“No,” she says, her voice catching. “It’s all the same. I need something to happen. I can’t stand this waiting. It’s killing me.” As she begins to tremble, her shoulders sinking, Ted steps forward to comfort her. He stands with her in the hall, his arms around her, rubbing her back, wrapping her up in what safety he can offer.

“Maybe it’s not the baby,” he whispers gently. “Maybe it’s just the appendix, and this will quit.”

They stand in the hall, nothing to say, Ted running his hands over her back, her temple resting on his chest.

“Would you like me to read to you?” he offers. “We can put Frieda on the bed and I’ll read to you both.”

“No,” she says, her sigh muffled by his sweater. “I can’t simply wait. I need to do something.”

Ted rubs her back, deliberating, abstracted himself, trying to imagine some feasible distraction for her.

“Do you want to write?” he asks. “Shall I give you an assignment?”

“No,” she says. “I can’t think to write.”

They stand together in the hallway, Sylvia leaning her weight into her husband’s chest. Frieda is contentedly occupied on the rug in the front room, jabbering to herself, hugging her playthings and giving them noisy smacks. With her cheek against his heart, Sylvia senses as Ted’s mind snags on an idea, as someone with their ear to a track can sense the vibration of a coming train. “What is it?” she asks, subdued, gingerly comforted by his closeness.

Again, he hesitates, feeling reluctantly at risk. “If you’d like,” he begins, proceeding with measured caution, hoping to shield himself as well as her, “you could do some typing.”

“I don’t have anything right now,” she answers, her voice, along with her latent panic, sparking.

Ted pauses, holding her, keeping her contained. “I’ll need to type up my drafts when I’m finished…” he says quietly, skirting a more graphic description of his work, all of his current poems and drafts and typescripts in their present state.

“But they told me to rest,” she equivocates, unsure of the right response, balancing two possibly contradictory impulses at once, both of them coupled to blamelessness.

“It’s not doing you any good to simply wait,” Ted reminds her. “We don’t know how long…” he adds, his voice trailing off.

Tasting the breathable air, Sylvia registers her husband’s sincere concern, a love, she prays, more powerful than her faulty self. Her instinct for self-preservation bubbles up from where it had sunk to the bottom. “I could type,” she affirms.

“I could still make tea,” Ted adds, relieved. “Shall I set you up at your typewriter?”

“Yes,” Sylvia answers, her attention foaming. She eases out of his embrace to inspect his desk. Six or eight pasted sheets, stacked in flaky layers, appear to be ready. “Can I take these?” she asks.