Written long before I became a parent, this story deals with the anxieties of expecting parents, and the anxieties of even making the decision.  What does it mean to create new life on a geologic time scale?

Michael’s yeti sits lightly on the foot of the bed, watching with soft brown eyes as Michael makes a third pass at tying his tie. He mumbles “Around the tree, under the log,” but he’s speaking only to himself, not to his silent observer. He is careful not to speak to it.

Michael first noticed the yeti when he awoke sometime during the night, his bladder full of passed beer. Blinking in the dim red light of alarm clock numerals, he’d stared at a hulking figure leaning against the closet doorframe. All he could make out was the humanoid shape. Confident that the beast was a delusion of sleep, he climbed from the bed quietly, shuffled past, careful not to acknowledge or come into contact with it, and went to the bathroom. When he returned, he was surprised—but somehow not disturbed—to see that the yeti remained. Despite its presence, he slept until the alarm screeched hours later.