Dreams and Shadows - By C. Robert Cargill Page 0,3

the baby’s room. Something was wrong. Very wrong. For a baby who never made a noise louder than a cough to wail like that, it had to be a matter of life and death. She careened around the corner, stockinged feet slipping on the hardwood floor, arms flailing like a windmill to keep her balance, as she slid to a stop next to Ewan’s crib. The changeling shrieked and it cried and it screamed its little head off, the sound pushing in on her inner ear as if she were twenty feet underwater.

Reaching in to pick up her child, she stopped, her hands hovering above the baby. This isn’t right, she thought. “What’s wrong, sweetie?” she asked. “Tell Mommy what you need.” But the changeling continued its hellish squeal. Tiffany peered closer, her eyes trying to make out its features in the dark as she reached in, once again attempting to pick up her child.

Then the smell hit her, a rotting, fetid stench like week-old garbage littered with animal corpses, left to sweat in the humid Texas heat. She shuddered, covering her nose with the back of her hand to keep from gagging.

Looking again, she caught a glimpse of a single, sharp tooth. Is he teething? Already? Cautiously, she stuck a finger in his mouth, running it along bleeding gums. The little fiend bit down, sinking a single, jagged, cavity-ridden tooth into his new mother’s flesh.

She yanked back her hand, yelping, sticking the bloody finger in her mouth. The screaming stopped and the changeling opened his eyes, gazing upon Tiffany for the first time.

She could see the creature’s yellow, catlike eyes—black slits where the pupils should be—glowing in the dark of his crib. And she screamed, terrified of the monster staring back at her. The changeling smiled and—hearing the nourishing fright in his mother’s voice—let out a soothed coo.

Tiffany couldn’t explain it; she couldn’t find the words. Every time she opened her mouth, the story falling out seemed implausible, unbelievable even to her. With the baby wailing in the other room, Jared stared at his wife with a look she’d never seen before. He’d been in the room, examined Ewan a dozen times himself. The baby was fine. Clearly upset, but fine. There were no jagged teeth. No glowing yellow eyes. There was no monster in that crib. But something was wrong.

“It wasn’t a dream,” she said bitterly. “I know what I saw.”

He reassured her, putting a sympathetic, worried hand on her arm. “I know you do, baby. I believe you.” But he didn’t.

“I want to take him to the doctor,” she demanded.

“We’ll take him. But . . .”

“But don’t tell him what I told you?”

“I didn’t say that,” said Jared.

“You didn’t have to.”

THE PEDIATRICIAN HAD kind eyes when she burst into tears in front of him. Of course, having only met her a few times before, he had no idea how out of character her hysterics were. And when she finally felt at ease enough to let her secret out, he remained unflappable, even smiling a little. He’d heard all this before; it was never good and rarely ended well.

“Ewan is fine, Mrs. Thatcher. He’s a perfectly healthy baby boy.” He looked over at the changeling who lay perfectly still, smiling, growing evermore content with his mother’s rapidly mounting anxiety.

“I don’t understand,” she said, trembling. “When I brought him in he was screaming his head off. He’d been screaming for eight hours straight. He’s not all right.”

“Ma’am, look at him. Whatever was wrong seems to have passed. What’s happening is completely normal. It happens all the time. The stress of a new child . . .”

“I know what I saw,” she snapped. The doctor didn’t flinch.

“I know. I believe you. Which is why I’d like to prescribe something.”

Tiffany relaxed for a moment, allowing herself to believe that someone finally understood—but that confidence was eroded when the doctor called Jared into the office to join them. Postpartum. That wasn’t the scary word. Postpartum was fine. Psychosis was the word that almost broke her.

The first day was by far the easiest. Tiffany took her medication, spent the day cradling the baby, sitting in the handcrafted rocking chair bought for her by her proud in-laws. The gentle creak of the chair on the floor was a kind reassurance of better times.

Creak. Creak.

The baby was quiet all day. Not a peep. Jared wanted to say something, but he thought better of it. At least Tiffany was at peace, and completely bombed out of