you have this big bruise and swollen place on your forehead, it goes up into your hair, and a little blood dried on your face. So, have you seen Craig? When's he coming to get me? Did Rory get sick in Lawrenceton? He sure was acting awful funny."
"What do you remember about that night?" Hard to believe it had only been five days.
Regina looked down at me doubtfully. She was sitting on the floor beside me now, the cup still in her hand. I became aware I was lying on yet another sleeping bag, and she was crouched on the cold concrete. Her black hair was a mass of tangles and her eyes were puffy.
"After you guys left to go to that dinner, I was in your house fixing up some supper, one of those Healthy Choice microwave meals you had in the freezer." I would have nodded if my neck wouldnt've snapped. "Then I heard a car pull up, and I knew it wasn't you because you guys were gonna be gone longer. So I look out, and it was a black kid. He was real polite, said a friend had brought him out to get his dad's truck. I thought I saw something fall out of the back of the trailer as he was turning it around, but I didn't tell him. I figured I'd go pick it up later. After he'd driven the truck out of your backyard, and the guy who'd given him a ride had followed him out of the driveway, Craig and Rory turned in. They came into the house with me, and we started fighting almost right away. I was mad. I'd left because I needed time to think, and here he was right on my tail.
"I began to get a little nervous, alone with the guys, them being so mad at me. Course Craig would never hurt me, but he was really furious, it was the worst fight we'd ever had." Regina's face softened. "He's usually so sweet," she said almost tenderly. "It was one reason I almost kept the baby." I had my serious doubts that Craig had been the baby's father. In my secret brain compartment where I keep a lot of thoughts I want to hide from myself, I'd stored the idea that the baby looked much more like Rory. Rory's baby picture, framed in his sister's house, had been the spitting image of Hayden. "So Rory began feeling bad?" I asked weakly.
"Yeah, he was acting really strange. He said he was so sleepy he couldn't stand up, and I told him to go lie on the couch. He said some blonde-haired woman, some older gal in a fancy car, had asked them to help her in the liquor store parking lot, and she gave them a couple of beers to say thank you, I think her car had gotten stuck in a dip or something, and they'd helped her rock it out. Rory thought there'd been something in the beer; he said when he got through there were some speckles in the bottom of the bottle." "So you went over to the garage apartment?"
"Yeah, actually, Craig and I..." And here Regina turned coy. In between quarrels, they'd wanted a passionate reunion, apparently. "You took Hayden?"
"Yeah, sure, we couldn't leave him in the house over there, with Rory out of it! On the way over, Craig picked up something from the yard. It was a hatchet, from the back of the guy's pickup, and he put it on the steps so the guy would see it if he missed it and come back."
That was where the hatchet had come from. One small question explained.
"So you took the baby over to the apartment."
Regina turned a dull, unbecoming red. "He was asleep," she said defensively. "We didn't have time to put up that crib thing, so I laid him in his infant seat in the recline position."
"Then?"
"Well, before things got... serious, you know... we heard another car pull up, and Craig said, 'Hey, what is this place, Grand Central Station?' and I looked out the front window and it was the Granberrys!" Regina shook her head. "I said, 'Craig, you're not gonna believe this!' and he says, 'Hey, we're not letting them have our baby, cause here they are following us!' and I said, 'You're right, let's keep Hayden.' " Regina sighed, offered me some more water. I started to shake my head no, then realized that was a very bad