Maternicity
Marian ignored the pain in her feet until they began to go numb. Then she pushed herself even further, to the park bench by the middle school, where she set her child down and lumbered down next to her. The apartment was only four more blocks, and she knew from experience that her pain today would ease tonight, but only if she got off her feet immediately, for at least fifteen minutes. She hugged Crow close to her and warned her to stay on the close side of the jungle gym. Crow pulled, impatient to be released. Her mother accommodated her after first unsnarling the hood of the almost-new red sweatshirt they’d acquired from a church charity basement. The dark blue sweat pants were anything but new, with knees worn enough to appear mesh, and old stains on the cuffs that suggested that the previous owners regularly waded through geese droppings.
The other children probably wouldn’t notice or care, but Marian was very conscious of the conversations between the mothers on the next bench. Would they notice the holes in the knee? Or maybe they would see the bluish cast to Crow’s face, the remnant of acrylic paint that resisted Marian’s washing attempts in the Church restroom.
No, they would not notice. The lights had come on, but there were shadows gliding about every child’s face. What they would notice, Marian recognized, as the last three children frolicking with Crow around and under the jungle gym were collected, was the mother who was lingering outside with a child in a somewhat dangerous neighborhood when every other woman and child had turned in before the sun completely set. And always, she noted, in groups or with a large boyfriend or husband playing escort. Screw the pain she would suffer tomorrow, and the next day. Marian rose and called for Crow, who giggled and hid behind a wooden slide. They’d only been in the playground for ten minutes, and Crow wasn’t finished playing, even if her companions had all left. Marian called her again, trying not to sound frightened. She noticed a man wearing blue gym shorts and a pink collared shirt, leaning against the fence and staring into the park as if her were in no particular hurry to go in. They would have to pass him to get out on the side of the street she intended to go, something she didn’t relish. So she hobbled over to the jungle gym, forcing herself not to look back at the entrance. She made a funny mechanical sound, and pretended to operate an electric screw driver, in reverse. Crow looked stricken for a moment, then laughed when Marian pantomimed dropping screws from the structure. The little girl didn’t really know what screws did or how they functioned, but she couldn’t help but find an adult’s interest in assembling objects humorous. Crow herself favored disassembling things, reducing items to their component parts. For that reason, she couldn’t resist padding over to look for the invisible screws, and Marian pounced as much as late term pregnant woman can.
It was enough. Crow cried out “No, NO.” then struggled for a moment before settling into a quiet sulk. Ignoring the returning pain in her feet, Marian pressed the little girl into her chest, hoping that whatever sights she was facing behind them were less capable of scarring her emotionally. She walked toward the entrance and the man in the pink shirt, refusing to look directly at him.
Just as she reached the gate, a mob of teenage basketball players rounded the corner and filed in between her and the suspicious pink character. One or two openly leered at her, and she was thankful that their motivations, at least, were so transparent. She continued the long walk, slowing occasionally to make certain that nobody was following them, and more than once wishing she had taken that Christian guy up on his offer to drive them directly back home.
She temporarily forgot the pain and the numbness when she rounded the corner and saw that her apartment had three police cruisers parked outside. Without missing a step, she walked past the entrance with her face straight ahead, and turned back up the block again, trying to distract her confused girl as she adjusted their destination to the location of someone, anyone, who might take them in for the night.