Amor monstruoso (1)

The baby was a dear little thing. Sherilyn had an extraordinary pram cum buggy for her – I’d never seen anything like it. It was state of the art, all aerodynamic lines and huge plastic wheels and so silent they’d be on you before you realised they were there. It was dreadfully distracting – you were so busy admiring this expensive carriage, you had to remind yourself there was a real live baby in it. Mind you, she was so quiet and still she could have been make-believe, like the dolls they give little children in nativity plays in case they drop baby Jesus. I’d never subscribed to any religion, but after they found her I had this niggly question batting around in my mind: would it have made it any easier if I’d had a faith to cling on to? If I’d believed in all that nonsense, would the idea of a credible evil have helped? I didn’t think so. I’d always rather prided myself on never having slid into religious faith as insurance as I got older, so I wasn’t about to become a docile penitent, even in the face of this appalling tragedy.

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Monster Love by Carol Topolski