What he wanted to do was talk Kayla into dealing with the corpse. Kayla was a bleeding heart, and if he emphasized his grief, if he focused on the trauma he would suffer having to see Old Bo in his current state, then maybe he could elicit enough sympathy to get her to undertake the grisly task. In exchange he would offer to change the baby’s diapers for an entire day, which would appeal to her shrewder, more rational side.
Speaking of the baby, Shelton remembered how they’d put her to sleep upstairs before they got high. Kayla had been worried about secondhand smoke. She asked if it was the same for meth as it was for cigarettes, could it harm you just by being near it? Shelton said it stood to reason that it could, and they did the responsible thing and took the baby to the second floor.
Shelton knew he should check on the baby right away, even if it meant walking by Old Bo. It was the right thing to do. Babies needed checking and the truth was Shelton sort of liked the little bugger. Jenna was cute as anything, and not too much trouble.
Of course, what Shelton really wanted was for Kayla to wake up and go get the baby herself. He could start a fire and Kayla could bring the baby downstairs for Shelton to hold. Then he and Jenna could sit nice and cozy on the couch while Kayla disposed of Old Bo’s corpse. Afterward she could brew coffee and cook them up some pancakes. Then they could eat and share some of their fondest memories of Bo. It was a lot to ask, but it was Shelton’s dream, and for a moment there on the couch he dared to dream it.
He nudged Kayla with a toe, but she was crashed. He got down on his hands and knees and checked her air and was comforted by the shallow, tender breaths she drew through her nose. Shelton kissed her on the forehead and whispered that he loved her. It was the truth.
“Now, let’s see about this baby,” he said, and stood up.
Shelton walked to the base of the stairs, where he paused to gather his courage. He picked a dirty T-shirt off the banister and slid it on. He pulled the collar up over his nose, and while the shirt stunk like sweat and hot piss it was no defense against the presence of rotting death. His eyes watered as he ascended the stairs and he gagged when he passed Old Bo and hurried to the end of the hall where they’d left Jenna.
Sometimes he called it the baby’s room, just to see how it sounded, and he was grateful for the fresh air through the window when he finally pushed the door open.
“Good morning, sunshine,” he said, but when he turned to the bassinet Jenna was gone.
It was a startling sight. Shelton had seen some things in his time, but he couldn’t remember anything as awful as that little empty mattress and smooth bedsheet, right there where a baby should have been. But where could Jenna have gone? He knew they’d put her down in the bassinet because he specifically remembered opening the window. They’d done it so the smell from the dog didn’t make her sick. He was sure of it, because he remembered that he and Kayla had debated the decision at length. She thought the cold would be bad for the baby, but Shelton insisted.
“This is science,” he had said. “There’s bacteria floating around in this air and the cold will kill it.”
He had no idea if this was true or not, but it sort of seemed like it might be. Kayla eventually ceded to this logic and they put Jenna in the bassinet beside the open window. He remembered saying they’d be back in a minute and then heading downstairs to smoke some shit.
Shelton sat down on the floor and crossed his legs Indian style. It was the way he sat when he needed to think. He hunched forward and picked at the carpet. He was stupefied.
How long had he been passed out? And had the baby somehow gotten out of the bassinet and crawled away? As far as Shelton knew the baby couldn’t crawl, but suppose it had learned while they were downstairs sleeping? Suppose the baby flung itself out of the bassinet and then all of a sudden figured out how to move? Suppose it went off on a little stroll? It didn’t seem likely but Shelton couldn’t be sure; he didn’t know that much about babies.
Then he had a terrible thought. He had the worst possible kind of thought and hurried to the window and looked down. If the baby had flung itself out of the bassinet, then the odds were fifty-fifty that it had gone out the window side and plunged straight to the ground. And if it had plunged straight to the ground it would have long been buried by the falling snow. He looked out at the blizzard, felt the cold bite his knuckles on the windowsill.
“Jesus, no,” he said.
He ran outside in his stocking feet, took a shovel from the porch, and started working through the drift beneath the window. He dug and with each plunge came closer to fathoming the horror he would suffer if he plucked the baby out of that drift with his shovel blade.