“Allright, allright.” Rayson stood up and spoke quickly to Neal, as if irritated by the entire situation. “You’re just going to have to wing it, Mr. Becker. We’ll look after your baby while you go downstairs and have your foot treated, but after that, you’re going to have to take her home.” He paused and looked at Annie, then turned back to Neal. “There’s no point in you staying here—we’ll call you as soon as your wife comes around.”
Neal stared at Natasha, fear coiling up inside him like a dark, slick snake. She wiggled her legs and arms happily, as if she was looking forward to being all alone with Daddy.
Dr. Rayson took two steps towards the door, but turned back to Neal.
“You do know how to take care of a baby, don’t you?”
The eyes of all the medical personnel focused on Neal’s face.
“Well, sure,” Neal said, trying to hide his uncertainty. “Of course I know how.”
CHAPTER 8
It took Neal a good ten minutes to strap the baby seat into the passenger seat of his car. He and Annie and Natasha hadn’t been on many happy little family outings together, and he didn’t have much experience with the device. He was glad that the orderly who had wheeled Natasha and him out to the car had gone back inside the building and wasn’t watching the struggle.
During this lengthy process, Neal avoided looking at Natasha’s face. She had fallen asleep, but he had a gnawing fear that her eyes would pop open and she would say...well, he didn’t know what she might say. The thought of her speaking at all terrified him.
When he finally finished strapping her in, he went around to the back of the car and tossed the two crutches the nurse in the emergency room had given him into the trunk, along with his unused right sneaker. The nurse had done a good job bandaging up his foot, but there was now no way he could put his sneaker on. It didn’t matter—he could drive just as well shoeless.
It was a depressing night, a cold drizzle falling from the sky. His battle with Natasha’s car seat had gotten him breathing hard, and this had made all the windows to fog up. He started the engine and let it idle for a moment, waiting for the defroster to clear the moisture enough so that he could see through the windshield.
He would not look at Natasha. Instead, he tried to concentrate on the things he would have to do in order to care for the baby until they could track down Annie’s mother. Surely the unpleasant woman would come home tomorrow. Unless she was out for the whole weekend with Dan or Doug or whatever the guy’s name was that she was currently banging. Paula Crawford was trash, as far as Neal was concerned. She cared more about her own sexual escapades than she did about her daughter and granddaughter.
When Neal and Annie had decided to get married, Annie had invited her mother to come down to Atlanta—less than a two hour drive—to celebrate. But Paula had refused because Charlie (the guy she was banging before Dan or Doug or whatever the guy’s name was) was coming through town and she wanted to “see” him. And this was already after she was dating the new guy!
Neal wondered what Paula would say when she found out her daughter was hospitalized, laying in intensive care, battered and unconscious. Do you think she’ll stay unconscious until Monday? One of my old boyfriends is coming into town this weekend, and I already have plans...
Trash, absolute trash. Of course, Neal knew it was a two-way street—Paula didn’t care too much for him, either. Still, that was no excuse for her attitude towards her daughter, and her granddaughter. If Paula had ever come down to Atlanta, Neal would have been more than happy to live somewhere else for the duration of her visit—they wouldn’t have even had to see each other. But, no, she was too damn busy running around with her boyfriends to help out. She hadn’t even seen Natasha since the day she was born!
The only thing Paula Crawford had done for her new granddaughter was make that ridiculous orange jumper Natasha was wearing now. Big black letters that were embroidered across the front boldly announced:
BABY
NATASHA
It arrived in the mail two weeks after the baby was born, after she finally had a name. Giving the child a name had been such a source of contention between Neal and Annie that “Jane Crawford-Becker” had simply been entered on the birth certificate. They both agreed to officially change it later. Because Annie was so sure her child would be “special,” she insisted on a unique name. Boy, had the names ever been unique! Her first choice was Amethyst, followed by Raziel and Zealanda.
Neal couldn’t stand any of them. Having suffered his way through grade school with the quintessentially nerdish “Rupert” as his middle name, he was against choosing anything that might cause his baby daughter any distress. He was in favor of a simple name, like Susan or Diane or, yes—even Jane.
But Annie wouldn’t hear of it, not for her baby.
Finally, one evening Neal had a brilliant idea.
“Let’s let our little daughter choose her own name,” he’d suggested. They were sitting in the living room on the plastic covered couch. Annie was holding the baby in her arms.
Neal’s young wife frowned at him. “You want to run that by me again?”
“I’m serious.” He jumped up and retrieved the tome of baby names that Annie had nearly worn out during the past six months, ever since she’d found out the baby was a girl.
“Give her to me—you take the book.”
Annie looked at him like he was nuts, but carefully handed Neal the infant.
“Now start flipping back and forth through the girls’ names. The first time she makes any type of sound, stop on that page.”
Annie immediately understood and began steadily flipping through the book. The baby kicked its feet and turned its little head, almost as if she understood what they were doing, too. But a long time passed—she was completely silent.
“Ga!” she said suddenly.
Annie stopped flipping. “She’s in the N’s.”
Neal leaned forward, looking. “Now start running your finger up and down the names, very smoothly, back and forth, back and forth. Yeah. Next sound she makes, that’s her name. Agreed?”
Annie looked skeptical. “Well...maybe...” She kept running her finger up and down the two open pages, looking at her little girl. “What’s your name, tweety? Can you pick your name for Mommy and Daddy?”
Neal leaned forward, looking at the names. “God, I hope she doesn’t choose Nefertitti.” The book listed every name known to mankind, and a lot that sounded completely made up.
“Geeh!” the baby finally said.
Neal leaned forward to see where Annie’s finger had stopped.
“Natasha!” they both said together.
“Hey, I kind of like that,” Neal said.
Annie frowned again, but he could tell she wasn’t completely against it. “Natasha... that’s not bad, I guess. But it sounds too Russian, don’t you think?”
“No. Lots of Americans are named Natasha these days. It’s a little exotic, but not too over-the-top.”
Annie took the baby back and peered closely at her tiny face. “Are you Natasha?”
“Gah!” Natasha said, drool running out of the side of her mouth.
That last “gah” sealed it.
A week later, they’d received the jumper that Annie’s mother had supposedly made for her granddaughter. He never had liked the ugly thing. Neal soon discovered a tiny a MADE IN CHINA tag on the inside. All the lazy woman had done was embroider Natasha’s name across the front. And she probably hadn’t even done that herself.
In any case, whenever the baby was wearing the hideous garment, he thought she looked ridiculous. She reminded Neal of a mean little wrestler, the wild-and-crazy types you saw on the Saturday morning TV programs.