Baby Wilson

"Baby Wilson" is presented from a first-person point-of-view by a reliable narrator, Lester. The story opens in a Southern California suburb.

Lester is a twenty-something man who works menial jobs and shares an apartment with his girlfriend, Karen Robileaux, also in her twenties. He works at a diner; she at a health food store. Lester suspects that Karen is mentally unstable, and becomes convinced of this when she arrives home holding a newborn infant boy in her arms. Karen, who occasionally shoplifts, has abducted it from a local hospital; its wristband reads "Baby Wilson." Lester insists she return the child, but Karen adamantly refuses: "I couldn't do that—this is my newborn baby." Rather than seize the tiny kidnap victim and personally take it to the authorities, Lester passively submits to "this crazy lovesick girl."^[1] Lester is now an accessory to a serious felony after the fact. Lester visits his supervisor Brenda at the diner and seeks counsel on what to do. She disparages his stupidity for living with Karen, and warns him that kidnapping is a federal offense. Brenda, however, instructs him to pickup formula and diapers in the meantime at Kmart.

Monitoring the local news, Lester discovers that a police bulletin has been issued with a composite drawing of Karen provided by hospital staff; the FBI have been alerted. He decides to abscond to Las Vegas with Karen and the boy she has named "Jesu."

The street-wise Lester engages in a number of evasions after winning a few hundred dollars at a gambling casino: he changes the plates on his car and purchases several stolen credit cards to fund their flight. En route, Lester discovers he is falling more deeply in love with Karen.

The couple are shocked when authorities report that a ransom note has been delivered to the bereft parents of the child, who offer to pay it. The ransom note is a hoax. Lester and Karen realize they must relinquish the child. They locate a small Catholic church and anonymously Karen informs the kidnapping in confession: she tells the priest where to find the child on the premises. Baby Wilson is returned to his parents.

Lester proceeds to travel north to Alaska, where he and Karen—who is now pregnant—settle down to a new life. Lester works multiple jobs to support his family. Karen decides to call the male child she is carrying Jesu.