SPHINX... and other stories

Molly Says:

MOLLY SAYS:

by Dan Ahearn

Molly says: I think it's so. 

What? 

I just think it is, that's all. 

What? 

A baby. 

Silence. Something sucks me forward like the edge of something very high. Scary  but fun. 

I don't know what you are talking about, I say, trying to sound above it all and cool. But a whine sneaks into my throat and I warble like that guy that played the ukulele at the beach. 

Molly revolves, doing her heathen idol impression, her eyes X-ray me for a moment and she smiles.  

Yes you do, she says. 

Her painted eyelids fall heavy heavy until they hit bottom with a bumf. And she  turns away, her long black straight hair settling like a curtain over her face. 

Back to the TV and the rented movie. It's supposed to be a story where people  fall in love. Never in a million years, these two. Neurotic dependency, yes. Love, no.  

Whatever that's supposed to be. Let's be honest, I don't really know. 

I tilt my gaze to an interesting corner where the cracks in the ceiling meet the cracks in the wall. My little apartment. Picturesque. 

I hold off, choosing. But why bother? I'm posing already. 

Are you sure? 

Molly nods.  

How? A doctor? 

No. The night it happened, I thought so. But I waited. Now I'm sure. 

I scoff: When it happened? What? What's that? When it happened. 

That one time. Remember? When it thundered. When it was so good. 

I shake my head like I don't know what she's talking about. But I do and she's right. That one time it was good. Heroic. The way it always is in trashy fiction and movies that go straight to video.  

I personally put it down to too much sugar and loud booming scaring the shit out of us. But Molly is not that way. Like the way sometimes she knows something she can't know. 

I felt a baby knocking that night. Didn't you? 

Knocking? No, I wouldn't put it that way. But to myself I think: Something was funny. 

Molly says: We were driven that night. Something compelled us. 

I select a rational tone: We'll find out for sure and then we'll deal with it. Okay? Get one of those things you pee on and then we'll have something to discuss. 

Molly frowns: I will. But we don't need to. I'm sure now. But we can do that other thing if you want. That's all right. After all, you can't know. I mean you can't feel what I'm feeling. Can you? 

Feel what? 

I just feel changes going on. Things are different. 

Have you been pregnant before? 

No. 

Then how can you be sure? 

I just know. Okay? Let's not talk it to death.

So we do that. Molly comes over the next night with a little paper bag from the drugstore. She takes the thing into the bathroom. I follow and watch while she pees on it. She takes it from between her legs and holds it out and we both wait and wait, and then watch the little plus sign appear that's supposed to mean you've got a problem.