Conundrum Read Online Free PDF

long , and my head spun hard until I got my balance.
    I picked up the runt, still wrapped in a towel. “This one needs warming.” I unlatched the gate, where Buster and Angel stood, alert, sniffing at my little bundle.
    “Do you need me to stay here and keep on eye on these guys?” Jeremy asked.
    “Only if you want to. But, t hey’re doing fine.” Better than I was. I just wanted to get in the bathtub and soak, lock the door, wallow in my misery. Instead of lifting my spirits, these three new lives only sank me deeper. I gritted my teeth so hard my jaw began to ache.
    One child. That’s all I wanted. Was that too damn much to ask for?
    Jeremy closed the pen gate behind him and followed me back into the house. Two boxes sat on the counter, partway full of kitchen items. I heard Jeremy suck in a breath as the reality of our situation came careening at him. He stood by the counter while I filled two empty plastic soda bottles full of hot water and laid them against the flanks of the baby buck. I wrapped the towel back around the kid and , within seconds, the heat brought his attention around. His eyes lost their glaze , and his face grew alert and animated. Within two minutes, he began mewling for milk, sniffing my hand for a teat.
    “That’s amazing,” Jeremy said. “The way he perked up so fast. No oven this time?” He’d seen me put babies in towels on the open oven door, with the heat blasting out at them, like a mini sauna. It disconcerted the dogs to see the kids placed in the same contraption that produced tasty food. They’d give me distressed glances, wondering if I really intended to cook the kids for dinner, lingering close by and giving the bundles a face - washing from time to time.
    “He seems to be coming around just fine. I need to take him back to the barn so he can nurse.” I gave his little dark head a scratch, and he pushed up against it in pleasure. I looked into his eager eyes , and my own longing grew unbearable. I turned to Jeremy.
    “Why don’t you finish what you were doing here ? ” My voice sounded flat and unemotional to me. Jeremy seemed to flounder for words. Before he had the chance to say anything else, anything that might make me beg him to stay and not throw away ten shared years, I hurried out the door with my charge in my arms. I cradled the little bundle and let the tears stream down my face as I hurried to the barn. Maybe Yeats was right. Maybe once things fell apart, the center couldn’t hold, no matter how tightly you hung onto it.
    In the soft light, I placed the buck on the straw, still wrapped in his towel and flanked with his hot water bottles. Sassy sniffed him, then started with her licking and baaing. His little voice responded back each time she spoke to him, a staccato duet. Eventually, he wriggled free of his swaddling and got to his feet. He pushed over to where his brother and sister were sucking noisily, and I pulled his sister off to get him situated on a teat. He nosed around for a moment until he got the warm nipple in his mouth and sucked. Sassy stood content, chewing her cud, and making sporadic little throat noises at her triplets.
    I picked up the placenta that lay on the straw and threw it away in a plastic bag. Already the babies had fluffed up, their coats damp and steaming in the air. The barn was warm, so I decided not to run the propane heater. I slid to the straw and tucked my knees under my chin, willing my stomach to stop cramping. Only then did I see a stain of blood seeping through the crotch of my jeans.
    I heard Jeremy’s truck engine start up, then heard tires crunching the gravel road and down the driveway. I listened until the noise faded, leaving me to the quiet of the barn and the sounds of a new family luxuriating in their joy and contentment.
    Jeremy didn’t know I was three months pregnant. I had hoped beyond hope that this time would be different. That maybe our luck had changed, that we could put all the pain and sorrow