Anna said, “So, are you still throwing up?”

“Not as much anymore.”

She handed me a bowl of gray-green mush; a wooden spoon stood straight up in the middle. “It’s grubs mashed with special leaves. Eat it every morning. I’ll bring you a fresh bowl every day.”

“Thank you,” I said, taking the bowl.

“Give it a try,” she said with an encouraging smile.

Not taking my eyes off her face, I dipped in the spoon, scooped out a tiny amount, and ate it. Sweet, meaty, grassy. Horrific. I took another small mouthful and set the bowl down.

“Delicious, right?”

I nodded.

“I knew you would love it. This is your first baby?”

“Yes.”

“Ah, careful. No sitting on hot rocks. If you do, the baby will come too early. And stay inside when there’s a full moon. That’s really bad for the baby. Paco was born on a full moon.”

I set the bowl down. “Paco’s not such a bad kid, you know. Why won’t anyone take him in?” Of course, I knew why, I just wanted her to tell me to my face.

“Well, his face, he’s marked . . .”

“You think he’s evil, or something? Has he ever done anything bad?”

“Not yet.” She looked uncomfortable.

“He was just born like that,” I said. “Like you were born with a beautiful face. Like I was born with red hair.”

She shrugged and smiled as if what I’d said was true on the surface, but I was still missing the point: the kid was damaged goods. “You can take him in, then, since you like him so much.”

“Or maybe you and Franz could do it.”

“Franz would never . . . we have enough mouths to feed!”

I shrugged. “Everyone shares the food. I mean, he’s the only little kid in the longhouse. It’s pretty sad. Doesn’t seem fair.”

“He seems used to it.” She huffed Claudia up higher on her shoulders. “Besides, maybe you better worry about other things. Having your first baby is a big deal.”

She quickly thanked me for the bag—discussion over—and set off down the stairs to her hut. It made me sad, but maybe Anna was right. In a few short months, I’d have a child of my own to take care of, be expected to love. That alone felt impossible.

New requests poured in: the tongue of the giant anaconda over the Anaconda Bar had fallen out of its mouth. Reattach it. For that, I stood on a stool and used the big hand-sewing needle Anna lent me. It was like sewing two leather handbags together.

For protection in the jungle, the hunters wanted long sleeves added to short- or no-sleeved shirts, or long pants made from short ones for the same reason. The material was always weird: cotton/poly blends—heavy on the poly—often with weird stripes or patterns: floral, polka dots, plaids, or sometimes prints with the Little Mermaid, Aladdin, or Beauty and the Beast. I thought the men would hate these fabrics, but the favorite turned out to be the Little Mermaid flannel, which For God’s Sake was instructed to bring back as much of as he could find.