Janie stopped crying between the car and the front door, but once she got inside her apartment pain ballooned and fresh tears came. She gasped, dropped her handbag on the couch and lurched through the kitchen yelling, "Baby!" She heard Todd's office chair slide before he appeared in the hall, looking scattered, "What are you doing home?"

She fell into him, "It hurts."

Her husband didn't bother to ask what it was. He just held her a minute, then led her to the bedroom and laid her down, his face hard to look at it was so helpless. She felt him lift her shirt and lower her skirt, felt the tape securing the bandage pull at skin down there. Pain, already roiling, spilled over. She said, "Aagggh."

"Sorry. I have to see. Don't move."

It took too long and hurt too much, but the bandage came off. Todd dropped it on the bed—a white square, stained pinkish by the rash and the anti-inflammatory she applied each morning. She thought of her last EPT test, how she was sure she'd see two pinkish splotches, as if the force of their lovemaking would coerce her womb to life. She thought of Johnny Kelly saying, "Uh oh, it broke." She closed her eyes and waited for Todd.

"Stop wiggling."

"I'm not wiggling."

"Oh, Christ." She heard retching, then liquid on hard wood. She sat up quick and the rash flared. Todd wiped vomit from his mouth with the back of one hand.

"What are you—?"

He shook his head and stared at her belly and, though she knew it was a mistake, she allowed her eyes to follow his. The rash had arrived a week ago, three boils, each about an inch around, marching a neat line between her belly button and right hip. She'd applied Cortisone Cream, but what began innocuously pink became angry purple-lined red by week's end. She kept scratching was the problem. She couldn't help it. This morning the marks had been bigger than ever, raised half an inch off her skin. They'd developed veins in the night, green and yellow like diseased tree branches. Seeing the rash now, her first thought was that nothing had changed. Then she saw she was wrong.

The boils were moving.

Back and forth, up and down, the ulcers on her skin stretched and pulled and quaked; like they housed something trapped, and it wanted out.

Todd was still trying to get himself together when the bathroom door down the hall clicked closed. He ran that way shouting, "Don't lock it!" Knowing it was too late. She made a tradition of this, hiding in the bathroom.

"I don't want you to look at me." The door muffled her voice.

"We have to go to the hospital."

"No!"

"Janie, c'mon!" Todd stared at an imperfection in the door's paint, a careless drip that had been allowed to dry, standing out in just-so light.

"I'm not coming—Owwww!"

"Janie!"

A pause, then, "I'm okay." Meek, her voice, small and exhausted. Then, "Oww!" Again.

"Unlock the door! Baby!"

Nothing.

"Can you unlock it?"

More nothing.

"I'm coming in!" That was all Todd could think of then, getting inside, getting his wife. He reared back across the hall, set himself, charged. There was a dull, hollow thonk as he bounced.

Janie screamed, a high, steady tone like an auto alarm, but dead and wet against the bathroom tile. Someone started pounding at the front door, Mr. Harris across the hall, wondering what all the noise was about. Todd threw himself at the bathroom door again. The brass knob plate cut his arm and blood smeared the whitewash, trickling towards the floor parallel to the fossilized paint drip. His arm hurt in a distant way, like loud noise from far off. He kept at the door. Janie in there, screaming.

His feet pointed him toward the kitchen before his head even considered the bathroom key in the Fibber's Drawer. From behind a gelatin wall, the sounds of Mr. Harris pounding fought the sounds of Janie screaming. Todd fought them both, concentrated on rescuing the old-fashioned brass key, the one that came with the doorknob he installed himself, from the drawer's far corner. Then it was in his hand and then he was in the hall jamming it into the keyhole, thinking she's not screaming anymore, I wish she was screaming 'cause at least when she was screaming I knew she was alive.

The silence was the loudest ever. The key scraping the lock made a kettle drum in the void. Then the door was open and he was looking down at his wife on the floor, blood spreading under her like time lapse video of a flower blooming.

Waking up, Janie realized things this way: that it was dark outside; that she was in bed; that Todd was seated over her, looking down; that the pain in her abdomen was gone.

"Hi," said her husband. His face was hidden, backlit by the bedside lamp.

She remembered coming home early, Todd removing the bandage. She remembered running to the bathroom where she felt safe sometimes.

"Hi," she said back. "Am I okay?"

"You're fine."

She remembered a white tile by the corner of the tub. She'd stared at a crack in its corner, stared and screamed because she was so scared. Of what? "What happened?"

His head grew, eating the light behind him as he leaned toward her. She felt his hand on her cheek.

"You scared me," he said.

"Me too." She felt for her rash. Todd had dressed it with another bandage. He helped her sit up and she asked, "Is it gone?"

"Kind of." The lamp bulb emerged from behind him, exploding her vision in golden streaks. Half blind, she just saw Todd hold something out to her. A box.

"Can you see?" He asked, placing it in her lap. It was a shoebox. There were five neat pencil holes poked in the top. She squinted up at Todd. He smiled. The box moved, just a little.

"Go ahead," he said. "Open it."

She did, and there on a bed of tissue paper lay three, small, wet furry balls. They had little feet, four apiece, and little ears atop their heads, and little eyes. They should have been black, those eyes, but they were white and home to penetrating irises, which—though impossibly small—were human.

"What are they?"

Todd laughed and shrugged, the afternoon's strain given way to an insane sort of humor. "Hamsters, baby. They came out of you."

Todd tried to read People on the toilet, but couldn't pay attention. Karl had died in the night, outlasting Rudy by just a day. He and Janie tried not to overmourn—they were hamsters after all—but it was hard. The little guys refused to drink or eat or do anything but huddle, shake and die. He and Janie wanted so bad to be parents, and though neither was ready to substitute raising hamsters born of boils on Janie's torso for raising real children, they were still off to a bad start.

At first it had been fun. They cleaned and groomed the hamsters, snapped photos with them, named them. Todd wanted to give them pet names, "Demon," "Fuzzy," and "Spot." Janie said, "No." Karl and Rudy were after their respective male godparents. Kevin was after Todd's father, an industrial building contractor and avid stamp collector from Baltimore. Kevin didn't look much like his namesake, but he was the sweetest of the three, more outgoing than his brothers. Now he was the only one left. Todd dreaded Kevin's death, which would surely come soon.

When they awoke Friday morning to find Rudy stiff and cold, Karl and Kevin keeping cautious distance, Janie had cried. Karl had been struggling before bed last night, and they were prepared to find him this morning, but it still sucked. Poor little guys, why wouldn't they eat anything?

Todd had to keep Kevin alive. Maybe it was the box. That was no way for a hamster to live, even a baby. A cage was the thing. Todd recalled seeing one in Walmart a few months back.

There was a scratch at the door and he said, "I'm in here."

A fancy, multi-colored, plastic cage. Kevin could really settle into a place like that. Maybe find his appetite.

Another scratch. He folded the magazine and said, "Jesus, Janie."

From deep across the apartment, Janie's voice echoed, "What?"

There was a shadow in the center of the gap between the bottom of the bathroom door and the floor below. Another few scratches and Todd saw a nose poke under—a baby hamster nose.

"Kevin?" Todd asked, and Kevin appeared, squeezing through the gap, nose twitching the air.

He was brown with white splotches. His fur offset the strange beige of his eyes like carpet matching the drapes just so. He was bigger than the other two, which would explain why he'd lived longer. He was also—judging by his ability to get out of the shoebox, off the dresser, down the hall, and here to the bathroom—smarter. Todd was angry with Kevin for the adventure, and angry with Janie for not paying better attention, but he was proud too. Talented little guy.

Kevin squatted between Todd's shoes and looked up at him, nose pistoning.

"Look at you, huh?"

Kevin blinked, making Todd a little nervous.

"Daddy's going to the bathroom," he said.

Turned out Kevin was fast too. In a flash he was up Todd's leg—claws pinching and pulling little hairs—and on his thigh. What an able little hamster! So bright and fast! "Look at you go, pal!" Todd shouted.

Kevin sat back on his haunches, regarding the triangle of Todd's crotch.

"You don't want what's down there," Todd said. "That's dirty poopy."

Kevin looked up at him, then back at the triangle. Todd heard footsteps outside the door.

"He eats what, now?"

"Shit. He loves it."

"Ugghh."

"I know it's gross but, well...who are we to judge? At least he ate."

"You fed it to him?"

"I picked some up with a cotton swab. He ate it off the tip."

"Man."

"He loved it, honey. Aren't you happy?"

"Of course, but..." Kevin was somehow dignified in her husband's hand. "Well, if he's eating..." Janie thought of Rudy and Karl, dead in the shoebox. She'd wept for them, and thought this might be what an amputee feels like because, though mysterious creatures born of her skin, they had been part of her. The thought of losing Kevin too, of all the life she'd produced being eradicated, was profound and dark.

It had been four months since Janie got promoted and they decided to try for a baby. Four months since she went off the pill. Four delayed periods. Four negative EPT tests. At first it was funny, like, "Well that didn't work, let's try again." Then it was annoying, then frustrating. With each failure she locked herself in the bathroom, crying while Todd waited in the hall. She didn't know how to tell him it was her fault.

She'd dated Johnny Kelly in high school. Johnny had two kids by two different mothers, which was enough for common sense to join Janie's father and friends in warning her away. She listened to neither and it proved a lot: that men who are strong on the outside are often weak within; that playing bad girl got old fast. It also proved she couldn't bear children.

A broken rubber one night and Johnny Kelly's notoriously fertile semen was loose within her, birthing nightmares of abortion and single motherhood and, in the end, nothing else. She thanked God back then, prayed it was luck. These last four months' EPTs said different.

She spent her time in the bathroom wondering how to tell Todd she was barren. Then the hamsters came along, and with them the relief of maybe never having to tell Todd anything.

"As long as he's eating," Janie said.

Todd made in the litter box, cut a small hunk and placed it in Kevin's dish. The hamster was bigger now, full grown in just two weeks. Lucky for him then, to occupy the finest hamster home available, a custom-built conglomerate of five Kritter Kondo's by Oronco™, a mass of shining, colorful Lucite atop the former kitchen table.

At Kevin's disposal were four large chambers connected by a vast network of tubes through which he squeezed and crawled at all hours. If not in the tubes, he relaxed on a bed of straw and wood chips, or recreated on one of three exercise wheels. Sometimes Kevin ran all night, the plastic hum lulling Todd and Janie to sleep.

At the sound of his food dish being filled, Kevin appeared in the main chamber. "Hey, buddy," said Todd. "How we doing today?"

Kevin fixed Todd with his eternal gaze, sat back and twitched his nose—such a proud little hamster.

"Ready to eat?"

Always. With diet established it was impossible to keep Kevin's dish full. Before going back to work last week, Janie had read up on Kev's nutritional needs and found overfeeding to be the leading cause of hamster death. They settled on one gram per meal, three times a day, but Kevin so loved eating that Todd had taken to sneaking him extra. Janie worked all day, so she didn't know. It was a little father-son secret.

Kevin waddled to his bowl and started gobbling. God, he was cute. Todd could stare at him for hours. Raising him took away from the freelance writing Todd had done pre-rash, but that didn't matter. The care and comfort of Kevin was Todd's sole concern. Look at him there eating, so noble and proud, a little king.

Kevin finished and allowed himself to be picked up. Todd held the hamster in his palm, feeling the weight that increased every day, staring into prairie brown eyes.

"And how was lunch today, sir?" He asked.

Kevin bit him on the finger.

Todd yelled, "Owww!" and shoved Kevin back into the Kondo.

It was just a small bite, a paper cut. Stung a little, surprised him too. No big deal though. Todd dabbed it with a Kleenex, then checked to make sure Kevin was okay. Janie's book said hamster bites were common. Kevin couldn't be blamed and Todd yelled so loud and just about threw him back in the cage…poor little guy.

But Kevin wasn't alarmed at all. He sat back on his haunches, looking at Todd through green hued plastic. Todd grabbed another tissue, meaning to clean Kevin's paws, but Kevin—so intelligent!—took care of himself, licking the blood off slow and meticulous, sure to get every drop.

"Are you kidding with this?" She asked.

Todd, bleary, "What?"

Janie spread wide her arms to signal this mess, this room, this apartment, this life. "And where's Kevin?"

Todd squinted about the room, "He was here...what time is it?"

"God, Todd!" Janie took off for the kitchen, depositing her briefcase and jacket on the counter, hearing Todd behind her, "Did everyone stay so late tonight?"

"Everyone on the Becker account!" No Kevin in the kitchen, nor the bathroom—where he sometimes enjoyed the cool tile—nor in Todd's "office," now fossilized beneath a layer of dust.

Todd from behind her, "Janie, what's your problem?"

"My problem, Todd, is everything."

"I'll find him. Have something to eat."

"I'm not hungry."

Kevin wasn't on their bed, and he wasn't in either litter box, which left one place. Janie paused in the doorway to their room, trying to relax. She didn't want to alarm the hamster.

She turned once to glare at Todd, then knelt by the bed and lifted the dust ruffle.

Kevin barley fit under their bed anymore. He weighed almost sixty pounds now, and filled the space like an oversized hotdog in a standard bun. His eyes were sad and tired, black crud caked around his mouth.

"Oh you poor thing," she said.

"Now don't make it seem like—"

She shut Todd's voice out. She hated him right now. She lifted Kevin, trying not to groan. The hamster cooed and turned his head away from hers (thank God; his breath reeked).

"Janie, he likes it under there. That's where he rests after dinner."

"No he doesn't. And look at him. He's filthy."

Todd executed his most petulant, five year-old's half frown.

"This is it," she said.

"This is what?"

"I've had enough worrying about home and work. I'm taking a leave of absence."

"What are we going to do for money?"

"We have savings. And you make money. Used to anyhow." This last should have been under her breath, but wasn't.

"That is completely unfair!" Todd actually stomped. "We agreed I would stay home with the children."

"Yes, and we see how that's worked out."

She laid Kevin on the bed. He rolled and stretched, larger then even her fluffiest down pillow.

Todd glared at her from the doorway, hurt, sure, but deserving of that hurt; asleep on the couch, the house a mess, while poor Kevin cowered in the dark. She wanted to tell him all of this, but cooed to Kevin instead, "That's alright, big boy. Mommy's coming home now."

Todd used the cleaver and the knife. The cutting board was arranged so the blood drained to a basin in the sink. He'd been doing this so long now his hands performed their tasks automatic. First had been the neighborhood tabby, then the family of raccoons camped by the garbage cans out back, then the possum, which looked like a giant rat and squealed like a child. After that he'd gotten into stray dogs from area Humane Societies (never the same branch twice). Janie didn't know. It was one of a million things she didn't know about raising Kevin.

Had she, though, would she do as Todd had? It was an important question. If Kevin bit her instead of him, would Janie have recognized his taste for blood, seen that it far outweighed even his appetite for feces? Would she have squeezed her own for him? And when that led to dizzy spells, would she have killed the cat, sniping it from the balcony with an ancient air rifle, bashing its head with a rock, skinning it and cleaning it and sealing the entrails in a gallon Ziplock, then burying them deep in a neighbor's dumpster? Would she have made flesh the primary component of Kevin's diet, leading to his fantastic growth?

Todd wondered. He wondered about his wife a lot.

Doubtless, she loved Kevin. And they shared something seen in quiet times—when she cuddled or nuzzled or carried him—something Todd's own relationship with the hamster could never approach. Kevin, so regal around Todd, was almost childlike with Janie. For all the love and care Todd provided each day, Janie had carried Kevin inside her, and that Todd could never match.

The cleaver wedged on a hunk of gristle. Todd wrenched it free and wiped his hands on his apron, new this week, red to hide the stains.

She took advantage of the bond though, in her worst moments even lording it over him. She'd always known Todd better than he knew himself. He'd loved that about her once.

So would she? Todd liked to think so. In those first frenzied months butchering small animals, he suckled himself on the thought: Janie would do the same. Still, he hid everything, which meant he didn't really believe it, right? What he really believed is that she'd be horrified, like when Todd first got Kevin to eat. "He eats shit?" It had been all on her face, that disgust. Todd saw, though Kevin never did, and Janie—to her credit—trucked on.

He loaded seven fist-sized hunks of meat into Kevin's dinner bucket, grabbed the blood bowl out of the sink and left the kitchen.

When it came to loving the hamster, Janie was the best; but regarding the actual nuts and bolts of the job, the care and feeding, she had no idea. The hours spent cleaning, cooking, helping, fixing, consumed Todd's life. Not that he regretted it. It was as fulfilling a chore as could be imagined, and the idea that he'd do it every day until he died comforted him to sleep nights. But it was hard, and a simple "thank you" now and then wouldn't hurt. Kevin thanked him all the time, of course, with his darling expressive eyes of beige. But Kevin couldn't speak, and Janie never thought to mention it. Instead, she tried to steal the duty from him, spending days at home, monkeying with established routines.

He opened the door to Kevin's room. The light was off and the rhythmic hum of the hamster's breathing was audible, a burlap sack dragging down a dirt lane. Todd turned the wall dimmer slow, so as not to hurt Kevin's sensitive eyes.

The hamster was over seven feet long now, near 300 pounds. For a big boy he got around well, making much the same use of the apartment he once made of the Kritter Kondo. He slept a lot too, and would go straight through the night if Todd allowed it; but a midmorning feeding - between 3:30 and 4:00am - forestalled the midday grumps.

Kevin yawned and rolled, magnificent in the moonlight. Whiskers thick as telephone cable scraped the wood floor. Even lying on his side he came up to Todd's chest, a bulk of fur and flesh filling the room, smelling of meat and must and sweat.

"Hey, big guy," Todd cooed softly, placing a hand in the thick pelt under Kevin's neck. Kevin's eye, large as a dinner plate, regarded him. "Sit up for your snack." Kevin did, and the room creaked.

What Janie didn't know was astounding. She didn't know that Kevin liked to suck the marrow from the bones of animals Todd brought him. She didn't know about the midmorning feedings, though they'd gone on under her nose for months. She didn't know that—just as Kevin once preferred his parents' shit to all others'—he'd discount entire portions of fresh meat just for a taste of Todd's own blood, small amounts of which he drank for dessert. He was part of Todd and Janie; eating of them his purest communion. Todd just wished he could provide more. Janie would wish it too.

Maintaining the ruse had been easy, because Janie didn't want to know different. She wanted Kevin sweet and small, a momma's hamster. Her being home every day made things difficult.

Todd placed the feed bucket on the floor. It was a garish, yellow plastic affair with KEVIN painted on the side in Janie's girly script. The hamster snapped to, and Todd smiled. So well behaved!

Sometimes he got Kevin to sit up, lie down or roll over for his food, but it was late and Kevin was hungry, ropes of translucent saliva gathering under his jaws. Todd kicked the bucket toward him and stood back while Kevin dove in.

He laughed. Once it'd been impossible to get the boy to eat, now—watch out!

Kevin tore in, jaws firing. Todd giggled again. Janie never knew about any of it, but here she was proving Todd's theory. Kevin licked his bucket clean, outside and in, then scoured the floor around it with his tongue before moving to the blood bowl, of which he drank long and deep. Cleaning was Todd's lot, but thanks to Janie, whom Kevin appreciated even more in death than life, the hamster was finally picking up after himself.