Christopher Ransom - The Birthing House

'Yeah, about that, Mrs Laski. Is there something I don't know about our house, your old place? Leon gave me that book and if there is some significance . . . ?'

Mrs Laski's eyes shot up from her pocket book and held him with a hard stare, but it lasted only a second before she was smiling again. 'Leon should have never left that with you. It's a lotta history, ya know, Conrad.' A lot of hiss-tow-wee . 'He doesn't like to talk about it, but it's not like we're ashamed of it.'

With her bags in her cart, Mrs Laski dragged the train out of the line and followed Conrad toward the front doors. He knew he could outrun them, but not without appearing insane. One of the kids was now literally clinging to her leg, sitting on her foot so that the woman had to walk in a loping gait. Conrad did an involuntary and quite rude double-take when he saw that one of the boy's hands was - oh dear God - missing three fingers and gnarled into a ball of flesh, twin nails growing out of what should have been the first knuckles. On the back of the 'hand' was an Idaho of lumpen black fur.

'You can have it back, it's no big deal to me either way,' Conrad said over his shoulder, forgetting he had already torched the album. He shuffled faster past stacks of bulk water softener. Guilt wasn't even a factor now. They were so loud and grubby, it made him feel sick to be in their company.

'Oh, no no, too late for that. The book stays with the house.'

The house? You can have the house!

He realized, tallying it as a group, each child was malformed in some way. Jesus Christ, is she his wife or his sister ?

'I'm sorry,' he said, feeling sweat leak down his ribs.

'There wasn't no devil at work in there. Lots of lil 'uns made their way into this world thanks to those women.'

'I'm not sure--'

'My family's not cursed. Accidents happen everywhere. We were happy there for a long, long time.'

'Never mind, it's not--'

'Those women were there for each other in hard times. And we all come upon hard times, don't we, from time to time?'

Conrad finally understood, and knew that he had known all along. The women were the lost women and their midwives, broken souls who came to heal . . . and got stuck bearing children . . . like the Laski kids.

'God always gave us more children, and He wouldn't do that in no home that was cursed.'

Something from dinner with the Grums came back to him. Gail and Big John and Steve arguing about how many children the Laskis had.

It's like ten little Indians over there , Steve had said.

Could have been something rare , Gail had said . Just one of those things.

'I'm sorry for your loss,' Conrad said, watching the flicker of dark martyrdom in her eyes.

But she recovered quickly. 'No regrets, Conrad.' No ree-gwetts. 'And who would trust a hospital any more these days, right? Those places are full of diseases.' Mrs Laski was giggling. 'A hospital! That would be ridiculous!'

Roddy's reference to the doctor. The sketched cross in the yard.

Conrad wanted to slap her face and tell her this wasn't funny. He realized the only things stopping him were the children, staring up at him as if he had joined their traveling circus.

'I have to be--'

'Do you and your wife have any kids yet, Conrad?'

'I'm sorry, I have to get home.' He did not look back as he fled to his car.

'Say goodbye, kids, say bye bye mistah hay-wiss-son!'

Ten little Indians. Some made it out, some did not.

All of them born in his birthing house.

The phone had not been docked long enough to hold a charge, but that turned out not to matter. Their conversation was short.

'What's wrong?' He could tell she was crying, again or still.

'I'm sorry I yelled at you, Baby. That was shitty of me. I just miss you.'

She sniffed. 'I went to the doctor today.'

'Okay.' The house was hot. So hot and humid it made him sway and plop down into one of the chairs at the two top. 'What kind of doctor?'

'It wasn't a surprise. I've known for a while.'

'A while?'

'I'm pregnant.'

13

She was right - it wasn't much of surprise. The rest of the conversation had been a blur. He hoped he'd said at least some of the right things. She had been too tired to go into it. They agreed to keep it a secret for a few more weeks. There was always a chance she would miscarry, and he was ashamed to feel a sliver of hope that she would. No sooner had he thought that than a wild shot of pride and longing he had never imagined filled his heart. He wanted to be a father. This was it. Time to become a man. Do it right, better than Dad.

But that longing was fleeting, too. Something other than Jo's new condition and Mrs Laski's traveling circus was eating him. Something about the timing of her pregnancy did not make sense.

He could see it only one of three ways. Jo was lying and not pregnant, which she would never do. That sort of emotional manipulation was beyond even her. The other possibility was, under the stress of the move and all the shit that had gone on leading up to it, he had forgotten having sex with his wife. That did not seem likely, because men don't forget, ever. The last possibility was that she was pregnant with Jake-the-out-of-work-actor-fuck-buddy's baby.

She claimed they hadn't had sex. But what if they had? What if she had been lying just to gloss it over and move on? He hadn't really wanted to know one way or another before. But now he did. Oh yes, now he needed to know everything.

Oh, this is bad. This is fucked up. How do you ask her if the child is really yours? Without detonating a nuke?

Answer: you don't.

Then, with the out-of-control force of a nightmare, the rest of it clicked into place. Something far worse than deceit or infidelity.

What if he was not the father because there was no father?

What if it was the same with her as with the Boelen's? What if it was something in this new environment? Everywhere he turned he was confronted with pregnancy, eggs, children: he had become surrounded by burgeoning life. There should be nothing frightening about that. It could all be a coincidence.

Unless the house made things this way. Unless everyone who lived here was touched by it.

Unless the house was hungry for more.

14

'It's not only impossible,' Dr Alexis Hobarth said. 'It's fucking impossible. Those animals have been separated, in my care and my care alone, for the past three years.'

'I'm sitting on nine apparently healthy Boelen's eggs, Alex.'

Dr Hobarth was something of a jet-setting playboy in the reptile community. He'd returned Conrad's call while attending the annual National Herpetological Symposium in DC, where he was to deliver a paper on a new subspecies of water monitor his team had discovered on a remote island in Indonesia. So far Conrad had explained the situation with the eggs, but kept his fears about his wife to himself.

'So,' the doctor said, amused, 'what are you doing in Wisconsin, anyway? Are you out of your mind or do you just crave cheese?'

'Alex, it's not important why I'm here. What's important is I have nine eggs in my garage. You told me yourself there was zero chance of fertilization before they reached sexual maturity, at some four years of age and six or seven feet in length. Not only that, she's been eating like a horse since she arrived. You know a gravid female doesn't eat, I don't care how good a keeper you are, and I'm not that good.'

'You have photos?'

'Of the eggs?'

'Yes.'

'No, I don't, as a matter of fact. But I will be happy to email you photos later today.'

'Where are the eggs now?'

'In the garage.'

'You left them with the female?' Hobarth's voice registered concern.