The saleslady reads the room. We’re not in the mood for her full pitch, and she returns to hanging Christmas decorations that it should be too early to put up.
Mom confidently leads Aunt Angelina and I to the newborn section and begins to page through the tiny hangers, so I mimic her.
There’s no way babies are actually this small. I’ve seen babies before, and they’ve never been this little.
I remember holding Angie’s daughter at the hospital. Had she been this size? I close my eyes and try to remember the feel of her, the weight, not heavy but so solid, and I turned to Finn and I—
Oh God.
Everything stops. There’s no boutique. There’s no onesie in my hand. I’m sitting on that hospital bed with him, and he loves me, but I don’t know it.
How could I not know it? It’s so stupidly obvious now, and I want to scream at us, but I can’t. We say the things we said that day, and even though every word was “I love you,” it also wasn’t. And I can’t change that. I can’t change that. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t, I can’t… Oh God.
“They really are that small,” Aunt Angelina says, and I’m back in the store. Finny is dead. He was always dead. It was only briefly in my mind that he was alive again.
I look down at the onesie with blue polka dots I am holding.
“I was just thinking that a newborn couldn’t really be this size.”
“They grow fast,” my mother says. “You don’t need too many newborn outfits. A few weeks later, they’re a whole different baby.”
There’s a pause. Mom, Angelina, and I are assessing each other. If Finny was alive, this is when The Mothers would begin to reminisce about the two of us as babies.
Is it safe? We are asking each other, ourselves. Mostly, they are asking me, but Mom and Aunt Angelina have their moments too.
“You’ll still need more than you think,” Aunt Angelina says, moving the conversation forward. “It’s amazing how many outfit changes babies need.”
Babies. Not Finny as a baby.
Mom takes the polka-dot onesie from me and adds it to the pile in her arms. “They always throw up on the cute ones,” she says.
The Mothers are now unsure about the outing. Mom glances at Aunt Angelina, her concern for her bleeding through her normal poise. But I’m not paying attention anymore.
When Mom mentions throwing up, I start thinking about how I haven’t vomited in a while, which makes my body say, “Wait, yes. That’s a good idea.” Before I can worry about Angelina, I’m needing to find someplace to expel my eggs and sausage.
I can already taste it as I exit the boutique and rush for the trash bin in the main mall.
I thought I was done with this. It had been two days since I’d thrown up.
Twelve hours since I’ve cried.
I barely make it, spewing chunks in an arch as I lean over the trash can.
Finny would be proud of me for that one, I think as I heave again.
“You’re getting really good at aiming your vomit, Autumn.”
I can hear his voice, really hear him say it.
No. I don’t truly think it’s him, though there was a time when I entertained the idea. I’ve accepted this new reality without Finny, yet I can’t stop myself from thinking about him. And when I do? There he is.
My Finny.
“Autumn.”
I gasp for air between heaves. My stomach muscles ache in new mysterious ways, even when I’m not vomiting.
“Autumn?”
“I’m okay!”
“I have a water bottle in my bag,” Aunt Angelina says.
Water sounds amazing, and I hope my body lets me have some soon. I take a shuddering breath but don’t move from the trash can.
“Where’s Mom?”
“Buying the onesie you were holding. Plus another hundred or so other bits of overpriced fabric. Don’t worry, kiddo. I’ll take you to the resale shops and load you up on baby clothes that you don’t have to be fussy about.”
I stand up straight and take another breath, assessing my body. I feel like the captain of a ship amid a squall, telling the old gal to stay steady and ride the waves.
Aunt Angelina hands me the bottle and smiles.
Thank goodness she doesn’t look too much like Finny. Her smile is different, her hair is darker, her chin sharper. I see him in her, but it could be much worse.
Like the way she carries herself, with a constant stoicism.
“Better?” she asks.
“What if I never stop throwing up? I read some women do that.”