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The week between Christmas and New Year’s brought a letter from Barb. I came back from the Croissant Roll on Saturday night and the envelope was sitting on my pillow. I had long since gotten over the sense of outrage that Janice, or any of her staff, could walk into our room without permission and even go so far as to search our possessions if they wanted. It was a good instinct that made me leave my mother’s box and most of the contents of my backpack locked in the trunk of Little Red. Cici says they are looking for drugs, but I haven’t seen anybody I would suspect to be using, and I think I would recognize it if somebody were. Besides, my little run-in with Debbie when I first moved in, which left me feeling intimidated and threatened, was enough to teach me to keep my mouth shut and stay to myself. Brandi went to the hospital on Sunday, three days after Christmas and had a little boy. She came back to Life House only to pack and she was gone by Tuesday. Her room sits vacant down the hall. Tammy or Beth will move into the empty room, and they will both have a single for a time. All the rooms have the same furnishing, two beds and a dresser, but the girls closing in on their due date don’t always have a roommate, so the room gets to be a single for a time. They are both due in March.
I settle on my bed, putting my back against the wall, my legs crisscrossed with my growing belly curving low into the hollow. I open the letter, preserving the ornate script of Barb’s hand. “Dear Alison, We were so relieved to get your letter. I know you told us you had something to do, but we didn’t realize you were going away. I hope you are doing well and eating enough. Will sends his love. Steven’s boy, Tyler, got his scholarship to play ball, and you can’t hardly have a conversation with him these days. Although we are mighty proud. James got a dirt bike for Christmas and likes to scare me half to death. I just don’t much like motorcycles. I had a cousin who wrecked one and ended up in a home, eating from a tube. He never could walk on his own after that. I don’t know if a helmet would have saved him, but either way, I don’t care for motobikes. James does wear a helmet, at least. Not much else happening here. We have a present for you, when you come back our way. Please write again. I felt so bad about how I acted at Thanksgiving. I hope you can forgive me. Much love, Grandma Barb.”
It’s so ridiculous that I’m sitting here with tears streaming down my face as I read her letter for the third time, that when the door opens and Cici comes in, I try to hide the letter, but my face gives me away. Like I’m doing something shameful. Like she walked in on me reading a dirty book. I stop trying to tuck the letter under my pillow, and start to laugh.
“What’s wrong with you?” she asks, coming in, bringing the smell of the outdoors with her. She hobbles to the nearest seat and drops heavily into it. The pain in her back has returned, and she sits with her right leg stretched out in front of her, perched at an awkward angle on the chair.
“Nothing.” I laugh. “Just a letter from my grandma.” A small thrill shivers through my head and down through all the hairs on my body. I’ve been working up to it, this idea of Grandma and Granddad, and I suppose this is a safe place to try it out. If it doesn’t work, or feels too corny, I can discard it, and they never need to know.
“That’s nice.”
“Where have you been?”
“Well. I just ate a burrito the size of my head, from the Mexican place over on Fifth. Extra spicy. Do I have any hair left in my nose?” She tilts her head back and says, “I drank a gallon of water, I kid you not, and I think I destroyed my taste buds.”
“Why did you do that?” I ask, trying not to laugh but chuckling a little anyway. She doesn’t really know how funny she is, and I know she isn’t feeling funny.
“Because.” She moans as she says this, and the word draws out until it is just a small hiss. “I have to stop being pregnant.” She moans again. She is too pregnant, really, to be just thirty-six weeks. She has another four weeks to go, at least, and I can’t imagine how she’s going to hobble through them.
I laugh. “Does destroying your taste buds help with that?”
“Janice told Beth that spicy food can make you go into labor.” I will have to keep that in mind, although apparently it doesn’t always work.
“Can I do anything for you?” I ask.
“Pop me? Please.”
My pregnancy has been so much easier than hers. I’ve had almost no symptoms, other than my growing belly. Little Miss Can’t Be Wrong shifts and moves enough that I know she’s okay and alive in there, but not like Cici’s little dude, who, I swear, is using her kidneys as punching bags. If we were able to see inside of her, I have no doubt she would have bruising on ninety percent of her internal organs.
“Well, I wouldn’t know how to do that. What else does Janice say?”
“Massages, hot baths, pedicures, nipple stimulation? The massage is out, and I can’t get into a hot bath. I’d be embarrassed to have somebody do my feet, I can’t even see them.” She pauses and gives me a quirked-up eyebrow, “That leaves nipple stimulation. Want to volunteer?” she asks. “Just kidding. I know you’re straight.” I laugh because what else am I supposed to do with that? Aren’t we all straight? We wouldn’t be here if we weren’t, would we? Maybe it’s not as cut-and-dry as I think.
We sit, letting the silence collapse in around our breathing, thinking our own thoughts, until she finally shoves herself back up. “I guess I’ll go walk up and down the stairs.” I hop off my bed, and we leave the room together, to work our way past her sciatica into her labor and delivery. An hour later, we stop at the bathroom, having given up on all the ways to induce labor. I’m standing outside, waiting, because it seems wrong to just go. She is tired, and even though her back has eased some, it still hurts.
“Oh my God!” Her scream echoes through the bathroom, and I rush in, heading to the stalls. I am terrified that she is having the baby right here in the bathroom. Poor baby, dropping into a toilet bowl. That would be the worst birth story.
“What?” I ask because she is moaning and laughing, and when I push the door open, I see her on the toilet, her feet spread wide. She leaning forward, her face streaming with tears.
“Oh my God, it burns!” Her face contorts, and I start to laugh.
“That’s a-one spicy burrito!” I say, and she laughs harder. I let the door fall closed, and she goes on about her butt being on fire and how she is never eating spicy food again. By this time, I am laughing so hard that my cheeks ache.
There is the sudden gushing of water, and she stops laughing. “Oh shit,” she says. “Go get Janice!” I hit the door at a trot, heading back to our room to get the intercom. “Hot damn!” she yells, her voice triumphant. “The spicy burrito worked!”
She is already in the hall, her clothes pulled back in place, hobbling toward the stairwell when I come out of the room. I’m terrified because it’s too early. She isn’t due yet. Can’t things go wrong if a baby is born too early? Whatever the risks, she is utterly unconcerned, singing down the hallway, hooting that she is soon not to be pregnant anymore. Cici is like one of those amazing women who gave birth in fields and just kept working.