The Nursery

by Szilvia Molnar

As hard as it can, the August sun pushes itself into our small apartment on the third floor. The baby I hold in my arms is a leech, let’s call her Button.

All while you are still a thought and I think about how I am going to resent you once you arrive. You will disrupt the peace. You will get in the way of my freedom. It’s possible you may one day ask for an apology, I’m just being honest. I want you as much as I fear you.

Adaptation is my partner. Negotiations are necessary. And I am not shackled to the notion of accuracy, sometimes it’s more important to indicate the direction of the motion presented by a word than to land on the correct one.

she squirmed unpredictably in my arms, resembling shellfish still alive on a chef’s cutting board.

And still, with the birth of Button, it was the death of John. I can’t help but make it sound as though my husband is dead when I describe him.

John leans down and kisses Button on the head as she is sucking on my nipple and, even though I am sure that he will kiss me next, the exchange of affection strikes me as unfair. His display of tenderness toward Button is a betrayal. I created Button, let me have your love first.

I gave birth and birth made me into a child. Button was out of me, I turned to the side, and my legs curled up in a fetal position. Never have I wanted my own mother so much.

sex after giving birth is like throwing a sausage down a hallway.

But anyway, don’t worry he adds after I’ve already left the table. Your body will bounce back. I can’t stand that everything John says is a quote, a handful of scripted words that are easy to say for the sake of saying something.

Other women started leaving their rooms and entered the hallway at the same slow pace, also freshly injured from the war of birth. I speculated if this is what infirmaries had once resembled and joined the stream of wounded soldiers.

In the morning I will want to check where the word “resentment” comes from, but the next day I will be too tired to remember which word I had been thinking of tonight.

I fiddle with getting Button to see the nipple. It’s. Right. There. In. Your. Face. Baby.

Friends tell me she is so Aww this and so Oh that, until she spits up on their sleeve. Her reflex is so innocent, but nobody is keen to clean up. Here you go they say. My reflex is to apologize, I must have read somewhere that that’s what new mothers do, and I jump to wet a corner of a kitchen towel before returning to take the unwanted baby. I’m very sorry. Again with the apologies.

A wall is erected—the one that separates the child-ed with the child-less. It is built brick by brick from the mutual understanding that we do not understand each other anymore. So it goes.

I can’t help but wonder if Button took something with her when she was born. She drove me to my undoing.

When can you put the baby down? Will the baby be less attached to me if I put it down? Or will the baby be more attached to me if I put it down?

The utter helplessness of a baby is infuriating.