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The sun has only just started to dip in the late August sky, air buzzing with the comfortable summer heat warm enough that even Lars is stripped down to a mere t-shirt. With the garage windows flung wide to entice in an evening breeze, Lars is ready to tuck into the book Margo lent him when he catches sight of Karin bridging the gap between their homes with long, purposeful strides.
She wants something.
Lars pushes away the temptation to pretend he’s not home. Karin has been so kind to him — especially this year, with everything that happened with Bianca — that he owes her…well, maybe not his full company, but at least his greeting. He opens the door before she has a chance to knock.
“It’s just for the evening, Lars!” Karin doesn’t even offer a greeting as she brandishes a foil wrapped plate at Lars. “Just long enough for Gus and I to get ice cream. Please! I’ve been dying!”
It’s like a thunderstorm has blown in without him realizing the sky was filling with clouds. Lars gapes at Karin, trying and failing to slow his now-racing heart as one thought fills his head in a loop: I’ve been dying, I’ve been dying, I’ve been dying.
Lars’ brother, Gus, arrives at the doorstep in time to sheepishly interject, “She isn’t actually dying.”
Karin elbows Gus in the ribs. “That’s what you’re opening with?”
“What?” Gus wheezes at his wife, “You’re not! Doc said you’re in perfectly good health at last week’s check-up.”
“Sure, but what does the doctor say about how I’m dying to get out of the house?”
“That’s good,” Lars exhales a shaky breath he didn’t realize he was holding as Karin and Gus debate the semantics of her claim. Months of practicing how to hide his worry come in handy now as Lars shifts to hide his trembling hands behind his back. “That’s really good.”
Seeing Karin at the hospital after the birth had been terrifying. Even though the nurses all assured him both mother and baby were in great condition, Karin had looked so wan and exhausted that the worry nearly ate Lars alive.
Now, several months later, it’s hard to tell if she’s feeling any better. Taking care of an infant seems to bring the perpetual side-effect of exhaustion, so Karin always seems at least a little out of sorts. Lars tries to help where he can, like bringing their bins out on trash day or picking up groceries on his way home from work. Karin is very gracious in her thanks, but it doesn’t change the fact that no amount of help will fix Karin looking like a gust of wind could topple her over.
Still, as Lars inspects Karin now, it’s true that she looks at least a little better than usual. She’s managed to comb her hair into a ponytail and put on a clean shirt, a step up from the new normal the Lindstroms have fallen into of late. Gus and the doctor might be right. Karin might be okay. Or at least nearing the ballpark of okay, which is all Lars can allow himself to hope.
“Fine, I’m not dying. But it would be so good for my mental health,” Karin nudges past Lars to set the plate (which smells strongly of leftover chicken) down on his kitchen counter. “Wouldn’t you agree, dear?”
Like a dart thrown with surprising accuracy, the dear hits Gus square in the chest.
Interest piqued, Lars glances back at his brother. Gus has strong thoughts on manhood, many of which lead back to treating his wife well. Does that apply even when Karin doesn’t appear to have direct medical advice backing up her statements?
Gus rocks from one foot to the other. “Only if Lars is comfortable.”
“He is! You are, right?” Before Lars can respond, Karin continues, “Henry is already asleep in his crib. Really you’d just be in the house keeping an eye on the baby monitor while we’re gone—”
Oh. They want him to watch the baby.
Renewed concern curls in Lars’ gut as he considers this task. He hasn’t been asked to babysit his nephew before, which makes sense to Lars. Babies are complicated. Karin and Gus shouldn’t trust the care of their son, Henry, to just anyone. But here they are, all of a sudden acting like the task of keeping their child alive is so easy that Lars might be able to do it without even laying eyes on Henry at all.
“—But, if he does wake up,” Gus cuts off his wife with a gentle pat to her shoulder, “Would you be okay with holding him? Just long enough to help him calm down.”
“He’s swaddled,” Karin adds hastily, “All wrapped up.”
There it is. Lars knew it couldn’t have been that easy.
Lars has held his nephew before, but only under direct supervision. All he knows for sure is that babies, even healthy ones like Henry, are very fragile. One wrong move and…and…Lars swallows hard, a lump in his throat at the thought of anything bad happening to his tiny nephew. “But, his neck…”
“That’s old news,” Karin waves a hand, “Henry can support his own neck now. And he’s a great sleeper. And he barely cries! Gus says he takes after you in that.”
Lars blinks. He’s never thought of himself as a good baby before. How could he, after what happened to Mom? The surprise can’t help but tumble out. “I was a good sleeper?”
Gus half laughs, half coughs. “Nah, you just didn’t cry much. I remember Dad saying…” he waves a hand, “I mean, it doesn’t matter.”
Lars wants to ask more. Gus remembers a different version of Dad, one who wasn’t so withdrawn, but Gus likes talking about their dad about as much as their dad liked talking about Mom. To Lars, Dad had just been distant. Borderline uncaring. Lars imagines baby Henry growing up, his uncle just as far away, despite the closeness of their homes. Little Henry, also mourning someone he never really knew.
Bianca would have known how to handle this. With her upbringing, it was no surprise that she was good with kids, but what Lars had always admired was just how much Bianca loved them too. Didn’t matter that she could never have a baby, she would have adored Henry as much as she would her own son.
The thought sends a zing of courage through Lars’ heart. He knows what he has to do.
“One second, I need to—” Lars mumbles, guiding the door nearly closed.
As he searches for what he needs, Lars can still hear Gus and Karin outside, their voices drifting through the open window.
“See? I told you he wasn’t ready to watch Henry,” Gus says, though not unkindly, “I can stay home while you go to the grocery store and grab us some pints of Ben & Jerry’s.”
“He didn’t say no!” Karin hisses, “I think he’s gonna do it.”
Lars had purposefully left the door nearly closed, taking great care to ensure the latch didn’t click into place. But, then again, the other two were probably still overwhelmed from life with a new baby. Even with her nice shirt and passable ponytail, Lars could still see the dark circles under Karin’s eyes. A month ago, Lars even watched Karin smear ketchup onto her sandwich instead of jam — and she didn’t even notice when she ate it. Compared to that, catching an un-closed door must be nearly impossible.
When Lars emerges onto his doorstep, he’s wearing his pink sweater. It’s of the softer ones, just in case the baby thinks wool is too scratchy.
“I can watch him,” Lars interrupts the on-going debate between Gus and Karin. “So you can get real ice cream.”
He almost regrets the offer when Karin yanks him into a tight hug.
Next comes the barrage of information. Pacifier location (on the dresser), baby monitor (plugged in on the kitchen counter), Emergency contact (Gus sheepishly admits he purchased a cell-phone so Karin could always get ahold of him). Then, in the whirlwind of love and chatter that is Lars’ sister-in-law, the pair are gone, leaving Lars alone in his childhood home.
No. Not alone. His companion is the whole reason Lars is here.
Their house is alive with the song of a home that loves them back: the hum of the fridge, the creak of the ceiling fan, the gentle crackle of static emanating from the baby monitor. Lars is pretty certain he would be able to hear Henry crying without it, but he does appreciate the added line of defense. He’s determined to babysit properly.
While Lars sits at attention, he curls his arms now, practicing the position so he can feel more ready to pick up Henry if the situation arises. If only this sort of preparation made the real thing less…intense. He’s practiced touch with Margo too. Handshakes after nights out. Help up after falling while roller skating. Once, at the state fair, sitting so close on the Ferris wheel that their legs touched. But as much as Lars tries and as patient as Margo’s been, touch is never easy and it’s rarely pleasant.
He’s considered telling Dr. Bergman about it. They still meet, even though Bianca is no longer around to require medical attention. Most recently, Dr. Bergman had been the one to help Lars prepare to hold baby Henry at all, supporting him through practice sessions with an infant mannequin in her office.
“Does it make you sad?” Lars asks one afternoon as Dr. Bergman guides the doll into his arms. “When people talk about babies?”
Dr. Bergman quirks an eyebrow. She doesn’t say anything, just pats the mannequin on the head before returning to her chair. The desk adds a comforting distance between her and Lars when she finally replies. “Why? Does it make you sad?”
Lars resists the urge to squirm in his seat. Instead, he carefully positions his arms, determined not to jostle the baby, whose eyes are closed in sleep. The stiffness is not comfortable. But, then again, neither is the weight and pressure of the baby — which isn’t even accounting for the fact a real baby will also bring heat and motion. Lars swallows thickly, wondering, not for the first time, why he’s trying.
“I asked you first,” he looks up, gaze reaching her nose instead of her collar. It’s not eye contact, per se, but it’s progress.
She exhales a soft, sad laugh. “Sometimes.”
Lars glances back down at the baby. He’s almost tempted to rock the child, but its expression is so serene that even though Lars knows it is just plastic, he still fears he would wake the baby. “So why do you do it?”
Dr. Bergman shrugs. “Guess the happy outweighs the sad.”
“How do you know if it will?”
“You don’t. You just have to try.”
A wail pulls Lars back to the present.
Lars’ first instinct is to freeze, breath catching in his throat as he tries not to make a single sound. Maybe Henry is fine. Maybe Henry will fall back to sleep if not disturbed. Maybe…
…Henry’s cries only grow louder, garnering a shrill edge of infant desperation that both cracks Lars’ heart open and makes him want to clap his hands over his ears. The former wins out, guiding Lars clumsily up the stairs until he notices how loud his unintentional stomping must sound. For a moment, he feels like a child again, the thudding of his father’s feet against these very steps the only reprieve from an otherwise silent house.
But — no. Lars’ dad is gone. It’s just Lars in the Lindstrom home now. Lars and the baby.
He pauses in the doorway of what was once the Pink Room, now Henry’s room. Lars forgot that the room that once held his mother and, later, his girlfriend, is now unrecognizable — in no small part because the walls have been painted yellow. Gus had wanted to repaint upon learning the gender of his son, but Karin refused without explicit permission from Lars. To split the difference (and because Bianca would have wanted it repainted for the baby), Lars selected a gentle, cheerful yellow paint.
There are more changes, of course. Gone is the old bed, replaced with the sturdy Lindstrom crib for Henry and a rocking chair for Karin. There’s also a shelf of thick, colorful books, a basket filled with soft toys, and a mobile boasting farm animals crocheted by a woman from church. And of course, ruddy-cheeked and wrapped tight in a dinosaur blanket, there is Henry.
At the sight of his nephew, Lars suddenly finds himself quite shy. This is the first time he’s been alone with Henry and the fear of inadequately caring for the child is almost crippling. With some effort, Lars blinks away the terror. He can do this.
“Hey, Henry,” Lars’ voice comes out a strangled croak. He takes a deep breath and tries again, giving the doorframe two gentle knocks, “Hey, Henry. It’s your Uncle Lars. Can I, uh…can I come in?”
Lars doesn’t expect an answer, but it seems rude to burst into Henry’s space unannounced, especially since he’s practically a stranger. After giving the crying Henry a moment to absorb the information, Lars takes one furtive step into the room…then another…then another…until he is at the edge of the crib.
Henry really does look so tiny. Beneath a thick tuft of dark hair, Henry’s eyes are closed tight, face contorted into a cry that seems bigger than his swaddled little body. It takes Lars three false starts before his hands make contact with the child. Despite Karin’s insistence that Henry would be fine, Lars takes immense care to support Henry’s neck. When his fingers make contact with Henry’s soft, warm skin, Lars has to suppress a whimper of discomfort — it hurts it hurts it hurts — as he carefully shifts Henry against his sweater-clad arm instead.
Once Henry is set in his arms, Lars slowly inches backwards until he reaches the rocking chair, anchoring them both to a safe harbor. Only at this point does Lars realize with horror that he’s forgotten the pacifier. Too late now. The thought of standing back up and rummaging around the crib, or the drawers, or, heaven forbid, carrying the baby downstairs with him, makes Lars sick. They’re going to have to manage without it.
“It’s okay, Henry,” Lars murmurs. He uses his legs to propel the rocking chair, resting both arms against the armrest to brace against the squirming Henry. What are you supposed to tell a crying baby? Surely not stop, right? “I’m here, Henry.”
Not that Lars is convinced that phrase will mean much to his nephew, who would probably much rather want his mom right about now. Lars’ heart aches for the sobbing child. He feels the absence of his own mother just as keenly. “She’s okay,” Lars reassures Henry, “Karin left for ice cream, but she’s healthy and she’s coming home.”
But this doesn’t work either.
With great effort, Lars attempts to bob his arms up and down with the motion of the chair, a trick that Dr. Bergman taught him. The motion feels stiff, robotic, and pointless in the face of Henry’s continuing wails. Except…wait. Are the cries easing some? Henry’s face does seem less strained and his eyes — his eyes are open now, a familiar deep brown.
Lars lets out a shaky breath as he continues to rock. “You’ve got your mom’s eyes,” he explains to Henry, “I do too. I mean, I have my mom’s eyes. That’s what everyone told me, anyway. I never got to meet her.”
No. Bad. This is too sad for the baby. Lars nearly backtracks until he realizes Henry’s eyes are trained on his face, cries slowing to small, hiccuping whimpers. Lars cringes under the intensity of the gaze, but steels himself. Sad, little Henry needs him right now.
“She would have liked you, I think,” Lars continues softly, “Bianca would have liked you too. She is my—” another pang of grief, “was my girlfriend.”
He pauses, wondering briefly if what he’s going to say next will be disrespectful, but it doesn’t seem fair to only talk about death to a kid barely old enough to maybe hold up his own neck.
“Margo would like you too,” despite the heat of the bedroom, Lars feels a shiver down his spine as he says this aloud, “She’s my friend. We have bowling league together on Tuesdays and Saturdays.”
From here, the words begin to tumble out. Lars has never been great at talking, though after Bianca swept in and loosened the debris damning his heart, he’s found it all a little easier. He tells Henry about bowling, and the town they both call home, and the day Gus brought Karin here and they made the property feel a little less lonely.
Only then, with Henry quieted in his arms, can Lars bring himself to talk about Bianca.
“She was really good with people,” Lars admits, shifting his arms to accommodate Henry’s wiggles, “Like. Kids and adults and old widows at church. Bianca just had a knack for knowing how to help them. It’s why she got elected to school board, I think.”
He pauses, glancing at Henry. “Can you keep a secret?”
Lars takes Henry’s silence as assent. “Right. Um, well…” Lars rolls the impending tension out of his shoulders, blinks it out of his eyes. “I haven’t told anyone this before but I…sometimes wonder…” he groans, the effort of admitting the secret straining his chest, “I wonder what she saw in me.”
He fixes his gaze out the window, staring at the dusty blue of the end of a late summer sunset. “Cuz Bianca was so kind, and so funny, and so good with everyone and I’m…just me.”
Bad, bad, bad
Fire bursts across his pointer finger, wrenching Lars from this line of questioning, and he looks down to find a small hand, wriggled free of the dinosaur blanket, wrapped around his finger. It’s an astonishingly tiny thing, fingers as delicate as twigs, nails as fine as leaves. The touch, which covers barely half of a single one of Lars’ fingers, is white hot.
Bad, bad, bad
Lars is acutely aware of Henry’s heat radiating against him in the summer evening, a low, intense burn against his chest, his arms, his waist. He squeezes his eyes shut, but it does nothing to dull the sensation of Henry’s chest rising and falling against Lars’ own. Lars stifles a whimper, wanting nothing more than to put Henry in the crib and back away.
Bad, bad, bad
Lars opens an eye to find Henry staring at him. The baby yawns contentedly, hand still wrapped around Lars’ finger, blinking up at Lars with the trusting expression of a child who finally feels safe enough to drift back off to sleep, and Lars knows his fate is sealed.
It does not matter how much this hurts.
Lars will endure it forever for Henry.
To distract himself from the discomfort, Lars considers what Bianca might do with a sleepy child. Probably sing them a lullaby, some beautifully lilting hymn. Lars doesn’t know any hymns, or lullabies either. But as the panic starts to rise in his chest, he thinks of Margo. They’ve been carpooling to work these days, the mornings and nights feeling a little less bleak because of it. And when Lars can’t fill the conversation — which is often — they’ll turn to song.
“You’re a good singer,” Margo says breathlessly, after the pair, drunk on the delicious possibilities of a Friday, finished belting out a rowdy rendition of Here Comes the Sun.
“You’re the choir singer,” Lars adjusts his grip on the steering wheel once, then twice, heart pounding, “I’m not…it’s…”
“In my professional choir opinion,” Margo tries to take on a professional tone but loses it almost immediately to her own giggles, “We can both be good singers.”
“I don’t know,” Lars mumbles, heat rising to his cheeks that has nothing to do with the June weather.
“Well, I like it,” Margo replies, suddenly shy as she adds, “You sing like you mean it.”
Now, Lars reaches for the best song he can think of to share with Henry. Softly, like he’s afraid of startling his nephew, he begins to sing. And yes, his voice is a little husky and rough at first, but he means every word.
Let there be cuckoos
A lark and a dove
But first of all, please
Let there be love