Fiction 227: False Alarm

The crash sounded as if the world was ending.

That was what Claire believed when she sat on the floor of the nursery, watching Sophie babble over the wrecked shelf as if it were the most fascinating thing she'd ever seen. The baby had managed to keep her stuffed elephant during the fall, oblivious to the wreckage of books and picture frames all around her crib.

"Jesus," Claire yelled, her hands still shaking. She'd sprinted up those stairs so quickly she almost face-planted on the landing. Her heart was pounding oddly like it had lately, like a bird flapping its wings inside her ribcage.

Sophie lifted her head to glance at her and grinned, showing her two small teeth. Fine as fine. Not a scratch on her.

But Claire couldn't stop going over it in her mind. The sound. That awful, loud snap followed by nothing. Within those three seconds of silence before Sophie's little shocked "oh!" sound, her brain had gone to the most terrible conclusions. She'd thought about blood, broken bones. The edge of the shelf coming down on Sophie right on the--

"Stop it," she said out loud, because sometimes that worked.

She started picking up the books, trying to keep her breathing steady. "In your nose, out your mouth." That's what the articles had said. All the stupid articles about new mom stress that made everyone seem like all they had to do was some yoga and drink more water.

The shelf had been wobbly for weeks. David vowed he'd fix it, but with work and all the rest. well, it just never got accomplished. And now look.

Sophie started fussing a little, probably getting tired once again. Claire scooped her up, and the baby calmed immediately, nuzzling her head into the crook of Claire's shoulder as if nothing ever had happened. As if the world hadn't almost ended twenty minutes earlier.

"You're fine," Claire breathed into Sophie's smooth hair. "You're completely fine."

But she wasn't. Claire wasn't fine, and she knew it, but to voice it seemed gigantic and frightening.

Her phone beeped on the changing table. David.

"How's your day so far? Sophie sleeping?"

She stared at the note for hours. How was her day? Good, she'd spent the morning checking to see that Sophie breathed every ten minutes while she napped in case she didn't. Then she'd reorganized the medicine cabinet for the third time that week because what if they needed something during an emergency and couldn't locate it? Then a shelf fell over and she'd almost had a heart attack over nothing.

"Good. Quiet day."

She pictured him reading those words over his desk, perhaps smiling to himself before going back to whatever important thing he was working on.

Sophie was heavier in her arms, that boneless sleepy-baby weight. Claire should put her back in the crib the rest of her nap, but the crib was where the shelf had fallen. What if screws were loose now? What if the shock had compromised the frame somehow?

She found herself walking toward their bedroom instead, sitting in the rocking chair with Sophie still clutched in her arms. Just for a moment. Just until her heartbeat settles.

This was the thing nobody ever said. The way your own body turned on you like this. The way you could look at your healthy, gorgeous baby and still be wondering if something awful was going to happen awfully wrong at any second. All the time. Like you were waiting for the other shoe to fall except the shoe was a piano and it was going to fall on the most precious thing in your life.

"I'm stupid," she murmured to Sophie, who was now nearly asleep.

But was she? The shelf could have fallen on her. Children got hurt all the time from things like that. Claire had read the stories online, she couldn't help it, even though David kept telling her to stop googling worst-case scenarios.

Her phone again:

"Don't forget dinner at my parents' tonight."

Shit. She'd completely forgotten. That meant getting Sophie dressed, getting herself dressed, pretending to be fine for three hours while she slowly lose her mind over little things. David's mom would probably remark on how tired she looked, and his dad would play around with Sophie in a way that left her chest knotted with worry.

"Right. What time again?"

"Six. Are you okay? You've been off lately."

Off. That's one way to put it.

"Just tired. You know how it is."

But he didn't know how it was, not really. He had to get out of the house each day, go someplace where the most difficult issue was deadlines and meetings. He didn't spend all his waking time listening for sounds that shouldn't be there, locking and relocking doors, having mini anxiety attacks over broken shelves.

Sophie was all asleep now, her small chest rising and falling in that lovely rhythm that Claire would catch herself repeating without even realizing it. She ought to be relieved. Delighted, even. Her baby was healthy and strong and lovely.

But all she could feel was suffocating.

The house was too quiet now. She could hear the hum of the refrigerator downstairs, the car driving by outside, the neighbors' dog barking. Mundane sounds.

But why was she waiting for the next crash then?

Postpartum anxiety, they call it.

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