The Baby Swap Miracle

by Caroline Anderson

  ‘I was—and of course I’m sad, but maybe it’s time to let go—and anyway, it’s not just me, is it? What about Em and Andrew?’ she said, not allowing herself to think about Sam yet, thinking instead of her friends, because it was easier. Safer. ‘I’m gutted for them, because it could so easily have worked this time and the treatment’s so physically and mentally gruelling. To think they’ll have to go through it again…’ She fell silent for a moment. Poor Em. Poor all of them.

  ‘I’m not sure they’ll want to try again,’ Sam said after a thoughtful pause. And thinking about it, he wasn’t sure he could help them. He’d found it harder with each cycle, been more reluctant the more time he’d had to think about it, and now—

  ‘It’s such a mix-up,’ she said, sifting through the clinic director’s words and trying to make some sense of them.

  ‘Tell me about it,’ he said tautly, prodding his black coffee with a teaspoon and scowling at it.

  He looked frustrated and unhappy, and she could understand that. She’d forgotten much of the conversation, the clinic director’s words wiped from her memory by the shock of his revelation, but she remembered the gist of it, and as she trawled through it again in her head she was just as bewildered as she’d been during their meeting.

  ‘I still can’t really see how it could have happened,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘They seemed absolutely certain about what went wrong—certain enough to check the DNA of the remaining frozen embryos—which means that everything was properly documented, so why wasn’t it picked up at the time? It doesn’t make sense.’

  ‘Because the embryologist was so distracted she didn’t even realise she’d made a mistake. She was clearly not fit to be at work and didn’t pay sufficient attention to detail, hence the confusion between your names.’

  ‘What—Eastwood and Hunter? I don’t think so.’

  ‘But Emelia and Emily? They’re quite similar if you’re not concentrating, and she’d missed off your surnames, and spelt your name with an “i” in the middle, which just made it worse. And it was only when the new embryologist sorted out the backlog of paperwork that the inconsistent reference numbers alerted her. Did you miss that bit?’

  ‘I must have done,’ she said slowly. ‘I wasn’t really listening, to be honest, after he’d told us what had happened, but if she left off our surnames it makes a mix-up more understandable, I suppose…’

  ‘Absolutely, but it’s no justification,’ he said flatly, dropping the teaspoon back into his saucer and leaning back. ‘It’s just attention to detail. It’s critical in a job like that. If you’re incompetent, for whatever reason, then you shouldn’t be working there. It’s inexcusable. They’ve created a child that should never have existed, put both of us in an untenable situation, and no amount of compensation can atone for that.’

  There was a hint of steel in his voice, and she realised he was more than frustrated and unhappy, he was angry. Furiously angry. Because he didn’t want some random woman having his child? Reasonable, under the circumstances. She’d feel the same in his shoes. But the embryologist—

  ‘Don’t be too hard on her,’ she murmured. ‘She’d just learned her husband was dying. I know how that feels.’

  Something flickered in his eyes, and he nodded briefly. ‘Sorry. Of course you do. I didn’t mean to sound harsh, and it was the clinic managers who were at fault. They should have given her compassionate leave or someone to work with to keep a quiet eye on what she was doing, not just left it to chance. But that doesn’t alter what’s happened to you and the situation you’ve been left in.’

  And him, of course. She wasn’t the only one who was affected, but she was the only one who couldn’t walk away—the only one in what he’d called an untenable situation. And he looked as if he’d rather be anywhere else in the world but here, so she owed him that chance.

  ‘Sam, this needn’t make any difference to you,’ she said carefully. ‘I’m not asking you to sign up to any kind of responsibility for the baby—’

  He gave a hollow grunt of laughter and drained his coffee.

  ‘Emelia, I signed up to give my brother a child. A child who’d be brought up by a loving, devoted couple. A child who’d have not only a mother, but a father. I didn’t sign up to be a sperm donor, to hand over my genetic material to a stranger and take no further part in my child’s life. That was never on the agenda and it’s not something I’d ever do, but that’s not the point now. The point is you’re having my baby, and I won’t walk away from that. From either of you.’

  A muscle worked in his jaw and she swallowed. Was that what she wanted for her child? A dutiful, angry father stomping about in their lives? She wasn’t sure. She didn’t know him—and he was right, he didn’t know her. Time to change that, maybe.

  ‘I’m not that strange,’ she said, trying for a smile, and he laughed again, but his voice was gentler this time.

  ‘No. No, you’re not that strange, but you are alone, and you didn’t sign up for this either, Emelia. You were supposed to be having your late husband’s baby, with the support of his parents. Now, there’s no possibility of that ever happening, and you’re pregnant with a stranger’s child—a stranger who’s very much alive and involved with this, and I can’t imagine how you feel about it. About any of it. Or how your in-laws will feel, come to that.’

  Good question. How did she feel? She didn’t know yet. It was far too complicated and she needed time to sift though it and come to terms with it before she could share it with Sam. Her in-laws were another question altogether, and she had a fair idea how they would feel.

  ‘It’s going to be horrendous breaking it to them. They’ve grown so used to the idea that this was James’ baby, and they keep feeling my bump, Julia especially. Really, you’d think it was hers the way she just assumes she can touch me.’

  He felt a stab of regret, because he’d wanted to ask if he could feel it, felt a crazy need to lay his hands on the beautiful, smooth curve that held his child, but of course he couldn’t. It was far too intrusive and he had no right to touch her. No rights over her at all. Lord, what a crazy situation.

  ‘So what do you do? When she does that?’

  ‘I let her. What can I do? She smiles this proud, secret little smile, as if it’s all her doing, and she’s constantly buying things—the nursery’s so full I can hardly get in there.’

  ‘And they’re all things for James’ baby, not mine,’ he murmured, realising that this mix-up was going to have a devastating effect on so many people.

  She nodded.

  ‘That’s right. And they need to know.’

  She swallowed. She couldn’t put this off any longer, and she needed time alone to think. Sam sitting there simmering with anger and some other emotion she couldn’t get a handle on wasn’t helping at all. ‘I ought to get back and tell them.’

  ‘Do you want me to come?’

  She stared at him, wishing he could, knowing he couldn’t, and he realised that, obviously, because he went on hastily, ‘No, of course you don’t. Sorry. You have to tell them alone, I can see that, but we need to talk sometime, Emelia. This won’t go away.’

  She nodded. ‘I know—but not yet. I need time for it to sink in, Sam. Give me a while. Let me tell them, try and explain, and let me think about my options, because this changes everything. My whole future.’

  Sam searched her soft, wounded eyes. She was being so brave about it, but what if it wasn’t what she wanted? What if, when she’d considered her options—?

  ‘If you don’t want to go through with this, if you want to take the clinic up on their offer—it’s your decision,’ he said brusquely, a painful twisting in his gut as he said the words—words that could end his child’s life. Words he’d had to say, even though they went deeply against his every instinct.

  Her eyes widened, her hand flying down to cover the little bump that he so wanted to lay his hands against, and she stood up abruptly.

  ‘No way. This is my baby, Sam,’ s
he said flatly. ‘I haven’t asked you to get involved in its life, and I don’t expect you to if you don’t want to, but there’s no way I’m taking them up on their “offer”, as you so delicately put it. I’ll have it, and I’ll love it, and nothing and nobody will get in the way of that. And if you don’t like it, then sue me.’

  And lifting her chin, she scooped up her keys, grabbed her bag off the other chair and walked swiftly out of the café, leaving him sitting there staring after her. The relief left him weak at the knees, and it took him a second, but then he snapped his mouth shut, got up and strode after her.

  ‘Wait!’ he said, yanking open her car door before she could drive off. ‘Emelia, that’s not what I was trying to say. I just thought—’

  ‘Well, you thought wrong,’ she retorted, and grabbed the door handle.

  He held the door firmly and ignored her little growl of frustration. ‘No. I thought—hoped—you’d react exactly as you did, but you needed to know that you have my support whatever course of action you decide to take. This thing is massive. It’s going to change the whole course of your life, and that’s not trivial. You have to be certain you can do this. That’s all I was saying—that it’s your call, and for what it’s worth, I think you’ve made the right one, but it’s down to you.’

  He thrust a business card into her hand. ‘Here. My contact details. Call me, Emelia. Please. Talk to me. If there’s anything you need, anything I can do, just ask. If you really are going to keep the baby—’

  ‘I am. I meant everything I said. But don’t worry, Sam, I don’t need anything from you. You’re off the hook.’

  Never. Not in his lifetime. He hung on to the door. ‘Promise me you’ll call me when you’ve spoken to them.’

  ‘Why?’

  He shrugged, reluctant to let her go like this when she was so upset. Concerned for her. Nothing more, he told himself. Just concerned for her and the child. His child. His heart twisted. ‘Because you need a friend?’ he suggested warily. ‘Someone who understands?’

  Her eyes searched his for the longest moment, and then without a word she slammed the door and drove away.

  He watched her go, swore softly, then got into his car and followed her out of the car park. She’d turned left. He hesitated for a moment, then turned right and headed home, to start working out how to fill his brother in on this latest development in the tragic saga of their childless state.

  Better that than trying to analyse his own reaction to the news that a woman he found altogether too disturbingly attractive was carrying his child—a child he’d never meant to have, created by accident—that would link him to Emelia forever…

  ‘I’ve got something to tell you.’

  ‘Well, before you do, come and see what Brian’s doing in the nursery,’ her mother-in-law said, her face beaming as she grabbed Emelia’s hand and led her through the door.

  Why not? she thought bleakly. Why not do it there, amongst all the things gathered together to welcome their new grandchild? The child they’d thought they might never have.

  The child they never would have. Not now. Not ever.

  She sucked in a breath and stood there in the expectant silence, aware of their eyes on her face, their suppressed excitement as they eagerly awaited her reaction. And then she looked at the room.

  He’d painted a frieze, she realised. Trains and teddies and alphabet letters, all round the middle of the walls. A little bit crooked, a little bit smudged, but painted with love. Stupidly, it made her want to cry.

  She swallowed hard and looked away. Oh, this was so hard—too hard. ‘I had a letter—from the clinic director,’ she said bluntly, before she chickened out. ‘I had to go to there and talk to him. There’s a problem.’

  ‘A problem? What kind of problem? We paid their last bill, Brian, didn’t we? We’ve paid everything—’

  ‘It’s not the money. It’s about the baby, Julia.’

  Her mother-in-law’s face was suddenly slack with shock, and Emelia looked around and realised she couldn’t do this here, in this room, with the lovingly painted little frieze still drying on the walls. ‘I need a cup of tea,’ she said, and headed for the big family kitchen, knowing they’d follow. She put the kettle on—such a cliché, having a cup of tea, but somehow a necessary part of the ritual of grief—and then sat down, pushing the cups towards them.

  They sat facing her, at the table where James had sat as a boy, where they’d all sat together so many times, where they’d cried together on the day he’d died, and they waited, the tea forgotten, their faces taut with fear as she groped for the words. But there was no kind way to do this, nothing that was going to make it go away.

  ‘There was a mix-up,’ she said quietly, her heart pounding as she yanked the rug out from under them as gently as possible. ‘In the lab at the clinic. They fertilised the eggs with the wrong sperm.’

  Julia Eastwood’s hand flew up over her mouth. ‘So—that’s another woman’s baby?’ she said after a shocked pause.

  Oh, dear. ‘No,’ she said. ‘It’s my baby.’ And then, because there was no other way to say it, she added gently, ‘It’s not James’ baby, though. It’s someone else’s.’

  ‘So—where’s his baby?’ she demanded, her voice rising hysterically. ‘Has some other woman got his baby? She’ll have to give it back—Brian, she’ll have to, we can’t have this—’

  ‘Julia, there is no baby,’ she said, trying to firm her voice. ‘The embryos all died before they could be implanted.’

  She let that sink in for a moment, watched Brian’s eyes fill with tears before he closed them, watched Julia’s face spasm as the realisation hit home. The wail of grief, when it came, was the same as when James had taken his last breath. It was as if she’d lost him all over again, and Emelia supposed that, in a way, she had.

  She reached out and squeezed the woman’s hand. ‘Julia, I’m so sorry.’

  She didn’t react, except to turn into Brian’s waiting arms and fall apart, and Emelia left them to their grief. There was nothing she could add that would make it any better and she just wanted to get out before she drowned in their emotion.

  She was superfluous here, redundant, and it dawned on her that their only thought had been for the baby. Not once in that conversation had either of them expressed any concern about her, about how she might feel, about where she would go from here.

  Not surprising, really, but it was a very good point. Where would she go? What would she do? She could hardly carry on living here, in the annexe they’d created when James was ill—the annexe where he’d lost his fight for life and which after his death, with the IVF conversation under their belts, they’d told her she should think of as her home.

  But not when she was carrying another man’s child.

  So she packed some things. Not the baby’s. As Sam had said, they belonged to a child who never was, and they would no doubt be dealt with in the fullness of time. She closed the door without looking at the little frieze in case it made her cry again, and put a few changes of clothes in a bag, enough for a week, perhaps, to give her time to think, although with very little to her name she wasn’t quite sure where she’d go. She just knew she had to, that staying, even one more night, simply wasn’t an option.

  She put her case in the car, then went through all the contents of the annexe, piling the things that were hers alone into one end of the wardrobe so they could be packed and delivered to her wherever she ended up, but leaving James’ things there, lifting them one at a time to her lips, saying goodbye for the final time.

  His watch. His wedding ring. The fountain pen she’d given him for his birthday so he could write the diary of his last months.

  She stroked her fingers gently over the cover of the diary. She didn’t need to take it, she knew every word by heart. Julia needed it more than she did. She touched it one last time and walked away.

  Leaving the bedroom, she went into the kitchen and turned out the fridge, staring helplessly at half a bo
ttle of milk and an opened bag of salad.

  There was no point in taking it, but it seemed silly to throw it out, so she put it back with the cheese and the tomatoes—and then got them all out again and made herself a sandwich. It was mid-afternoon and she’d eaten nothing since she’d left Sam, but she couldn’t face it now. She drank the milk, because she hadn’t touched her cup of tea, and then put the sandwich in the car with her case for later, had one last visual sweep of the annexe and then she went to say goodbye.

  They were in the kitchen, where she’d left them, as if she’d only been gone five minutes instead of two or three hours. She could hear raised voices as she approached, snatches of distressed conversation that halted her in her tracks.

  Julia said something she didn’t quite catch, then Brian said, quite clearly, ‘If I’d had the slightest idea of all the pain it would cause, I never would have allowed you to talk him into signing that consent.’

  ‘I couldn’t bear to lose him, Brian! You have to understand—’

  ‘But you had lost him, Julia. You’d lost him already. He hardly knew what he was signing—’

  ‘He did!’

  ‘No! He was out of his head with the morphine, and telling him she was desperate to have his child—it was just a lie.’

  ‘But you went along with it! You never said anything—’

  ‘Because I wanted it, too, but it was wrong, Julia—so wrong. And now…’

  Her thoughts in free-fall, Emelia stepped into the room and cleared her throat, and they stopped abruptly, swivelling to stare at her as she fought down the sudden surge of anger that would help no one. She wanted to tackle them, to ask them to explain, but she wasn’t sure she could hold it together and she just wanted to get out. Now.

  ‘I’m leaving,’ she said without emotion. ‘I’ve put all my things in the end of the wardrobe. I’ll get them collected when I know where I’ll be. I’ve left all James’ things here for you. I know you’ll want them. I haven’t touched the nursery.’

  ‘But—what about all the baby’s things? What will we do with them?’ Julia said, and then started to cry again.