Aftertaste - Meredith Mileti [69]
The next day I don’t get out of bed. It’s a chilly February morning, the sky the murky color of dishwater, and it looks as if it might snow. I’d gone to bed early the night before, just after Chloe, and had then awakened in the early hours of the morning to fiddle with the space heater to fight the chill in the room, only having to rouse myself later when the temperature felt too high, not quite understanding it was my own personal thermostat that needed the adjustment. Since then I’ve hardly slept, tossing and turning in a fitful, uneasy doze.
My father climbs the attic stairs when I’m unable to even drag myself from bed to attend to Chloe’s cries. He’s already dressed, which means it must be late. He comes in with Chloe, but after taking one look at me, immediately deposits her back into her bed. He returns a minute later with the thermometer, which he puts in my mouth, telling me that I need to keep it under my tongue, like I’m five years old. I can hear him in the next room dressing Chloe. The thermometer beeps, but I don’t even have the energy to take it out. Instead, I let it slide out of my mouth, where it makes a little moist spot on the pillow. When I open my eyes, my father is picking up the thermometer, Chloe in his arms.
“Hmm,” is all he says. He brings me a cool glass of water and a couple of Tylenol and tells me I need to rest.
I drift in and out of consciousness for most of the day, losing track of the time. When I next see my father hovering over me, the room is dark. When I ask for Chloe, he tells me that she is already asleep.
It is two days later, Tuesday, when I finally and fully awaken. Fiona has moved in downstairs, ostensibly to take care of Chloe, although I can’t help but think she was just waiting for a convenient opportunity to tighten her grip on my father. Now, here she is, balancing a tray on one hand and wearing some sort of frilly apron over a pair of spandex pants.
“Don’t be silly. I have a zillion vacation days I haven’t used,” Fiona says when I manage to thank her for helping take care of Chloe. “It’s fun, kind of like a tag team,” she says, looking at her watch. “Your father should be home in a few minutes to watch the baby, and then I’m off to my exercise class. Don’t worry, dear, Chloe’s just fine,” she tells me. When I ask to see her, Fiona replies that she’s happily playing downstairs in the playpen, and besides, she’s worried that I might still be contagious. Then she pulls from her apron pocket the large, rectangular baby monitor, which she plugs in beside the bed. “Here you go. You can listen to her at least.” After the initial burp of static I can hear Chloe’s small voice. I resent Fiona’s proprietary tone, but the thought of protesting seems infinitely more exhausting, and so I sink back into the pillows, my forehead damp with exertion.
“Look,” she says, depositing a small stack of magazines onto the bed, along with a tray of soup and some ginger ale. “I brought you these, in case you feel like reading.”
Along with Pittsburgh Magazine, Fiona has brought me the most recent issue of Cosmo, which features an article on the current sex toy craze, and a magazine called Channel that has as its lead article an interview with Genghis Khan as told to medium John Edward.
Fiona lays the back of her hand on my forehead. The gesture is at once maternal and self-conscious and speaks of a certain intimacy, the desire for which, at least on Fiona’s part, I can only guess at. For some reason, I’m reminded all at once of my mother, who was not in the least the maternal sort. When I look up at Fiona, I see that her eyes are soft and kind and that she has meant the gesture to be comforting and