward them, and she let him go, hoping his makeshift disguise would hold.

“Hi.” Never very outgoing, Feena surprised herself with the tinny friendliness in her voice. She sat down on one of the benches next to a woman with a braid. “Is that your son? I hope my little sister isn’t bothering him.”

The woman smiled at her, open, easy. “No,” she said, turning back to the playground as Christopher toddled over to a short round boy making hopeless swipes at the monkey bar. “How old?”

“What?”

“How old’s your sister?”

“Oh.” Feena realized the woman was making small talk. She didn’t suspect a thing. For her, Christopher was a cute, towheaded little girl in jeans. And a butterfly clip! “Two.” Feena watched Christopher grab the little boy’s arm. “Two and a half.”

“Angel’s four,” the woman told her.

“Angel?”

“Yep. That’s his real name. Named after my grandfather.” The woman flipped her braid behind her. “Anyway, Angel’s four. But he loves little ones.” She studied the children, proud, relaxed. “Especially girls.”

They talked, the two of them, while Christopher made inroads. Soon he and Angel had appropriated the sandbox and were helping its formerly lone occupant mold and stomp paper-cup houses. It was so right, so natural, Feena grabbed her chance.

“My name’s Candace.” She’d always liked the impudent, breezy sound of that name. It made her feel braver, somehow, holding out her hand to this stranger, this adult.

“I’m Dale,” the braided woman told her.

“Dale, do you think you could do me a big favor?” Feena stared past the playground to the strip mall. “Do you think you could watch my sister while I run and get some diapers?” She smiled at Dale, a you-know-what-it’s-like apology. “We’ve run out.”