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Show Moon - 56 And what to do about Joy? She had become a dreary presence in the house, so much so that for a while Anne had felt cruelly impelled to take away Joy's name and call her Dolores. Joy had this thing about bloody heads and had taken to wearing a white cloth wrapped around her head and smearing the heads of her dolls with circles of red paint. It was positively morbid, but surely to make a fuss would only make it worse. A son for James-it must be a son, for he wanted one so-and this time of imagined blood and sadness would be over. He came fast, easy, headfirst. They named him Caleb, after James' grandfather. Caleb went at her breasts like a greedy little lover, sucking up her milk with noisy slurps and sending waves of pleasure deep into her belly. James smiled at her, his eyes a blue glowing like the tips of certain flames. And Joy was taking it so well. Her eagerness to help was a great surprise. Joy wanted to be the one, always, to change Caleb's diapers and swish them in the toilet, to wipe the vomit off his face. This copious vomit worried Anne, reminding her that Joy hadn't wanted her milk, but she couldn't bring herself to give up this wonderous closeness with her baby, not for a while. She felt for the first time her power as a woman, as if she were a mountain melting snow into the rivers, these rivers flinging up vapor into the sun, the vapors rising into clouds and clustering around her like acolytes. Joy persisted in her need to mother her baby brother. She even asked to have him sleep with her so she could be the one to get up for him, which, of course, Anne would not allow. Only once had Joy seemed to worry. She'd come to her and James one evening, her eyes downcast: "Will you throw me in the trash can now?" They'd laughed and that seemed to be the end of if. But this made Anne begin to lose confidence again. What sort of mother had she been to |