night shift

Jessa had never before experienced this level of soreness all over her body. She used to be an athlete, for chrissakes. But this—this was something else entirely. She wasn’t sure why having babies was so normalized with all of the suffering it involved.

Maybe she could deal with only the stitches, or the bleeding, or the bleeding and bruised nipples, or the back pain, or the sleep deprivation; but altogether, they made her feel like some sort of warmed-over zombie. She could pass for one with the way she dressed these days. Her uniform now involved some version of a sweatsuit, though mismatched, with milk- and only-god-knows-what stains. And the smell! She knew that her shower routine had taken a backseat, but she somehow felt even more pungeant than usual.

She tried not to think about the lack of meal trains, and the comparatively minuscule number of friends and family dropping in to snuggle the baby, at least compared to what she had seen on social networking when her internet-acquaintances and mommy accounts posted their babies. For Jessa’s family, it was her, the baby, and her partner: they had moved to a new state away from family shortly before they found out that she was pregnant, so she told herself this was the reason. Maybe they should have found a church. It was too late now.

At least the witnesses to her funk were limited. A few family members who could afford the flight, and weren’t tied down with children themselves, flew in to meet the baby after Jesse and baby were discharged from the hospital. The last of the crew, her sophisticated cousin, arrived on day four at home with Indian food in hand. When Jessa opened the door, her lizard brain responded to the food before she could fully take control of her mental faculties. She realized that she wasn’t sure the last time she had eaten a meal. Their first few days at home, it seemed like the second she sat down with a plate, the baby realized that her own food source had its attention otherwise occupied and passionately protested. Jessa wasn’t comfortable with all of the feeding positions, so she needed to focus her full attention, and both hands, on ensuring the proper latch. She couldn’t feed herself and her baby.

Jessa finally remembered herself and greeted her cousin. They traded goods: he cuddled the baby while she handled the food. This was his first visit to the house, and in any other circumstance, she would feel self conscious about its small size and shabbiness, but the Indian food wasn’t getting any warmer. They sat down at the table to eat, and she immediately began tearing off hunks of naan to shovel daal into her mouth directly from the takeout container. There was about a third of it left, and a significant amount dribbled down the front of her sweatshirt, when she realized it must have been a shared size. Cheeks stuffed like a chipmunk, she smiled apologetically and scooted the bowl back over to him.

He politely spooned a bit into his mouth, gently rocking the baby with the other arm, and asked about her partner, Antoni. He was at work but should be home soon. Oh wait. What time was it?

Antoni had been doing his best to help with the baby, but carving out his role and time with her was difficult with a breastfeeding schedule of every two hours. Ironically, this view did not seem to be shared by the lactation consultant they met shortly after delivery. She was tall, willowy, and ashy blonde. One of those people who could be thirty-two or fifty-two. Her voice was tinkly and she seemed to have read a few books on how to make eye contact and physical touch make their recipient feel heard.

She helped Jessa with her latch and seemed unfazed by her bruised, bleeding nipples. Jessa felt a little more comfortable with everything by the end of their session, so the consultant started her rehearsed farewell speech. She ended it by shifting her gaze from Jessa to Antoni, her warm smile growing even warmer. Jessa could tell by her tone that the consultant was about to drop what she perceived as life-changing knowledge.

“Breastfeeding is hard, but it’s the best for your precious baby girl. You’ve done so well already, and it will only get easier from here, but continuing for at least one year will take real commitment and support. The role of the partner is so, so important for breastfeeding. In fact, he’s the real hero here. With his support, you will be able to give your baby what she needs.”

Antoni and Jessa had exchanged a quick glance, his full of apology and a smidge of amusement. The consultant perfunctorily patted Jessa’s knee and made her way out of the room, leaving Jessa with an exterior of amused shock but an interior roiling with her buried issues of inadequacy. Surely the consultant was just trying to be helpful and encourage Antoni’s role in caring for their baby. Jessa, in her most rational of minds, recognized the lactation consultant’s utter bullshit, but she couldn’t ignore the hunch that if she failed at this, the very basic task of nourishing her baby, she had failed as a mother.

At home, Antoni enthusiastically embraced his role as her beverage and snack butler when she was feeding the baby. When they first made it home, he popped open a bottle of champagne, excited that she could finally share a fun drink with him. She sipped at it through a terse smile, the whispers saying,

Why would you drink alcohol and hurt your baby with the tainted milk? Why are you already a bad mom? Bad mom. Bad mom.

The champagne turned bitter in her mouth and she redirected her attention to her baby. She was quickly, mercifully, mesmerized. She studied the intricate swirls of hair on her brow, her soft, cool cheek, her dark eyelashes. Her squeaky hiccups, enthusiastic (yet adorably uncoordinated) limbs kicking and kicking, communicating something Jessa felt she needed to be able to interpret before she could tear her eyes away.

Jessa felt like the baby was always hungry, or thirsty, or needed a little snack. If she slept, it was in Jessa’s arms. She didn’t want to sleep in her crib, or her bassinet, and Jessa had spent hours doom scrolling about SIDS and accidental smothering. Bedsharing was not an option. Jessa spent her nights holding the baby on the couch, doing anything she could to avoid drifting off. Scrolling mommy groups online was surefire method of keeping herself awake, and this is where she learned of the many ways she could lose her baby on accident:

Sometimes babies suffocated in their bedding. Propped at the right angle, their teensy straw-like esophaguses could close up and block their breathing. Exhausted parents drove straight to work and left their babies sweltering in the car. A few parents backed over their babies with their cars. All of these stories kept Jessa wide awake with her heart pounding, eyes burning.

Jessa wasn’t sure how long this sleep deprivation routine lasted. One day when Antoni did not have work, he noticed her zoned out in a doorway, swaying from sheer exhaustion, clutching the baby in her arms. He rushed over to her, gently guided her to the couch, took the baby, and later told her that they needed to change their approach. He wanted to be more helpful, he wanted to help feed their daughter. Couldn’t she please, please just pump so he could give her bottles during the night?

She finally relented. She started pumping bottle after bottle, froze bag after bag. Her nipples hadn’t yet healed, so she averted her gaze when the milk turned crimson with her blood. She wouldn’t stop feeding on demand during the day, but took shifts throughout the night with Antoni. He spent hours walking the baby up and down their tiny house; she screamed and screamed for the first few nights of this arrangement, refusing the bottle, but Antoni refused to give her up. Jessa curled up in the bed, eyes brimming with tears, exhausted but too distressed to sleep while her baby was distressed.

The baby got used to Antoni and the bottles and Jessa finally got to sleep. But it was a fitful, dreamless sleep. Without fail, she would wake up in a panic, patting the sheets, trying to find the baby wrapped up, suffocating inside the bed. Eventually, Antoni learned how to transfer the sleeping baby from his arms into the bassinet by their bed.

Jessa tried Antoni’s method that successfully led to a sleeping baby inside the bassinet, but it didn’t work with her. The baby’s eyes popped open the second Jessa put her down, wailing with a purple-red face. So during Jessa’s shifts, she continued to sit on the couch, cradling her sleeping baby in her arms. Putting her down in her crib or bassinet didn’t seem worth the turmoil it caused. Such an upset only made it harder to put her back to sleep.

So there they were, baby asleep and Jessa watching Desperate Housewives. At one point, the formulaic plot lines had converged too closely to keep her awake, so she shut off the TV. She reverted to her latest favorite hobby, examining her baby’s face.

But something strange happened, either with her eyes or her brain. She knew this wasn’t actually happening to her baby, but she was stuck with the eyes in her face and the brain in her head, and her eyes saw her baby’s precious, squishy face morph into something else entirely:

Her big blue eyes shadowed into cavernous depths. Her pink, fleshy cheeks gave way to the chiseled cheekbones of a bare skull. Her rosebud lips melted away, leaving menacing, black-and-bone teeth that formed into a sneer.

Jessa’s stomach dropped. But just as quickly as the face appeared, it disappeared. She pushed it out of her mind but turned Desperate Housewives back on for the rest of her night shift.

Each subsequent night, the face returned. It was only a blip, but it imprinted on Jessa’s brain. The fear of it returning nightly, and the startled bewilderment after it happened, started bleeding into the daytime.

Their peaceful mornings, when Jessa had her one cup of coffee with baby in her swing, she grew preoccupied by the face. During afternoon tummy time, she peered at her baby intently, wondering if her face would morph during the daytime. Soon, all Jessa could think about was the face: its grotesque, decaying form, its smiling expression staring at her as she snuggled her baby close.

She couldn’t tell Antoni about this. Who knows what he would think, who he would tell, and what this meant for her and the baby. After days and days of quietly reflecting on the sneering face in her memory, drastically reducing her already limited sleep, she passed out and dreamed her first dream in weeks.

She was in an all-white space looking at a backdrop of fluffy clouds in purply pinks and golds. She rocked her baby and looked down at her, feeling so lucky to share such a beautiful view with her best girl. Suddenly, she heard a thunderclap and jumped, drawing her baby closer, but her arms were empty. With panic rising in her throat, she stood, searching for her baby. She felt gusting winds on her face, chilling her to the bone. The rain drops were large and piercing, and she worried that wherever her baby was, she must be getting wet and cold. The fluffy white clouds turned into a menacing, swirling gray mass.

And then she saw something familiar. The face. The outline of the face fills and swells, formed through the swirling storm, swelling larger and larger until it consumed the entire sky. She woke up shaking, too terrified to panic at the fact that she must have fallen asleep with the baby in her arms.

Jessa saw herself there: she is on the couch holding her baby, who is fast asleep. She watches herself stand up, walk to the nursery, and gently place her baby in the crib. She sees the baby start to scream, but doesn’t hear her. She turns and heads to the bedroom where Antoni is sleeping. She sees herself pick up his phone and set the alarm, on full blast, for five minutes into the future. She sees herself walking to the front door; she opens it, and walks out.