Krik? Krak!

Marie, a domestic worker, is in Port-au-Prince when she finds a beautiful baby with purple lips wrapped in a blanket on the curb. She compares the baby to the stories of Baby Moses and Baby Jesus she learned as a child, and wonders why no one is around to claim the baby. She wonders if it is a trap left by one of her many enemies, such as the women who slept with her husband while she was experiencing recurring miscarriages. Marie studies the baby, who is wearing a blue dress with the word “rose” embroidered on the collar. The baby looks exactly as Marie had imagined her own babies would look. Marie calls the baby all the names she imagined for her own daughters. She remembers hearing stories on her boss’s television about women who abandoned their babies; she wonders if this baby was one of the abandoned. Marie picks up the baby, which she is now calling Rose, and feels that it is warm. The baby does not stir or cry when Marie picks it up, and it smells like the gardenias in the house where Marie works.

At dawn each morning, Marie repeats her mother’s prayers.