The woman giggles.
The voice says, “I’m not shitting you, man.”
John drops the bag.
“Now, who the fuck are you and what do you want?”
“I think I got the wrong house,” says John.
“Most fucking likely.”
“No,” says the woman. She tosses the half-eaten pizza slice into the box next to her. She looks sweat-soaked or greased. Her nipples are red flares. She’s bald between her legs. “No, he don’t.”
“How do you know?” says the voice.
“That’s John.”
“John?”
“The husband.”
John hears a baby cry in back. “What’s going on here?”
Frowning sheepishly, the woman pulls a blanket from the couch, wraps it around herself from the neck down. “I’m Moira’s friend, Carla. From Puffy’s?”
John’s thoughts can’t find anywhere to land. He looks more closely at the woman and thinks maybe he’s seen her around. He recognizes the blanket covering her as the one Moira’s mother made them for a wedding present. That’s their television set playing. Their couch. “What are you doing in Moira’s house?”
“Babysitting.”
“Babysitting?”
“For Nolan.” The woman stands up. “Moira’s out.”
“Out where?”
“I didn’t ask.”
“Christ,” says John. “You’re watching porno movies.”
“We got a constitutional right,” says the voice.
“You got a fucking gun on me?”
“I put it away.”
John doesn’t turn around. “And fucking in front of my kid!”
“He was asleep,” says the woman.
“Till you woke him, John.”
“Fuck you,” says John. He glances at the television screen, on which three men in wolves’ masks are screwing Little Red Riding-Hood. “Both of you!”
“I’ll get him,” says the woman, starting for the back bedroom.
“No, you don’t,” says John. “You don’t go in there with my kid!” He looks around at the room filled with empty beer cans, a half-full vodka bottle, ashtrays with butts of something smoked in them. “You better have your clothes on when I come back,” he barks over his shoulder at the man. “I don’t want to see your sorry ass naked in my wife’s house! Christ, what’s the matter with Moira?” He reaches down, switches off the television set. In the ensuing hush, the kid’s wail becomes more pronounced. John starts toward it.
“Better let me,” says the woman.
“What?”
“He ain’t used to seeing you.”
“Ain’t what?”
“You’re apt to scare him.”
“I’d punch you in the mouth,” says John, pushing past her, toward the sound. “ ’Cept I been taught better!”
“Okay,” says John. “Okay. Easy now.” His arms and legs pedaling madly, the kid lies on his back, squawking like a bird begging for a worm. John’s words have no effect on him. He’s like a lump of wood standing there. “Daddy’s here.”
Above the crib hangs a mobile of small animals. Pushing one with his finger, John makes them spin. The kid wails louder. John grabs the animals to stop them. The mobile pulls free from its mooring and lands in the crib. The kid screams like he’s dying. John tosses the mobile onto the vanity. A Vaseline jar is knocked to the floor. The kid hollers, “Mommy!”
John didn’t know he could talk. Part of him is elated. He leans into the crib and gushes, “I’m Daddy. Can you say Daddy?”
The kid looks mortified.
He hates me, thinks John. Already he’s decided. Probably thinks I abandoned him. Or he knows I’m evil inside. Can see right into my soul. Christ, he tells himself, he ain’t a year old. How can he know anything? Why won’t he stop crying, though. What would Moira do? Pick him up, maybe? He reaches down, puts his arms beneath Nolan’s back. He lifts him. The boy goes completely still. A moment later, he lets out such a scream John nearly drops him. “What’s the matter?” he asks, in a panicked voice that petrifies both of them. “Did I hurt you? Did someone else? For Christ sake. Show me where!”
The wailing builds to a crescendo. John turns the boy over in his hands several times, looking for bruises or cuts, some sign of an injury. Then he thinks maybe it’s one of those scars you can’t see, some mental pain having to do with the fucking he must have overheard in the next room. He thinks about Moira leaving their son with these people. And he’d always believed she was a perfect mother. I’ll go for custody, he thinks. Raise the boy myself. “Stop now,” he begs. “Cut it out, Nolan. You’re scaring Daddy!” He puts the boy against one shoulder, starts patting his back. Then the woman, Carla, is there, her hands reaching out. “Easy now, John. Just give ’im over gentle.”
She’s wearing blue jeans and a pullover black jersey. Her wild, frizzy hair is still sweaty at the temples. John says, “What’s the matter with him? What did you people do to him!”
“He’s fine. Just a little scared’s all. And hungry. Poor little man.” John hands her the boy. She deftly cradles him in one arm. With her free hand, she places a bottle in his mouth. He stops crying, then starts making wet suckling noises. The woman softly rubs his back, rocks him to and fro, coos gibberish in his ear. John glares at her. He wants to say something but isn’t sure what. Reaching out a hand, he gingerly touches one of his son’s socked feet. The whole foot is smaller than John’s finger. He touches the other foot. He counts five tiny toes through the cloth. There’s tears in his eyes. Incredible, he thinks. Absolutely unbelievable what Moira and I done. “He looks like you,” says the woman.
John grimaces at her.
“Yeah. You know, round the eyes.”
“I’m gonna tell Moira what I found here,” says John.
The woman shrugs.
John places a hand on the boy’s head, feels the heat there, the silk-soft hair. He thinks about taking him back, but is afraid his son will cry again.
“Got Moira’s long legs, though,” says the woman, “and gentle temperament.”
John walks past her into the living room.
His mouth drops open. Before the television set, holding the bag he brought for Moira, stands the lanky man with bulging eyes, veiny, tattooed arms, and collar-length, thin blond hair who earlier today John saw crossing the street with Waylon.
“You remember me, John?”
John doesn’t say. He looks for the gun and sees it protruding above the left side of the man’s belt.
“Way you looked at me, I thought maybe.”
“I seen you comin’ out a’ Puffy’s today.”
“I didn’t see you.”
“Maybe you was too busy watching somethin’ else.” John jerks his head toward the bedroom. Suddenly he is struck by the smallness of the world. He imagines himself the bull’s-eye at the center of a shrinking target.
“We got something in common there, don’t we, John?”
“I can’t guess what.”
“Oh, come on, John. We fish in the same pond!” The man laughs. He’s clothes-coordinated with Carla, except
