Page 67 of Brood
Every cell in my body aches.
Even in my condition, I sense some sort of tension radiating off him.
It upsets me. I have to fix it. “I can do it. Give me a minute.”
“It’s okay,” he says at last, a rasp in his voice that’s rarely there. “I’ll take care of it.”
His words are such a relief, I start to cry in jerky shudders, still unable to pry my eyes open. But, after a minute, a needling thought pierces my exhaustion. I peek out of my lids to see what he’s doing.
He’s at the sink, preparing a bottle of formula. He’s watched the process enough to know how.
“No,” I gurgle. “They’ll see. They’ll see.”
In our quarters, we might have some semblance of privacy, but there’s nothing of the kind here. There’s a camera in every corner of this room.
“No, they won’t.” He walks over to lift Rosie out of her crib. He carries her and the bottle of formula over to the lounge. He shows me a small device in his pocket. “This disrupts the cameras. We can’t use it for long, or they’ll figure out it’s not a normal outage. But we’ve got a little while.”
There are tears leaking out of my eyes as I watch him feeding little Rosie with the bottle of formula. “I should do it.”
“No, you shouldn’t. You sleep. I’ve got this.”
I’m still crying a little, even as I curl back up and drift back to sleep. After a while, I’m vaguely aware of motion. Will must be putting Rosie back in her crib. Then he’s coming back to the lounge. Pulling my head back into his lap.
He caresses my neck. My jaw. My back.
“Why are they doing this to us?” I choke out, too tired to even wipe tears away. “We’ve always been good. We’ve always done what we’re supposed to do. Why are they treating us like this?”
“Because they can. Because we’re useful to them and they can.”
“I wish we could get out of here. With Bun.”
“I know. Me too. But where could we go where we’d be safe?”
“I don’t know.”
“Nowhere. There’s nowhere.” The bitterness in his voice softens as he strokes my face gently. “Try not to worry right now. Just get some sleep. I’ll wake you up when Bun is ready to eat again.”
“Okay. Thank you,” I manage to get out. “For helping.”
“It’s my job.”
“What’s your job?”
“To take care of you.” There’s a pause. “You and Bun. I never…”
I wait, longing to hear the end of that sentence as deeply as I long for real sleep.
“I never knew what it felt like before.”
* * *
Three months later, and I almost feel human again—like my entire existence is more than nursing and sleeping.
Once both Bun and Rosie (who is now officially Patricia) reached five months, Dr. Cameron and the nursery workers got less rigid with the breastfeeding. Bun has already started on some solid food, and Rosie has moved to formula during the night hours.
That means I have my nights back. I still haven’t been allowed back in the kitchen. During the days, I’m mostly in the nursery, feeding Bun and Rosie and helping out another mother who just had a baby two months ago.
But I get to spend nights in our quarters again and have several hours of sleep in a row.
