It hadn’t taken Sharon long to figure out that wine was the answer, a way for her to make it through the miserable days of screams and dirty diapers and an aching pussy and nipples that burned like they’d been set on fire. One glass softened the world’s edges; two glasses turned down the volume on Ashlynne’s shrilling and her own pain; three or four glasses let her actually sleep, even while the baby was crying. Wine sanded down the world’s sharp corners. Wine turned the open wound of her loneliness into a manageable ache.

First she bought bottles. Then, to economize, she bought boxes. When Mrs. Fogerty at one of the east island package stores started to give her the stink-eye and Billy Durant at the west island one handed her a list of AA meetings with her five-gallon box of Chardonnay, she’d ask her sisters and her mom to shop for her when they went off-island. “I think Costco’s having a sale,” Sharon said, proud of her cunning as she handed Amanda a wad of cash. “I can stock up for the summer.”

Ashlynne developed a hideous diaper rash after Sharon left her in a wet diaper while she’d been asleep (passed out, her mind whispered, you weren’t asleep, you were passed out). Sharon slathered cream on her daughter’s scrawny legs and bottom and tried not to think about how sometimes she saw herself grabbing the baby underneath her armpits, grabbing her and shaking her and screaming into her face shut up, shut up, shut UP. In spite of her ministrations, the rash kept spreading, crawling up Ashlynne’s sunken belly and down her sticklike thighs. Sharon started stirring droppers full of infant Benadryl into her bottles of formula. A sleeping baby wasn’t as appealing as a placid, gurgling baby, but it was sure better than a red-faced, screaming-its-head-off baby, and Sharon needed Ashlynne looking her best for when she’d present her to Kevin, who’d be back on-island over Memorial Day, same as always.

“Go t’sleep,” she said on Friday night, wiping wine off her mouth with her forearm as she settled Ashlynne into her crib. She gave the mobile’s key a few cranks. The pastel-colored teddy bears started to spin over the tinny, tinkling strains of a lullaby, which was quickly drowned out by Ashlynne’s shrieks. “Mommy’s gonna take a li’l nap.” She sat down in the rocker, pulled a blanket up to her chin, and shut her eyes. Nine hours later, she awoke. Her eyes felt gluey, and her mouth tasted like a scummed-over pond. Something was wrong. The sunlight was wrong, its slant unfamiliar, and her apartment was too quiet.

Sharon lurched to her feet, sending the rocker into motion, unnoticed, and crossed the tiny nursery in three giant steps. The crib was empty. Ashlynne was gone.

What did you do to me?