A Grown-Up Kind of Pretty by Joshilyn Jackson

saw he had his cel phone clutched in his hand.
    “Who did you cal ?” I asked, my voice too harsh, accusing.
    “Rick Warfield?” he said, and in that moment I could have cheerful y shot Tyler and dumped his body directly into the hole the wil ow had left. I could not tel Rick Warfield a story about Poltergeist and archaeology. He was a brighter bulb than Tyler, by several thousand watts.
    I heard my voice, at top volume, asking him, “On what planet does, ‘Don’t do an effing thing,’ mean, ‘Please cal the chief of police’?”
    Tyler shook his head at me. “Aw, man, Ginny, we had to cal someone. He’s coming right over. Maybe we should back off and put up tape around that spot?”
    “We don’t know it’s a crime scene, good Lord,” I said. “And it’s not like you travel with yel ow cop tape in your toolbox.”
    “I got duct tape,” Tyler said, and now he sounded almost hopeful.
    “We are not on CSI: Miami , Horatio,” I snapped, and his crest fel a little. The meanest piece of me thought, Good .
    I pushed past Tyler onto the concrete slab that passed for a patio. I stopped there and stared across the yard toward the open silver keepsake chest. Rick Warfield was coming, to lay his rough hands on the bones wound up inside that yel ow blanket. I could not stop him. My gaze moved to the heap of streaked and faded knit cloth lying beside it.
    My feet walked me toward the box like they’d had their own terrible idea and they didn’t feel like checking with my brain parts before putting it into action. I bent down and picked it up in both hands. It unfurled into a shape I recognized. A baby dress. I turned the dress in my hands until I had it by the shoulders and could see the tag. Kidworks. I found myself pinching the cloth so tight that my fingers cramped, but I could not let go.
    I knew this dress. I knew it. I had bought it myself, for Mosey. For Liza’s little girl, along with a host of blankets and fuzzy socks and sleepers. That was fifteen years ago, and the dress was faded and striped with mud and some kind of green-gray moldy slime I didn’t want to think about, but I recognized the ruffles at the hem. I could not help remembering it. It was the last thing I saw my grandbaby wearing before she and Liza had disappeared.
    I remembered putting Liza’s baby in that dress when she was only a couple of weeks old, bald as an egg with foldy legs she kept frogged up against her bel y. Liza sat in a heap on the sofa, plumb wore out. The baby was fretting, but this baby’s brand of fret was nothing. I’d gotten through Liza Slocumb’s screamfest of a babyhood without ever once throwing her off a train trestle or eating her like a hamster momma would have. I could handle a little gritching. The baby seemed mel ow to me. That’s how I thought of her then: sweet, not weak.
    I said, “Liza-Little, I got this. You can take the second shift.”
    Liza said, “You got work tomorrow, Big.”
    “Wel , so do you. You have to momma al day and get enough brainpower to final y give this child a name. We keep cal ing her The Baby like no one ever made one before. If you don’t decide soon, I’m going to saddle this poor child with Gretchen, just to spite you.”
    When the baby fel asleep, I moved her to her bassinet in Liza’s room without bothering to change her into pajamas, because the pink knit dress was so soft. Liza was sleeping more deeply than the baby, flat on her back with arms thrown up over her head like a child herself. The skin around her eyes was peachy-colored, smooth and tight.
    Hours later I stirred, hearing Liza up in the night, rattling around. I didn’t hear the baby, but her gritchy cry was always so quiet that this didn’t set off any worry bel s. I rol ed over and closed my eyes.
    The next morning the door to Liza’s room was shut and the house was quiet. I figured they were sleeping in. I knew how it could be with babies, day and night mixed up. I crept around dressing, eating