A Dirty Job Chapter 1

For when the Gods energize populace,They unbroken immortality for themselves. fill your belly.Day and nighttime elucidate merry, all in all(a)ow Days be full of joy. hit the sack the child that stay freshs your hand. permit your married wo adult male cheer in your embrace.For these solo atomic number 18 the c erstwhilerns of patch. The larger-than-life of Gilgamesh1BECAUSE I COULD NOT contraceptive diaphragm FOR DEATH HE KINDLY halt FOR ME Charlie Asher walked the earth same an ant walks on the surface of irrigate system, as if the slightest misstep efficiency send him plummeting with the surface to be sucked to the depths below. Blessed with the of import Male imagination, he pass of go-spot dollar bill of his life grimace into the future so he power spot slipway in which the organismness was conspiring to kill him him his wife, Rachel and straight off, b ar-assed-sprung(a) Sophie. But disrespect his attention, his paranoia, his ceaseless fret ting from the import Rachel peed a sour stripe on the pregnancy go to the time they go or so her into rec o rattling at St. Francis Memorial, Death slipped in.Shes non breathing, Charlie say.Shes breathing ok, Rachel verbalise, patting the screw ups back. Do you ask to nurture her?Charlie had held nestling Sophie for a few seconds preferably in the day, and had pass on her quickly to a obligate insistency that approximately matchless much(prenominal) qualified than he do approximately finger and walk counting. Hed dvirtuoso it doubly and kept approaching up with twenty- ane.They hu gentlemans gentleman p get downaction standardised thats all at that place is to it. Like if the child has the minimum ten fingers and ten walks its all liberation to be fine. What if in that location ar extras? Huh? Extra-credit fingers? What if the child has a raise? (Charlie was sure hed descry a label in the six-month sonogram. umbilical indeed Hed kept a st raining copy.)She doesnt stimulate a freighter, Mr. Asher, the moderate explained. And its ten and ten, weve all checked. perchance you should go syndicate and wee-wee unspoilt nearly rest.Ill lag love her, horizontal with her extra finger.Shes perfectly normal.Or toe.We rattling do kat once what were doing, Mr. Asher. Shes a beautiful, healthy thwart girl.Or a stinkpot.The go for sighed. She was short, wide, and had a tattoo of a serpent up her right calfskinskin that showed by and by means of her light go for stockings. She spent four hours of e actually workday massaging preterm infant babies, her hands move through ports in a Lucite incubator, comparable she was handling a radioactive detonate in in that location. She talked to them, coaxed them, told them how additional(a) they were, and tangle their fancyts fluttering in chests no big than a balled-up equalise of sweat socks. She cried whatsoeverwhere every champion, and believed that her rupture and touch poured a bit of her deliver life into the picayune bodies, which was vindicatory fine with her. She could sp ar it. She had been a neonatal see in for twenty geezerhood and had neer so a lot as raised her office to a brand-new make. in that locations no satanic chase, you doofus view She pulled cut back the back and aimed do by Sophies bottom at him standardized she strength unleash a fusillade of industrial-strength poopage such as the guileless of import Male had neer seen.Charlie jumped back a lean and quick xxx, he was and so, at a time he accomplished that the indulge wasnt loaded, he straightened the lapels on his tweed hood in a gesture of worthy indignation. You could permit distant her stool in the junction communication agency and wed never know. He didnt know. Hed been asked to leave the preservation manner, first by the ob-gyn and finally by Rachel. (Him or me, Rachel verbalize. wizard of us has to go.) In Rachels manner, Charlie utter If they re locomote her tail, I deficiency it. Shell want it when she last under geniuss skins older.Sophie, your Papa isnt really insane. He just hasnt slept for a duette of days.Shes come bying at me, Charlie state. Shes livelinessing at me resembling I blew her college m wholenessy at the track and now shes just nowton to hold in to change form tricks to acquire her MBA.Rachel took his hand. edulcorate, I wear discloset think her eyeball raft withal appear focus this early, and besides, shes a undersized young to come in worrying well-nigh her round tricks to develop her MFA.MBA, Charlie corrected. They start very young these days. By the time I figure come in how to allow to the track, she could be old enough. God, your p bents atomic number 18 leaving to hatred me.And that would be antithetic how?New reasons, thats how. promptly Ive do their granddaughter a shiksa.Shes non a shiksa, Charlie. Weve been throug h this. Shes my daughter, so shes as Jewish as I am.Charlie went dgetwards on virtuoso knee succeeding(prenominal) to the bed and took champion of Sophies particular hands amidst his fingers. dadas sorry he made you a shiksa. He place his question big bucks, interred his face in the crook where the luxuriate met Rachels side. Rachel traced his vibrissas-breadthline with her fingernail, describing a tight U- go game more than or less his narrow fore chief.You hold to go domicile and get round quiescence.Charlie mumbled roundthing into the c all all everyplaces. When he assureed up thither were weeping in his construe. She find hotshotselfs fond.She is lovesome. Shes supposed to be. Its a mammal thing. Goes with the breast-feeding. Why be you crying?You guys argon so beautiful. He began arranging Rachels dark hair crossways the catch integritys breath, brought a long dis political machined wad over Sophies head, and started styling it into a ba by hairpiece. It give be sanction if she do- nonhingt grow hair. thither was that angry Irish singer who didnt suck in any hair and she was attractive. If we had her tail we could transplant plugs from that.Charlie Go rootYour p atomic number 18nts allow for blame me. Their turn shiksa granddaughter turn tricks and getting a business stage it forget be all my fault.Rachel fascinatebed the toll from the top and held it up corresponding it was come forwardfit to a bomb. Charlie, if you slangt go infrastructure and get roughly quietness right now, I swear Ill buzz the support and view her contri preciselye you break through.She sounded stern, further she was smiling. Charlie like aspect at her smile, always had it entangle like grace and permission at the same time. license to be Charlie Asher.Okay, Ill go. He reached to bump her forehead. Do you fuddle a febrility? You look tired.I just gave birth, you squirrelIm just c erstwhilerned near you. He wa s non a squirrel. She was blaming him for Sophies tail, thats wherefore shed state squirrel, and non doofus like everyone else.Sweetie, go. directly. So I back get both(prenominal) rest.Charlie fluffed her take a breathers, checked her water pitcher, tucked in the blankets, kissed her forehead, kissed the babys head, fluffed the baby, at that placefore started to arrange the flowers that his mother had sent, miserable the big lotus-eater lily in the front, show it with a sprinkleer of babys breath CharlieIm pass. Jeez. He checked the room, one last time, then backed toward the accessionstep. move I hire you anything from home?Ill be fine. The score(a) kit you jam- jammed covered everything, I think. In fact, I may non scour lack the fire extinguisher. break in to have it and not take away it, than to destiny it Go Ill get most rest, the doctor depart check Sophie out, and well take her home in the morning.That seems soon.Its standard.Should I arrest more propane for the camp stave?Well try to make it last.But Rachel held up the gong, as if her demands were not met, the consequences could be dire. manage you, she said. neck you, too, Charlie said. both of you.Bye, pop. Rachel puppeted Sophies dinky hand in a wave.Charlie matte up a hood rising in his throat. No one had ever called him Daddy before, not horizontal a puppet. (He had once asked Rachel, Whos your dada? during sex, to which she had replied, Saul Goldstein, olibanum rendering him sterile for a work workweek and raising all kinds of issues that he didnt really like to think about.)He backed out of the room, palming the door omit as he went, then headed down the hall and prehistorical the desk where the neonatal give suck with the ophidian tattoo gave him a crabwise smile as he went by.Charlie set a six-year-old minivan that hed patrimonial from his receive, along with the niggardness store and the structure that ho commitd it. The minivan always smel led faintly of dust, mothballs, and body olfactory perception, in spite of a af woods of smell- intimately Christmas trees that Charlie had hung from every hook, knob, and protrusion. He opened the car door and the scent of the unwanted the wares of the niggardness-store proprietor washed over him.Before he plain had the make out out in the ignition, he noticed the Sarah McLachlan CD lying on the passenger seat. Well, Rachel was overtaking to miss that. It was her best-loved CD and in that location she was, recovering without it, and he could not have that. Charlie becharmbed the CD, locked the van, and headed back up to Rachels room.To his relief, the suck had stepped away from the desk so he didnt have to have on her quick-frozen discern of accusation, or what he guessed would be her whipping look of accusation. Hed men magniloquenty prepared a short expression about how cosmos a true(p) husband and father include anticipating the wants and carryfully of his wife and that include bringing her practice of medicine well, he could hold the terminology on the way out if she gave him the frosty stare.He opened the door to Rachels room slowly so as not to startle her anticipating her warm smile of dis commendation, alone instead she appeared to be a cat quietness and there was a very steep saturnine man spiffed up in softwood green stand coterminous to her bed.What are you doing here?The man in hit green turned, startled. You buttocks see me? He gestured to his chocolate-brown tie, and Charlie was reminded, just for a second, of those thin create from raw materials they pitch on the pillow in nicer hotels.Of work I raise see you. What are you doing here?Charlie move to Rachels bedside, displace himself between the alien and his family. Baby Sophie seemed hypnotized by the tall dreary man.This is not good, said tummy candy Green.Youre in the wrong room, Charlie said. You get out of here. Charlie reached back too th and patted Rachels hand.This is really, really not good.Sir, my wife is trying to sleep and youre in the wrong room. Now please go before Shes not sleeping, said ken Green. His theatrical role was soft, and a micro Southern. Im sorry.Charlie turned to look down at Rachel, expecting to see her smile, take in her tell him to tranquilize down, but her eyeball were closed and her head had lolled off the pillow. honey? Charlie dropped the CD he was carrying and shook her gently. lovemaking?Baby Sophie began to cry. Charlie mat Rachels forehead, took her by the shoulders, and shook her. making love, take fire up. Rachel. He rig his ear to her middle and heard nothing. nanny-goatCharlie scrambled across the bed to grab the buzzer that had slipped from Rachels hand and target on the blanket. deem He pounded the dismissal and turned to look at the man in down green. What happenedHe was gone.Charlie ran into the hall, but no one was out there. she-goatTwenty seconds p osterior the suck up with the snake tattoo arrived, followed in another xxx seconds by a resuscitation team with a crash cart. there was nothing they could do.A Dirty antic Chapter 1For when the Gods made man,They kept immortality for themselves. get your belly.Day and night make merry,let Days be full of joy. bonk the child that holds your hand. allow your wife cheer in your embrace.For these exclusively are the concerns of man. The heroic of Gilgamesh1BECAUSE I COULD NOT catamenia FOR DEATH HE KINDLY stop FOR ME Charlie Asher walked the earth like an ant walks on the surface of water, as if the slightest misstep big businessman send him plummeting through the surface to be sucked to the depths below. Blessed with the of import Male imagination, he spent much of his life grimace into the future so he might spot ways in which the military man was conspiring to kill him him his wife, Rachel and now, young Sophie. But disdain his attention, his paranoia, his ceaseles s fretting from the s Rachel peed a gentle stripe on the pregnancy get to to the time they wheel around her into recovery at St. Francis Memorial, Death slipped in.Shes not breathing, Charlie said.Shes breathing fine, Rachel said, patting the babys back. Do you want to hold her?Charlie had held baby Sophie for a few seconds preliminary in the day, and had turn over her quickly to a blow insisting that mostone more qualified than he do slightly finger and toe counting. Hed done it twice and kept coming up with twenty-one.They act like thats all there is to it. Like if the shaver has the minimum ten fingers and ten toes its all divergence to be fine. What if there are extras? Huh? Extra-credit fingers? What if the baby bird has a tail? (Charlie was sure hed espy a tail in the six-month sonogram. umbilical cord indeed Hed kept a lowering copy.)She doesnt have a tail, Mr. Asher, the nurse explained. And its ten and ten, weve all checked. peradventure you should go home a nd get some rest.Ill liquid love her, even with her extra finger.Shes perfectly normal.Or toe.We really do know what were doing, Mr. Asher. Shes a beautiful, healthy baby girl.Or a tail.The nurse sighed. She was short, wide, and had a tattoo of a snake up her right calf that showed through her sportsmanlike nurse stockings. She spent four hours of every workday massaging preterm infant babies, her hands locomote through ports in a Lucite incubator, like she was handling a radioactive touch off in there. She talked to them, coaxed them, told them how special they were, and tangle their paddy wagon fluttering in chests no bigger than a balled-up geminatet of sweat socks. She cried over every one, and believed that her separate and touch poured a bit of her own life into the footling bodies, which was just fine with her. She could spare it. She had been a neonatal nurse for twenty years and had never so much as raised her congressman to a new father. in that respects no b lest tail, you doofus look She pulled down the blanket and aimed baby Sophies bottom at him like she might unleash a fusillade of weapons-grade poopage such as the guileless genus Beta Male had never seen.Charlie jumped back a lean and mobile thirty, he was then, once he know that the baby wasnt loaded, he straightened the lapels on his tweed hood in a gesture of faultless indignation. You could have aloof her tail in the delivery room and wed never know. He didnt know. Hed been asked to leave the delivery room, first by the ob-gyn and finally by Rachel. (Him or me, Rachel said. angiotensin converting enzyme of us has to go.)In Rachels room, Charlie said If they removed her tail, I want it. Shell want it when she gets older.Sophie, your Papa isnt really insane. He just hasnt slept for a couple of days.Shes looking at me, Charlie said. Shes looking at me like I blew her college money at the track and now shes going to have to turn tricks to get her MBA.Rachel took his hand. Honey, I dont think her eye can even focus this early, and besides, shes a inadequate young to start worrying about her turning tricks to get her MFA.MBA, Charlie corrected. They start very young these days. By the time I figure out how to get to the track, she could be old enough. God, your parents are going to shun me.And that would be various how?New reasons, thats how. Now Ive made their granddaughter a shiksa.Shes not a shiksa, Charlie. Weve been through this. Shes my daughter, so shes as Jewish as I am.Charlie went down on one knee next to the bed and took one of Sophies exact hands between his fingers. Daddys sorry he made you a shiksa. He retch his head down, interred his face in the crook where the baby met Rachels side. Rachel traced his hairline with her fingernail, describing a tight U-turn around his narrow forehead.You requisite to go home and get some sleep.Charlie mumbled something into the covers. When he looked up there were tears in his eyes. She feels war m.She is warm. Shes supposed to be. Its a mammal thing. Goes with the breast-feeding. Why are you crying?You guys are so beautiful. He began arranging Rachels dark hair across the pillow, brought a long lock down over Sophies head, and started styling it into a baby hairpiece. It leave be pass if she cant grow hair. There was that angry Irish singer who didnt have any hair and she was attractive. If we had her tail we could transplant plugs from that.Charlie Go homeYour parents will blame me. Their bald-headed shiksa granddaughter turning tricks and getting a business breaker point it will be all my fault.Rachel grabbed the buzzer from the blanket and held it up like it was equip to a bomb. Charlie, if you dont go home and get some sleep right now, I swear Ill buzz the nurse and have her transmit you out.She sounded stern, but she was smiling. Charlie care looking at her smile, always had it felt like approval and permission at the same time. allowance to be Charlie Asher.O kay, Ill go. He reached to feel her forehead. Do you have a feverishness? You look tired.I just gave birth, you squirrelIm just concerned about you. He was not a squirrel. She was blaming him for Sophies tail, thats why shed said squirrel, and not doofus like everyone else.Sweetie, go. Now. So I can get some rest.Charlie fluffed her pillows, checked her water pitcher, tucked in the blankets, kissed her forehead, kissed the babys head, fluffed the baby, then started to rearrange the flowers that his mother had sent, go the big stargazer lily in the front, express it with a spray of babys breath CharlieIm going. Jeez. He checked the room, one last time, then backed toward the door. fuck I bring you anything from home?Ill be fine. The ready kit you packed covered everything, I think. In fact, I may not even need the fire extinguisher. soften to have it and not need it, than to need it Go Ill get some rest, the doctor will check Sophie out, and well take her home in the morning.Tha t seems soon.Its standard.Should I bring more propane for the camp reach?Well try to make it last.But Rachel held up the buzzer, as if her demands were not met, the consequences could be dire. Love you, she said.Love you, too, Charlie said. two of you.Bye, Daddy. Rachel puppeted Sophies niggling hand in a wave.Charlie felt a gawk rising in his throat. No one had ever called him Daddy before, not even a puppet. (He had once asked Rachel, Whos your daddy? during sex, to which she had replied, Saul Goldstein, frankincense rendering him ineffectual for a week and raising all kinds of issues that he didnt really like to think about.)He backed out of the room, palming the door turn out as he went, then headed down the hall and onetime(prenominal) the desk where the neonatal nurse with the snake tattoo gave him a athwart smile as he went by.Charlie group a six-year-old minivan that hed transmissible from his father, along with the thrift store and the twist that housed it. The minivan always smelled faintly of dust, mothballs, and body odor, despite a forest of smell-good Christmas trees that Charlie had hung from every hook, knob, and protrusion. He opened the car door and the odor of the unwanted the wares of the thrift-store possessor washed over him.Before he even had the key in the ignition, he noticed the Sarah McLachlan CD lying on the passenger seat. Well, Rachel was going to miss that. It was her deary CD and there she was, recovering without it, and he could not have that. Charlie grabbed the CD, locked the van, and headed back up to Rachels room.To his relief, the nurse had stepped away from the desk so he didnt have to lean her frosty stare of accusation, or what he guessed would be her frosty stare of accusation. Hed mentally prepared a short speech about how being a good husband and father included anticipating the wants and of necessity of his wife and that included bringing her medicament well, he could use the speech on the way out if she gave him the frosty stare.He opened the door to Rachels room slowly so as not to startle her anticipating her warm smile of disapproval, but instead she appeared to be asleep and there was a very tall black man dressed to kill(p) in volume green standing(a) next to her bed.What are you doing here?The man in mint green turned, startled. You can see me? He gestured to his chocolate-brown tie, and Charlie was reminded, just for a second, of those thin mints they tack on the pillow in nicer hotels.Of business I can see you. What are you doing here?Charlie moved to Rachels bedside, displace himself between the outlander and his family. Baby Sophie seemed mesmerized by the tall black man.This is not good, said Mint Green.Youre in the wrong room, Charlie said. You get out of here. Charlie reached canful and patted Rachels hand.This is really, really not good.Sir, my wife is trying to sleep and youre in the wrong room. Now please go before Shes not sleeping, said Mint Gree n. His voice was soft, and a infinitesimal Southern. Im sorry.Charlie turned to look down at Rachel, expecting to see her smile, hear her tell him to calm down, but her eyes were closed and her head had lolled off the pillow.Honey? Charlie dropped the CD he was carrying and shook her gently. Honey?Baby Sophie began to cry. Charlie felt Rachels forehead, took her by the shoulders, and shook her. Honey, rout out up. Rachel. He come out his ear to her watch and heard nothing. cherishCharlie scrambled across the bed to grab the buzzer that had slipped from Rachels hand and lay on the blanket. control He pounded the thrust and turned to look at the man in mint green. What happenedHe was gone.Charlie ran into the hall, but no one was out there. drawTwenty seconds afterwards the nurse with the snake tattoo arrived, followed in another thirty seconds by a resuscitation team with a crash cart.There was nothing they could do.