“Yes, thank you, Mistress,” Molly echoed. “You helped me so much.”
After giving one last snuggle to the baby and congratulatory hugs to both of them, Mistress Lorna was gone. Molly’s Master placed their slumbering baby into his isolette and turned down the lights. “You should sleep while he sleeps. That’s what the nurse said.”
“But I don’t want you to go.”
“I’m not going.” He crawled onto the narrow hospital bed and spooned behind her. She relaxed back into his solid warmth, feeling the last of the lingering tension in her arms and neck fade away. She fingered her cool metal collar as he nuzzled her, dropping a kiss behind her ear.
“Sleep, Molly.” He reached out to touch the metal-rail sides of the bed. “Think of this as your cage.”
She took his hand. “You’re my cage, Master. I love you.”
“I adore you, little kitten. Now obey me. Sleep.”
She tried, but she couldn’t quite settle down. After about ten minutes, she whispered in the darkness, “Master, are you still awake?”
“Yes.”
“He doesn’t have a name yet. I can’t sleep without knowing what to call him. Shouldn’t we decide?”
“Hmm.” Mephisto drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Marvin?”
She giggled. “That’s awful. Anyway, we agreed, no ‘M’ names. Molly and Mephisto is already a tongue-twister.”
“Yes,” he said, licking her earlobe. “But you go by kitten most of the time. How about Walter?”
Molly wrinkled her nose. “Um.”
“Jethro? Wolfgang? Hoboken?” Her Master put a hand over her mouth as she burst into laughter. “Shhh.”
“You’re kidding, I hope,” she whispered.
“Cthulhu?”
She choked back another laugh behind his fingers, then peeled his hand away. “That kind of works. It goes with the whole Mephisto thing.”
“If we’re thinking along those lines, we could go with Beelzebub, or Archfiend—Archie for short. Diablo. Hell, we could be really subversive and name him Satan.”
“Not my baby. He’s too sweet for that.”
“You’re right. We’ll go with Hoboken.”
They laughed another moment or two, then her Master sobered. “I would suggest Clayton, but I’m not sure I could stand our son having the same name as your former Master. Kind of squicks me.”
Molly shuddered. “Yeah, me too.” She drew her fingers up his strong, hair-roughened forearm, then down again to lace with his fingers. “You know, I’m kind of partial to Jonathan. I always have been, I don’t know why.”
Her Master considered a moment. “Jonathan. I like it. My real name also starts with a J.”
“I know.” Molly felt intensely sleepy all of a sudden, now that the big decision was made. Their sweet baby Jonathan. She liked the formality of the name, and the way it could become Jon, or Jonny, depending on the kind of little boy he grew into. That was still a mystery. There was so much to come. Would his eyes stay deep blue like Molly’s, or turn dark like her Master’s? Would he be short or tall, reserved or active, creative or sensible? “Do you think he’ll be a lot like you?” Molly asked just before she drifted off.
“I don’t know, baby.” He pressed another kiss against her shoulder. “I only know I want him to be as happy as me,” he added in a quiet afterthought.
As happy as both of them. Safe in her Master’s arms, Molly fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.
Epilogue
Her Master walked with her along the cool, tree-lined lane. It was late August; Jonathan was already three and half months old. Master pushed him in the stroller while Molly carried her violin case.
“It’s been a while since we were here.” Her Master looked around at the solid, gray tombstones. “But it still looks the same. Not much changes in a cemetery.”
“Kind of comforting, isn’t it?” Molly murmured.
Jonathan peered around in his stroller, clutching his favorite blankey in one hand. He was an easy baby, laid back and cuddly. He looked more like his father every day. His eyes changed to a medium brown and his headful of dark hair looked very dashing. People always called him a beautiful baby, but Molly thought beautiful didn’t even cut it. He was just...a miracle.
Mephisto parked the stroller a short distance away and reached into the basket underneath for the flowers and gardening tools they’d brought. They worked wordlessly side by side, cutting back the bulbs that had bloomed in the spring when they’d been too busy and too pregnant to keep up with these visits. Afterward the baby had kept them running around the clock, and when things settled down, there was the necessary re-connection with each other. As a result, Clayton had been neglected until now.
They’d brought vibrant colored flowers. Petunias in fuchsia, pink, purple. Her Master held them up so Jonathan could bat at them. The baby’s eyes drank in the colors. Then Mephisto knelt and dug little holes for Molly to fill. She looked down at him, her beautiful partner, with his strong back and shoulders, his riot of dreadlocks. They’d brushed across her cheek that morning, those dreadlocks. Across her back, between her legs. She flushed and shivered a little, remembering. Such pleasure...and a little pain too. They were getting back into it. It was her Master who wanted to take things slowly, who seemed to find new vulnerability in her now that she was the mother of his child.
But they would find their way. She had a few slave tricks up her sleeve, and by now, she was getting pretty skilled at what made her Master tick, what wound him up and made him do the most evil, delicious things to her.
She still missed her old Master. Now and again things would remind her of him and she’d feel the pang of his loss. Not things like the meetings she still attended to carry on his business, but things like a look from her present Master, or a particularly hard spanking that moved her to tears. A tender kiss, a stroke of fingers down her cheek, and she’d remember another time, another place with the same feeling, the same fullness in her heart.
She’d have to tell Clayton all this some time when Mephisto wasn’t there. Not that he would object. They were just private feelings, memories for Clayton alone.
They patted down the last of the soil around the petunias. They wouldn’t last the winter, but they’d be able to visit more frequently from now on. They could put in more flowers in the spring. Jonathan might be walking by then, or at least getting close.
“Do you want me to leave him here so you can introduce him to Clayton?”
Molly looked down at her baby, then back at him. “That would be kind of silly, wouldn’t it?”
He shrugged. “Jonathan likes to hear you play. Why don’t you keep him with you?”
“Yes, Master.” Molly was grateful he’d spared her the embarrassment of having to ask. Because, silly or not, she wanted to introduce her baby to Clayton, even if Clayton wasn’t really there. Or maybe he was there somehow. Molly always felt closest to him here, his picturesque gravesite like some earth-to-afterlife portal between them.
“I’ll leave you three alone,” her Master said, pressing a kiss on her temple. “Take your time.”
Molly played first, soft, soothing violin music. She played for Jonathan a lot. The sweet resonant notes of the violin seemed to have the power to soothe him when nothing else could. Mephisto tried to replicate the effect
with recorded music a couple times while Molly was away, but apparently digital violin music didn’t relax him quite the same. Molly wondered if it had something to do with the movement of the bow across the strings or her particular style of playing. Anyway, she was glad her old Master had made her learn, and her new Master had encouraged her to keep trying, and that she hadn’t been successful in smashing her violin those many months ago.
By the time she finished her short concert, the baby was fast asleep in his stroller and Mephisto was looking pretty drowsy himself over in the shady glade where he waited. He’d laid down on the lengthy bench and slung a hand over his eyes. It was a perfect day for relaxing outdoors and enjoying fresh air. Molly sat in the spongy green grass over her old Master’s grave and soon found herself stretched out in the sun too. She rolled onto her side, brushing the slender soft green blades.
“Hello, Master,” she whispered. “It’s Molly. I’m sure you know that already, from the violin playing. It’s a beautiful day today. Sorry I haven’t been to see you more often. I found out I was pregnant.” She closed her eyes and ripped up a few blades of grass, scattering them around. “I was angry to find out you misled me about the sterilization. But I’m glad now you did it the way you did, because I did end up wanting a baby. Thanks for leaving me that choice.” She looked over at her slumbering son. “I have a beautiful boy named Jonathan. He loves music and he looks just like your old friend Mephisto.”
At that moment, Jonathan made one of his sweet funny baby faces in his sleep. What was he dreaming about? What had Molly dreamed about at that age? Probably simple, wonderful things. Things she wanted, that she eventually got. Love and belonging. She was a lucky girl, because she’d gotten them twice, along with much, much more.
“I’m doing great otherwise. I’m still volunteering, but fewer days a week now. Mrs. Jernigan helps watch the baby. You wouldn’t believe how sweet she is with him. She was always such a bitch to me.” Molly slapped a hand over her mouth. “Sorry, Master. But she was. Oh, and guess what? My friend Eliot graduates next year in the spring. He’s in law school on your dime, some fancy university in New York. You remember, we talked about it earlier? I still meet with him now and again. He decided to specialize in family law. We used to talk a lot about my adventures at the Family Center, and he says that’s why he decided to go into that. You know, to help.”