Chapter 80
“CAN SOMEBODY SHUT THAT baby up?”
Ray Taggart is still aiming his pistol at Amber and Lily. Amber and Hailey are sobbing, Lily is screaming, and Ray is pissed.
“Listen,” he yells at Amber, trying to be heard above the baby, “either you shut her up or I’ll do it for you.”
He aims the gun directly at Lily’s head.
Now Amber, Hailey, and even Ben are screaming. I have to shout over all of them.
“I think she needs changing!” I yell. I look at Amber, who nods yes, so I walk toward Lily. “Let me just take her upstairs and—”
“You’re not going anywhere!” Ray says, swiveling around and aiming the gun at me. I sit down and fold my hands in my lap so he can’t see that I’m shaking.
“I only meant… we keep her diapers upstairs,” I say.
“Where?” he asks.
“In the nursery.”
He turns to Metcalf and gestures with the gun. “Go with her,” he says. “Make sure she doesn’t try anything funny.”
I stand up.
“No,” Ray says, changing his mind. “Better yet, go yourself,” he tells Metcalf.
I sit down again.
Metcalf as somebody’s flunky. If this weren’t a life-and-death situation, I’d find it funny.
“Nursery is the second door on the right,” I tell Metcalf as he heads to the stairs. “The diapers are in a drawer of the changing table. Bring down some wipes and the Tubby Todd Sweet Cheeks Diaper Paste too. Also the changing pad. And the organic talc-free cornstarch.”
We all listen as Metcalf wanders around upstairs. We hear him open a drawer, then close it. It feels like he’s upstairs for a few weeks, but finally, he comes bounding down the stairs, holding everything. He walks over to Amber.
She looks at me. “You do it,” she says. I look down at her hands. They’re shaking. So I take Lily from her.
“It’s okay,” I whisper to the baby. “Everything is going to be okay.” Lily looks up at me, her eyes sparkling with tears. If I didn’t know better, I could swear she knows I’m lying.
Metcalf puts the changing pad on the sofa and stands next to me holding everything else. He’s frowning. He looks like an angry magician’s assistant. Ray comes over as I lay the baby down on the pad. His gun is aimed directly at Lily’s head again.
I peel her diaper off slowly, trying to buy time. The diaper is filled with poop. “By any chance, did you bring a plastic bag?” I ask Metcalf.
“You didn’t ask for one,” he says.
Not wanting to risk getting poop on the couch, I put the dirty diaper on the floor. Both Taggart and Metcalf look disgusted.
“Hand me a baby wipe,” I say. (Blasting orders at Metcalf! I hope I remember this moment forever.) He pulls a few out of the pack and I wipe Lily slowly with each of them. There is total silence in the room. Everyone is watching me as if I’m performing the most delicate brain surgery.
“Baby cream,” I say as seriously as if I were asking for a scalpel. I squeeze some out of the tube and rub it into her little tush. “Now the baby cornstarch.”
Metcalf gives me the container. I’m leaning over Lily with Taggart still behind me. I open the container and shake some into my hand, then I bend down as if I’m going to sprinkle the powder on Lily’s butt.
As if!
Instead, I pivot quickly and toss the cornstarch into Ray’s eyes.
Startled, he sputters and coughs, then takes a step back.
That’s when I lunge at him and knock the gun out of his hand, and in the second before it goes off, my entire life flashes before my eyes: money under my pillow from the Tooth Fairy…
Sammy Hagopian, my first crush… teenage angst…
unprotected sex… my first internal exam… protected sex…
Then, a thunderous noise. The smell of something burning.
It’s me! I’ve been shot!
Everybody is rushing toward me. I’m screaming and bleeding and they’re all screaming too and the pain gets so bad I start blacking out, but before I do, I lift my left leg and kick Ray Taggart in the balls. He goes down.
The last thing I hear is a voice from outside, a booming voice echoing as if it’s coming through a megaphone: “FBI! Freeze!”