Page 35 of The Wrong Track

“My middle name is Marie,” I expanded, and also told her my date and place of birth. “No father.”

The registration lady shot a fast glance at Tobin, but she didn’t say anything. “And the baby’s name?” she asked.

I thought of the house where I’d been so comfortable and safe. “What was your grandma’s name?” I asked him.

“Ella.”

“Ella Margaret,” I told the registry person. Because Margaret had been my grandma’s name, and I’d loved her and I wanted her memory to continue somehow. Unlike other members of my family, she wasn’t here to object to me using it. “Ella Margaret Chastain,” I said, and that was it. The tiny bundle had a name.

“How pretty,” the woman commented, and typed away. When she finally left, I looked at Tobin again.

“I can go home now. It’s all legal.”

He seemed startled. “Don’t you think you should stay a while? They told me forty-eight hours.”

“I’m only running up the bill.” I looked around the room. “Lulu packed a bag for me with things to wear.”

Very carefully, he put the baby into her bassinet and found the bag in the corner. “Unfortunately, she put your stuff on top of my dirty gym clothes,” he said, and then sniffed. “No, you’re not going to want to wear…is this a bikini?” He held up a swimsuit bottom that I hadn’t put on in at least three years.

“She didn’t like my wardrobe,” I said. He was gingerly taking out a tank top that I only ever wore as an undershirt, because the straps were lace and so was the part over my breasts. I looked down at my bulging chest. “I don’t have anything that’s going to fit me.”

“I can ask my mom,” he started to say, but I shook my head. She’d been over several times since I’d moved in, and she’d always been cordial. But she didn’t like me there, that was also clear, and I didn’t blame her. I couldn’t imagine her going through my drawers.

“I can just wear this,” I said, plucking at the gown.

“No. No, I’ll bring you something else. I’m going to get a car home to pick up my toothbrush, anyway.”

“Why do you need one?” I asked, confused.

“The nurse told me that if no one is in the other bed in this room, then I can sleep here in the chair. It folds out,” he explained.

“You don’t have to,” I said. That chair would probably afford him less rest than his real bed would and he had a hard enough time sleeping there. “I think you should stay at home.”

The baby started to fuss. “Are you sure?” Tobin asked. “You don’t mind being here alone?”

“It’s fine,” I assured him. He needed sleep for his bones to heal faster so he could get back behind the wheel, get back to work. He kind of enjoyed going through the cold cases but I’d often catch him looking out the windows, trying to give his brain a break from the reading.

The baby cried harder. “What do you think is wrong with her?” I asked nervously.

“I have no idea. Pick her up and try rocking,” he suggested. “She seemed to like that.”

But she only cried more, opening her little mouth and yowling in a way that reminded me of a hurt cat. There had been a lot of strays in the neighborhood where I’d grown up and I remembered their lonesome wails in the night. “Is she hungry again?” I asked. “Is it her diaper?” Gingerly and awkwardly, I checked and changed her. She still cried. I picked her up, gingerly and awkwardly again, and put her on my shoulder. Other girls had babysat or taken care of much younger siblings, but my sister and I had four years between us and she’d only been my responsibility when we got older. I didn’t even remember her being so small.

“Want me to try?”

I gratefully passed over the angry, inconsolable infant. He unbuttoned his shirt with one hand and put her right under his chin, her face against his skin. “She liked this earlier,” he explained. “I was trying to soothe her so you could sleep. Right, Ella? We had to be quiet because your mommy was so tired from bringing you into this world. You kind of gave her a hard time.” He kept talking to the baby about her birth, about his fears that she would be born on the side of the road in his partner’s old Lincoln, about hearing her cry for the first time and the relief he felt.

But then he looked up at me. “They switched from saying congratulations to working on you. Your head was on my shoulder and I watched your eyes close and I thought…” He stopped. “I think you should stay at the hospital for another day. It’s not fun to be here but you need it.”

I tried to remember the birth. I knew that I’d stopped fighting everyone because Tobin was holding me, telling me that everything was going to be ok and that he was there. “I’m sorry I scared you like that. I should have called and told you that I was in labor.” I leaned back in the bed, so tired again. “At first, I didn’t know what was happening and then I kept thinking I had more time.” And now, that time was up.

“I’m just glad that Lulu happened to stop by.”

I blinked and let my eyes stay closed for a moment before I opened them again. Right, Lulu had “happened to stop by.” She had done that at least fifteen times that I knew of, so she sure must have had a lot of business on his street. “I was really lucky that she was there,” I said. “She stayed here, too.”

“I didn’t know she had that in her,” Tobin admitted, and I thought that he sounded impressed.

I nodded and blinked again, and this time, I let my eyes stay closed. When I opened them, Tobin was gone and I was alone with the baby. That was good because I had to get used to it, since this was how it was going to be. It didn’t feel good, though. She was up most of the night until the nurse took her to another room but I was up, too, jumping at every noise and never really falling asleep. When he came back the next morning, I was so glad to see him that I started crying.

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