Barnacles are the most beautiful creatures on the planet. They get a bad rap from sailors and blue whales, but they are magnificent, complex, underappreciated beings.
After hatching from its egg, a barnacle begins life as a nauplius, a tiny, mobile crustacean that swims through the ocean, searching for a place to call home. It molts six times, transforming into a type of larva called a cypris. Then it glues its head to a suitable rock, whale body, or ship’s hull and metamorphoses into the animal we know as a barnacle.
Some people collect seashells when they visit the beach. I collect the empty shells of barnacles.
Our house on San Juan Island, in northwest Washington state, is littered with them. I live there with my husband Jake and my three-year-old son Jackson, in a cute little wooden bungalow close to the water. Everything is close to the water in the San Juans. On those islands, the ocean is always all around you.
I used to be a marine biologist, or at least I studied to be one. But after Jackson was born, it just made sense for me to stay home with him while Jake commuted to Seattle for his job as a software developer. So that’s what I did.
Every day, I take Jackson out to the beach. If it’s low tide, we check the tide pools to see what we can discover there. Jackson loves the colorful, otherworldly creatures we find: bright purple sea stars; sea cucumbers the color of garnets; limpets and chitons clinging like armor to the salty rocks; scuttling crabs, eternally grumpy at our uninvited presence in their world. And whenever I find a barnacle test, the dried-out shell that remains after the animal itself has died, I put it in my pocket and take it home to add to my collection.
Today Jackson and I are at the beach during a very low spring tide. He sits and squelches his hands through the gray sand, humming to himself. A few feet away, I pick my way across the slippery rocks, searching for treasures to take home.
A wave crashes over my legs, knocking me off balance. I fall ungracefully into the water. Jackson looks up from his pile of wet sand and calls out to me.
“I’m alright, baby,” I assure him. But my legs hurt from the sharp rocks. I’m sure I’ll have bruises all over. I start to rise from my seated position, then stop.
Directly in front of me is the biggest barnacle test I’ve ever seen in my life. Normally, a barnacle test can anywhere from less than a millimeter to a few centimeters in length, but this one is the length of my forearm and nearly as wide. I’m at a loss as to what the species might be. Giant acorn barnacles, the largest known barnacle species, live in this part of the Pacific. But this is something altogether different. Larger, longer, more tube-shaped. And infinitely more beautiful.
I pick up and admire my treasure as Jackson continues his humming and squelching. I examine the test carefully for signs of any plant or animal life growing on it. As a rule, if a test has seaweed or even algae growing on it, I leave it behind, throwing it back into the ocean. I only take home the ones that are thoroughly dried out and dead.
Two tiny clumps of green-brown seaweed cling to my prize. I feel my heart sink.
I look out at the water, at the white-capped waves crashing onto the shore. I feel the weight of the barnacle test in my hand. Then I clutch it to my chest, as if the sea itself would try to wrest it away from me.
No, I won’t give this one up. I will not surrender this beauty back to the ocean.
I feel sorry for the seaweed. But it has to be this way.
“Mommy! Come look!”
Jackson’s voice snaps me out of my reverie. I realize I’m still sitting in the frigid water. I feel a sharp pinch in my nether regions. A crab?
I quickly stand and check for sea life clinging to me. Finding nothing, I return to the sandy beach and praise Jackson’s mess of a sand castle, the barnacle test still in my hand.
The test is too big for my pocket, but I wouldn’t put it there anyway. I want to hold it, to feel its smooth ridges, to admire its architectural beauty. I feel my pulse quicken just looking at it.
I clutch the enormous test while I wait for Jackson to tire himself out playing on the beach. When I see the fussiness start to creep into his face, I coax and cajole him back along the trail to the parking lot. What should have been a five-minute walk turns into twenty. When we finally reach the car, I bundle him into his car seat and set my barnacle test onto the passenger seat next to me. I set off toward home, glancing over at my trophy at least as often as I check the rearview mirror to see if Jackson has fallen asleep yet.
By the time I pull into the driveway, Jackson is sleeping soundly in his car seat. I carry him inside and help him settle back down again in his big-boy bed. Then I race back out to the car to retrieve the barnacle test.
I sit at the kitchen table admiring it. It’s majestic, more beautiful than anything I’ve ever seen. I marvel at its size, its long tubular shape, the ridges that run along its massive length. I peer inside, wondering if more bits of algae might be trapped in there, but I can’t see all the way down to the base of its carapace. Poking at the withered seaweed attached to the outside, I wonder if I should have plucked the plant off and thrown it back into the sea. Too late now, I rationalize.
Once Jake gets home from work and Jackson is in bed, I draw a hot bath and ease myself in. My legs still hurt from my fall on the rocks. There’s a strange itching between my legs. I wonder if I might be developing a UTI.
That night, I sleep with the barnacle test on my nightstand. Jake gives it a funny look before he lies down, but he doesn’t say anything to me about it. Jake tolerates my barnacle obsession. He knows I gave up any serious hope of a career in marine biology in order to stay home with Jackson, so he lets me satiate my need to be connected to the ocean in whatever small ways I still can.
Once the lights are off, with my eyes closed and Jake snoring softly behind me, I reach one hand out and stroke the test until I fall asleep. Even in the dark, it’s beautiful.
The next morning, Jake kisses me and Jackson goodbye and heads out to catch the ferry for his commute to Seattle. On a good day with no traffic, it’s a three-hour trip between our home and his office.
After Jake leaves, I set Jackson in front of the TV and go to the kitchen to cut up an apple for his morning snack. Suddenly I feel a sharp pain in my lower abdomen. It feels like a bad period cramp, but this is the wrong time in my cycle for that. I ignore it at first, peeling and slicing the green fruit. But the pain grows sharper and sharper, like my uterus itself has turned into knives. Jackson sings along with Ms. Rachel, oblivious to his mother curled up and whimpering on the kitchen floor, the apple forgotten, abandoned half-sliced on the counter.
Jackson eventually wanders into the kitchen and finds me there, his hunger having overpowered his addiction to Ms. Rachel’s face.
“Mommy?” he asks. “Can I have a apple?” His small voice pulls me out of whatever cave of pain I had fallen into.
“Yeah, of course, Jackie,” I say, sitting up and pulling him into a hug. “Mommy just doesn’t feel very good right now.”
I fight the pain long enough to stand up and swallow a couple of extra-strength ibuprofen tablets. I ignore the sensation of being stabbed from the inside and finish cutting up Jackson’s apple. I hand him the yellow plastic plate with his apple slices and almond butter on it. Then I retreat to the bedroom to lie down and wait for the pills to work their magic.
I wake up to Jake standing over me.
“Are you alright?” he asks. He’s holding Jackson, whose little face looks like he’s been crying. Jake looks both furious and concerned.
I sit up, disoriented, my head pounding.
“What are you doing home?” I ask. My words come out slurred and wrong.
“It’s 9 o’clock,” he says, unable to disguise the anger in his voice.
I look at my watch. 9:03 PM.
“I—”
“Jackson was alone in the living room watching god knows what on YouTube. How long was he left alone? Why weren’t you with him?”
I suddenly feel sick to my stomach. Ignoring Jake’s questions, I run into the en suite bathroom and puke into the toilet.
Jake doesn’t speak to me the rest of the night. I think about going into Jackson’s room to kiss his forehead. Instead, I trace the ridges of the barnacle test with my fingertips and stare up at the dark ceiling until sleep overpowers me.
In the morning, Jake kisses me and says he forgives me. That evening, he brings me a gift: a self-help book. 101 Meditations for Moms: Relieve Stress and Live Your Best Life! is splashed across its pink cover.
I try the meditations. Not all 101 of them, but the first five.
I don’t feel any better.
For the first few days, the pain is in my abdomen. It feels like horrible menstrual cramps, but I don’t bleed. After a week, it branches out to my lungs, my heart, my legs, my arms. My head aches constantly.
It’s not just the pain that disrupts my life. I lose interest in almost everything. I stop taking Jackson to the beach, letting Ms. Rachel care for him instead. I flinch when Jake reaches for me at night. The only joy or peace I feel is when I’m cradling my giant barnacle test, running my fingers along its surfaces, feeling the raised lines of its outside, staring into the darkness within it.
Jake takes me to the clinic, but the doctor says there’s nothing physically wrong with me. It’s just the stress of motherhood, he says. He prescribes me an antidepressant.
More and more, I catch Jake looking at me with a frown on his face, like he’s sure I’m faking all of this just to ruin his career and get out of taking care of our son.
After several weeks of meditating, taking antidepressants and ibuprofen, and wondering if I’m going crazy, I suggest hiring a nanny, or at least a part-time babysitter. Jake calls it a “ridiculous idea.” He says the whole point of me staying home with Jackson was to avoid incurring childcare expenses.
I grit my teeth and say nothing, remembering our discussions about the many ways Jackson would benefit from being with his mother full-time during his first few years.
One morning, as I fidget with my barnacle test while Jackson plays with wooden blocks, I wonder if I might be pregnant. Jake and I have talked about a sibling for Jackson, but we haven’t been actively trying for one. A pregnancy would explain the constant nausea, the tiredness, maybe the headaches, though probably not the constant shooting pains throughout my body.
I strap Jackson into the car and drive down to the pharmacy. The barnacle test sits in the front seat next to me. I pick up a box of pregnancy tests for me and a bag of pea-flavored Harvest Snaps for Jackson, then rush home to find out if Jackson is about to become a big brother.
I lock myself in the bathroom so that Jackson won’t come in. I pee on the stick. I wait.
Not pregnant.
I look down at my belly. I haven’t been exercising much since getting sick, but I don’t think I realized until this moment just how big my belly has gotten over the past few months. It looks like more than just getting fat, more than period bloat.
Have I even had a period since that day at the beach?
The test has to be wrong.
I pull another one out of the box, unwrap it, and squeeze out a few more drops of pee.
Not pregnant.
Suddenly I hear a wailing from the living room. I’ve forgotten about Jackson.
Jackson stands in front of the open refrigerator, grape juice pooling around his tiny feet. The empty juice container lies on the floor beside him.
“Okay, honey, that’s okay,” I rush to reassure him. “Everybody drops things sometimes.”
I clean him up with the kitchen towel and send him off to play, then mop up the rest of the mess. I try to ignore the crackling, almost electric pain in my arms and legs, the heavy feeling of my swollen belly.
Once the floor is more or less dry, I lean the wet, purple mop against the refrigerator door and try to catch my breath. All this activity has left me exhausted. I grab the barnacle test and carry it to the bedroom. I lie down, hugging the test against my body like a teddy bear.
I awake to shouting. Filtered through the pain in my head, it sounds far away, like someone is yelling underwater. I open my dry, swollen eyes.
Jake’s face is inches from mine, purple with rage. Jackson stands next to him, crying, blood pouring from a gash on his forehead.
I throw up on the floor in front of them, then go back to sleep.
When I wake up, the house is empty and dark. Next to the barnacle on my nightstand, a note in Jake’s sharp, angular handwriting:
I’m taking Jackson & going to my parents’ in Spokane. Whatever is wrong with you, you’re obviously not fit to be a mom.
I stare at the note. Then I let it drop to the floor, pick up the barnacle test, and cradle it to my chest as I lie down to sleep once more.
When I wake up again, I feel something moving in my abdomen. I look down at my belly. It’s huge, far bigger now than when I fell asleep. I look nine months pregnant. My belly button sticks up into the air like a castle on a hill.
But it isn’t my belly button. The color is not the pale pink of my skin. Instead, whatever is sticking out of me is pus yellow. I watch in a mix of horror and fascination as it pulsates, not with the rhythm of my heartbeat, but to its own strange metronome.
The sight of it, and the smell of two-day-old vomit, make me retch again.
But I’m hungry. Desperately hungry.
I rinse out my mouth and scrape briefly at my teeth and tongue with a dry toothbrush. Then I head for the kitchen.
The house is still empty. But the refrigerator is not.
I eat ravenously. Dill pickles, peach yogurt, possibly moldy sliced gouda. I scoop mayonnaise out of a jar with a spoon and swallow it. I drink Jackson’s apple juice. I bite into raw onions and gnaw at a head of garlic. My stomach is like a bottomless pit. I feel compelled to fill it in any way possible.
Once the fridge is empty, I take my keys off the rack by the front door and get into my car. I glimpse my reflection in the rearview mirror: a haggard, disheveled woman, food smeared across her face, puffy eyes, veins pulsing cobalt under pale skin.
I look like a monster. But I don’t care.
My abdomen feels heavy, not from the food but from something else. Something alive.
I buckle my seat belt across my thumping belly. Whatever is inside kicks, wriggles, dances.
Yes, now I understand.
I am going to be a mother.
I remember a video I saw online a few years ago. A woman with gold-tanned skin and dreadlocks piled on her head like snakes, laboring in the ocean, the waves pushing sand and sea foam onto the crowning head of her little boy.
I know where I have to go.
The life in my womb beats against the walls of my uterus, demanding to be let out. I can feel the contractions now, stronger than anything I’ve felt before.
I drive to the visitor center of the park where I found the barnacle, park in the empty lot, and stagger out of the car. Before me is the ocean, just a few minutes down a dirt trail.
I breathe through the contractions and limp down the trail, fearing I might give birth too soon.
Reaching the beach at last, I plunge into the freezing water. The shock of the cold makes it hard for me to breathe, but the life inside me is the only thing that matters.
I labor in the gentle waves, pushing away driftwood and laughing, reveling in the beauty of the experience.
I feel connected: to nature, to the life inside me, to the ocean.
Suddenly I feel an urge to push. I squeeze my muscles hard, pushing with all my might.
Beneath me, millions of tiny white nauplii flow out of my body, an eruption of little white dots. They disperse into the water around me, beginning their journey to find new homes. I caress the life-filled water, feeling nothing but joy.
My babies. My little ones.
I tilt my head back and laugh. Cackle. Whoop!
My babies are going out into the world.
This post was written in response to
’s Augtober Writing Challenge, Week 3. The assigned genre, as you may have surmised, is body horror.
Parasitic barnacles are real. Fortunately for us mammals, they only parasitize other crustaceans (as far as we can tell). They attach to their hosts and send branching structures out into its body to feed. Some species engage in what is called parasitic castration, in which the host animal is prevented from reproducing. Its reproductive organs are either destroyed or co-opted as an incubator for the parasite’s offspring, which the parasitized animal mistakes for its own.
Many thanks to A.C. and Eve for their thoughtful feedback on drafts of this story.
This was an awesome read. A little too close to home (I live in the PNW and have ocean science friends ha ha!) but that made it all the more freaky
oh my god. so, so, good. I absolutely loved the story and also all the commentary about the “real life” horrors of pregnancy, motherhood, chronic health issues, and general gaslighting women receive when trying to get medical care.