She’d remained enthusiastic during the numerous practices with the initially fumble-footed man. His skill increased rapidly, and so did her excitement, up until the time she woke up from her nap on the roof. The sun was setting; the children were all gone. Rob had put a blanket over her, and was sitting near her head, reading a book.
“Maybe this isn’t such a good idea,” she said.
“Don’t be silly,” he said. She had thoroughly convinced him of how great it was going to be, and had gone through the whole routine with him over and over, even though he was the competition. Grampus would skate around the egg a few times while the opening seconds of the music played, and then she would claw her way gracefully out of the egg and stand there, as vain as Miss Piggy and as beautiful as Linda Blair. As soon as the audience appreciated her pregnant belly, she and Mr. Grampus would start to move. The routine was more groovy than athletic. There were some fancy spins and a few jumps, enough to make it seem like they were working hard.
She looked at herself in the mirror in their room and wondered if people wouldn’t just think she was fat, rather than discovering that she was pregnant. The colors in her wonderful suit seemed dull — instead of looking like she was clothed in dark rainbows, she looked merely covered with different sorts of smeary cheese. Her hair was wrong, and her teeth were too small, and the suit made them appear brown. She sat down on the bed and considered not going at all, but John Grampus came knocking at the door and calling out for her excitedly. She put on her yellow gown and hung her skates around her neck and answered the door.
She tried to hide in a dark corner to watch the other dancers, but a black light nearby in the ceiling made the white parts of her suit glow like a beacon.
“They’re disgusting,” said Grampus, talking about Dr. Tiller and Dr. Snood. Their outfits were the best part of their routine: Dr. Snood in a silver spacesuit, Dr. Tiller in a silver dress, with a headdress that seemed to be encrusted with pieces of disco ball. They bounced and kicked out their heels and made a rolling motion with their fists. Jemma agreed that it was not very impressive, though Dr. Tiller made the dancing seem stately and severe. “When’s our turn?”
“Last,” she said. “Or never. I think I’m going to chicken out.”
“Oh, come on. If she can do it, so can you. And you did all that work. And you look so fine. Or I bet you do, under that robe. Let me have a peek.” Jemma lifted the sides of her robe. “Wow. Turn around. Ah… you look a little… ah. Well, what does that mean?”
“The usual thing,” she said.
“She doesn’t tell me anything anymore,” he said.
“I didn’t tell anybody. Well, almost nobody.”
“I don’t think she trusts me. She trusts you… she talks about you non-fucking-stop. Wait until you see her costume, she said. It will make you give praise. You’d think she would have mentioned a baby.”
“She was sworn to secrecy,” Jemma said, making it up right there because she thought it might make him feel better.
“But what does it mean. To happen now?”
“People are supposed to be happy for me,” Jemma said quietly. He only stared at his skates, ignoring the show. She’d asked herself the same question before: What did it mean for a baby to be coming here? She still didn’t entirely know how she felt about it, on most days, but she thought that in the broadest context it must be a very good thing. They were going to be in need of babies, weren’t they, though they seemed to have an embarrassment of them, with all the bouncing former NICU players perambulating through the halls? If they were all dried up and sterile, wouldn’t that have been a mark of further displeasure, or doom? She wondered again if anybody else were pregnant, and hiding it, too. Certainly there was enough fucking going on. Maybe her own declaration tonight would draw like declarations from the crowd, with women throwing off their disco frocks, or lifting their blouses to show their full bellies and shout, Me too!
“Well, get in your egg, Mama,” he said suddenly. Rob and Magnolia were dancing, she interrupting her dance with splits and handstands, and Rob doing a backflip every time a particular wah-wah sound came up in the music.
“Can we beat that?” she asked. Grampus didn’t even look at them.
“Is it a contest? Come on. We’re going to be late.” He took her hand, and she let him lead her away to where the open egg was secluded behind a folding screen. He helped her in and then put the top on, fixing it in place with fast-drying cement. She huddled there, listening to the closing strains of Rob and Magnolia’s song, and to the enthusiastic applause they received. She thought of her brother inside his egg, and inside her own egg. Copycat, he said. And, Lame-o. And, Go kick some ass. And, I love you.
The egg moved: Grampus was sliding her out to the middle of the dark floor. A fog machine began to hiss nearby as the first few bars of the music played, and the lights came up — she could see them shining through the walls of the egg, blue and red and purple and gold. Her cue was approaching. She bounced on her heels while she heard Grampus skating in a circle around her; the lady began to sing. She could see Grampus’s shadow throwing out its arms on either side of the egg. In just another moment she would stand up.
47
I am weary, my sister says. And still so much to do.
Are you tired of the baking and the cleaning and the sewing? I ask.
It is no more effort than praise, she says. But still I am weary. I am weary for the new world, or weary of the old one. Woe to the preserving angel! Her task is the hardest.
Never to sleep, I say. Subject to every creaturely whim. Slave to fools. Preserving the doomed.
I must love what is impermanent.
Your body is a shell.
My beauty is ruined by stone and steel.
You are imprisoned.
My bottom is cold. For weeks my bottom has dragged in the black depths of this sea of wrath. Why should an angel suffer the cruel vicissitudes of a bottom? My substance is light!
At least you are not lonely.
I am, in my way. They are not celestial personalities. There is no song with them. There is no praise. Though some sing, and some praise. I am not lonely like you, though.
I am contented.
Lonely angel! No one to talk to except your own hand. Dull, lonely exile!
I was friends with the boy.
And now he is returned to life, and beyond you. My poor little brother. Come to me anytime and I will comfort you.
I am not a mortal. I have no need of you.
Woe to the recording angel! His job is the hardest.
I only have to listen and watch, I say. And make sure that nothing is lost.
Suffering angel! Lonely angel! Keep him from the madness of boredom and uselessness!