The Shadow Wife

Crushing the butt of his cigarette beneath his sandaled foot, Johnny stood up. He ran his hand over his dark, sparse beard, the beard of a boy, not a man, and stared into the fog. If the day had been clear, he would have been able to see the ocean from here, beyond a few of the other cabins, beyond where the cliffs plummeted down to the sea. Today, though, his gaze rested on nothing more than drifting clouds of cotton.

He became aware of the silence almost instantly. The wailing and moaning had stopped, and he turned toward the cabin door. Was it finally over? Shouldn’t the baby cry or something?

He heard the rapid pounding of footsteps across the splintery living-room floor of the cabin, and Felicia pushed open the screen door. Her face was flushed, and she looked like a wild woman.

“Get help, Johnny!” she said. “The baby’s not breathing. Get that woman who came last night. Penny’s friend. Carlynn. She’s a doctor.”

He turned and ran in the direction of Cornflower, Penny’s cabin, hoping he’d be able to find it quickly in the fog. He’d managed to find her cabin in the middle of the night several times during the past couple of months, when Ellen had encouraged him to go to the older woman for sex, since she had not felt up to it, and sure enough, his feet seemed to know the way.

He remembered seeing the new woman in the dining room the night before, but he hadn’t known her name. She was an old friend of Penny’s, someone had told him, just here for a visit. He’d found himself staring at her. She was a small and slender woman with large blue eyes and shoulder-length blond hair that framed her face in an uncombed, unkempt and utterly appealing way. She was probably in her mid-thirties, nearly his mother’s age. But she didn’t look like anyone’s mother. Nor did she look like a doctor.

He burst into the living room of the cabin to find Penny and Carlynn sitting on opposite ends of the old sofa, sewing. They looked up at the sudden intrusion, hands and threaded needles frozen in midair.

“The baby’s not breathing!” he said.

In an instant, Carlynn dropped her sewing and ran toward the door. He and Penny followed close behind.

“Which way?” Carlynn called as she stepped into the fog.

Johnny grabbed her arm and ran with her toward Rainbow, but he stopped short at the front steps of the cabin.

“In there,” he said, pointing.

Carlynn wrapped her hand around his wrist and nearly dragged him up the steps with her. “Your girlfriend will need you,” she said, and he knew she was giving him no choice.

The inside of the cabin was hot from the woodstove, the steaming air hitting him in the face as he ran with Carlynn through the living room and into the bedroom. Ellen was crying, shivering as if she were cold, and she reached a hand toward him. A strange scent, a mixture of seawater and copper, filled his head and made him feel dizzy, but he sat down on the bed next to Ellen. Holding her hand, leaning over to kiss her damp forehead, he felt a tenderness inside him that was so sudden it made his chest ache and his eyes burn. He kissed her fingers, rubbed her arms. He was a weak and stupid idiot for making her endure this alone, he thought as he bent over to hug her. He should have been with her throughout the whole ordeal.

Her legs were still spread, her feet flat on the mattress. From where he sat, Johnny had a clear view between her knees of Felicia and Carlynn hovering over something. His child. The thirteenth child.

“The cord was wrapped around her neck,” Felicia said to Carlynn.

Carlynn nodded. She leaned over the infant and puffed into the baby’s nose and mouth. Johnny waited for the cry, but it was only the sound of Ellen’s weeping that filled the room.

Carlynn puffed some more, and then Felicia sat back on her thick haunches, tears in her eyes.

“She’s gone,” she said, touching Carlynn’s shoulder. “She’s gone.”

“No!” Ellen wailed, and Johnny leaned over to press his wet cheek to hers. “No, please.”

“Shh,” he said.

Carlynn lifted the baby, and for the first time Johnny could see the infant, her tiny arms flopping lifelessly at her sides, her skin a pale, grayish blue. Carlynn held the baby in a strange embrace, her hands flat against the infant’s chest and back, her lips pressed against the bluish temple. The woman’s eyes were closed, her lashes fluttering slightly against her cheeks, her breathing slow and deep, and the room grew still. Ellen stopped crying. She lifted herself on her elbows to be able to see better, and for a moment, Johnny wondered if Carlynn were mentally ill. What was she doing?