Chapter 9

Meeda doesn’t need eight years of therapy to understand she is the woman on the steps and the child standing by her side, Janie. She was such a good girl. But then came Nathan. What was the saying? Wednesday’s child is full of woe. That was Nathan. She would sit and rock him for hours. And he would scream and scream. Nothing worked. Not the warm milk, the patting, the caressing, the soft tone of her voice whispering in his ear. “Quiet, Nathan, quiet.”

“Rats in the cellar,” she’d told the young clerk at Miller’s Hardware. “I’ve tried everything. Everything.” And to this day, as far as Meeda was concerned, she had.

So she bought the colorless crystals in the bottle with the red plastic cap and mixed them in with Nathan’s formula. Just to get a little sleep, she told herself.

Meeda is almost there now. Only a few more blocks to go.