What to look for. The eggs, nits, stuck to the shaft, close to the scalp. Dark if they’re fresh, translucent if they’ve already hatched. A seven-day gestation cycle. The nymphs, freshly born, almost impossible to spot without experience. You learn to see. A dot that shouldn’t be there, smaller than a comma or a freckle, moving, but not mature enough to reproduce. Seven more days to reach full growth. The adults are grey and black, size of a poppy seed. They hate the light and run from it, down the part in a child’s hair. Wingless, flightless, they crawl from head to head. One mature louse can lay ten eggs a day, one hundred fifty eggs in a lifetime. Around the ears, the base of the neck, the crown: these are the warmest spots on the human skull. Kids scratched raw. Bleeding sometimes.
The shampoo is not so bad — more flower than chemical — but it tingles and has to stay on the head for ten minutes to work. The pharmacist will put it in a discreet paper bag and whisper to you about side-effects. Asthmatics should seek alternative treatment. Between application and rinsing, we walk around wearing matching towels and shower caps. Same treatment for everybody, even the two-year-old.
Don’t touch. Don’t rub your eyes.
Bag hat, she says, scrunching it with her fingers. Funny bag hat.
Ten minutes on each head. Enough time for the killing ingredient to soak all the way through. De-lousing. Then rinse. Naked kids, braced between our legs, standing under the shower. Facecloths over their eyes and mouths. Don’t swallow any of this water. Spit it out. Spit right now. A scar on our daughter’s stomach from before. We go through with a fine-toothed comb. It is made of metal, comes in a plastic sleeve with the shampoo. Every inch of every head every night. The box says repeat application after seven days. Repeat again if infestation persists. It has been three weeks. Thought we were finished and clear. Then, today, a perfect specimen, a text book example, crawling out of our daughter’s bangs.
Treats for everyone who is good. For everyone who can stay still, who doesn’t complain or scratch or talk about it. A secret. Only for the people who live in this house.
Chicken bugs, chicken bugs, says the youngest. Bugs that lay eggs on your head.
Notes sent out on blue paper. The school is overrun. Public health. A new look for the oldest. Tight braids woven close to her head. Stare at other kids coming off the bus. Which one of you is the source of this? Wonder about parents. The fine lines. Different levels of commitment. Who is lazy and who is not? Dirty or clean. It makes no difference. Together no matter how you feel about it. All of us moving through at the same time. Shared threats. Cross-contamination. One passed hat, two kids leaning over the same desk. Good Lego. A colouring book. Clay. Work too close and the whole cycle starts again.
WE DO BATH and we do pyjamas and we do story. The Magic School Bus becomes a lizard, then a moth. Ms. Frizzle. A lesson about camouflage. How to hide in plain sight. Tucking in. Kisses and hugs. Settling down. Noise. Whispers and rustling at first, then steady breathing in the rooms. Quiet. Nine o’clock.
I sit on the couch. Nothing for three minutes. Strange thick silence in the house. Water running in the pipes. The last two hours of a day. Aftermath.
She comes down, still wet from the shower. T-shirt and underwear.
Okay, she says, I’ll do you and you do me.
My head in her lap. Gooseneck desk lamp pulled down close. Bulb warm on the base of my neck. Our dishwasher hums. She works the metal comb through my hair. Rolls my skull from side to side, up and down, front to back. Ten minutes. Taps her fingers on my temple.
All done, she says. Nothing new. Nothing I can see.
My mouth on the elastic of her underwear. The smell of lotion. Soap.
We switch. Her face in my crotch.
I wouldn’t get any ideas if I were you, Romeo.
Fold the rows of her hair with a skewer from the shish kebab set. Need to follow straight lines. Keep everything systematic. Front to back, side to side, up and down. It takes half an hour with long hair. She falls almost asleep. I pull an egg down the whole length of the shaft. Find one living insect, mature. Pluck it from her skin and watch it wriggle on my middle finger. Bring my thumb down hard. All the strength I can muster. The pressure between two points, crushing. I separate my fingers. The legs are stilled. Its body rests in a circle of her blood. Red seeps into my fingerprint. Parasite. Life sucked from our lives.
My hand on her cheek.
All done.
She comes back. Sleepy drool. The open slot of my Christmas boxers. Wetness around Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.
Are we good? she says.
Yeah. Only one live one.
I guess that’s progress.
Can’t go on forever.
No.
She touches her fingertips to her forehead and runs them from the hairline over her eyelids and down to her cheeks.
Tired.
I know.
I’m going to go up now. Don’t you stay too long. Big day tomorrow.
Yes.
Night.
It’s going to be okay.
I know.
Good night.
If you blow up an adult louse three hundred times, you can see its claws. Black and white shots in all the brochures and pamphlets. Textured stills taken with a good camera and a microscope. The things I have learned in the last three weeks. Websites. A book from the library: Rats, Lice, and History by Hans Zinsser, written in 1934. What he tells me: “As far as we can ascertain, since man has existed, the louse has been his inseparable companion.” Aristotle believed they came from nothing, that lice were the only creatures in life that ‘generated spontaneously.’ Part of our bodies, he thought, proceeding directly from us. Born out of human sweat. He couldn’t get close enough. Couldn’t imagine their cycle. But look now. Obvious when you magnify. Females and their eggs. Sticky, water resistant sacs glued to a thread. Three pairs of pinchers for each adult. Tight and knife sharp. Worse than a lobster. Look at the stills. Each of the six legs wrapped around a single strand of hair. Or digging into the scalp. They drink your blood. Found one in a 5,000-year-old Egyptian tomb. Still there. Holding onto the carefully braided hair of a mummified little girl.
The present tense. Everything happens here. A guy banging on the front door of the university house she shares with four other girls. Late on a Friday night. My first time in this place. One of her roommates moaning in the next room. Our beds less than a foot apart, separated by drywall and air. Give it to me, the girl on the other side says. Coos up high like a bird. Give it to me.
We are her unintended audience. Quiet. Rolled eyes and suppressed giggles. Oh, the ecstasy, she whispers to me. Back of her hand on her forehead. Half-open mouth. The ecstasy. We laugh. Move in silence.
The knocking comes loud and fast. Shakes us up. Somebody with a purpose in the middle of the night. He screams her name. Hammers on the aluminum door frame. Her name first, then the strike. Knuckles on the windows. Glass rattling near its breaking point. Hear the ping. We are nineteen years old. Four or five in the morning. What was his name? The guy banging on the windows that night? The guy calling for you?
He howls for five minutes. Gets tired. Goes away. We think he’s played out, but no.
I know you’re in there.
Banging. Hard cracking in his voice.
I’m sorry, he says. I just want to talk. I screwed it up. I know. I’m sorry.