He snickers. “Slide off a flat surface?”
“You are both correct,” April says. “It is almost certainly safe, given the child’s lack of mobility, but a slippery metal table still doesn’t seem like the safest place to set a baby.” She aims a look at Anders.
“Hey, I’m not the one who put her there,” Anders says. “And Eric literally just unwrapped her as you two came in.”
April nods at Dalton, as if to say that if he did it, then it’s fine. The first time they met, she referred to him as my fuck toy, and I’m not sure what was more shocking, the word coming from my very proper sister or the sentiment coming from my very straitlaced sister. In the last six months, she’s done a complete about-face, and now, if Dalton does something, then it’s the right thing to do. I’m totally on board with her not treating my lover like trash, but I can’t help wishing I could get a little of that approval thrown my way.
“Eric?” she says. “It’s a bit chilly in here for the baby. Could you…?” She looks over to see he’s already starting the fire, and she nods, pleased that her trust is so well placed. Anders and I exchange a look.
I hold the baby until the fire’s blazing and the chill is leaving the room. Then I lay her on the exam table.
“Would you take over?” I ask Dalton. “I need to find something for her to eat.”
“Yes,” April says, not looking up from her examination of the baby. “We’ll need formula and bottles. Also diapers, for the inevitable after-products of feeding. Tell the general store to put together a box of all their infant supplies.”
Anders, Dalton, and I all look at one another.
“Uh,” I say. “We don’t carry infant supplies. We don’t … have any infants.”
“In case you haven’t noticed that in the past six months,” Anders murmurs.
April shoots us both a glare of annoyance. “Yes, I have noticed there are currently no babies, but I’m sure there are supplies in storage for them.”
“There aren’t,” I say. “We don’t ever have babies here. Or children. Or even teenagers.”
She glances at Dalton.
“Yeah,” he says. “I was special. But Casey’s right. We don’t allow anyone under eighteen, and there’s a reason why we have a shitload of condoms and diaphragms and every other method of contraception. We’re not equipped to handle childbirth or children.”
April flutters a hand at me. “Just get … whatever.”
* * *
As I hurry through town, I’m trying to figure out what I can get. Milk is the obvious choice. We have it in powdered form, and I know that’s less than ideal, but it’s that or nothing.
As I’m racking my brain for alternate foods, I keep thinking, Oh, I can google that. For someone raised on modern technology, it’s a natural instinct. Well, unless it’s a medical question, where even “I have an odd rash on my thumb” will lead to “Cancer! Death! Plague!”
Sixteen months in Rockton have not yet rerouted my neural circuits enough to keep me from reaching toward my pocket every time I have a research question. Now, instead of a cell phone, I carry a notepad, where I can write down all those questions for the next time I’m in Dawson City with internet access. This problem won’t wait that long.
I need to find a resident who has had a child. That should be easy enough in a town full of people in their prime child-rearing years. Yet that is exactly what makes this not easy at all. Like Dalton said, we don’t allow children. We also don’t allow spouses. You come alone. You leave everything—and everyone—behind. That means that if you’re deeply devoted to a partner, you won’t come to Rockton. If you have kids, you won’t come to Rockton. There are exceptions, I’m sure, where the danger is so great that you say goodbye to your family for two years. But single and childless is the normal.
I don’t even know who has grown children. Residents reveal only what they want and invent whatever backstory fits who they choose to be while they’re here.
That’s when I spot the one person I know for certain has had a child.
Petra is coming out of the general store after her shift. Before I can catch up, another resident stops to talk to her. I hear them discussing art that the resident has commissioned as a Hanukkah gift. Down south, Petra had been a comic-book artist. Well, after she spent a decade as special ops in the United States. She’s also resumed the latter job here, as a spy and—at least in one case—assassin for her grandmother, one of the town’s early residents and current board members.
Until six months ago, I’d have said Petra was my closest friend in Rockton. The whole “actually a spy and assassin” part has put a damper on that. Petra and I have resumed some form of cautious relationship. We’re not going to sit around braiding each other’s hair but we weren’t exactly doing that before either. It had been a stable, steady, comfortable friendship, and it no longer is, and I mourn that.
When Petra sees I’m waiting to speak to her, she wraps up her conversation quickly. I motion her over to a gap between the general store and the next building.
“We have a baby,” I say.
Before I can explain, she says, “You’re having a—?”
“No, we found a baby abandoned in the forest. She’s very, very young, and we’re … We’re a little lost. We don’t exactly have baby guides in the library, and I could really use some help.”
When I’d first hailed Petra, her step had lightened, and she’d smiled as she walked over. Now the remains of that smile freeze before sliding away.
“I…” She swallows. “I can’t really…”
“Was that a lie?” I say. “About your daughter?”
Confusion flashes, and then anger. “Of course not. What kind of person would make up…”
She trails off because she realizes the answer to that. A child’s death is exactly the kind of tragic backstory anyone with her training might give. I have no idea specifically what she used to do. “Special ops” is as much as she’ll say, but if she’s done any spy or interrogation work, she knows only a stone-cold bitch wouldn’t have been affected by the story of her daughter, so I must question it.
“No,” she says, quieter now. “I would hope you’d know I wouldn’t make up something like that, but yes, I get it. Anything I know about babies, I’ll happily pass along, though I’ll warn that my ex was the expert parent. I meant that if you’re looking for someone to care for this baby?” She manages a wry smile. “I’ll stick to dog-sitting.”
“I understand. If you can pop by the clinic and give us anything—maybe some sense of how old the baby is—that’d be great. Right now, though, we need food. She’s not rolling over or lifting her head yet, and as little as I know about babies, I realize that means she’s still on an all-liquid diet.”
“Damn, she really is young. Okay, well, I guess milk will have to do until you can get into Dawson for formula. We’ll need to rig up something to use as a bottle. Let’s go into the store. I have a couple of ideas—”