Caul Baby

A Novel

Morgan Jerkins

A Black woman's path to motherhood leads her to a mysterious and powerful Harlem family in this fiction debut by a New York Times–bestselling author.



"Gave me chills almost every time I turned the page. . . . The book traces a legacy of Black, female pain through the somewhat softening lens of magical realism. It's an unsparing take on the ramifications of trauma on Black American women, and Jerkins manages it as a spellbinding story." — Glamour



Laila desperately wants to become a mother, but each of her previous pregnancies has ended in heartbreak. This time has to be different, so she turns to the Melancons, an old and powerful Harlem family known for their caul, a precious layer of skin that is the secret source of their healing power.



When a deal for Laila to acquire a piece of caul falls through, she is heartbroken, but when the child is stillborn, she is overcome with grief and rage. What she doesn't know is that a baby will soon be delivered in her family—by her niece, Amara, an ambitious college student—and delivered to the Melancons to raise as one of their own. Hallow is special: she's born with a caul, and their matriarch, Maman, predicts the girl will restore the family's prosperity.



Growing up, Hallow feels that something in her life is not right. Did Josephine, the woman she calls mother, really bring her into the world? Why does her cousin Helena get to go to school and roam the streets of New York freely while she's confined to the family's decrepit brownstone?



As the Melancons' thirst to maintain their status grows, Amara, now a successful lawyer running for district attorney, looks for a way to avenge her longstanding grudge against the family. When mother and daughter cross paths, Hallow will be forced to decide where she truly belongs . . .



Engrossing, unique, and page-turning, Caul Baby illuminates the search for familial connection, the enduring power of tradition, and the dark corners of the human heart.



"An exhilarating tale of family, belonging, and bodies, this promises to be one of the most exciting releases of the year." — Elle



"A fascinating, of-the-moment story about the intersection of motherhood, power, and community." — Real Simple



"Laced with generational pain and sprinkled with magic, Caul Baby is a sweeping family drama with no shortage of action." — The Chicago Review of Books



"Jerkins solidifies herself as one of our guiding literary lights, no matter the genre." — Booklist

Part I

1

Something was bound to happen to Laila’s baby, and everyone from the pews of Abyssinian Baptist down to the northern shore of Central Park knew it. One of the last vestiges of the Black elite in Strivers’ Row, she was the only one whose brownstone was not punctuated with the sounds of pitter-pattering feet or wails in the dead of night. The first few times Laila became pregnant, she couldn’t wait to tell everyone who crossed her path. Then, weeks later, some of those same people would casually ask for an update and she’d reply, her face crestfallen, her posture slouched. As the first failed pregnancies turned into several, people stopped asking though she never stopped announcing, hopeful that collective faith would carry her flailing belief in the power of her body, and in God’s will. Eventually, she lost count of how many children abandoned her after the first heartbeat, or how many times she’d wake up with blood soaking her backside. Her body was desolate land, each crack in her earth a forewarning from the last child to future ones that this place was no home. Some of the fetuses grew, saw the dents of their past siblings in her womb, and joined them in the ether. After they disappeared, they left a hollow hole as a reminder of what could have been.

Seven months after her latest loss, Laila found out that she was pregnant yet again. She stared for a long while at the two pink lines that formed on the pregnancy test she’d purchased from the nearby Duane Reade. In her earlier years, she would’ve squealed; she would’ve danced, knocking over Q-tips and tweezers and extra rolls of toilet paper. But this time, she turned toward the mirror, holding the test with one hand and with the other pinching the side of her belly, saying, “Don’t fuck with me this time. Please.”

Laila figured she’d keep this pregnancy a secret. Any woman with a smidgen of common sense should know that this child—like the others—would not live past the first trimester. She continued on with her life: attending social events around the neighborhood, busying herself with redecorating her home and taking on the occasional interior design gig, a skill she pursued out of love rather than necessity. Her husband, Ralph, an architect, was usually out of town at least two weeks a month due to a long-standing assignment in Boston, and so he barely noticed the extra snacks lying around when he returned home or her frequent dashes to the bathroom. Neither he nor anyone else suspected anything. That is, until one night, Ralph returned home a day early and found a copy of What to Expect When You’re Expecting lying half-open on the arm of their love seat. When Laila emerged from the bathroom wiping her mouth, a few water droplets dotted her slip so that the satin clung to her belly, emphasizing its roundness. He shook his head while holding the book with both hands and smiled as he approached her. She stood like a deer caught in headlights in front of Ralph and weakly said, “I’m sorry.” He then swooped her into his arms before they released a glorious laugh. That night, he went out and bought a fudge crunch ice cream cake from Baskin-Robbins and they ate it in bed, his hand caressing Laila’s stomach the entire time.

Neither of them could remember the last time their home had been filled with such happiness. He offered to relinquish his responsibilities for his Boston-based project in order to wait on Laila hand and foot, but she refused. He thought it might be best to care for Laila more carefully this time around, but she would hear nothing of it. The money that he would receive for the completed job would be helpful since they planned to spoil their miracle baby rotten. To make up for his absence, Ralph began to send flowers or small gifts like boxes of chocolate or handwritten love letters. He’d call morning, afternoon, and night for brief check-ins and hired a twice-a-week housekeeper so that Laila would not overwork herself and jeopardize her health.

This child was different because it was growing and changing her from the inside out, persevering from the first trimester and moving past the middle of the second. Laila’s brown skin became dewy, a sunset behind a hill. Her hair, once fine and short, sprouted thick and unbridled. Her neighbors craned their necks when she passed them on the sidewalks. Her walk was different. Instead of her usual erect posture, she hunched slightly, her legs waddling. “Missus Reserve got a baby in ’er,” bystanders whispered on their front stoops behind their potted amaryllis bulbs and hibiscuses. A pair of meddling women could not restrain their curiosity and approached a five-months-pregnant Laila as she walked by their brownstone’s front stoop one sunny afternoon.

“Oh, hi, ladies.” Laila smiled and placed a hand on her belly.

“Good afternoon, Laila,” they replied one after the other.

The women—Sydney and Constance—could smell the sweat and sweet, doughy aroma stemming from her groin. They squinted with intrigue when they could not find that caul, that special cork skin-like membrane dangling from her neck. What else would explain why she was still pregnant if not for the extra assistance that no gynecologist could provide? When these meddling women did not say anything else after their initial greeting, Laila followed their intense eyes to her bare neck and nervously rubbed her throat.

“What are you staring at?” Laila asked.

“Sorry, it’s just—I mean, it’s a miracle that you’re still pregnant,” Constance said. She received a sharp elbow to the side of her left breast by Sydney.

“What she means is that it’s a blessing, and we’re happy for you.”

“Thank you, but that still doesn’t answer the question. What were you looking at?”

Sydney and Constance looked at each other with uneasy, tense faces.

“What? Spit it out!” Laila laughed, but inside she found nothing funny about the moment.

“Well—” Sydney answered. “We thought that you might have gotten help from those Melancon women.”

“Oh no. Nope.” Laila wagged her right pointer finger in the air and shook her head. “I don’t want to get involved with that mess. You’re not saying you actually believe in that, do you?”

“I admit that I’ve been curious from time to time,” Constance said. “I mean, have you ever seen one of them up close? They must have something extra on their skin because it doesn’t look like ours. It’s like . . . another layer, like a shield, it’s hard to describe. What if it’s true what they say, that it can protect or heal you?”

Laila stared at the ground and made small circles with her right foot. Her belly was extending her shadow, and she imagined the day when her shadow would part into two: she standing, her small child leaning against her side. “I don’t know,” Laila said. “I don’t know. It just seems weird.”

“Well, we’ve all heard the stories,” Sydney said. She sighed. “You have to wonder why some gossip like that would float around all these years if there wasn’t a lick of truth to it. And since you got money, it’s—” Constance elbowed Sydney again. “All right, jeez! Hey, listen, if you don’t believe, go to their bodega up on 142nd and Adam Clayton Powell. The daughter, Josephine? She may be in there.”

“Good luck with your pregnancy, Laila.” Constance gently pulled Sydney away so that they could walk in the opposite direction of Laila. They argued all the way to the end of the block over whether or not it was appropriate to bring up the Melancons until they became too distant for Laila to hear anything else that they were saying.

It didn’t matter. The seed was planted. Laila rubbed her throat and sternum as she reconsidered their questioning of her pregnancy. In fact, Laila forgot which errand had made her leave her brownstone in the first place. Who was she kidding? Laila thought. For all the kicks and hunger pangs, she was haunted by the fear of another miscarriage. No matter how many times her doctor assured her that the baby was safely growing with a steady, fast heartbeat, she could not be too certain. What if there was some truth to what they said about the Melancon women? She’d never actually seen one up close. Her curiosity got the best of her. She decided to see if they appeared just as Sydney said.

The bodega was on the end of a block full of similar real estate, as was the way with many a Harlem street corner: another deli, another Crown Fried Chicken, and a Laundromat. When Laila entered the store, there was a young, curly haired woman filing her nails at the cash register and a man placing hamburger patties on the griddle. But Laila was the only customer. The entrance door chimed, and Laila turned her neck to see a sophisticated woman strutting into the bodega wearing black patent leather pumps and a cream-colored tweed suit dress. She had mahogany skin and amber eyes that alternated between rolling around and cutting into two fine slits as she reprimanded the cashier for her repeated tardiness. She had to be one of the Melancon women. She was indeed a sight to behold! Laila strolled down the aisles and saw the usual brands of Oreos, Cheez-Its, multipurpose house cleaners, and canned goods. These items were cheaper by forty or so cents than those sold at the bodega closest to her home. How was it that this woman could afford such expensive attire from managing a run-of-the-mill bodega? Did she think she was too good to wear T-shirts and jeans like everyone else who worked behind those counters? From there, Laila created an entire narrative in her head about this woman: she had to be stuck-up, and her attire was a way to prove that she was better than everyone else. Most stuck-up people tended to be bitchy and rude. That’s probably why people always gossiped about the Melancons but no one ever knew them. They didn’t let people get too close because they were bougie, and though the moniker applied to her too, Laila knew that bougie Black folk were the most insufferable kind of Black folk.

Laila looked over the top shelf of the aisle where she stood and saw that Melancon woman watching her.

“Good afternoon,” she said, and flashed an ebullient smile. Her voice was like fresh silk, with a slight rasp at the end.

Laila’s throat dried up. She cleared it and said, “Good afternoon.”

“Let me know if you need any help, okay? We’ve moved some things around in here.”

“Huh. Oh. Sure. Thank you.”

Laila lowered her head and grabbed two boxes of Chips Ahoy! for when she would be hungry later. When she approached the register, the Melancon woman was watching the television mounted on the back wall beside all the over-the-counter drugs and travel-sized toiletries. The local news was reporting that the International Monetary Fund was expanding its anti-money-laundering units across the United States. What put Laila at ease was how much this Melancon woman fidgeted during the announcement. The action softened her intimidating appearance. As she leaned closer to the screen, the sleeve of her jacket inched higher and Laila’s eyes bulged at the sight of a glossy film on her wrist that dazzled in the light.

“Is this all?” the woman asked.

Laila jumped. “Oh. Maybe—Can I get a copy of New York magazine?” Laila pointed to it. The Melancon woman moved too quickly along the edges and hissed as one of the pages sliced her fingers. A paper cut was painful, but Laila didn’t think that her response of hurriedly turning her back, hunching over, and covering her entire hand was necessary. There were a box of Band-Aids and a bottle of hydrogen peroxide right on the back shelf if she needed it. After a few seconds, Josephine turned around and said, “Sorry, how embarrassing.”

“That’s okay. Don’t worry about it.”

As the woman reached for the New York magazine with the same hand as before, Laila saw that there wasn’t so much as a nick on any of her fingers.

The woman looked down at one of the titles of the inside stories, detailing a new labor trafficking act being debated in New York, and smirked. “That’s some pretty heavy reading for a pregnant woman.”

Laila chuckled. “It’s always good to be aware of what’s going on.”

“Indeed.” She slowly rang up the newspaper and took a beat with the two boxes of Chips Ahoy!. “If I can ask, how far along are you?”

“Excuse me?”

The woman repeat...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Epigraphs
• Contents
• Part I
• Part II
• Acknowledgments
• About the Author
• Also by Morgan Jerkins
• Copyright
• About the Publisher