Slam by Nick Hornby Page A

alternative was that I got up and did something terrible to this baby.
    â€œOw. Ow. That really hurt.”
    â€œYou awake now?”
    â€œNot really.”
    She put the bedside light on and stared at me. She looked terrible, to be honest. She’d put weight on, so her face was much fatter, and her eyes were puffy from sleep, and her hair was greasy. I could see that we were in her bedroom, but it was different. We were sleeping in a double bed, for example, and she used to have a single. And she’d taken down her Donnie Darko poster and put up kiddy stuff in its place. I could see this horrible pink-and-blue animal alphabet.
    â€œWhat’s wrong with you?” she said.
    â€œI don’t know,” I said. “I just seem to stay asleep no matter how hard you hit me. I’m asleep now. I’m sleep-talking.” That was a lie, really.
    The baby carried on crying.
    â€œJust pick the bloody baby up.”
    I was pretty confused, obviously, but I was beginning to work some things out. I knew, for example, that I couldn’t ask how old the baby was, or what he was called. That would make her suspicious. And there wasn’t much point in trying to explain that I wasn’t the Sam she thought I was, that somebody, maybe Tony Hawk the skater, had put me in some sort of time machine, for reasons best known to himself.
    I got out of bed. I was wearing a T-shirt of Alicia’s and the pair of boxer shorts I put on that morning, or whatever morning it was. The baby was sleeping in a little cot at the end of the bed. He was all red in the face from crying.
    â€œSmell his bottom,” Alicia said.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œSmell his bottom. See if he needs changing.”
    I bent down and put my face near him. I was breathing through my mouth to stop myself from smelling anything.
    â€œHe’s all right, I think.”
    â€œJust jig him about a bit, then.”
    I’d seen people do this with babies. It didn’t look too hard. I picked him up just under his armpits, and his head went flying backwards, as if he had no neck. He was crying even harder now.
    â€œWhat are you doing?” said Alicia.
    â€œI don’t know,” I said. And I really didn’t know. I didn’t have a clue.
    â€œHave you gone mad?”
    â€œA bit.”
    â€œHold him properly.”
    I didn’t know what that meant, obviously, but I had a guess. I put one hand behind his head, and the other hand against his back, and I put him against my chest and jiggled him up and down. After a little while he stopped crying.
    â€œAbout bloody time,” said Alicia.
    â€œWhat shall I do now?” I said.
    â€œSam!”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œIt’s like you’ve got Alzheimer’s or something.”
    â€œJust pretend I have.”
    â€œIs he asleep?”
    I looked down at his head. How were you supposed to tell?
    â€œI don’t know.”
    â€œHave a look.”
    I carefully moved the hand that was holding his head, and it flopped over to one side. He started crying again.
    â€œHe was, I think. He’s not now.”
    I got him back against my chest and jiggled, and he went quiet again. I didn’t dare stop, this time, and I kept jiggling, and Alicia went back to sleep, and I was alone in the dark with my son on my chest. I didn’t mind. I had a lot to think about. Like: Did I live here now? What sort of a dad was I? How did Alicia and I get on? Have Mum and Dad forgiven me? What did I do all day? Would I ever go back to my own time? I couldn’t answer any of these questions, of course. But if I really had been projected into the future, then I’d find out the next morning. After a little while I put the baby back in its cot and got back into bed. Alicia put her arms around me, and eventually I went back to sleep.
    As I was waking up, I was convinced that I’d had this really weird dream. I moved my legs forward under the bedclothes, just to see