Walter grumbled. “Does he have tickets to the World Wrestling Federation or something?”
“Shut your hole” came Wrangler Man’s lovely retort.
“Walter.” I winced as Zeke latched on to me like a roach clip. “Sometimes mathematicians shouldn’t try to make jokes.”
Just as the captain ordered a crosscheck of the doors we heard vigorous wails come down the jetway. A man dressed all in black, like Johnny Cash but for the white collar of a priest, stepped carefully through the door, his hair a fringe in front of his eyes, his cheek pressed into the dark head of the reddest-faced baby I have ever seen.
“Holy fucking Christ,” Wrangler Man cried from his seat, and we watched everyone lean away, like the parting of the Red Sea, as the priest and baby passed. He made his way along the aisle, petting the baby’s head and clucking awkwardly. A flight attendant helped him get seated, the door shut, and, finally, for better or worse, we pulled away from the umbilical cord of the jetway and tore through the permanent frosting of brown muck over Newark.
Zeke can’t settle down with the other baby’s screaming. He’s snorting and snuffling, and my milk is getting in his eyes. Every time he reattaches I dig my nail into the thin skin on Walter’s left hand. No age spots yet. Walter has his tray down and he’s arranged the limp banana along with the apple and bagel into a pathetic still life.
Behind us the priest’s baby continues its caterwauling with impressive lung capacity. I turn and see Wrangler Man slam on earphones and pound the buttons on his seat trying to get the flight attendant, the in-flight music station, anything to drown out the baby. Another flight attendant rushes past with a cute little bottle of Jack Daniel’s in one hand and a baby bottle in the other. The baby screams and hiccups and then is silent.
Walter sighs heavily and I close my eyes. Walter told me the name of the hormone that releases into a woman’s bloodstream when she lactates (his term). Oxytocin. I only wish it was bottled and sold because it puts me right to sleep.
Walter is twenty-five years older than I am. It isn’t hard to imagine that I was his student. I was in his Excursions in Math seminar and, surprise, I had to take even the bonehead class twice because math for me is like eating twenty-five hard-boiled eggs in one sitting, which I tried on a dare in sixth grade. I could swallow only the first six and they came back up. I won’t bore you with the details of how I ended up in this life with Zeke and Walter, heading to meet octogenarian in-laws in Coeur d’Alene. Basically I moved upstairs. Quit my downstairs boyfriend and moved upstairs with Walter. I’ll just say it was another in the series of nondecisions that my parents say make up the arc of my life. At least Mom and Daddy can say I married a professor, even if he is a Democrat.
At first I had all the time I wanted to lie around and read the Brontë sisters. As a faculty wife I could take classes for free, and I did, once. Walter didn’t put any demands on me. He just liked me to be home when he came in. I liked the straightforward sex. For added mystique, I had him whisper things about π and solving for x while we fornicated.
Then I was pregnant and all of the sudden he asked me to quit smoking and eat six ounces of soy protein at each square meal. He dragged me on long walks and encouraged me to squat whenever possible to loosen the ligaments in my hips. This was Walter’s Big Chance. His first wife, who raised Scottish terriers, fled after ten years of watching him calculate and avoid her. With me carrying his progeny, he took over my life, and now with Zeke here, named for his great-uncle, attention hasn’t waned at all. He highlights articles about how the baby should latch on with my entire areola pressed up against his soft palate and how nursing myelinates the nerves for rapid-fire brain activity. I want to know if Zeke will ever smile.
“Shut your hole” came Wrangler Man’s lovely retort.
“Walter.” I winced as Zeke latched on to me like a roach clip. “Sometimes mathematicians shouldn’t try to make jokes.”
Just as the captain ordered a crosscheck of the doors we heard vigorous wails come down the jetway. A man dressed all in black, like Johnny Cash but for the white collar of a priest, stepped carefully through the door, his hair a fringe in front of his eyes, his cheek pressed into the dark head of the reddest-faced baby I have ever seen.
“Holy fucking Christ,” Wrangler Man cried from his seat, and we watched everyone lean away, like the parting of the Red Sea, as the priest and baby passed. He made his way along the aisle, petting the baby’s head and clucking awkwardly. A flight attendant helped him get seated, the door shut, and, finally, for better or worse, we pulled away from the umbilical cord of the jetway and tore through the permanent frosting of brown muck over Newark.
Zeke can’t settle down with the other baby’s screaming. He’s snorting and snuffling, and my milk is getting in his eyes. Every time he reattaches I dig my nail into the thin skin on Walter’s left hand. No age spots yet. Walter has his tray down and he’s arranged the limp banana along with the apple and bagel into a pathetic still life.
Behind us the priest’s baby continues its caterwauling with impressive lung capacity. I turn and see Wrangler Man slam on earphones and pound the buttons on his seat trying to get the flight attendant, the in-flight music station, anything to drown out the baby. Another flight attendant rushes past with a cute little bottle of Jack Daniel’s in one hand and a baby bottle in the other. The baby screams and hiccups and then is silent.
Walter sighs heavily and I close my eyes. Walter told me the name of the hormone that releases into a woman’s bloodstream when she lactates (his term). Oxytocin. I only wish it was bottled and sold because it puts me right to sleep.
Walter is twenty-five years older than I am. It isn’t hard to imagine that I was his student. I was in his Excursions in Math seminar and, surprise, I had to take even the bonehead class twice because math for me is like eating twenty-five hard-boiled eggs in one sitting, which I tried on a dare in sixth grade. I could swallow only the first six and they came back up. I won’t bore you with the details of how I ended up in this life with Zeke and Walter, heading to meet octogenarian in-laws in Coeur d’Alene. Basically I moved upstairs. Quit my downstairs boyfriend and moved upstairs with Walter. I’ll just say it was another in the series of nondecisions that my parents say make up the arc of my life. At least Mom and Daddy can say I married a professor, even if he is a Democrat.
At first I had all the time I wanted to lie around and read the Brontë sisters. As a faculty wife I could take classes for free, and I did, once. Walter didn’t put any demands on me. He just liked me to be home when he came in. I liked the straightforward sex. For added mystique, I had him whisper things about π and solving for x while we fornicated.
Then I was pregnant and all of the sudden he asked me to quit smoking and eat six ounces of soy protein at each square meal. He dragged me on long walks and encouraged me to squat whenever possible to loosen the ligaments in my hips. This was Walter’s Big Chance. His first wife, who raised Scottish terriers, fled after ten years of watching him calculate and avoid her. With me carrying his progeny, he took over my life, and now with Zeke here, named for his great-uncle, attention hasn’t waned at all. He highlights articles about how the baby should latch on with my entire areola pressed up against his soft palate and how nursing myelinates the nerves for rapid-fire brain activity. I want to know if Zeke will ever smile.
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