She spends the evening cleaning the apartment. She does Will’s laundry and changes his sheets and towels. At 10:23 p.m., he texts. Yes.
Frida’s hands are shaking as she puts on her coat and turns off the lights and locks the door. During the drive, she tells herself that she could still avoid the basement. Meryl said that, in the dark, she thought about Ocean, surviving for Ocean.
“I knew she’d want me to try,” Meryl said.
Will might change his mind when she gets there. Harriet might wake up. But she would take the basement for a few hours, a night, a few days, a week with her daughter.
At each stoplight, Frida considers turning back.
Tonight, it’s easy to find street parking. She parks a few steps from Gust and Susanna’s front door. She texts Will and asks him to buzz her in. This might be how Meryl felt when she reached the top of the bell tower. No matter what happens, there will be comfort and pleasure. A moment with her daughter where she makes the rules. A different ending.
As she climbs the stairs to the second floor, Frida thinks of her parents. They can’t wait to see her. They’ve never gone this long without seeing her. Her father still calls her his baby. They’ve prepared her room. They’ve been getting the house ready. She could simply take a look at Harriet and fly home as scheduled. Despite her mistakes, everyone is excited to see her at the family party on Christmas Eve.
Will has left the door ajar. The living room is strewn with Harriet’s toys. There are new pictures of the three of them on the walls, Harriet’s preschool watercolors hung with pink tape, photos of Henry on the refrigerator, a Moses basket in the hallway, stacks of cloth diapers, a pile of onesies on hangers.
Frida has never seen their place messy. She refuses to think about the new baby or his surgery or Gust and Susanna in the hospital. She sits down beside Will and takes his hand. She needs one more favor. She’d like an hour with Harriet alone. There’s a bar a few blocks away. He can wait there. She’ll text him when she’s done.
“I don’t think you should. What if she wakes up?”
“She won’t. Gust said she sleeps well now. They made a big thing about that at my court date. How well she sleeps. She only has trouble sleeping when she’s sick. Please. I need this. It’s only an hour. I’m not asking to stay all night. I’ll never ask this of you again.” She promises to be quiet. She promises not to turn the lights on. She just wants to watch her baby sleep.
“No one will find out.” She tells him about the social worker timing them, making them pose for pictures, being dragged out of the building. Didn’t he say that what happened to her was barbaric? Didn’t he say he wanted them to have more time? They had thirty minutes after a year apart. “You don’t know what they did to us. At that place. If I told you, you wouldn’t believe me.”
They argue for another ten minutes. Frida watches the clock as Will asks her again what happened. To her, to the other mothers. Why can’t she tell him?
“I’ll tell you later. I promise. But I need you to do this for me. Please. You said you’d do anything for me. This is anything. If I have to say goodbye to her, I want some privacy. They didn’t give me any privacy. I just want more time.”
Will relents. “Okay.” He goes to get his jacket.
Frida follows him. She stands on her tiptoes and kisses him on the lips. Gives him the kiss she would have given Tucker. Will is a good man. One day he’ll be a good husband. A good father.
“What was that about?” He tries to kiss her again.
“Nothing.” She pulls away. “I love you. Thank you.”
“I love you too. Be careful, okay? Call me if you need anything.”
Once he leaves, Frida moves quickly. She finds a duffel bag in the front closet. She finds Harriet’s winter coat, her hat and mittens, her shoes. She goes to the bathroom and grabs Harriet’s toothbrush and toothpaste, a bottle of baby shampoo, one of her hooded towels, some washcloths. She enters the nursery and opens Harriet’s dresser drawers, grabs sweaters and pants and T-shirts, socks and underwear, pajamas, some blankets.
Harriet is sleeping the sleep of the dead. Frida grabs a few stuffed animals from the rocking chair. She hasn’t taken a good look at Harriet yet, knows that if she stops to consider what she’s doing, she’ll unpack the bag and put the room back in order, she’ll think of her parents and Will, Gust and Susanna and Baby Henry, everyone she’s hurting.
In an hour’s time, she’ll be at least sixty miles outside the city. She doesn’t know what happens after that, only that she has to get Harriet out of bed quickly and quietly. She sinks to the floor and bows her head to the carpet. She whispers, “I’m sorry.”