Chapter 7: Please Don't Eat the Placenta

[pascal_curious]

 

 

Andromeda Lesath Curious arrived on this planet at 3:48 AM on November first. I named her after Andromeda, the beautiful daughter of Cepheus and Cassiopeia, also our nearest large neighbor galaxy, and Lesath, Scorpius's Upsilon star.

 

 

The look on Circe Beaker’s face when she entered my room was priceless. The sight of me mostly naked is horrendous enough itself, but add to it soiled sheets and a green baby attached to a bloody placenta and you have the makings of a truly terrifying recurring nightmare.

 

“OH. MY. GOD,” she exclaimed. “How the…” she paused for a moment, apparently in search of the appropriate words. “No. Never mind. I don’t want to know how this was even possible. I’ll just do what needs to be done and pretend that this is a perfectly normal occurrence.

 

She approached the bedside and took the baby from my arms.

 

“Men giving birth to green babies, it happens all the time.” She continued trying to convince herself as she went about her work.

 

“You see it in those newspapers every week. You know the ones. They’re the ones near the checkout at the grocery store, right next to the ones with the headlines about Jesus’ face on a piece of toast and the vice president being a cross-dressing transsexual hooker.” She mumbled more about headless chickens, bat-boys and Bigfoot’s gay lover as she ministered to Andromeda. She finally placed Andromeda, freshly cleaned, diapered with a dish towel, offending placenta detached, and swaddled in a fluffy bath towel in Vidcund’s outstretched arms.  

Vidcund held her as if she had infectious leprosy.

 

“It’s a baby, Vidcund, not a bomb. Hold her like this.” Circe corrected him by placing Andromeda's head in the crook of one of his arms and wrapping his other arm around her body.

 

Vidcund held Andromeda as instructed while Circe went about barking orders to the rest of us.

 

“You,” she said, pointing at me, “Go take a shower.” I got up, grabbed a clean pair of boxers and headed for the shower.

 

“Lazlo, you change the bedclothes,” she commanded. “And if the mattress is wet, flip it before you put on the clean sheets.”

 

“Nervous, you can help me clean up this mess,” she explained, pointing to the afterbirth on the floor. “Get some plastic grocery bags and wrap everything up in them, then put them in a black garbage bag and put it out in the garbage bin.”

 

“You can’t put that out in the garbage. Garbage pickup isn’t for four days, it will stink to high heaven by then,” argued Lazlo as he stripped the sheets from my bed.

 

“Hmm, I guess you’re right,” she stated, scratching her head. “You will have to wrap it up and put it in the freezer until garbage day.”

 

Nervous made a retching noise as he picked up the placenta with the aforementioned plastic grocery bag. He tied the bag closed and took it to the kitchen to wrap it more thoroughly. 

 

“And for the love of God, make sure nobody eats it,” Circe advised.

 

Nervous, being tired and irritable, got a wild hair up his ass and wrote 'EAT ME’ on the package with black magic marker .  Grinning deviously, he shoved the parcel in the freezer and slammed the door closed.

 

By the time I emerged from the bathroom order had been restored to my room. Lazlo and Nervous sat patiently on the bed and Vidcund sat on the chair in the corner anxiously cradling my daughter.

 

Circe approached me as I entered the room and made a general assessment of my condition. She examined my scarred bellybutton and then proceeded to inspect my chest.

 

“What are these?” she demanded, cupping my flat little man boobs in her hands. You don’t even have any tits! How are you going to feed her? She is going to need to be fed about every two hours.”

 

In a shocking moment of clarity, the reality of the enormous responsibility of being a father, a single father, hit me like a ton of bricks.

 

“I hadn’t really thought of that,” I responded feebly.

 

“This is the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen. Men having babies! What idiot came up with this idea,” she grumbled.

 

A weak cough came from Vidcund’s corner of the room. He shifted uneasily in his chair.

 

“Lazlo, you and Nervous are going to have to go to the MegaMart and get some things. I will write you a list of what you need.”

 

Circe took Andromeda from Vidcund’s arms and handed her to me. She instructed me on the proper way to cradle a baby.

 

 I suddenly felt incredibly inadequate. I knew nothing about how to care for a baby. What was I going to do after everyone left? 

 

Circe noticed my discomfiture and her demeanor softened. “Don’t worry Pascal, I will write down some instructions for you.” She smiled at me sympathetically and lightly caressed Andromeda’s cheek.   “You will be fine, and so will she.”

 

 

Comments

[kin-thalas.livejournal.com]

I love unorthodox thoughts and spirits. It makes the world not so boring and "normal".
And hey, we´re here for fun ;)