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  • Heather*
  • Donald Barthelme (bio)

"This it?"

"That's it."

The twins, Hilda and Heidi, have had a baby.

Sam is in shock. How did this happen?

True, he's been sleeping with them both.

"Baby's crying," says Hilda.

"'Course it's crying," says Heidi. "Got no credit cards, can't speak French, don't know where its next meal is comin' from, I'd cry too."

Sam pokes the bundle with a knuckle.

"Appears to be some kind of a foot down here."

"A good foot," says Hilda. "Made it myself."

"She did the feet," Heidi says, "I did the elbows."

"C'mon guys," says Sam, "ease up, ease up."

The baby's in a clear plastic bin atop a rolling cart placed between their beds. Why do the nurses giggle constantly as they bring trays, offer pills?

Sam's been away for months. They did this behind his back, as it were.

The baby is a handsome article with light brown hair and one ear that folds forward when she turns her head against the pillow. He's allowed to hold her.

He's brought the twins pâté, spinach quiche, beer and wine.

"Well," he says, "what are we going to do now? I mean practically speaking?"

"When you were in North Dakota for all that time," Hilda says, "we thought of you."

"Yeah," says Heidi. "Barbecued, mostly." [End Page 66]

"It was an intolerable situation," he says. When they nurse the baby, handing her from bed to bed, he notices that both have breasts bursting with milk. "But what are we going to do about this? I mean we got to regularize this thing in some way, is the way I see it."

"The wages of sin," Hilda says, "are doubt, confusion, fear and paternity suits, plural."

"Come off it," he says. "You guys knew what you were doing." They've named the baby Heather. He was not consulted. He takes a swig of red wine from a styrofoam cup. "Like where are we going to live, for example?"

"We and Heather," Hilda says, "will live t' home, like always. Where you live will depend entirely on how you act."

"How I act? What am I supposed to do?"

"The right thing," says Heidi.

"Which one?"

"Both."

"That's against the law."

"Little late in the day for ethical musings, ain't it?" says Heidi.

They're both musicians, Heidi a violinist, Hilda a flutist.

"Them that sows wild oats has got to bale the barley," Hilda says.

"Okay, you got fast mouths, this we knew already," Sam says. "The question is, Smart Asses, which of you is the actual producer? Which one did the work?"

"Us did it," the twins say together. "We."

"I did the ears, footprints, and organs of generation," says Hilda, "buddy let me tell you it was not easy. Gettin' all those little whorly lines on the footprints just exactly right, took me nine fuckin' months."

"I did the hair, the chin, and the joints," says Heidi. "You notice she's got a lot of flex in those joints. We do good work around here. We don't let nothin' out of the shop less it's just 'zackly right."

"Whoo boy," says Hilda, "you bein' off reconstructing North Dakota and all, you missed a lot. You missed morning sickness, evening [End Page 67] sickness, and high-noon sickness. You ain't been pullin' your weight, Donor."

"I remind you," says Sam, "that putting old Hilda in old Heidi's bed was not my idea."

"Got to have some fun in the world," says Heidi, and Hilda says, "Mother always taught us to share."

"So you've told me." The baby's staring at him.

"She did the medulla and the bad habits, I did the thyroid and the family resemblances," Hilda says. "Doesn't she look a bit like Uncle Hamish?"

"That the one hung for stamp theft?"

"Now come on," says Hilda, "don't be bitter."

"We're just funnin' you," Heidi says.

"Well," says Sam, "I'll marry somebody, but I'll be Goddamned if I'll marry everybody."

"One potato, two potato," Hilda says, "who do you...

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