The sameness of the color and lack of decoration gave the room an ambiance that discouraged unwanted activity and thought. Just looking at the walls dulled Andrew’s mind and made him sleepy. It was obvious that this room was never meant to raise a baby in, but only to provide a temporary holding place until the adoptive mother came to take her child home.
The nursery’s only decoration, if it could be called that, were the presence of three identical nondescript brown teddy bears mounted on little platforms about seven feet off the floor on three sides of the nursery. The teddy bears were so plain and unadorned that Andrew couldn’t imagine why Krystyn had taken the trouble to have expensive matching walnut shelves made for them so they could be displayed so prominently. They had been affixed to their platforms in such a way that they leaned forward in an attitude of dutiful watchmen. The unblinking eyes of the teddy bears gave Andrew the singular impression that they were guardians that somehow watched over the nursery. Certainly their vantage point and position gave the trio of bears a perfect view of everything that happened in the nursery. They gave him the strange feeling that they were some sort of infantile version of living temple statuary that gave omniscience to the goddesses who ruled the female-dominated kingdoms of dark, forbidding nurseries.
Aside from the odd decoration, the nursery was well-ordered and spic and span-new from the ceiling to the baseboards. The floor, bedding and walls were immaculately clean; there were no children’s toys or dirt to mar the perfect order that prevailed in the sober nursery. In the corner of the room was a dark hued high chair made of heavy black walnut and cushioned with navy blue padding. Beneath the high chair was a dark blue plastic pad to keep the room neat when the baby was fed. Next to the high chair, against the wall, stood an adult chair that was evidently meant for Krystyn’s use when she fed her charges. On the right side of the room was a low child-sized armoire with a large acrylic jar on top filled with blue handled, round-nippled pacifiers. Andrew smiled at the sight of the pacifiers, despite the depressing motif, Krystyn had to accede to an infant’s desire to suck in order to keep it quiet. A baby might be subdued temporarily by the décor, but if it felt the urge to suckle, the only course was to give into its demands or suffer through its wails of discontent.
