Perley made his small steady nursing noise, his chug chug. He fixed me with his whale eye, that large peering marble next to my nipple. He gazed at me with—well, I guess I thought of it as trust, but not simple trust, more like don’t-fuck-this-up trust. Do you respect me? he was asking. I whispered into his face, I respect you. I respect the mystery of you. He laid his hand against my cheek and pinched. He reached up and touched his index finger to my eye, and he pressed hard. With Perley’s finger buried in my eyeball, stupid names came to me. He was my Lumpy Bundle, my Thorny Lamb, my Silken Puppy, my Fruit Bat, my Monster Rat, my Velvet Piglet.

I reached into my overalls and I took out the bottle of cooking oil that I’d smuggled from camp. I unscrewed the top and drank from it for ten full seconds before taking a breath. The golden oil coated my insides. It was meat and milk and cake and bread. Fat.

I rocked Perley and drank deeply. I looked down the hill. Through the leaves, I could see Helen and Karen far below at the house site. One of them dropped the nail gun and the other bent over to pick it up. I saw, but didn’t hear, a sheet of plywood crash to the ground. Helen climbed a ladder. Karen steadied it. With their bright faces under the sweep and gleam of the dogwood, they could have been mistaken for the best of friends.

3

KAREN