Page 32 of Clever Little Thing

I got back into the tent before it got too dark to see, and sat there, shivering. It suddenly occurred to me that Pete wasn’t lost. Pete had left me because I was too neurotic and demanding. Because I was a selfish tyrant who couldn’t sleep without her special pillow. He was gone. Nobody had ever taken care of me the way he did, and nobody ever would again.

Eventually I crawled into our sleeping bag, the one Pete had made by zipping two single bags together. I pulled it tight around me and lay there, shaking. I was alone again, back in that room, radiation coming off my skin, unloved and unlovable.

It felt like hours later when Pete climbed into the tent. He wrapped his arms around me, full of apologies. “I’m so sorry, baby,” he said. “I was on my way to the car, and I guess I wasn’t paying attention and must have gotten turned around in the dark. I was so worried. Didn’t you hear me calling?”

“I calledyou. I called and called.”

Pete groaned. “I must have been too far away by then. I just got completely goddamn lost. I thought I was going to be wandering around all night. Then I stumbled into the creek, so I followed itdownstream until I recognized the place where we crossed, and from there, I was able to make my way back. I’m so sorry, baby.”

“You were gone for so long,” I said.

“Honey, it was barely forty-five minutes,” Pete said.

“It felt like hours.”

Pete gave a shuddery sigh. “I feel like such an idiot. I’m supposed to be the big outdoors guy, and I got lost within a mile of our tent.”

I burst into tears. “I thought you left me.”

Pete wrapped his arms around me. “Never. I love you. How could you think that?”

I pulled him into the double sleeping bag and nestled against him, and he murmured into my hair. “I would never leave you, never, never.”

Now I press the phone to my ear, wishing I could nestle against Pete now. It can’t be easy to be married to me. “I still feel awful that I doubted you,” I tell him.

“It’s OK,” said Pete. “I didn’t take it personally. You were terrified of your nail polish too, remember?”

“It had phthalates in it.” I threw out all my makeup and most of my toiletries, certain that otherwise Stella would be born deformed. That was in the second trimester.

After saying goodbye to Pete, I sit on the bed and lean against the headboard. The raised embroidery on one of the decorative pillows digs painfully into my back. I was in the second trimester when I became convinced the oily bread was harming me.

then

20.

My doctor ran the probe over my gently rounded stomach. “I’m a little concerned about the size, for twenty-one weeks.” She frowned at the ultrasound picture. “You need to take in more calories.”

I was stricken. After all this time relaxing and gestating, I only wanted to hear good news. “But the baby is OK?”

“You can feel movement?”

I nodded.

“How’s the nausea? Any better?”

“I feel like I’m about to throw up some of the time, but I never actually do.” She had a corkboard plastered with baby pictures: girl babies with tulle rose headbands, boy babies with robot onesies. Pregnancy felt like one long battle against nausea and exhaustion. It was almost a jolt to remember I had a baby like these inside me: Stella’s brother or sister.

The doctor frowned. “Morning sickness usually fades away in the second trimester. Have you found anything to help with it?”She glanced at my chart. “You tried promethazine in the first trimester. That didn’t work?”

I shook my head. “I only feel better when I eat this one kind of flatbread.”

“Pregnant women often get very specific cravings.” She smiled to herself. “For me, it was freshly squeezed orange juice. No other kind. Had to be completely fresh.” She studied the sharp bones of my hips. “What else are you eating?”

“This bread is the only thing that makes me feel better. Then I sleep for hours.”

“A lot of people have trouble with bread nowadays.”

A muscle jumped under my eye: it was happening more, recently. I placed my cold fingertips on my cheek. “I’ve never had trouble before.”

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