By Melissa Ridley Elmes
In her dream, Mary had a child.
It was a recurrent dream. As with all dreams, the details were hazy, although all the senses were accounted for so vividly that she always remembered something specific of it in the morning. The images were never precisely the same, but they evoked the same emotions. In the dream’s various iterations, Mary enjoyed the smell of her child’s skin in the summertime or after running in the springtime rain; the sound of her child’s laughter and singing; the feel of her child’s arms thrown around her neck in a bear hug, and the warm little body curled up next to her for a bedtime story; the taste of her child’s jammy kiss after a peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich for lunch; the sight of her child’s form twirling carefree like a ballerina, and rolling in snow or grass, and doing somersaults and cartwheels. There was definitely a golden glow, and joy, and happiness, and although she never actually saw a face, Mary knew her child was absolutely beautiful and the most perfect of all children who had ever been born.
Of course, this child had not actually been born.
Mary had never had sexual intercourse, not in reality or in dreamland. She didn’t like to think about the physical logistics of it all—the coitus, the pregnancy, the labor and birth—not her own, or anyone else’s, which is why adoption and fostering were as out of the question as artificial insemination or the old-fashioned biological means of obtaining a child, oneself. She wasn’t a prude, she didn’t think—she was just risk-averse, and thought motherhood should be beautiful, a condition of absolute grace and honor—not messy and painful and, well, frankly, undignified and terrifying.
All of this also explained why Mary had never married, although she had occasional romantic feelings for this or that man. She was an ethical woman, and she didn’t think it would be fair to marry a man when all she wanted was a child. For years, Mary had hoped she might change her mind, fall desperately and madly in love with someone and see babies whenever she looked at him, be so lovestruck that she wouldn’t mind doing with him all of the things it took for a woman to have a child—but, that never happened. She began to grow resigned to the idea that being a mother was not her destiny. Her face became sad, and people started noticing and wondering was she sick? And occasionally, did someone break her heart? But no one asked, because no one wanted to pry.
And then, one night, the child of her dreams had arrived, complete and whole, with no mess and no fuss and no pain. Despite having no prior experience with children (not because she didn’t want to, but because it was too painful to interact with other people’s children when she did not have one of her own) Mary found that she was a natural mother, just as she had always suspected she would be. In her dream, they blew bubbles together, laughing as they chased them across a dandelion-strewn field; they made sandcastles together on a sunny beach with beautiful ocean waves crashing beside them or baked cookies together in a warm and cozy kitchen while snow fell outside; and when they were done, she tucked her pajama-clad child into bed and sang a lullaby and kissed the warm forehead and turned out the light. She woke up overjoyed. She smiled at everyone she met throughout the day. Oh, it’s so nice to see you so happy! people said, although no one asked about the source of her happiness, respecting her privacy. Mary appreciated their circumspection because she didn’t want to share her child with anybody. This child was hers, and hers alone, the most perfect of all children ever (not) born.
*****
For a while Mary was happy, her days filled with anticipation and her nights filled with being a mother. But then one night her child did an unthinkable thing.
They were sitting in a kitchen at a table in a window nook (Mary could never really be sure it was her kitchen, although she was always sure it was her child) watching snow fall and sipping hot cocoa with marshmallows floating on top—Mary never forgot the marshmallows. Her child took a sip and looked up, revealing a cocoa-foam mustache grin. Mary laughed. Then, her child’s voice turned serious. “Mommy, can I ask you a question?”
Mary reached over and lovingly wiped away the foam moustache. “Of course, Sweetheart. You can ask me anything.”
“Where’s my daddy?”
Mary stiffened. “What?”
“Where’s my daddy?”
“Sweetheart, you don’t have a daddy.”
“Everybody has a daddy.”
Mary felt her heart start to beat faster. It was suddenly hard to breathe. “You don’t have a daddy, Sweetheart. Just me. Just a mommy.”
“But everybody has a daddy,” her child insisted stubbornly.
Mary was shocked. Her child had never, not once, in any dream, talked back to her. Her child had never, not once, in any dream, argued with her. She felt an odd sensation within and realized she was … hurt. And strangely, afraid. “I think it’s time for you to go to bed,” she said firmly, taking the cocoa cup away from her child and walking over to the sink.
“But why won’t you answer my question?” Her child persisted, in a voice that suggested tears might be on the way.
Her child had never, not once, in any dream, cried, and Mary had no idea what to do or say. She just stood there by the sink, silent, holding the half-drunk mug of cocoa and listening to her own breathing speed up and her heart rate accelerate until she felt panicky. Finally, when she thought she might scream or throw the mug to break the unbearable tension, her child stood up, walked over, and hugged her.
“It’s okay, Mommy, you don’t have to answer my question. Will you sing me a bedtime song?”
Mary almost wept with relief. “Of course, Sweetheart. I will sing you as many bedtime songs as you want. I love you.”
“I love you too, Mommy,” her child responded, climbing into bed and reaching for a stuffed panda bear Mary remembered buying for her in a store in another dream. Mary sat on the bed and tucked her child in and sang every lullaby she could recollect, sang them over and over, driving away any memory of their conversation.
*****
Mary woke up feeling as though something were not quite right. She decided to stop on the way to the auto repair shop where she worked at the front desk to treat herself to a nice cup of coffee. She walked up to the door of the coffee shop just down the street from her house at the same time as an elderly gentleman whose smile widened as she approached. He held the door open, allowing her to enter before him. She appreciated that he didn’t crowd her, but instead waited several seconds longer than it took for her to pass across the threshold before following her through, the door’s bell jingling cheerfully as it closed behind him. Mary went up to the counter and ordered a cup of coffee, then walked across the coffee shop to slide into a seat in a booth near the window so she could watch people walk by as she sipped. The elderly gentleman sat at a nearby table, occasionally looking over and smiling at her. Mary understood that he wanted to initiate a conversation, but she wasn’t in the mood to talk.
Finally, he leaned over more conspicuously, impossible to ignore. “Good morning. I’m sorry to interrupt, but I just can’t help it, you’re so pretty. What might your name be?”
Mary evaluated the look on his face and the tone of his voice. He didn’t seem to be hitting on her; his affect was quite paternal, really.
“Mary,” she replied at last, sensing no threat.
“Mary. That’s a pretty name.” His smile included Mary, and the table she sat at, and the empty seat across from her. She hoped he wasn’t thinking of joining her. She started planning how best to make a speedy exit if he did.
He tried again to strike up a conversation: “Not hungry this morning?”
“No,” Mary replied, looking down at her coffee and wishing he would take the hint to leave her alone.
He looked again at the child in the seat across from her, who frowned slightly and shook her head at him before returning her attention to the electronic device in her hand, on which she was evidently playing a game.
“Ahhh, I see,” the man said teasingly, “you’re a little shy!”
Mary wondered if he were, perhaps, unable to pick up on social cues.
The child didn’t look up. I’m not supposed to talk to strangers.
“Oh, I don’t mean any harm,” the man said. “I’m just a lonely old man, don’t pay me any mind. I miss my granddaughters, you see.”
Mary nodded politely and pointedly returned her attention to the scenery outside the window.
The child paused her game to look at him. How many granddaughters do you have?
“I have three,” he answered with another smile. “They live quite a distance from here. But we talk on the phone. Video conferencing.”
I’m looking for my daddy, the child volunteered.
“Well, isn’t that interesting?” The man asked.
“I guess so,” Mary answered, bewildered at this insistence that she respond to his efforts at a conversation. She decided her relaxing coffee had been spoiled, and since he wasn’t leaving, she might as well go, herself. “I’ll be going now–I hope you have a nice day.”
She stood and walked over to the trash bin, placing her cup in the tub for dirty dishes on top of it. The child slipped out of the booth and stood, putting the electronic device in her pocket. Bye, she said to the man.
He smiled and waved: “Goodbye, Mary. It was nice to meet you.”
Disconcerted, Mary hastily opened the door of the coffee shop and stepped outside. The child followed just behind, and the door closed behind them both.
“What a beautiful child,” the man remarked to the middle-aged woman sitting at the table to his other side, who nodded in agreement.
“Her mother’s a bit odd, though,” she replied. “It’s none of my business, of course, but I wouldn’t just ignore my daughter in public like that, as though she didn’t exist.”
In her dream that night, Mary was playing hide-and-seek, but her child was nowhere to be found.
*****
As the days passed, Mary began to wonder what was wrong with people. First, it was the man at the coffee shop, with his strange efforts to engage her in conversation. Then, a woman at the supermarket checkout line who grinned at the front of her shopping cart and offered the carton of eggs sitting there a free balloon, the bank teller at the drive-thru who asked if she preferred red or purple lollipops, and the young couple, wife heavily pregnant, beaming at the empty space beside her and giving her wide berth on the sidewalk as she walked home from work. As a final oddity, the young man who had waited on her at her favorite restaurant (and commented on why she wasn’t hungry despite her having devoured quite a large plate of food, and then asked her if she wanted ice cream with sprinkles on top for dessert) ran after her when she left, brandishing a gaming device: “Miss? Miss? I think your daughter left this.”
Thank you, the child walking just behind her said to him.
Because the waiter was so determined to give it to her Mary took the device, and he smiled at a point just above and to the side of her waist and said “you’re welcome!” and went back inside, leaving Mary to wonder if she had said “thank you” and just not realized it, and why people were behaving so oddly towards her.
Everyone is so strange. It must be a full moon, Mary thought, letting herself into the house and locking the door behind her. She put the gaming device on the table in the hall with the intent to take it back to the restaurant tomorrow on her way to work so they could put it in their lost and found. Some child would be missing it.
*****
When Mary woke up the next morning, frustrated because for the umpteenth night in a row she had not been able to dream her child, she noticed that the gaming device was not on the hall table. Had she just imagined that entire interaction with the waiter? Playing it back over again in her mind, she felt fairly certain it had happened—but if so, where was the gaming device? Had someone broken into her house and taken it? But the door was still locked, and none of the windows were broken. She suddenly felt tired and vaguely sick to her stomach. This is ridiculous, she thought, but maybe I ought to see a doctor just to rule out anything serious. She called and made an appointment to see her general practitioner during her lunch break.
It was wet outside, and the roads were slick with rain and oil. Mary noticed that cars were sliding here and there, threatening to hydroplane, which meant she was probably going to be quite busy at work for the next few days. She hunched her shoulders against the chilly wind that picked up as she walked to work, and then it started to rain harder again. She walked faster. People looked at her with alternating pity and consternation, and one man offered her his umbrella, asking, “aren’t you worried she’ll catch a cold?”
Mary shook her head, thinking she shouldn’t take his umbrella, who knew how far he had to walk, and the auto repair shop was only a block away. “No, thank you, I’m fine.”
I won’t catch a cold, the child answered, splashing her feet in the puddles on the sidewalk and swinging a stuffed panda bear back and forth as she skipped along. I like rainy days. And Mommy will make me cocoa tonight if I want it.
The man smiled at Mary. “Well, isn’t that nice?”
“Isn’t what nice?”
“Cocoa,” the man replied and continued on his way.
For the life of her, Mary couldn’t remember what in their brief conversation had led to cocoa. And she’d certainly heard him say “she’ll” instead of “you’ll,” hadn’t she? She was glad she’d made an appointment with her doctor; she would ask for a hearing test.
At the garage, she settled herself into her seat at the front desk and checked the messages on the answering machine, then logged in to review the reservations made through the online form. A woman came in while she was on the phone confirming a completed repair with another customer. The woman smiled at her, then smiled at the row of chairs in the waiting area. The girl did not look up from her gaming device. The woman returned her attention to Mary: “is she yours?” Mary shook her head impatiently, trying to listen to the other customer on the phone, who was yammering away about his schedule and how inconvenient it was that there wasn’t a drop-off service. She apologized for the inconvenience, reiterated their hours of operation, and hoped he’d have a nice day, then hung up.
Turning her attention to the woman in front of her, Mary recalled that she had said something while the man on the phone was talking, but she hadn’t quite heard what: “I’m sorry, did you say you were dropping off or picking up?” The woman requested an oil change and said she could come back later that afternoon. When they completed the appointment, the woman smiled again at Mary and then at the chairs in the waiting area. The girl was still intent on her device, heedless of the adults in the room, lost in child’s absorption in the task before her, a stuffed panda tucked securely against her side. “Maybe she’s one of the mechanics’?”
Mary followed the woman’s glance, but there was nothing in the waiting area except the chairs and coffee station and television showing the morning news. She had no idea what the woman was talking about, so she just shrugged and told her to have a nice day.
Mary answered phones, and cashed in repair checks, and took people’s money and fielded strange comments about how patient she was, and how good she was being, and strange questions about why she wasn’t at school today, and what game she was playing, all morning before she clocked out just before noon and stepped outside.
It was sunny now, although big, slick puddles remained on both the sidewalk and the street. Mary felt her shoe slide, almost lost her balance, managed to stay upright.
“Careful,” said a man walking past her. “You don’t want to get your shoes all wet.”
They’re already all wet, the child said crossly, scowling at him. You’re not my daddy.
Mary glanced back at him, wondering why on earth he would say something like that to a complete stranger; she wasn’t a child, after all.
She crossed a street at the walk signal and turned the corner, heading down the final block on the way to her doctor’s clinic. This was a busy street with lots of people heading to lunch appointments and meetings and dates, and the sidewalk was crowded. She waited with several people at the crosswalk across the street from the clinic. They politely gave her space to herself; maybe they could tell she wasn’t feeling well. A woman smiled in her direction. “Off to lunch with your mommy?”
Mary ignored her. She was tired of strangers asking her strange questions. The child replied, no, I’m looking for my daddy.
The stoplight changed to red, the signal turned to “walk,” and the crowd stepped off the sidewalk to cross the street. Mary held back a little to let the woman who’d spoken to her pass by, then began her own trek across the street. She slipped in a slick puddle, almost falling, righted herself, started to walk again, and slid alarmingly. She cried out and hands reached for her, grasping her arm and waist to help her to more secure footing.
The child lost her footing as her wet shoes met the slick puddle, and in her struggle to right herself, she let go of the panda, which went flying to land in the road with a soggy, squishing sound. My panda! The child cried out and ran back to retrieve it.
The stoplight changed from red to green.
Mary reached the far curb safely. Suddenly, the people around her were screaming. The hands that had helped her cross the street grasped her more firmly, protectively.
She turned to see what had happened.
A car was stopped in the road, its driver’s-side door flung open, its engine idling. In front of it lay a child. The child was not moving. Near her still hand lay a wet, dirty stuffed panda. The car’s driver was scrambling to the child’s side, a look of horror on his face. Everyone was on their phones calling the police. An accident …. There’s a dead little girl in the street …
“Are you the mother?” The hands asked.
Mary went limp, and the hands caught and held her as she sobbed.
*****
When Mary came to, she was in the hospital. She was sore and bruised, and her head ached from screaming and her throat ached from sobbing. The nurses tried to be kind and supportive. What a terrible shock. The poor little girl, so beautiful. What would Mary do now? It was a terrible thing, to lose a child.
It wasn’t my child. I don’t have a child, Mary said, over and over. She told it to the police; she told it to the doctors; she told it to the nurses; she told it to the psychiatrist they brought in to evaluate her mental state.
“You have a visitor,” a nurse said brightly.
“How are you?” The hands came into the room and sat down in the chair by her bed.
Mary wondered why those hands had come to visit her. Did she know them? She tried to force her mind to remember any previous encounter, but all she recalled were the hands reaching out to her, holding her, as the terrible accident unfolded.
“I’m sorry for just dropping in like this, but I was worried about you. After. Whether you were okay. That poor little girl.”
“It wasn’t my child. I don’t have a child,” Mary answered.
“It was still a terrible shock,” the hands said. “Such an upsetting thing to witness. You must have been so afraid.”
“No,” Mary said, “I wasn’t afraid. I didn’t see anything.” But that was a lie. She had seen the child lying lifeless in the road. She had seen the panda bear lying in the puddle. She closed her eyes tightly, willing the vision away. It wasn’t her child. Her child was safe in a dream, hiding from her, angry not to have a daddy. Her child was safe because she wasn’t real, and Mary started to cry.
“Can I do anything for you?” The hands asked.
Are you my daddy? The child asked hopefully from where she sat across the room, clutching the bedraggled panda bear in the crook of her arm and playing a game on a device. The hands did not seem to see or hear her. They were focused entirely on the woman in the bed.
Mary opened her eyes and took a deep raggedy breath and looked down at the hands, then up at the face above the hands. The face belonged to a man. He looked very kind, and very concerned. There was a gentle glow about him, and a promise of joy and happiness. As she felt the warmth of the hands that reached out and grasped hers, she smelled family dinners, heard delighted laughter over silly jokes, tasted the bright hope of a dream coming true.
The child across the room smiled and dissolved. The man smiled at Mary.
“Would you like some hot chocolate?” he asked.
Melissa Ridley Elmes is a Virginia native currently living in Missouri in an apartment that delightfully approximates a hobbit hole. Her poetry and fiction have appeared in Gyroscope, In Parentheses, Thimble, The World of Myth, Spillwords, and various other print and web venues, and her first collection of poems, Arthurian Things, was published by Dark Myth Publications in 2020.