I reached down to pick it up for her, but Clara snatched it first, her hand trembling slightly as she shoved it deep into her coat pocket.
“Just some junk mail,” she said, her voice dropping to a whisper.
I opened the blue diaper bag to slip a fresh bottle inside, and a sharp, chemical odor hit the back of my throat. It smelled like dry-cleaning fluid or fresh industrial adhesive, masked poorly by a synthetic lavender scent.
“Is this a new brand of diaper?” I asked, lifting one of the thick white squares from the bag.
“They are the organic ones,” Clara said, her voice clipped and tight. “The forty-five dollar box David wanted. Please, Arthur, don’t start.”
She turned away before I could ask why organic cotton would smell like a plastics factory.
By twenty past two, the front door had clicked shut, and the apartment was quiet. Toby lay in my arms, his tiny face relaxed in sleep, his breathing light against my chest.
I sat in the green armchair, looking at the silver baby rattle sitting on the side table. It was the same rattle my own father had given to David, polished until the engraving was nearly worn flat.
Holding my grandson was the only time the quiet of this apartment did not feel like a punishment for the years I had spent at the office, ignoring my own home. I wanted to build something real with David now, but every conversation felt like stepping on dry twigs.
A small twitch in Toby’s shoulder broke the silence of the room.
His tiny toes curled tightly inside his knit booties, and his chest rose in a sharp, sudden gasp.
I rocked him gently, but his eyes flew open, wide and glossy with a look of pure alarm that did not belong on a two-month-old child.
