Page 112 of Under Story

Eli peels the mango back and tugs the first square with his teeth.

“Can I have some?” Laurel asks.

She rises onto the balls of her feet to kiss him. The mango is still in his mouth. He pushes it into hers: firm but softening, warm from his body.

“Let’s go slow,” he says.

That evening, they walk through the neighborhood with Silas. At the cemetery, they see Mr. Nakamura, who waves. On the way home, Laurel takes Eli’s hand. And swings it as he grins.

“I love you,” Laurel says.

“I love you, too,” he says. “Again.”

—

Some people reacted to Silas’s birth with discomfort. When Laurel and Eli told Janet Rosen, she gasped, a hand flying to her mouth. One of Laurel’s colleagues sent the name of a grief therapist. But Clare has taken delight in Silas since the first time she saw him.

“Oh, honey,” she told Laurel. “He’s absolutely perfect.”

At daycare, Silas is the youngest newborn by several decades. Sometimes Clare joins Laurel to pick him up. Everyone else has come to retrieve their parents, not their children. Once, Laurel and Clare arrive behind two middle-aged women.

“Have you seen the little boy?” says one. “I think his name is Steven.”

“Tragic,” says the other. “I hate to say it, but I look at the mother, putting on this brave face, and I think: Thank God that isn’t me.”

Laurel fumes as a staffer wheels Silas to the door. On his cheek is a butterfly, the result of a face-painting activity. Seeing Laurel and Clare, he waves madly.

“Excuse us,” says Clare. She stalks forward to envelop Silas (“There’s our beautiful boy!”) before she turns back toward the women.

“You might consider minding your own business,” she adds, driving the wheelchair between them.

At six months, Silas can stand on his own. By March, he teeters from Eli’s arms to Laurel’s. He understands questions: Where is your nose? Let’s get your sweater. Do you want to take a bath? When Laurel asks him to get his favorite book—Hats, Hats, Hats—he looks through the shelf until he finds it.

His passion is for containers: putting things into them, taking things out of them. He giggles as they pull him in a laundry basket. When Laurel puts on Raffi, a rising star in children’s music, Silas shimmies.

Every week, he becomes a little more himself. Laurel feels guilty for thinking this way. Silas Two has always been himself; the person she hopes he is becoming is Silas One. Sometimes she scans his face for hints that he is more than what—or who—he seems. She longs for the son she knew to look out of his eyes, like an actor breaking the fourth wall.

His first word—light—is the same, but this time, he points to an iPhone flashlight instead of a lamp. He builds a small library of words, tended lovingly through repetition. One can foster an entire conversation.

“Tree,” he might say, pointing.

“Tree,” says Laurel, confirming.

“Tree,” says Silas, contemplating.

“Tree,” says Laurel, touching.

“Tree,” says Silas, touching.

“Tree,” says Laurel, staying with him.

They spend Christmas at Maisie and Noah’s with Clare. A popcorn garland hangs from the mantel, and Nori wears a collar with a bell. Silas has transitioned from his wheelchair to a walker, but that night, he refuses to use it. He staggers into the living room, arms outstretched, and collides with the tree. (“Sorry,” Eli says, retrieving a fallen ornament. “We call this the zombie apocalypse.”) Laurel brings their contributions to the kitchen: roasted vegetables, rosemary rolls, and a pot of indecent Swedish glögg. It has three kinds of alcohol and twice as many spices, as well as almonds, raisins, and an entire cup of sugar.

Maisie stands at the stovetop, stirring citrus and cloves in water: the O’Briens’ Christmas scent. She puts the spoon down to hug Laurel. “Hi, you.”

“I’ve missed this,” says Laurel, inhaling. Maisie’s parents were the only people she knew who cooked something you couldn’t eat. In kindergarten, Laurel and Maisie used a fork to surface a shriveled orange, which smelled much better than it tasted.

Maisie holds Frankie on one hip. She is now under two, three years younger than she was when Laurel met her. Her vocabulary is shrinking: juice, more, bye-bye. Maisie and Noah have joined a support group for parents of toddlers. They seem determined to find joy in small quantities. A homemade bûche de Noël waits in the refrigerator, and the tree is crowded with presents. By the time they finish dinner—and with it Laurel’s glögg—Silas isn’t the only one doing the zombie apocalypse. The adults sober up while playing charades, and the children watch a movie in the den. Frankie falls asleep before it’s over, but Hazel and Silas whisper as they come upstairs.