Chapter 9: The Farm

"I'm going to his door," I said.

Dot put down the dish towel.

It was Sunday night in her kitchen, and the window over the sink had gone dark.

Her husband sat at the head of the table, eating stew in silence.

Clayton sat across from me.

He had washed his face and put on a flannel shirt from my brother-in-law.

The sleeves stopped two inches above his wrists.

"Whose door?" Dot asked, though she knew.

"Philip's. In the daytime, with the neighbors watching."

"No," Dot said.

"Mel," Clayton said. "Give it a few days. You're still half starved."

"Every day I wait, my son is a day older in their house."

"The doctor will have a paper by tomorrow," Dot said. "Philip will want you back in that building. The law says he's your husband."

"Did the lawyers say that?"

My sister looked at the table.

"I called three of them this winter," she said. "Each wanted five thousand dollars."

"And?"

"And each told me the same thing. Without proof that baby is yours, you're a woman who left a psych ward with a story."

"What kind of proof?"

"A court order. A test. Something that isn't just you saying so."

"A test needs a swab from the baby."

"Yes."

"And someone has to hold him still while you take it," Dot's husband said.

Everyone looked at him.

He went back to his stew.

"It's the only sentence he's said since Friday," Dot said. "Eat your bread."

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