All the voices sound sensible at the time.
“And then you conveniently played into their plan by picking up Laurel’s baby and driving here?” Sky asks, one eyebrow raised, lip curled.
“You didn’t even take the right baby,” Peter says. “What kind of a mother doesn’t know her own child? I would never not recognize my own child.”
He’s staring fiercely at Chloe and I think, That’s true. Since she was born Peter has reveled in their similarities: the same square face, red-blond hair, blue eyes. I look from Chloe’s face to Peter’s. Then I look to Sky and, just like that, as if a key has turned in a lock, I understand.
Edith’s Journal, December 9, 1971
I just wish it would all be over. Every day I feel like I’m dragging an enormous weight. And I am. Libby said I might as well eat as much as I want since I’ll lose it all later. So that’s what I’ve been doing. She’s been buying boxes of the chewy chocolate chip cookies the bookstore sells and bags of candy bars. In the cafeteria I eat macaroni and cheese, slabs of meatloaf, pancakes, ice cream. I barely taste any of it. When I sit in the chairs in the art history library I feel my stomach pressing up against the fold-down desks. I can feel the other girls staring at me, whispering about me. The only class I go to is art history, where it’s dark and everyone’s eyes are on the slide screen. We’re up to the Renaissance. When I look at the rounded bellies of all those doleful Madonnas, I touch my own swollen belly.
All finals week Libby and I haven’t gone out at all. It’s been snowing all week. The sky is white, like a blank canvas. The only class I’m studying for is art history. Libby has made up cards with all the art slides and quizzes me on them. With each card she tells me about the city the painting or church is in and describes what we’ll do when we go there. She tells stories so well it’s as if we’re there. When I look out our window I see us on that blank canvas, eating crepes at a café in Paris, wading through fields of sunflowers in the south of France, lying on beaches on Greek isles. There’s no baby in these stories, but sometimes I pencil him in, strapped in a backpack, toddling at the water’s edge, floating above us like an angel in a Renaissance painting.
Tomorrow is the art history exam. Once I’ve taken it I’ll be done with this place. I’ve decided I’ll go to Nurse Landry and tell her about the baby. I know she’ll help me. It may mean getting in trouble, but I’m scared and I’m not sure that Libby really knows best anymore. I think she could use help too. I feel better now that I’ve made a decision. I’m going to go to bed now and try to get some sleep before the big exam.
December 10
So much has happened since last night and I don’t have long to write it all down, but I’ll do my best for Libby’s sake and for the baby’s sake.
I had gone to sleep but something woke me up. I noticed that Libby’s bed was empty. I thought she must be in the bathroom, but when a half hour went by and she didn’t come back I started to worry. I put on my robe and slippers and went out into the hall. Our room is at the end of the hall, right next to the bathroom. Most of the girls on the hall use the bathroom at the other end because it has showers, but Libby likes the one at this end because it has a big old-fashioned bathtub and she likes to soak for hours. I thought she might be taking a bath. I opened the door to the bathroom and saw that the lights were off in the sink area, but there was a light under the stall with the bathtub. I heard water dripping. The room smelled like old copper pipes and tampons. I thought Libby had a bad period and was taking a bath for cramps.
I left the outside light off and padded softly to the stall door. I knocked and called her name. I heard a grunt that sounded more like an animal than a person and I was suddenly very afraid. I wanted to turn around and run back to my room but the stall door had cracked open a bit because it wasn’t locked and I saw Libby crouched in the tub, a washcloth stuffed inside her mouth, her face purple. At first I was afraid she was dying, that she’d had some kind of fit or attack or that she’d been attacked. When I got closer to the tub I saw the blood, gallons of it. So then I thought this must be some kind of stunt, someone had tied Libby up and poured pig’s blood over her. I took the gag out of her mouth and grabbed her shoulders and shook her. When she looked at me she didn’t seem to recognize me. Then she let out a moan and her body shook and there was more blood. It was coming from between her legs. I reached there—not even thinking about being embarrassed to touch her there, just wanting to stop the blood—and my hand touched something round and hard.
My first thought was that Libby had somehow found a way to have the baby for me.
And then it was like I’d floated up out of my body and I was looking down. I could see two girls, one in the tub, one crouched over the tub, and I couldn’t tell who was who. The girl outside the tub was
