Charlie Franks is A-OK

by Cecily Anne Paterson

  Mum’s head jerked up from the sofa, and she looked around, her eyes streaming tears. ‘Is she okay? Is she alright?’

  I let go of Mum’s hand and looked over at Ness, who was holding something in her hands. It was a tiny, squirmy baby, all encased in a white bubble, just like Mika had been.

  ‘The sac is still together,’ she said. ‘It’s amazing. I’ve never seen that happen before. But she looks perfect.’

  Mum turned around and sank onto the floor, which were covered with the sheets I’d found. She was still crying, but her face was happy and her arms were out for her baby, and she didn’t even seem to mind the mess that was surrounding her. Goo, bits of snot-looking stuff, and some blood. I raised my eyebrows at it, but Ness didn’t seem worried, so I figured it must be normal.

  Ness turned to me. ‘We’ll need towels. Can you get some?’

  ‘Okay.’ I skipped towards the door, and then looked back. Mum was hugging the baby. And I was surprised for what may have been the seven hundred and fifty-fourth time that day. Instead of feeling angry about it, I felt happy. And then, I started to cry. With joy.

  23

  Chapter 23

  I brought as many towels as we had in the cupboard, a stack higher than my own head, and stumbled over myself to get through the door. Next to the sofa, Mum was still just sitting there, holding the baby, crying her eyes out and smiling.

  I handed the towels to Ness awkwardly and then stood back. Fozzles had needed time to bond with Mika. Maybe human mothers and babies were the same.

  But Ness didn’t seem to think so. She gave me a funny look. ‘Aren’t you going to hug your mum? And your sister?’

  ‘Can I?’

  She laughed. ‘Of course. Why not?’

  I didn’t need to be told twice.

  ‘Oh, Charlie,’ said Mum, tearfully. ‘You did it.’ She wiped her face and looked down at the baby, who was still gooey and covered in bits of stuff that I didn’t really want to ask about. ‘Isn’t she beautiful?’

  I looked at her little pink face. It was slightly squashed, her eyes were closed, and her mouth was opening and closing like the fish we used to have in an aquarium back when I was about seven. Objectively, no, she wasn’t beautiful.

  But then something warm came over me, something I’d never felt before. It was a fierceness, a protectiveness. It was more than a feeling; it was an absolute certainty that this baby was my baby sister. She was the most beautiful baby in the world. I would more than happily ride through storms and wade through creeks and get towels and have my hands ripped up if it meant she would be okay. ‘Wow. She’s ours.’

  Mum started to cry all over again, smiling at me and dripping on the baby, at which point Ness stepped in. ‘We need to wrap her up and keep her warm. Maybe even give her a feed until the ambulance people get here and can deal with the rest of it.’

  She held out a towel, Mum placed the baby into it and Ness wrapped her so tightly I got a little concerned.

  ‘She won’t be able to move.’ My voice was worried. ‘Aren’t you hurting her?’

  Again Ness laughed at me. ‘She’s fine. She’s used to feeling tight and secure from when she was inside your mum. And she needs to stay warm.’

  ‘Do you want a hold, Charlie?’

  My eyes went big and my heart started beating as Mum passed me the small bundle of towel-wrapped baby gorgeousness. ‘Just gently. No big movements.’

  I took my little sister and nestled her in my arms, right up against my chest. Her eyes opened and looked at mine, and she turned towards me in a wobbly sort of way. She reminded me a bit of Mika on that first night— with jerky, un-practiced movements, and big, curious eyes, looking around her as though she was asking, ‘What kind of world is this?’

  ‘It’s a big world,’ I whispered, turning away so Mum and Ness wouldn’t hear me. ‘But I’ll help you through it. I’ll cheer you on.’

  I sniffed the top of her head. It smelled beautiful, like the freshest morning on the crispest day in spring. ‘I’m going to be your sister forever.’

  My words were interrupted by a crashing on the front door, but I couldn’t move with the baby, my baby, in my arms. Ness jumped up and ran out to see what was happening, and ten seconds later, came back in with someone whose face I recognised.

  ‘Rob!’ I was delighted. If Rob the ambo was here, everything was going to be okay. Then I corrected myself. Everything was already okay. Mum had done a great job, the baby was beautiful, and I had gotten lots and lots of towels. Rob’s job was practically done.

  ‘I recognise you,’ he said, then he pointed to the warm bundle in my arms. ‘What’s all this, then?’

  I beamed. ‘I have a sister.’

  ‘And poor old Mum had to give birth in the middle of the storm.’ He grinned back. ‘Let’s get you sorted out and off to hospital, and make sure everything’s just as perfect as it should be.’

  Rob did checks on the baby (I had to reluctantly give her over) and Mum, and even though he said that everything looked great, we still had to get her to hospital, so we bundled them both up in warm gear and Rob parked the ambulance so the door was really close to the front door and they didn’t have to get through too much rain to get in.

  Ness and I scrambled under coats to get into her car and we followed them up the drive, which was now running like a river in some places, down the road and into town to the hospital, which was warm, clean, and lit; a nice change from our place. I thought about the piles of towels I’d left all over the floor, and the waterproof sheets Ness had rolled up and dumped in the laundry, and wondered what Mum would say after all her cleaning efforts of this morning.

  This morning. I laughed to myself. This morning seemed like a whole lifetime ago. I’d read books where the heroine in the story has her world turned upside down in the space of a day, but it had never really happened to me … until now. Even the big move we’d done last year wasn’t the same. Yes, it changed the things in my life—where we lived, and the stuff we did. But it didn’t change me. Today, though—today I woke up as one person, and I’ll be going to bed a totally different one.

  I have faith in you, Charlie.

  Mum’s voice echoed in my head, and then I realised she was talking for real. I turned my head. The doctor had gone (‘this baby is just fine and perfect’ she had pronounced), the nurses had exited and even Ness was out of the room, heading home to Tessa and James; she’d said she might bring them back later.

  ‘Can you hold her, Charlie?’ Mum’s face looked better than it had for the last eight months. She actually had colour, even though she looked tired. ‘I’m dying for a hot shower.’

  ‘Of course.’ I stood up and took the baby from Mum. Someone had gotten rid of our towel and wrapped her in a pink flannelette blanket. ‘Shall I sit down with her?’

  ‘Whatever you like.’ Mum rolled herself off the bed and headed into the bathroom. ‘Just keep her close. It’s good for her to bond.’

  ‘Like Mika.’ I smiled, then gazed down at the little face in front of me. Her eyes were closed, and her nose was the tiniest thing I’d even seen, except for her eyelashes, which made me gasp out loud when I noticed them. I peeked inside the blanket wrap and saw a little fist, closed up but relaxed, with the tiniest little fingers ever. And fingernails! ‘Oh!’ I said. I couldn’t help myself.

  We sat on the armchair for ages. Mum must have had the longest shower ever in the history of showers, but I guess she had a lot of icky stuff to wash off, plus with the power going off, the rain, and the mud I tracked in, everything had seemed kind of grubby at home. I didn’t mind, though. I just sat with my baby sister, looking at her and talking to her, and falling in love.

  Yes, I was in love with her. It was true. And astounding. For so many months, I had hated the thought of having a baby in the house, but the second I’d met her, everything was different.

  I looked towards the bathroom door. Mum was still in there, but I wanted to apologise. For everything. For thinking Mu
m wouldn’t love me as much if she had another baby. For thinking I was getting squeezed out. For assuming Mum didn’t care.

  ‘Love grows,’ I whispered to the baby. ‘There’s enough for everybody to have one hundred per cent of it.’ I blew on her forehead, just gently. She stirred and moved her hand, and I smiled to myself. In the stillness, the room seemed to shrink until it was just me and my baby sister, sitting together in the light and calm.

  Then, everything happened all at once. I heard the water in the shower stop and saw Mum’s head poke out of the bathroom. ‘She okay?’

  ‘Yes. Fine. She’s—’ But there was no space to say more. Out of nowhere appeared Dad, Josh and Coco, eyes bright and mouths laughing, and alternate looks of worry and wonder on their faces.

  ‘We raced back.’ That was Josh.

  ‘Is it really a girl?’ said Coco.

  ‘Are you okay?’ asked Dad. ‘I’m so sorry. I should never have left you.’

  Then, from Coco, ‘Did you seriously ride Cupcake across the creek in that storm?’

  I held out the baby to Dad, gave Josh a high five, and stood up next to Coco, all in one movement. ‘Yep.’

  ‘Oh my goodness!’ She was yelping, jumping around the room. ‘I can’t believe it. You are like, the biggest hero. Ever.’ She stopped and struck a pose. ‘My twin sister rode through a cyclone to rescue my mum. They’re going to give you an award, I reckon. That makes me some kind of celebrity, right?’

  ‘As if,’ said Josh. ‘Simmer down, petal.’ He rolled his eyes at Coco and turned away, just in time to nearly bash into two nurses who were coming in with some kind of medical equipment on a roller stand. ‘Oops. Sorry.’

  They made an amused face at him as they rolled their gadget up to Mum, who was back lying on the bed, hair wet and smile huge, with the baby snug in a funny little baby bed that looked like a plastic see-through tub on a shopping trolley frame.

  ‘Deborah, is it?’ said one of them, consulting a clipboard at the end of Mum’s bed. ‘And you’ve had the baby at home?’

  We all nodded at the same time like a set of bobble head dolls.

  ‘In this weather,’ the other one said. She took Mum’s arm, put a fat velcro strap around it, and pressed a button. There was a low electronic buzz. ‘Wow. I’ll bet that was an adventure.’

  Mum nodded. ‘A bit, yes.’

  ‘And I heard that someone had to ride through the storm to get help?’ The first nurse looked around the room expectantly.

  I blushed and tried to hide my face, but Coco grabbed my hand and used it to point at my own head. ‘She did. My sister. She rode my horse through a flooded creek.’

  The nurses looked impressed. ‘Wow. That’s a story for the records,’ said the second one. She undid the arm strap, took it off Mum, and put it back on the trolley. ‘You and this baby are going to have quite a bond.’

  ‘What’s her name?’ asked the first nurse. ‘Have you decided yet?’

  Mum and Dad looked at each other with faces that said, ‘What do you think?’ and, ‘I don’t know yet’.

  ‘We have a list,’ said Mum. She looked a bit apologetic. ‘But we still haven’t really been able to come up with one we both like enough.’

  ‘It should be Chloe,’ said Coco. ‘Or maybe Callie. Or Corinne.’

  ‘Ursula,’ said Josh. I checked his face to make sure he really didn’t think this was an acceptable name for the most gorgeous, beautiful baby in the whole universe, but it was alright. He was joking. ‘Or Gertrude.’

  Coco rolled her eyes and went to slap him on the head, but one of the nurses gave her a look like ‘hey, this is a hospital’ and she stopped.

  I stood up, suddenly. ‘I know what her name should be. It’s already part of her.’ My voice was strong.

  ‘Oh,’ said Mum.

  ‘Really?’ said Dad.

  I swallowed. I’d already proved it was true. I’d done the impossible and faced my fears, and gotten help for Mum when I really didn’t think I could.

  I have faith in you, Charlie. It had worked. Now I had faith in myself, and a friend in my baby sister.

  ‘We should name her Faith.’

  24

  Chapter 24

  They decided to call her Faith.

  Mum and Dad did that looking at each other thing which always means, ‘What do you think darling? I don’t know. We probably need to talk about it without the children here.’ Then Mum wanted to know (just to be fair, I’m sure) if Josh or Coco had names they wanted to be considered too but Josh had nothing and Coco’s next suggestions of Beyoncé or Sia were probably never going to be taken seriously anyway.

  They sent us out of the room with money for the vending machine and by the time we’d made our way back through the corridors with packets of chips and a chocolate milk each, our sister had a name.

  ‘It’s a bit hard to call her “Faithy” though,’ complained Coco.

  ‘Why do you want to call her Faithy anyway?’ said Dad. ‘What’s wrong with her name as it is?’

  ‘We’re Australians,’ said Josh. ‘She needs a nickname. It’s like, a birthright.’

  I laughed. ‘A birthright? Really, Joshie?’

  He threw a pillow at me and Mum growled at us. ‘The baby! Be careful. Faith is …’

  ‘Faith is,’ I said. ‘It becomes Fizz.’

  So Faith got another name. Actually, heaps of other names—Fizz or Fizzy, or ‘the Fizzster’ (that was Josh) or Fizz-o (‘in case she plays soccer one day’) or Fizz-a-licious.

  ‘Really?’ said Mum. Her face was tired now, but her smile was still right across her face. ‘Fizz-a-licious?’

  Right on cue, Faith stirred in her crib and started chewing her fist.

  ‘Awwwww,’ melted Coco, all over the floor.

  ‘Is that her food?’ said Josh. ‘We’ve got a cannibal baby.’

  I hit him across the head. ‘You’re a cannibal.’

  Mum shot a look at Dad and he stood up. ‘You guys, we’re going.’ He moved towards us with his arms out, like he was trying to herd us out the door. ‘Mum needs some sleep. Fizz needs some milk. And we need to drive home and make sure our house hasn’t floated away in the rain.’

  The house was still there, thankfully. My bed was still dry, also thankfully, because I crashed into it almost the same minute we walked through the front door. Mum would have been horrified if she’d seen me; I took my shoes off and pulled off my socks, but changing my clothes seemed too much like hard work when it felt like my eyelids were dropping off my face. I’ll clean my teeth and get dressed in the morning, I thought. Before we go to the hospital again.

  I didn’t.

  When I woke up, the rain had stopped, the sun was high, my teeth were extra-fuzzy and there was no one in the house.

  ‘Hellooo?’ I called through the lounge room a few times, and then out the back door and off the deck, just in case they’d gone outside, but there was no reply.

  The clock in the hall said elevenish, and from the look of the kitchen, they’d all had breakfast. I finally found the note blu-tacked to the outside of my bedroom door.

  Gone to the hospital. Home by four. We couldn’t wake you.

  I felt a short missing pang for Faith, but at the same time, a sleepy relief. Truth was, I was exhausted, and my muscles hurt with that post-exercise stiffness you get after a really good workout. Even my shoulders were tired; I must have been tensing up a lot while I was riding for help. I shrugged them a few times and circled my head around and then let out a sigh. Breakfast. Then clean up. Then wait.

  After three eggs, plus toast, butter, jam and a cut up apple, I wandered around the house. There were a lot of towels out. Maybe even more than I remember. There were two stacks of them in the lounge room, a few used ones dumped in the laundry and at least three pulled out and strewn down the hall. I must have dropped them in my haste to get to Mum.

  I threw on a load of sheets and towels, plus my uber-wet, still-dripping clothes from yesterday, and started cle
aning up the lounge room.

  It seemed incredible. Yesterday was so dark and wet and, even more crazy, my mum had had a baby right in here. I stood in the exact same spot Mum had been in and looked around me. This was what Faith had seen on her first ever day in the world.

  I plumped some cushions and stacked them (Mum’s way, not Dad’s) and headed back down the hall to what yesterday I called ‘the baby nursery’ but which would now always be ‘Faith’s room’. I shook my head. More crazy-pants stuff. Yesterday I had no baby sister, just the threat of one that I knew I’d hate. Today, I couldn’t get the most gorgeous baby in the world—who I’d named, and who I’d helped to birth—out of my thoughts.

  I stood by the side of the cot and patted the yellow and white mobile Mum must have put up some time. It was so strange that I’d had no idea, and no interest, about what was going on in this room. Now it was the most important room in the house.

  ‘How did I miss this?’ My words were quiet. I was speaking them to myself, but also out loud. Things you say in actual time and space have more weight than thoughts that just zoom through your head. ‘What was I seeing instead?’

  I knew what I’d been seeing. I knew what I’d been focusing on. And that day, it seemed laughably small.

  I turned my head slowly. This was the view Faith would be seeing every day for a long time. I wanted to know it completely so I could share it with her. Cot, cupboard, giraffe painting, window.

  Through the glass, I saw the horse shelter in the distance. I smiled. Faith would be able to see Fozzles and Mika—and Cupcake too, when she came back from Ness’s place—every day.

  I ran out of the room, and out through the laundry onto the deck to get a better view. Fozzles was gently grazing and Mika was gambolling (there was no other word for it) around close to her, her head up in the breeze and her tail streaming out behind her. She sniffed, and then trotted over to Fozzles, bent her head under her tummy and took a long drink of milk. In my throat, a lump grew and then settled at the back, out of reach, but so I knew it was there.