“Bottles, nipples, pacifiers, and formula. These are only free samples from the hospital. We have to get real ones and extras. Ointment, baby powder. This is travel-size. We’ll need more.”

“What for?” I said. “We’re only here a couple days, you said.”

“Well, I don’t know how long this stuff will last.”

I frowned at her. She’d better not be up to something.

“Thermometer strips, that’s fine,” she said, holding up each item as she named it. “Look at this tiny hairbrush and these little nail clippers.”

Cally was acting like she was playing with a doll. When I was a kid, I had to share a room with my sister, Deena. She’d had baby dolls and plastic accessories and stuffed animals all over the place. I’d wanted my own room so bad, but our mother took the extra one for her office. This was when Mom was trying to be a Realtor. What a joke. When she finally gave up, I convinced her to let me have the room. But for all of first grade and part of second, I’d had to put up with Deena’s play sets and make-believe shit.

“I don’t really care about all that,” I said as Cally showed me her supplies.

“We have water, coffee, cereal, beef jerky, Coke, and these sandwich cremes,” said Cally.

I took the package of cookies and ate a handful. When the baby cried, Cally picked her up and nursed her. That made her stop crying. Rocking on the rocker. I poked at the fire. After ten minutes, I said, “Did you still want to go to the store?”

“Yeah, as soon as she’s done.” She looked down at the baby pressed against her chest. The only sounds were the rocker creaking and the baby’s sucking noise. “The main thing is a car seat,” said Cally.

“Fine,” I said, looking at the door. There was a small pool of melted snow on the floor. “I found you a pair of boots you can use if you want.” I pointed to the extra pair I’d brought in from the truck. Cally and I had almost the same size foot. Hers were a bit large and mine were a bit small. We used to sit on the floor facing each other with our legs sticking out and match up our feet.

“Thank you,” she said, as if this was the nicest thing anyone had ever done.

“They’re just boots,” I said.

“That’s sweet.”

“Yeah,” I said. “So are you ready to go?”

“Can’t you see I have a baby hanging on my boob? I can go as soon as she’s done.”

“Then I’m going out for a smoke.”

“Okay.”