Daniel’s wife, Patricia, had been buried 11 days earlier. My brother had lasted less than two weeks.
She was 27 years old, unmarried and lived above the hardware store where she swept flats and cut the keys. I had exactly $312 in my checking account and a futon that didn’t retire until the end.
One of the triplets made a sound, a soft, moist hiccups, as if trying to be educated.
My brother had lasted less than two weeks.
I knelt on the porch boards. Two small faces were asleep, except the smallest, who looked at me with my eyes the same gray as my mother’s.
“Hey,” I whispered. “Hey, you.
At that time, Mrs. Hunter stepped out of the unit next door at his bathrobe, his shoes slapping the concrete. He had been my neighbor for six years and never cared about his
business, which, that night, turned out to be a mercy.
Two small faces were asleep.
***
Patricia had brought the triplets twice that summer, and the lady. Hunter had sat on the porch lulling over them as his mother shook the names and birth weights as a proud piercing sergeant.
***
“Noah? What is in the world?!”
“They are Daniel’s triplets.”
“Where is it?”
“He’s gone.
He looked at the note, looked at me, and then squeezed his hand against his chest.
“What’s in the world?”
“Honey, you can’t raise three babies alone!”
“I know!”
“You don’t even know how to heat a bottle.”
I Sighed.
My neighbor knelt next to me. I was thinking I was probably right when the little baby got up, blind and searching, and his fist closed around my index finger. He was small, warm and strong in a way that made no sense for a six-month-old.
I haven’t moved. I couldn’t.
