I repeated the gestures including the finger to my lips and pointed, also, to the sleeping baby. I ask you, how hard is that for the most simpleminded person to understand?
“What do you want?” said my sister, the college-educated former teacher, louder, as if the problem were one of volume. Again, I had that homicidal impulse.
I worked myself to stand without jostling Gracie, picked up the bottle from the side table myself, and carried it into the kitchen to refrigerate.
Gary and Louisa resumed arguing. I grabbed the baby carrier and headed to my bedroom with it. I didn’t want to put Gracie down, but I needed them to be quiet, at least, and I couldn’t intervene with her in my arms. In my room, I inched her into the carrier and took the pillowcase off my pillow to tuck it around her, so there’d be something light over her. She slept on soundly, the sleep of the innocent, the sleep of one whose needs still can be met.
“Gus will find her a good foster home. There’s a list—all pre-approved by the state,” Louisa was saying. She and Gary were both sweaty, but Louisa was a sight in those frayed shorts with dirt on her hands and knees and face (from wiping it with her hands), blondish hair gone wild pinned back, sunscreen forgotten—no matter how many times I remind her these days—Gary in his version of looking professional, collared plaid shirt and khakis with a belt. He does have a certain resemblance to me in the eyes—big and round and what people say is a startling blue, and he’s got dark blond, curly hair that he combs to hide that it’s receding. Maybe he doesn’t know it’s thin at the crown, too. I took the two of them in like that for a minute, trying to decide what to do. That was legal, I mean, and wouldn’t wake up the baby.
“No. Just give me some time,” Gary said. “All I need is some time. I’ll find her. You know how the system is, Mom. She’ll be judged, and she won’t get her baby back. What if she can’t even prove it’s hers?”
“Gary, don’t be dumb. Blood test.”
Gary got a funny look. “Mom, I mean, give her a chance. Just keep the baby for me for a little while. It’s what God wants.”
“Oh, and was it God or Jesus who told you about that? Personal meeting or telephone? Or maybe Western Union.” The sarcasm thing, you’ll see the family talent. Gary was always at such a disadvantage because he didn’t inherit it. Apparently Harold’s genes were dominant in that brain area. Unfortunate for Gary.
“Hold up,” I said. “Gary, what do you know about the baby and her mother? When and where did you find her?”
“Thank you for asking, Aunt CarolSue. Like I was trying to tell Mom,” he said, which probably antagonized Louisa further, “I just found her a little bit ago. Somebody put her in the church while I was in my office. There was a note asking me to help because her mother couldn’t take care of her.”
“I don’t suppose the father is in the picture,” Louisa said. “Yeah, that’s rhetorical,” she huffed into his silence. “So, let’s see the note.”
“I can’t do that. It would be unethical. It’s confidential.”
“But you think it’s a fine idea for me to keep the baby while you hunt down the mother?”
Gary shifted from one foot to the other. Closed his eyes, then opened them and looked at me for help before he looked back at Louisa.
“Um . . . yes.”
Before Louisa could say any more, I inserted myself. “I think we can do that, Louisa. For a day or two. Gary, you’ll have to go get formula and diapers, though. And a couple of onesies. And do that right now.”
Louisa wheeled and stared at me with as much shock as if she’d caught me naked out by the mailbox while juggling tomatoes, smoking a crack pipe, and guzzling a quart of her special tea.
I shrugged and turned to go check on Gracie. Leaving Louisa speechless was sort of fun. It all fell into place as I opened my bedroom door and looked at the baby, sleeping under my pillowcase. I could wait a day or so to pack up and leave. Of course, Gary was off his rocker about this, but his heart was in the right place, a compassionate place. What was a day or two? And besides. No more picking and canning for me while I worked up a Plan to get me and my stuff back to Atlanta. I’d take care of Gracie, sweet baby Gracie.
Chapter 9
Gary
As he backed the van out of his mother’s driveway, Gary couldn’t believe what had just happened. It was definitely a heavenly Sign. All he had to do was find Rosalina, explain to her that this wasn’t a good idea at all, maybe help her with money, which he’d probably have to borrow. He’d just have to make certain nobody found out. It would ruin his ministry for sure to be known as a fornicator, especially after all the talk when Nicole left him—although that was before he’d been Saved, of course, and his flock made allowances for that. But there was no way, no way, he could let anyone find out or all he’d done to redeem himself, all he’d done to build his church, would be lost. So he’d have to find her, was all. Find her. First, though, he reminded himself, he had to get into town and buy supplies for the baby. Aunt CarolSue had given him a list. And made it clear he’d better do it before he even thought about doing anything else.
He headed for the little grocery store in the blink of a town. It wasn’t much to speak of, but they had the basics, he was pretty sure. He’d have asked his mother where to go, but thought her head might explode if he did, and Aunt CarolSue hadn’t been back long enough to have a fix on current shopping. The grocery store had the advantage of being the closest, too, and he really wanted to get to work on finding Rosalina. Or on figuring out where to start looking. He felt amped up, as if he’d been drinking too much coffee, which he actually didn’t drink at all now because there had been a suggestion at that first revival—if he’d understood it correctly—that it might be sinful. Sometimes it was hard to keep all the Gospel rules straight, like what to eat and drink. Books like Leviticus and Judges—so many of them, really—required many readings and much study.
He parked the van at the IGA in Shandon Center and went in. Not helpfully, there were two different kinds of infant formula. How was he supposed to know which one to get? He was just pulling the one that showed a baby girl on the package—the other kind had a boy on it, so that must be how you knew?—when down the same aisle pushing her own cart, wouldn’t you know? Sister Amy! No, no! Gary jammed the formula back on the shelf as if it were a live grenade, turned his back and pushed his own cart down toward canned vegetables, which is where Sister Amy caught up to him as he was putting two cans of sauerkraut into his cart.
“Yes, it’s wonderful on a hot dog with some mustard, I find, and an easy supper when I’m busy,” he explained after she’d effusively greeted him and examined what he was buying.
“I thought we were discussing in Study Group . . . which Book is it that says pork isn’t clean?”
“Sister,” Gary admonished. “You know there are even chicken and turkey hot dogs, right?”
“Goodness! That’s wonderful. I’d not looked. Now I know! Thank you, Reverend Gary.”
They said their goodbyes, Gary paid and left. He’d have to go all the way to Elmont. Shandon Center just wasn’t going to work. He hadn’t been thinking clearly.
* * *
Elmont turned out to be the better choice anyway. There was the big box store there, groceries on one side, home goods on the other. He got the formula with the baby girl on the package, bought a case of it—he could give it to Rosalina to help her out—and then found out, by glancing at the instructions on the back, that he also had to buy bottles with plastic liners, nipples, and caps. Then he searched out disposable diapers. They sold those by