he sun was high in the sky when John Peacock awoke. He did not realize at first how late it was. He lay in bed with the feeling that he was somewhere else. He hadn’t been getting enough sleep lately, with the newborn. She was quiet during the day, but she did not like the nighttime. She would cry, restless, and she could not be comforted except by walking her up and down, up and down. It was a trial to get her to sleep, and moments of slumber were few and far between for the parents.
His thoughts drifted to his little angel as he lay, trying to identify what was so different and strange. They had not yet named the child. He called her his angel. Melissa toyed with one name and another, trying them on like gloves, feeling and exploring them on her tongue, and rejecting each in turn.
He turned his head to watch his wife sleeping. She was perfectly still and relaxed, and her face looked like a child’s face. She was just a babe herself, a delicate flower. The sun was falling on her cheek, creating an appealing shadow.
He sat up and looked at the window. The sun was high in the sky. He picked up his pocket watch from the nightstand. Ten o’clock.
“Wake up,” his voice sounded hoarse and quiet. He shook his wife’s shoulder. “Wake up.”
His wife stirred and yawned and looked at him and smiled.
“Hello,” she said.
“It’s ten o’clock,” he said.
“Ten o’clock?” She sat up. “She’s missed her feeding.”
“She’s so quiet,” he said.
His wife swung her feet out of the bed.
“I’m scared,” she said. “Come with me. Come check on her.”
John was also scared.
The two got out of the bed and walked across the room to the open doorway. The floor was cold. The hallway opened up from their room, running the length of the house. On the right side of the hall was a curtain that closed off the nursery. John was going to build a nursery door, but he had not gotten around to it yet. He felt a pang of remorse, having had nine months to build that door. The room was a converted storage cupboard, small, but big enough for a child’s room.
Melissa looked at John as they stood before the curtain.
He reached out his hand. His fingers touched the soft, cool cloth. He tugged gently. The cloth moved with his hand, bending to his will, pulling aside.
The cubby was still and quiet.
“Angel?” said John. “Baby?”
He stepped forward to the carved wooden crib, and for a relieved moment he thought that she was sleeping. She lay so quiet and so still.
“No,” Melissa said, breaking the illusion. “No—my baby.”
He turned from the motionless infant to his wife and saw the look of abject horror on her face for a split second before she collapsed into his arms in a dead faint.
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