sallow and th.in and withered for a man's mouth
to want to touch them. But instead, she smiled and
said thank you, and her father took the dollar-twen-
ty each time and paid the back electricity bills.
She remembers the nurse at the health center.
You ought to be ashamed, asking for milk. You have
only one, not even one, and there are women with
five and six children who need our milk. Don't you
think they come first? Annette had answered quick
then, flashed the words out like a slap in the face,
until the nurse blushed clear up to the points of her
little white cap. Wait
I'll go out and make more,
if that's what you want
How many did you say?
Wait, I'll make you some more ...•
It was an answer to remember.
She would brag
about it, some day in the future, when she had the
baby. It's lying in the carriage under a pink blanket,
and she's standing on the stoop, talking to the other
girls. Wait, I says to her, I'll go out and make more,
if that's what you want. And then she would laugh,
the full belly-laugh that couldn't come out of her
now.
She almost laughed now, walking in the cold
street, with her hands burrowing into her coat-
sleeves for warmth, holding the empty shopping-bag
against her body. But this laughter was something
to save, to store up in herself.
She walked faster,
and now she crossed the street, because the girl who
was walking ahead of her crossed. Then she crossed
again, because the girl crossed again. And then it
happened,
the girl turned around.
He face was
twisted, her mouth funneled like the muzzle of a
pistol attacking.
You're following me, trailing me
to the place. The girl stood there,
her mouth
worked, but it only fired blanks. Then she turned
around, walking faster,
crossed the street
and
crossed again, like a crazy one.
Annette followed her, stubborn as an animal.
Thinks maybe I'll lose the trail. But she was stub-
born, because the thing that grew in her was stub-
born.
Then they were going up the iron stairs together,
and she shouldered herself in at the door, and the
girl stood there, looking at the boss scared and
ashamed, like when you step into a place and see
that you've dragged in something foul from the
streets.
He began to whine that they were bringing the
law on him, they were landing him in jail. He filled
their shopping bags with the labels, but telling them
meanwhile they were lucky to get their twenty-five
cents per thousand, only for God's sake to keep your
mouths shut and don't tell anyone where you get it.
It's lousy, the girl said, friendly on the stairs go-
ing down. Twenty-five cents a thousand,
and that's
putting the string through the labels before you
tie ...
fifty cents for a day's, work. In a week,
enough to buy shoes. . . .
In a week, enough to buy a layette for the baby,
PARTISAN
REVIEW
Annette figured, but only to herself.
Twenty-five cents per thousand, equals a half-day's
work, equals fifty cents a day ...
she figured days
into money, money into days, equal signs dancing in
her head, like grinning mouths. She figured: in seven
days, enough to buy a layette for the baby, to cover
its nakedness when it comes; never enough to get
rid of the thing, so it won't be born naked and hun-
gry. She figured it out, climbing the stairs of 4
Thompson,
and at the top was Tom. He startled
her, prowling around in the shadow at the end of
the hall.
His hands leaped up, engaged her shoulders.
"J
esus, honey, the house is empty, we missed
hours alone. I'm waiting here hours ....
"
But her body stiffened under his palms, and he
brought his face close.
"Listen, honey, what's there to be afraid of? It's
safe skating now. You can't get caught twice, oile
time after the other. Listen, honey."
And it had to be his way, because she was too
tired to talk it out with him, and too lonely. Only
she'd rather have had him quiet, giving her a com-
forting place in the crook of his arm, instead of tear-
ing at her that way with the double haste of his
need and his fear that someone might come.
When it was over, she found herself the comfort-
ing place she wanted in the crook of his arm, and
she looked up at him, ashamed suddenly, covering
her mouth with her hand.
"Do you mind it, Tom, my teeth being black this
way? It's because when I was little, they gave me
medicine, and my mother didn't know to give it with
a glass tube."
He didn't mind it, not enough to be serious. "I
don't mind it, honey, I love you. Teeth fall out,
anyway."
"The baby's teeth will be good."
"We'll
feed the kid with a glass tube, with a
silver spoon. It won't take after its rna. It'll have big
white grinders, like me."
"Where you going to get the silver spoon, smar-
ty?"
He told her, Never mind, leave it to him.
She remembered about the women who faked
they were pregnant,
so they could get the extra dol-
lar-twenty from the relief. He asked her what in hell
was she doing with the money, she ought to be get-
ting extra milk and start fattening up.
"Look," she said, "we got the juice turned on
for it."
She told him the old man was beginning to look
at her sideways, boring into her with his eyes.
He said he didn't give a damn, she could tell the
old man she was carrying Tom Carney's brat. She
could promise him wedding bells. But she looked at
him sharply,
withdrawing,
suddenly wanting her
body to herself.
"Talk's cheap," she said, and sat
apart from h.im, warming the bitterness in her.
5
