"Hello?"
The guy in front of me stares at me, raising his eyebrows over eyes that look like they haven't seen sleep in a long time.
His eyes are bloodshot and undercut by dark rings beneath them.
The screaming within the townhome somehow gets even louder and I click into action.
"That's my niece you're letting scream in there." I snap, pushing by him and into the room.
There is a set of stairs to the left and a living room to the right where there are boxes of stuff shoved against one wall and a couch with a baby laying on a big pillow.
"I'm not just letting her scream." The guy, Ben, says following behind me. "I can't get her to stop."
"Well, she obviously needs something." I say, going over to her.
I stand in front of the couch looking down at her. She's so tiny, it doesn't seem real when I look at her that we all start out so little and defenseless.
I'm much more accustomed to seeing people at the end of their long lives. Once their bodies have shriveled and greyed.
I have zero experience with someone so new to the world.
Her fat little cheeks are fire red and her toothless mouth is open in a perfect pouted circle as screams fly from within her.
She's wrapped tightly in a thin white blanket and I reach for her but stall when I realize I don't even know how I'm supposed to pick her up.
"I'm open to suggestions." Ben says, coming to stand beside me. He reaches down and cups one big hand behind her head and the other under her bottom to lift her up from the pillow, holding her to his chest. He bops in place, trying to soothe her wailing.
"Is she hungry?"
"She won't take the bottle."
"Her diaper?"
"Clean." He says, looking at me with expectation. "What do I do?"
I stand there frozen, because, hell if I know either.
"They just let people take home babies with no clue what to do with them?" I run my hand through my hair, watching him try to rock her.
"Apparently!" He throws his head back and groans. "I have no clue what I'm doing. I'm freaking the fuck out. She's been like this since we got back to the house. I've tried everything. I've googled shit, I've watched YouTube videos, nothing is working!"
"Ok, ok." I say, wracking my brain. "Hang on."
I pull out my own phone and call Ella.
She answers on the first ring.
"Hayden, we have been so worried you were supposed to call us when-."
"How do you make her stop crying?" I cut her off. "She's losing her shit and she won't eat and she's clean but she won't stop crying."
"Ok, slow down." Ella says, and I can hear the noise in the background die down as she moves to another room. "I'm texting my sister." She tells me.
Every second seems to drag on as the baby just keeps screaming no matter how much Ben shooshes and rocks her. He looks up at me with desperation.
"Try skin to skin." Ella says quickly. "Some babies like that."
"What do you mean?" I demand.
"Take off her clothes and lay her on your chest against your own skin." Ella explains. "Sometimes they like that."
