Dawn (Cutler 1)

It quieted down in Momma and Daddy's room, but I couldn't stop wondering. I wished I had an older sister who wouldn't be embarrassed with my questions. I was too embarrassed to ask Momma about these things because I didn't want her to think Jimmy and I were eavesdropping.

My leg grazed Jimmy's, and he pulled away as if I had burned him. Then he slid over to his end of the bed until he was nearly off. I shifted as far over to mine as I could, too. Then I closed my eyes and tried to think of other things.

As I was falling asleep, I thought of that woman who had come to the bar door just as I was about to open it to enter. She was smiling down at me, her lips twisted and rubbery, her teeth yellow and the cigarette smoke twirling up and over her bloodshot eyes.

I was so glad I had managed to get Daddy home.

2

FERN

One afternoon during the first week of Momma's ninth month while I was preparing dinner and Jimmy was struggling over some homework on the kitchen table, we heard Momma scream. We rushed into the bedroom and found her clutching her stomach.

"What is it, Momma?" I asked, my heart pounding. "Momma!" Momma reached out and seized my hand.

"Call for an ambulance," she said through her clenched teeth. We didn't have a telephone in the apartment and had to use the pay phone on the corner. Jimmy shot out the door.

"Is this supposed to happen, Momma?" I asked her. She simply shook her head and moaned again, her fingernails pressing so hard and so sharply into my skin, they nearly caused me to bleed. She bit down on her lower lip. The pain came again and again. Her face turned a pale, sickly yellow.

"The hospital is sending an ambulance," Jimmy announced after charging back in.

"Did you call your daddy?" Momma asked Jimmy through her clenched teeth. The pain wouldn't let go.

"No," he replied. "I'll go do it, Momma."

"Tell him to go directly to the hospital," she ordered.

It seemed to take forever and ever for the ambulance to come. They put Momma on a stretcher and carried her out. I tried to squeeze her hand before they closed the door, but the attendant forced me back. Jimmy stood beside me, his hands on his hips, his shoulders heaving with his deep, excited breaths.

The sky was ominously dark and it had begun to rain a colder, harder rain than we had been having. There was even some lightning across the bruised, charcoal-gray clouds. The gloom dropped a chill over me, and I shuddered and embraced myself as the ambulance attendants got in and started away.

"Com

e on," Jimmy said. "We'll catch the bus on Main Street."

He grabbed my hand and we ran. When we got off the bus at the hospital, we went directly to the emergency room and found Daddy speaking with a tall doctor with dark brown hair and cold, stern green eyes. Just as we reached them, we heard the doctor say, "The baby's turned wrong and we need to operate on your wife. We can't wait much longer. Just follow me to sign some papers and we'll get right to it, sir."

Jimmy and I watched Daddy walk off with the doctor, and then we sat on a bench in the hall.

"It's stupid," Jimmy suddenly muttered, "stupid to have a baby now:"

"Don't say that, Jimmy," I chided. His words made my own fears crash in upon me like waves.

"Well, I don't want a baby who threatens Momma's life, and I don't want a baby who'll make our lives more miserable," he snapped, but he didn't say anything more about it when Daddy returned. I don't know how long we had been sitting there waiting before the doctor finally appeared again, but Jimmy had fallen asleep against me. As soon as we set eyes on the doctor, we sat up. Jimmy's eyelids fluttered open, and he searched the doctor's expression as frantically as I did.

"Congratulations, Mr. Longchamp," the doctor said, "you've got a seven pound, fourteen ounce baby girl." He extended his hand and Daddy shook it. "Well, I'll be darned. And my wife?"

"She's in the recovery room. She had a hard time, Mr. Longchamp. Her blood count was a little lower than we like, so she's going to need to be built up."

"Thank you, Doctor. Thank you," Daddy said, still pumping his hand. The doctor's lips moved into a smile that didn't reach his eyes.

After we went up to maternity, all three of us gazed down at the tiny pink face wrapped in a white blanket. Baby Longchamp had her fingers curled. They looked no bigger than the fingers on my first doll. She had a patch of black hair, the same color and richness as Jimmy's and Momma's hair and not a sign of a freckle. That was a disappointment.

It took Momma longer than we expected to get back on her feet after she came home. Her weakened condition made her susceptible to a bad cold and a deep bronchial cough, and she couldn't breast-feed like she had planned, so we had another expense—formula.

Despite the hardships Fern's arrival brought, I couldn't help but be fascinated with my little sister. I saw the way she discovered her own hands, studied her own fingers. Her dark eyes, Momma's eyes, brightened with each of her discoveries. Soon she was able to clutch my finger with her tiny fist and hold on to it. Whenever she did that, I saw her struggle to pull herself up. She groaned like an old lady and made me laugh.

Her patch of black hair grew longer and longer. I combed the strands down the back of her head and down the sides, measuring their length until they reached the top of her ears and the middle of her neck. Before long, she was stretching with firmness, pushing her legs out and holding them straight. Her voice grew louder and sharper, too, which meant when she wanted to be fed, everyone knew it.