“Where are you from, lovey?” Louise asked, turning to face me.
She had a thick accent. One I couldn’t quite place. The way she spoke felt like smooth silk against my skin. “I’m from Australia.”
“Ah, an Aussie.”
“Yep! That’s me.”
“I’m Canadian. I’m from a small town in Saskatchewan.”
I couldn’t even say that word let alone spell it. Not to mention I had actually no idea where that was. I mean, I knew where Canada was, obviously, but anything more than Toronto – right near Niagara Falls, Vancouver – on the LA side border and Quebec, the New York side where the yummy pastries were, I had no idea what was in between.
As if my silence gave away my ignorance, Louise kept right on talking. “If you think about the map of Canada, I’m pretty much right in the middle. Halfway across and halfway up.”
“So basically, you’re in the middle of nowhere then?” Darrell added as he slowed to a crawl as we dipped through another puddle.
“Yeah. That’s about right. What about you, Maggie?”
“Just Sydney. Nothing exciting really.”
It was the truth. Sydney wasn’t exciting to me. The traffic was horrendous. The roadworks never seemed to end. The best places had, over the years, become such tourist hot spots no actual Sydneysiders would ever bother going there. Bondi Beach for example. I’d lived in Sydney for years. Even with the traffic I was only probably forty minutes from the famous stretch of sand, yet I’d never actually stepped foot on it.
“Nothin’ exciting? Are you kidding me? Sydney is stunning!”
“You’ve been?”
“Not yet. It’s definitely on the bucket list though.”
“Well, ladies, I hate to interrupt this but if you wouldn’t mind looking over your left shoulder…”
“Holy shit!”
CHAPTER EIGHT
MAGGIE
FOUR YEARS AGO
While I lay on the bed, Drew sat beside me thumbing through a magazine, muttering at every page. I guess trashy gossip rags weren’t really his thing. Today was a hard day, and I was so grateful I had Drew by my side. He’d taken the day off. We both had gone to the fertility clinic for tests and an appointment with the specialist. Even though he’d been right here beside me, I was still shitting myself.
I’d been weighed and measured, poked and prodded. My arms were black and blue from the multitude of tests I’d been exposed to over the past three weeks. It’d taken us three months, a mortgage refinance, arguments, tears and way too many nights spent worrying if this was the right thing for us to do, just to get us to that point. Now we were here, I still wasn’t one hundred percent sure we were doing the right thing.
On top of all the medical shit we were going through, we’d made the decision that if we were going to do this, if we were going to take the gamble then we were going all in. Drew had insisted on doing this with me, something that I was extremely touched by. First step; we’d joined a gym. Four days a week I had a trainer, Ryan, pushing me until I wanted to vomit. Although I hadn’t told him my reasons for needing to drop the kilos, he pushed me anyway. For an hour I’d lift weights, bend and twist in ways I never had before and run until it felt like my heart was going to leap from my chest.
We’d cut sugar out of our diet completely and I truly believed that on top of the emotional tight rope I was walking at the moment, the lack of sugar in my system was turning me into the psycho bitch I’d become. When I’d caught Drew sitting in his car in the driveway chomping down a Snickers bar it had almost ended with him sleeping there. Drew’s ‘she’ll-be-right’ attitude had me wanting to junk-punch him.
“How much longer?” I asked him, eying the jug on the table on the other side of the room. I was dying of thirst but not allowed to have anything. Even though they were pumping fluids into me via the IV bag hanging above my head, it wasn’t doing anything to quench my thirst.
“They haven’t said anything. Want me to go and find out?”
Yes. “No, it’s fine.”
I was fidgety and frustrated. I’d been staring at the same white walls and light blue curtain for the past three hours. There were exactly forty-six folds in the curtains. Closing my eyes, I tried to block out the incessant beeping echoing down the corridor.
“It will be okay, Mags,” Drew promised earnestly as he reached out and took hold of my clammy hand, steadying my tapping.
“You don’t know that!” I snapped. The moment I did I felt awful as I watched him recoil.
Throughout this process there were moments when I hated Drew more than I hated snakes. And I hated them a lot. He didn’t get it. He wasn’t worried enough. At least it seemed like he wasn’t. After our first discussion, the one I’d never forget, things had changed.
“It’s my fault we can’t have a family.”
As the words fell from Drew’s lips, I took in the dishevelled, defeated man standing in front of me. In my eyes, Drew had always been invincible. Unshakeable. Larger than life. From the moment we’d gotten together, he’d been my rock. My safe place to land when the world around me was caving in and I felt like I couldn’t breathe. Taking in his mussed-up hair, red-rimmed eyes and untucked shirt he was only a shell of the man I’d fallen in love with.
“Drew, it’s not your fault.”
“It is though, Maggie. It’s entirely my fault. I can’t give you the baby you want. I’m the one stopping you from becoming a mum. And you’d be an amazing mum, Mags. I know you would. And I want that for you. If I can’t give that to you, maybe… maybe you’re better off finding someone who can… who can make your dreams come true.”
“Are you fucking kidding me right now?”
“Maggie…”
“No, Drew! Don’t you fucking dare Maggie me.” I exploded. In hindsight it probably wasn’t the right reaction to have, but it was the most honest thing I’d said in weeks. Months probably.
“Please, Maggie…”
“No, Drew! No! You don’t get to walk away from this, from me, because you’re scared. Do you think I’m not scared? Do you think I’m not freaking the fuck out over here? I’ve been reading up and talking to other people in our situation…”
“In our situation? Geez, Maggie. Why are you telling everyone about our problems? It’s embarrassing enough without the whole world knowing our business.”
“I haven’t!” I screamed, tugging at my hair until it stung.
“You just said…”
“I’ve been online. In anonymous forums and chat rooms asking what to expect if we decided to try the IVF.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, oh.”
“Why are you looking at them?”
“Because, Drew, I need to know. I need to know what to expect if we go ahead with it.”
“And what did you find out?” Drew slumped into his stool. Even though this was the absolute last ever conversation I wanted to have and one I definitely wasn’t prepared for right now, it looked like I wasn’t going to get a choice.
“Are you sure you want to do this? Now?” Drew nodded and I continued. “It’s going to be hard. Really hard. And it’s expensive. And stressful. And it’s likely to screw my body up.”
“What do you mean screw your body up?”
For the next hour we talked and argued. I cried. Drew swore. Somehow though, the decision was made. I don’t think either of us were completely sold on the idea, but it was all we had.
Now we were here. Waiting to hear how today’s procedure had gone. Drew kept asking me how I was doing and if I needed anything. I just waved off his concern. He was trying to do the right thing but his hovering was driving me up the wall. Surprisingly, I managed to wrangle my inner bitch and keep her quiet. Besides being an emotional disaster right now, my stomach wasn’t feeling so great. I didn’t want to tell Drew that though. He was worried enough.
When the doctor appeared, she seemed so detached, cold and unemotional. Not once did she meet my eye as she read from her
tablet. I understood every third word she was saying.
Thankfully she didn’t stay long and as soon as she was gone a friendly, helpful nurse appeared. After she’d removed the needle from the back of my hand, she’d left me to get dressed before I was discharged. Pulling my sweatshirt over my head, I kept my back turned. I was trying to hide from Drew. Even though he’d seen me naked a million times before, there was something about today, about this situation that made everything different. I didn’t want him looking at me. I didn’t want him to see me. It was probably the overdose of hormones they’d pumped into my system that had me unbalanced. My head was already so confused. I couldn’t handle much more. Not today anyway.
Tugging my jeans on, I couldn’t hold back the tears. I’d walked in here barely four hours earlier and my jeans fit just fine. Now, I was so bloated and disgusting they wouldn’t even do up.
“Mr. Sandford?”
“Yes?” Drew’s head snapped up so quickly I was surprised he didn’t give himself whiplash.
“Would you be able to come with me? We can get you set up with Maggie’s medications and you’ll need to sign some paperwork.”
Drew looked to me waiting for me to agree. With a half-arsed nod, he clambered out of the chair and disappeared down the hallway. Taking the opportunity for a moment of privacy, I slipped into the bathroom and washed my face. I looked like I felt. Like death warmed up. And not warmed up properly either. More like death that had been defrosted then chucked in the microwave on high for too long.
Tugging on my jeans again, I tried to stuff a handful of my fat stomach into my pants and attempted to drag the zipper up. Sucking my stomach in, I held my breath. It didn’t help. Nothing did. Swatting away the stupid tears, I hitched up my pants as high as I could before yanking my shirt down. All I could do was hope I was able to stumble out of here and across the carpark without my pants falling down and showing half the town my arse.
“You ready?”
Swinging my handbag over my shoulder, I threaded my finger through my belt loop and followed Drew out the door. By the time I dropped into the front seat of the car, I thought I was going to explode.
“Mags? You okay?”
Deciding lying was my best option right now, I smiled at Drew. A forced, awkward smile. “Yeah. I’m just a bit tired and sore.” Watching the relief that it wasn’t anything more serious spread across his face just reinforced the fact I’d made the right call keeping my problems to myself.
“That’s understandable. Is there anything you want on our way home?”
“No, I’m good. Thanks though.”
“All right then. Let’s get you home and on the couch.”
“Sounds like heaven.” It really did.
The next five days were the most torturous of my life. When they’d harvested my eggs, they’d managed to get twenty-two viable embryos. They’d fertilised them and each day, I made Drew ring the clinic to see how things were progressing. By the end of day one we were down to seventeen. When sunset came on day two, we were down to fourteen and my nerves were shot to shit. The more Drew tried to calm and reassure me, the more anxious I got. Although I’d been warned that this was entirely normal, for me it wasn’t. It wasn’t normal for me to have spent thousands and thousands of dollars on a gamble I wasn’t convinced was going to pay off.
“What did they say?”
“Maggie.”
“Tell me.”
“Maggie…”
“Drew! Tell me. How many left?”
“Nine.”
“What?”
“There’s nine that have survived.”
“H…h…how can that be?”
“It’s okay, Maggie. We’re at day four. Some will make it.”
“You don’t know that, Drew.”
“No, Mags, I don’t know that. But I have faith.”
“I don’t.”
Drew wrapped his arms around me and held me against him. It was like he was trying to hold all the fragile parts of me together, the ones that were barely clinging together by a thread. “I know you don’t, sweetheart. But that’s okay. I’ve got enough faith for both of us.”
“Okay.”
“Why don’t we go out? Do something? Think about something else for a minute. Can’t hurt, can it?”
“I’m really, seriously craving risotto.”
“Risotto?”
“Yeah, pumpkin risotto. And cheesy garlic bread.”
“Well, if that’s what you want, risotto it is.”
We made it to day five and we had five embryos left. I felt like a failure. How had we gone from having twenty-two to only five? It seemed like yet another thing I was failing at. I couldn’t even produce a decent egg that would make it.
After an argument with the specialist who strutted around the halls with permanent resting bitch face about what we wanted, she implanted one embryo inside me and wished me well. What sort of insensitive bitch wishes someone well when they know that you’re going through your own personal version of hell?
Shuffling out the door with my thighs clenched tightly, I was determined that this was going to work. It had to. If I was risking this much financially on it, I wasn’t going to do anything to jeopardise it.
For the next ten days I existed in a bubble. I did whatever I could to hide myself and what I was feeling from Drew. Even though deep down I knew it wasn’t his fault, none of it was, I was too embarrassed to talk about what I was struggling with. How bad I was struggling. There were some things I just couldn’t say to him. Not without feeling like I was a complete freak anyway. I was a woman on the verge of a meltdown. Even if that’s exactly what I was, the last thing in the world I wanted was for Drew to know it.
Every time my stomach grumbled; I was sure something was wrong. When it turned out it was nothing more than gas, I felt incredibly stupid. Each time I stripped off to climb into the shower I found myself staring at my non-existent baby bump in the mirror. I wasn’t a complete moron. I knew I shouldn’t expect to see any changes in my reflection, but I was looking for them anyway. Truth be told, I was hoping for something to seem different. I mean, I felt different, so shouldn’t I look different?
All the reading and all the late-night anonymous conversations in chat rooms did absolutely nothing to prepare me for the hell I was in. This was hard. Way fucking harder than anything I could have ever imagined. Right now, our desperate need to be parents had fucked us financially. My body was doing all sorts of weird and crazy things. Then there was my head. I was so screwed up. Normally I was an overthinker. I’d analyse myself into my grave given half the chance but this, this was tripping me up like a tsunami-sized wave.
The hardest part about it all wasn’t the money and it wasn’t the physical pain. Really it wasn’t even the emotional rollercoaster I was stuck riding, unable to get off. It was the fact that I felt like I was in this completely alone. And I was convinced it was all my fault.
When Drew and I had decided to push ahead with the IVF, risk everything and try, I’d managed to convince him that we keep it just between us. After more than a few brutal arguments and spilt tears, Drew had conceded and reluctantly agreed. Naively, I thought it would be easier. Easier on both of us. If no one knew then if something didn’t go according to plan, then it was only the two of us disappointed. There’d be no one to look at us with pity in their eyes. No one constantly checking to make sure I was hanging in there. No one promising us that it’d be different next time.
The downside was I was now standing here, all alone. With no one to confess my deepest darkest fears to. No one in my corner rooting for me. No one to talk me off the ledge I felt like I was clinging to. I wanted to talk to someone. To cry on their shoulder and have them wipe away my tears. Instead, I slid down the tiles of the shower, the hot water pounding on my shoulders and let my fat salty tears run down my cheeks and circle the drain. Disappearing like they’d never even existed.
It was day nine and my nerves were shot to shit. Actually,
they were shot to shit three days ago. Today I was barely clinging to reality. Even though it was a Saturday, I’d sent Drew to work. He was desperately trying to be everything he thought he should be – supportive, loving, kind and always there. That was the problem. He was never more than three feet away. We moved around the house in some kind of weird choreographed dance. I moved, he moved. I sat, he sat. It was driving me up the wall. I was ready to wrap my hands around his neck and throttle him. I could barely restrain my temper. It was like I had super-charged PMS.
Everything flared up and boiled over when he came home earlier than I expected. Dressed in my ugliest, rattiest sweats, with my fuzzy socks on, I was curled up on the lounge wrapped in a blanket. I’d started trying to read a book, then attempted to watch a movie. Nothing held my interest. Scoffing chocolates down my throat by the handful, when he walked in the door, I had smashed into rock bottom and landed. Hard.
“What’s wrong? Did something happen? Maggie, why didn’t you call me? You should’ve called me.” Drew panicked, dropping his bag and rushing to my side.
“It’s nothing.”
“Maggie! You don’t cry for nothing. Tell me what’s wrong. Please, sweetheart. Talk to me.” I could read the fear in Drew’s voice as he dropped to his knees beside the couch, wrapping my hands in his.
Seeing the pain in his face, the concern in his eyes I knew I couldn’t lie to him. Not this time. Not even if it was going to save him from this all-consuming guilt squashing me. “What if… what if it doesn’t work?”
Then there it was. The horrible, painful, terrifying truth.
My deepest, darkest fear was out in the open, just waiting for Drew to judge me.
I watched as my words sunk in. Drew’s eyes softened and I saw his eyes fill with tears. He looked like he’d just been sucker punched.
“If it doesn’t work…” Drew’s voice rasped as he fought to continue. “If it doesn’t work, then we deal with that if and when we have to. But for now, we’re not going to worry about that. We’re going to keep hoping that it does. All we can do is take it step by step.”
Broken Dreams Boxset Page 9
