The doctor’s office had photos of what happened to babies when their mothers got drunk: their sloppy little faces, wide mouths and wet-clay noses. But they seemed far away from us, Abe with his solid body standing proud next to mine. It was his baby more than ours—he had the rights, we had a deal—but still, he took good care of my body because of what I held for him. I wanted to keep that feeling, at least. It was the only good thing I had left. Your wife looks beautiful, one nurse told Abe. A big beautiful boat. He smiled and put his hand on the small of my back.

Fiona didn’t like my trips to Reno. “If he cares so much,” she said, “why doesn’t he come here?”

I said he was busy, which was true. How could I explain how desperately I’d pleaded: You can’t come here. Please don’t. I didn’t want him to see how I lived.

I pictured the forming skull inside of me, a tiny ball of cookie dough that would someday hold the gray of brain, wet knuckled eyes, spidery lashes. I wanted to put my ear next to my own skin just to hear both liquid pulses: one in the heart and another in the gut.

Sometimes Fiona looked at the bulge in my stomach like the devil had put his seed there. We didn’t sleep together anymore, and we certainly weren’t doing anything else. One night we tried, near the beginning of my last trimester—our two large bodies lying on her too small bed, our forehands touching, her hands fumbling past the lump of my belly to get her fingers under the elastic of my underpants. I turned away. “Let’s try to sleep,” I said.

She wanted to know if something had changed. I told her everything had changed. My privacy wasn’t mine anymore. It belonged to me and him. I knew I’d only have him a few more months. I didn’t want her hands or her breath on the skin around his home.

During the eighth month I found a note. Rent is covered for the year, she’d written. I stopped reading. I sat down with a cup of orange juice. After one sip I felt the need to pee, the pang running through me like electricity. She’d left for good.

I knew she wasn’t coming back, but in my head everything was still Fiona’s chair, Fiona’s fridge, Fiona’s closet. My water broke in her shower. I took a towel from the rack and felt the water coursing between my legs, as if the nozzle was still running. Okay, I thought. Here we go.