Debut Fiction: 'In Mother's Arms' by Bethan Hay

The baby is wailing. The toddler is screaming. One on each side, balanced as they all sway and bounce.

She sways as she carries them, she sways when she does not. Involuntary, compulsive, constant. A mother’s rhythm, her dance.

She dances to the song around her, kids, dog, pot boiling over, phone, doorbell, oven timer, unanswered texts, the same three episodes of a kids TV programme on a loop. Beep beep buzz sizzle ring ring WE ARE THE SUPERHERO DOGS beep buzz beep ring WE ARE THE SUPERHERO DOGS mama mama mama bark click Oh shit WE ARE THE SUPERHERO DOGS ring ring RING anybody home knock beep buzz mama mama mama bubble hiss bark bark mum mum mum WE ARE THE SUPERHERO DOGS

She dances. Side to side she moves with the music, feeling it in her bones and muscles as they pull her with it.

The dog is crying. An arm emerges to pet it. The cat is crying. Another arm bursts out to pet it. The phone rings, a new limb is born from her back and its fingers fumble with the receiver. She cannot hear the caller but she does not, cannot set it down.

The doorbell rings, she opens it. Her ribs twist and snap as an arm reaches for the parcel and another signs for it. The postman does not flinch.

The children are squirming, sliding down. Her spine is squeezed as forms grow from the base of her back and wrap themselves around to form a perch.

She drinks a cold coffee.

And she lifts the lid on the boiled-over pot. The phone is still there, and the parcel, and the baby, the toddler, the coffee, and the animals continue to follow for petting.

She sways and twirls with her troupe. Feeling the rhythm beep beep mama WE ARE THE SUPERHERO DOGS mama mama mama mama mama mama. Back and forth, one two three, up down, one two three, up down, one two three, up down.

Her arms are in a tangle. There is not enough space. They fight each other over which takes priority, which deserves the best place. Those closest to the toddler have to deal with kicks but those closest to the baby must bear the noise, and those emerging from her back grudge their unseen position. And one which holds nothing claws at her neck.

She sets down the phone, the parcel, the coffee, the baby, and the toddler, and she stops petting the animals.

She stretches. Ah! What unrivaled ecstasy to have free hands, but dances have two halves. The baby is wailing. And the toddler is screaming. The cat cries, and the dog. The phone rings. The doorbell sounds. She still needs that coffee. She is still hungry. The house is still neglected.

She attends to them, one by one, each with a free maternal arm and in the frenzy she is strangled.