He alternated between gnawing on one and gnawing on the other, looking expectantly at his mother to observe her respective reactions.
Sometimes when she was watching her children she felt as though she were watching footage of wild animals in their natural habitat.
Sometimes when she was in the Pit she fantasized about understanding everything, even believed for minutes at a time that something crucial was about to be revealed, that the Pit was about to explain itself to her.
Sometimes when she unlocked the glass case and held the Bible it seemed almost to quiver with life, though she knew this was just an illusion created by the movement of her blood inside her hand.
The phrase The life of the mind passed through her head, followed immediately, instinctually, by The life of the diaper.
The life of the crushed Cheerio. The life of the soggy kiss. The life of the sticky floor.
It was then that she heard footsteps in the other room. She switched off the light, scooped up Ben, pulled Viv across the bedroom to hide in the far corner. She crouched in front of the mirror in the dark, clinging to them. The baby in her right arm, the child in her left.
PART 2
1
On the other side of the door, in the living room, Erika was picking up the crayons. She had turned on all the lights and the room looked solid with light.
“I felt bad the kids and I left the floor such a mess, I’m happy I’m getting the chance to redeem myself,” she said as Molly stepped out of the children’s room and came down the hallway. Erika was the most energetic person Molly had ever known. “So what happened was we were going to meet at Tory’s for the fries but did you hear their basement flooded? So instead we’re going to meet at Beba, but later, but don’t worry, I swear I’ll rest up before my fish duties tomor— Oh, yay, Viv found The Why Book!”
How strange that Erika still existed, that she could stand right there where the deer had stood half an hour ago, talking as she always talked.
Molly experienced a deep unsteadiness. Everything seemed normal; she was disoriented by the normalcy.
COME OUT TO CAR WHEN E ARRIVES.
She realized that the whole time she had been putting the kids to bed, the promise of Erika’s imminent arrival was in her mind like a life raft.
E BACK BY 7PM.
But now, watching her unflappable babysitter talk on in the friendly light, she was finding it impossible to locate the words necessary to explain what was happening, to tell Erika about the intruder, to get her support in reporting the incident to the police.
“Have fun!” Erika said as Molly picked up her bag and opened the front door and felt something take hold of her body, a magnetic force that pulled her out of her home and toward the street.
2
The deer was sitting in the dark in the driver’s seat of their parked car.
They had two sets of car keys. One was in an airplane over another continent. The other she had dropped in her bag after locking the car when she got home from work.
Yet the deer was sitting in the dark in the driver’s seat of their parked car.
She could have turned away. She could have run back inside.
IF YOU DO NOT COME YOU WILL REGRET IT FOREVER.
She pulled on the handle of the passenger door. It was locked. Instantly the deer found the button and unlocked the door and pushed it open and pointed at the passenger seat with a black-gloved hand.
Molly remained standing in the open door.
Her key chain, the unmistakable beaded loop Viv had made at preschool, the key chain that ought to be clunking around at the bottom of her bag right now, dangled from the ignition.
The deer had the upper hand. The deer knew things he had no way of knowing. The deer could destroy her and her children if he so desired. It seemed clear that a path had been prepared for her; she saw no choice but to walk down it.
The deer was perhaps annoyed, or maybe upset, by Molly’s tears. He reached out toward her, both palms up, a gesture of exasperation or a gesture of invitation, surrender.
3
The deer was a nervous driver. Molly experienced his hesitations in her own body, the familiar anxiety of the left turn onto the thoroughfare. The deer head added to Molly’s tension, and presumably to the deer’s too, as it severely