The Boy in the Suitcase - Lene Kaaberbol [55]
“I implore you to contact us if you hear anything at all,” said Gužas. “It’s impossible for us to stop people like this if no one will talk to us.”
She nodded heavily. But she knew that if it became a choice between saving Mikas and telling the police, the police didn’t have a prayer.
Valionis closed his briefcase with a crisp snap. The two officers got to their feet, Valionis gave her his card, and Gužas shook her hand.
“There is hope,” he said. “Remember that. Julija Baronienė got her daughter back.”
Sigita felt a brief spasm in her chest.
“Who, did you say?”
“Julija Baronienė. The nurse. Do you know her?”
Sigita’s heart leaped and fluttered.
“No,” she said. “Not at all.”
SHE STOOD ON her balcony and watched the two men cross the parking lot below, get into a black car, and leave. Her right hand had come to rest just under her navel, without any directions from her. Certain things are never entirely forgotten by the body.
Contrary to everything Sigita had heard about first-time births, it had been quick, and very, very violent. In the beginning she had yelled at everyone in sight, telling them to do something. In the end she just screamed, for four hours straight. It was Julija’s hand she clung to, the nurse who was somehow also Granny; and Julija stayed with her so that she felt at times that this was the only thing that held her to this world: Julija’s strong, square hands, Julija’s voice, and Julija’s face. Her eyes were dark, the color of prunes, and she did not let go, nor did she let Sigita do so.
“You just keep at it,” she said. “You just keep at it until you finish this.”
But when the baby did come, Sigita could hold on no longer. She slipped, and something flowed out of her, something wet and dark and warm, so that there was only cold emptiness left.
“Sigita… .”
But Julija’s voice was already distant.
“She’s hemorrhaging,” said one of the other sisters. “Get the doctor, now!”
Sigita kept on slipping, into the chill and empty dark.
IT WAS NEARLY a day and a night before she came back. She was in a small, windowless room lit by fluorescent ceiling lights. It was the light that had woken her. Her eyelids felt like rubber mats, her throat was sore. One arm had been tied to the side of the bed, and fluids were slowly dripping into her vein from a bag on a thin metal pole. Her body felt heavy and alien to her.
“Are you awake, little darling?”
Her aunt Jolita was by the bedside. The fluorescent lights bleached her skin and dug deep shadowed pits beneath her eyes. She looked like a tired old woman, thought Sigita.
“Would you like some water?”
Sigita nodded. She wasn’t certain she could talk, but in the end she tried anyway.
“Where is Julija?”
Jolita frowned, her penciled brows nearly meeting in the middle.
“Your grandmother?”
“No. The other Julija.”
“I don’t know who you mean, darling. Here, have a sip. Now all you have to do is rest up and get better, so that we can get you home.”
That was when it happened. When Jolita said the word home. Something huge and black exploded in her head, her breasts, her belly. Its edges were so sharp and evil that it felt as if something was there, even though she knew that it happened because something was lacking. Because something had been taken out of her.
“Is it a boy or a girl?” she asked.
“Don’t think about it,” said Jolita. “The quicker you forget about the whole thing, the better. It will have a good life. With rich people.”
Sigita felt tears slide down her nose. They felt scalding hot because the rest of her was so cold.
“Rich people,” she repeated, testing to see if that might make the Blackness go away.
Jolita nodded. “From Denmark,” she said brightly, as if this was something special.
The Blackness was still there.
TWO DAYS LATER, Sigita was standing next to the bed in a gray sweatshirt and a pair of jeans she hadn’t been able to fit into for months. Standing was tiring, but she still couldn’t sit, and getting out of bed was so painful that she didn’t want to lie down again. Finally Jolita returned, accompanied by