She flinches a little, like I’ve slapped her, but her jaw sets. “Tanya,” she says. “If you don’t take her, I’ll leave her at your pack hall. Either way, she can’t come back with me.”
I look at her. Really look at her—the cold set in her eyes, and I know she means it. Suddenly, something occurs to me. “Where is she now?” I ask, and she shrugs toward the truck before walking over and pulling a car seat from the passenger side.
She sets the car seat on the porch boards, hard enough that I hear the plastic crackle, and stalks back down the steps. I don’t move. The carrier is covered with a faded pink blanket, and the thing inside is so small I can’t even tell if it’s breathing.
“Thank you,” Tanya says, but she’s already at the truck, already climbing in, already starting the engine. She doesn’t look back. I stand there for a long time after the taillights disappear, waiting for the punchline. It doesn’t come.
I feel like I should stop her or say something more, ask her when she’s coming back. But I already know the answer to that. She’s not.
I have no idea what to do. My hands hover, stupid and slow, above the little bundle. She doesn’t have the solid, high-wattage wolf scent yet, but there’s something in the tilt of her nose, the stubborn set to her frown, that I recognize. Even my wolf, usually so quick to judge, goes silent.
The car seat is heavier than I expected. I carry it inside and set it on the kitchen table, suddenly really noticing and cursing how cold the cabin feels.
I stare at the sleeping baby, waiting for instructions, waiting for instinct. She just keeps sleeping. There’s a bag. Diapers, formula, and a single bottle. One stained onesie. I open the fridge, find only beer and leftovers. I close it again, feeling useless.
I need help. I don’t know anything about this baby; she could be sick, she might not even be mine, and I don’t even know how to feed her or where babies sleep.
I carefully grab the car seat and load it into the truck as though it’s a live bomb that could go off at any moment. I know Skylar and Fern will be at the medical center, and heading there is the only thing that makes sense. I’m not sure if this is a medical emergency, but it sure as hell feels like some kind of crisis.
The drive to the clinic takes all of eight minutes if you’re law-abiding and four if you’re desperate. I’m somewhere in the middle, jittering between red lights and the weird, yawning silence in the passenger seat. The baby hasn’t made a peep, not even a whimper, and that seems like a bad sign. I check her every thirty seconds, and every time she’s still there, asleep, lips puckered and skin far too pale for my liking.
I slow down when I pass the old rec field. There’s a running track that wraps around what used to be Cheslem’s football turf, and even in shit weather, someone’s always out there. Today, it’s Dina.
She moves in long, violent lines, her stride too fast for a warm-up, too aggressive for exercise. She’s running the way you run when you’re trying to outpace something that’s already inside you. Her hair is in an elaborate braid, and her sweatpants are threadbare and obviously worn for function, not aesthetics, a silent fuck-you to anyone who expects her to put on a show,and yet somehow, her appearance draws me in the same way it always does. She doesn’t see me. I keep rolling, like maybe if I don’t make eye contact, the universe will ignore me for once.
I tell myself I don’t care what she thinks, but that’s a lie. I picture her seeing the baby seat in the back of my truck and coming to the obvious conclusion…that I’m exactly what everyone probably thinks I am; a mess of mistakes waiting to happen, leaving collateral damage in my wake. She has the right to judge more than most. She knows what my old pack did to her family, to her. I know I got out more or less intact, while she’s spent every day since learning to live with what happened.
I park in the clinic and lug the car seat inside, holding it with both hands to keep from shaking. Thank the goddess that the waiting room is empty because I barely know how to explain this to Skylar and Fern, never mind anyone else.
Skylar meets me at the door to the exam room. She’s wearing scrubs, her hair a wild honey tangle pulled into a bandana, and she looks tired but not unhappy to see me. Her wolf eyes flick to the car seat, then to my face, then back.
“Is that…?” she starts.
I nod, because words feel like too much work. “I need you to tell me she’s not dying.”
Skylar’s face softens, as if, despite not knowing what is going on, she can see how much I need help. She checks the kid’s pulse, unfastens the car seat straps with a skill I don’t have, and does a quick head-to-toe. I just stand there like a statue, arms crossed, trying not to look as desperate as I feel.
“She’s cold,” Skylar says, her voice warm enough to melt permafrost, “but she’s breathing fine.” She glances at me. “When did she last eat?”
“No idea,” I admit. The confession tastes like shame. “Maybe before the drive over…her, erm, mother just left her with me. Just now.”
Skylar clicks her tongue and cradles the baby in the crook of her arm. “Fern,” she calls, and a moment later Fern appears from the back, sleeves already rolled up. She spots the baby and the panic on my face and immediately pivots into therapist mode, which is to say, she pretends everything is normal, and nothing in the world could possibly go wrong.
Fern takes the baby as Skylar fills her in, then touches its cheek with her thumb, gently and practiced. “She looks like you,” she says, and I nearly choke.
“Impossible,” I say. “She’s not scowling nearly enough.” It’s a joke, but neither of them laughs.
“What’s her name?” Fern asks, rifling in a cabinet for a bottle, like there’s always a spare infant on the premises.
I stare at her. “I…don’t know.”
Skylar raises an eyebrow, but doesn’t comment. She fills a bottle with formula and hands it to me. “Here. She might take it from you.”
I look at the bottle like it’s a grenade. “How do I…?”
Fern smiles, patient and a little sad. “Just hold her. Angle the bottle up, not down. Let her set the pace.”
The baby’s mouth finds the teat on instinct, and a primal, guttural relief floods through me. As she eats, her eyes flutter open, dark and accusing. She looks like she’s already disappointed in my life choices. Which is probably fair.
