After Ava left, in something of an officious huff, Jordan placed baby Ernie in the electric swing, where he fussed for a few minutes before falling asleep.

When Ava returned an hour and fifteen minutes later, Ernie was still in the swing. He had slipped down a little; his head was cocked at an uncomfortable-looking angle, but everybody knew that babies’ necks were made of rubber.

Ava squawked, “Has he been in there the whole time?”

Jordan looked up from the crossword puzzle, which he always saved for last. “No.”

Jake, who was sitting at the kitchen counter eating a bowl of Golden Grahams, said, “Yes.”

“It’s a swing, Jordan,” Ava said, snapping off the power and unbuckling Ernie. “Not a babysitter.” She picked Ernie up. “And he’s soaked right through his outfit. Jesus Christ.”

Jordan raised his head and offered a half-hearted smile of apology, but really his mind was occupied with trying to summon up the French word for “winter.” Five letters.

Ava left the room.

Jake slurped his milk. “You blew it,” he said.

“Hiver!” Jordan remembered.


Later, to make amends, Jordan offered to take care of the baby while he watched a March Madness game with Jake: BYU vs. Florida. Then he volunteered to run out to the Stop & Shop for a few things that Ava needed, and he said he would take the baby with him.

“It’s too cold for the baby to go out,” Ava said.

“Nonsense,” Jordan said. “We are a hearty, seafaring people.” He bundled the baby up, packed him into his bucket car seat, and set out for the store. He was more than making amends now; he was stockpiling chits. The shadows of Town Meeting and Diana Hugo at home with mono loomed. Jordan was tempted to stop by the office-just for an hour or two-with Ernie. But no, that was a bad idea; Ava would need to breastfeed the baby. He would work later, he told himself. He would head in to the paper after Ernie was asleep.

Was there anything unusual about the nine o’clock feeding? About the midnight feeding? Later Jordan would rack his brain and come up with nothing. He gave Ernie a bottle at each feeding, and both times Ernie sucked it dry. Jordan burped him perhaps a little more thoroughly with the first feeding. At midnight, instead of feeling the leaden exhaustion that normally weighed him down at that hour, Jordan was agitated by his need to get to the office. He set Ernie down in his crib on his back. Ernie was asleep; he fussed for a minute, just long enough for Jordan to worry that he would wake himself up, which would mean that the process of putting him to sleep would have to be restarted. But then he quieted, and Jordan tiptoed from the room, closing the door halfway behind him, as Ava liked it, so she could hear the baby if he cried.

Jordan then, feeling like a cat burglar, or like a teenager sneaking out to meet his girlfriend, left the house. He went to work.


Ernie’s death was not Jordan’s fault. Intellectually, he knew this. He and Ava, just like most people, were educated about SIDS, or Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. But the possibility of its affecting them seemed remote. Neither of them knew anyone, or even knew anyone who knew anyone, who had lost a baby to SIDS. It was a tragedy that resided elsewhere-maybe in a trailer park somewhere on the outskirts of Detroit, where both parents smoked and the mother worked the third shift at the Ford factory and the father, who was only nineteen himself, put the baby to sleep facedown in smothering, too-soft covers. SIDS didn’t happen in a relatively affluent household with intelligent, doting parents.

Except it did.


Ernie’s death was not Jordan’s fault.

But Ernie’s head had been cocked at that funny angle in the swing for… forty-five minutes? an hour? Why couldn’t Jordan have just held him? Was that too much to ask?

And Jordan had taken Ernie outside in cold, wet, windy weather. Who knew how that had affected his lungs?

And when Ava was awakened by the hot, uncomfortable throbbing of her breasts (her milk was starting to leak); when she walked down the hall to the nursery, feeling astonished that Ernie had slept until five and ambivalent about waking him up to feed him; when she looked at Ernie and knew that something wasn’t right, that he was sick or something; when she picked him up and he didn’t yield and meld into her arms, he wasn’t warm, he wasn’t breathing; when Ava screamed (like a woman in a horror film, Jake would remember later, as if she were getting butchered by a chainsaw)-when all of that happened, Jordan wasn’t home. Ava was calling his name, she ran into the bedroom crying, jiggling the baby, slapping his tiny cheeks, trying to revive him.

“Jordan!” she shrieked. “JORDAN!”

At the moment when Ava called out for him, he was probably locking up the office, exhausted but satisfied with all that he’d accomplished. He was finally getting caught up.

“JORDAN!”

Ava had raced through the house, clutching lifeless baby Ernie to her chest; milk was flowing all over the front of her nightshirt. Her breasts were on fire, they hurt like hell. Ava sat at the kitchen stool and tried to nurse the baby, thinking that once he smelled the breast, he would wake up. But at the same time, she knew. Her engorged nipple dripped over an unresponsive mouth. She started bawling. Then there were hands on her. Jake.

Jake said, “Mom?”

She said, “Where’s your father?”

Jake said, “Um, I don’t know?”

Ava said, “Call nine-one-one.”

He said, “Why?”


Ernie’s death was not Jordan’s fault. But he could not bear to imagine those moments in the house-the moment when Ava discovered that Ernie wasn’t breathing, the moment when she tried to breastfeed him, the moment when Jake realized that his brother was dead-because the guilt leveled him each time.

He was not there.

He was at work.


When Jordan finally stumbled out of the bar at four o’clock, it was nearly dark. Nearly dark at four o’clock? He panicked. Would Ava and Jake be back? Jordan was drunk now. He needed a short black and a nap. Why was it so dark at four o’clock?

And then he remembered. It was July. Winter.


“How was it?” he asked Jake later. Jake and Ava had walked in the door at quarter to seven, which had given Jordan enough time to drink three cups of coffee and four glasses of water, take a nap, take a shower, and make himself a sandwich.

“Mmmmm,” Jake said.

“And that means?”

“It was lovely,” Ava interjected. She kissed Jake on the cheek, and Jake made a face, but she didn’t notice. She was breezy and happy, she was humming. Of course spending the day with her family would make her feel that way. Jordan was surprised she wasn’t bubbling over with bits of news and gossip; probably she knew how little he wanted to hear any of it.

Ava disappeared into the front part of the house, and Jordan tried again with his son. “Can I make you a sandwich?”

“Yes, please.”

“Did you eat at the park?”

“Sort of,” Jake said. “I had a sausage, but that was a while ago.”

“Did you kiss your grandmother?”

“Yes.”

“And you met Greta and Noah and…”

“Yes, everybody. There are a million more cousins now. All with names like Doobie and Spooner and Pats. Xavier was the only one I remembered. I couldn’t keep the rest of them straight.”

“I’m sure no one expected you to.”

“One of Mom’s sisters married an Aboriginal guy? Those kids were the only ones I really liked. You could tell they felt as much out of place as I did.”

“May, your Aunt May. Married to… what’s the guy’s name?”

“I can’t remember.”

“Doug, I think. He works at a bank. So those kids were nice?”

“I guess,” Jake said. “They were all way younger than me. I mostly threw the ball with them and stuff.”

“I’m sure your aunt appreciated that.”

“Mom acted weird. She kept kissing me and touching my hair and asking everyone, didn’t they think I was handsome, and she told them all how I was going to be a senior, only she called it Year Thirteen, which bugged me, and then she said I was going to ‘uni,’ which bugged me, and then one of the uncles… the big guy with the mustache?”

“Damon,” Jordan said, proud of himself for remembering.

“He told me I should go to uni in Australia, and Mom sounded like she thought this was the best idea she’d ever heard. But just so you know, I’m not going to uni or college or whatever in Australia. I’m going at home.”

“Of course,” Jordan said. He pulled out some bread for Jake’s sandwich. “Did anyone ask about me?”

“Everyone did. Mom said you were at home resting.”

“Did she?” Jordan said. “Well, that’s an interesting reversal.”

Jake snorted. “To you, maybe.”


That night, after they got into bed and shut off the light, Ava rolled toward Jordan and slid her hand between his legs.

Jordan’s arm shot out and nearly hit her in the face. She continued on, undeterred. Her hand stroked the front of his boxer shorts.

Jordan didn’t know what to do. He was paralyzed with confusion. He and Ava hadn’t made love in four years. Four years. Since before Ernie. After Ernie, Ava hadn’t wanted to. She was too sad at first, and too angry, too bitter and resentful. After a few months Jordan had tried to reason with her: they could try again for another baby. They could make this a story with a happy ending. Surely that was what she wanted?

“If we have another baby, it won’t be Ernie,” Ava said. “It won’t be Ernie!”

He knew what she meant. He saw that his own desire to have another child was nothing more than a selfish way of exonerating himself. He didn’t really want another child.

There was no sex at all that first year. During the second year Jordan tried again. He tried romance: on nights when Jake was sleeping over at the Alistair house, he lit candles and poured champagne. But he got nowhere with Ava. By then her anger and sadness had hardened into an enamel shell of indifference. She read Moby-Dick, she watched Home and Away, she didn’t care about anything. She asked him just to please leave her alone. Not even touch her.