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asked.
    â€œHe wasn’t a father. He was a sperm cell. One sperm cell.”
    â€œBut she has a father now?”
    â€œA real one,” Missy said. “And a mommy, too. She’s on her way. She’s all set.”
    â€œI think we would have something to talk about, if you wanted to.”
    â€œMaybe,” Missy said. “I’ll think about it.”
    â€œI’ll leave you my number,” I said.
    She nodded and I took out a notebook, scribbled my name and number, and tore out the page. When she took it, I noticed there were no rings on her fingers. None.
    I turned toward the door.
    â€œOne thing,” Missy said.
    â€œYeah?” I said.
    â€œThose girls. Dulcy. And Belinda.”
    â€œAnd Sharon,” I said.
    â€œYeah,” Missy said, a trace of high school creeping into her voice. “What did they say about me?”
    The plan had been to inquire of Missy Hewett, then grab lunch and a good beer or two at one of the Old Port pubs. When it had been conceived, about two minutes into the trip, a mile out of Prosperity village, the thought of an outing in the city, paid for by DaveSlocum, had made me almost grin. But as I sat at a long bench in an ale house called Three Dollar Dewey’s, I could barely muster a smile for the waitress.
    She was about Missy Hewett’s age, another child hiding under makeup and dyed hair. But if these children had to make decisions like Missy’s, what would they have to face as adults? What kind of scars did these decisions leave behind?
    Life was hard, as Missy said. Forget the moralizing about kids having kids, about lost opportunities, kids who would never get to Wellesley. Life was hard. Period. In Prosperity, Maine. In most places. If your life wasn’t hard, you were one of the fortunate few.
    No wonder these kids liked to wear black.
    I thought about it over a bowl of chili and a Samuel Smith’s Nut Brown Ale. Normally, a Sam Smith’s would lead me to thoughts of England and pubs in old stone buildings, thick black stout poured into heavy pint glasses. One nut brown ale would leave me at peace. Two would be a religious experience. There is a God and he is benevolent, for he—or she—invented hops and yeast.
    Today there was ale but no peace.
    I sat at the bench and played with the chili, which, like the ale, was good. But as I picked at the bowl, sipped from the glass half-heartedly, my mind was on Missy Hewett. There was Missy in her apartment, a little kid with a brittle hard shell. Missy, who barely had breasts and already hated men, who had reduced them not to a body or an organ but to a single cell. The father of her child was a sperm cell, she had said. The next step was a single strand of DNA.
    It was chilling. And sad.
    I pictured Missy in a hospital room, one where the only flowers were from the nurses. I pictured her in labor, grunting and cryingand letting out teeth-clenched screams that should not come from a child’s mouth. The nurses probably gave her chunks of ice to suck on, cool cloths for her head. Perhaps they had been even more gentle and kind than they were for other mothers, the ones who had men to hold their hands, to awkwardly lead them through the huff and puff learned in childbirth classes. Men to share the joy of a brand-new life.
    Missy had given her new life away.
    She probably had been right, even noble. Certainly, she had put her child’s life ahead of hers, its future before her pleasure. But I wondered for how long she’d relive that moment. Did she hold the baby and say good-bye? Did she give the baby a name in her mind? Did she decide that it had her eyes? Was there a last moment when she gave its tiny hand a squeeze, said a prayer for it to be happy and healthy and content forever and ever?
    â€œCan I get you another ale?” the waitress said.
    I looked up, startled.
    â€œNo,” I said. “It’s just no use.”

9

    M ary Varney was canning