Noreen had been beside herself, and the warmth of her gratitude went a long way to defrosting any chill that remained between them.
Helen and Myles arrived at her workstation and she dumped the load of files she’d brought from the meeting onto her desk.
‘I was just going to make some coffee,’ said Myles. ‘Do you want to join me?’
Helen checked her watch. ‘Sorry, Myles, I’ll have to get going to pick up Noah. I don’t know where the day went. And you do remember I can’t make it in tomorrow?’
‘The homecoming,’ he nodded.
She smiled thinking about it. ‘You know, I was so worried about taking Gemma on as a boarder, when I found out she was pregnant. But it’s going to be pretty great to have a baby in the house again.’ She looked at Myles. ‘You haven’t met Lola yet, have you?’
He shook his head. ‘Couldn’t get to the hospital. I’ve been short an assistant all week,’ he said wryly.
‘Well, you should come to the house on the weekend, if you’re free that is . . . any time,’ said Helen.
He looked uncomfortable. ‘I, um . . . maybe . . .’
‘What is it, Myles?’
‘I don’t know that Gemma would be all that pleased to see me.’
Helen groaned. ‘What is it with you two?’
Now he looked sheepish. ‘It’s complicated . . .’
‘What does that even mean?’ she said, frustrated. ‘I don’t understand, Myles. Gemma is a little out there, but she’s not a bad person.’
‘I know that.’
‘In fact, she’s a terrific person. She’s vibrant and funny and bright, and capable, very capable . . .’
‘I know.’
‘She’d be way better at all this stuff than me. I wouldn’t even be here without her.’
‘I realise –’
‘So why haven’t you given her the same opportunities you’ve given me?’
Myles didn’t say anything. But the way he was looking at her, maybe that was just as well. She turned her attention to the stack of files, feeling flustered. ‘I’d better do something about this before I go.’
‘Leave it,’ Myles said, placing his hand on top of hers, on top of the stack. ‘I want you to hear this, Helen. I haven’t said anything before because Gemma is your friend. But the fact is she lied to get the job, and, as you know, I’m pretty sensitive about people lying to me. Maybe I’m too sensitive, and maybe I have been too hard on her, I don’t know. But in my defence, I did hire her in the first place, and I didn’t sack her when I found out she’d also lied about being pregnant. And I was open to the job-sharing idea even before I met you.’
Helen’s head shot up. What was that supposed to mean?
‘That is,’ he added quickly, ‘on its own merits . . . before I knew how it was going to turn out . . . oh, Christ, Helen, you know what I’m talking about.’
She couldn’t look at him now. She stared fixedly at his hand covering hers. She could feel it all the way up her arm, like an electric current.
‘I really have to get going,’ she blurted suddenly, slipping her hand out from under his.
‘Helen . . .’
She ignored him, grabbed her handbag and walked briskly away from the workstation. ‘See you next week,’ she called, glancing back as she got to the corner. Myles was still standing there, watching her as she disappeared down the corridor.
*
Homecoming
‘Maybe I should stay in another day . . . or two.’
‘I don’t think they’ll let you,’ Helen murmured over her shoulder. She was crouched in front of the bedside cabinet, packing Gemma’s things into an overnight bag. Gemma hadn’t been ready when she’d arrived to pick her up, not that Helen was particularly surprised. She was all too aware how eminently capable babies were of throwing a spanner in the works, how the smallest thing became a major strategic exercise, how on some days putting a brush through your hair could be considered an achievement.
‘But what if something happens to her?’ Gemma asked in a small voice.
Helen turned to look at her as Gemma’s eyes filled with tears. ‘Gemma,’ she said gently, straightening up, ‘you’re healthy and Lola’s healthy. Nothing’s going to happen –’
‘How do you know that?’ Gemma sat stiffly on the side of the bed, cradling Lola in her arms. ‘Did you know that sometimes babies just stop breathing, for no reason? I was watching her last night, I pulled the crib close to my bed and just watched her sleeping, for ages. Her breathing was weird, stopping and starting, and sometimes I couldn’t even tell if she was breathing . . .’
Helen could still recall the palpable fear she’d experienced taking Noah home. David had reminded her she was a nurse: she shouldn’t be worried. But the problem was, being a nurse meant she knew everything that could go wrong.
‘Gemma, you’re going to feel so much better in your own bed, in your own place, and I’ll be right there . . .’
‘Not all the time, Helen, you can’t be there all the time. Not that I’d expect you to be.’
‘We’ll work out something,’ Helen tried to reassure her. ‘Between me, and your mum, and Phee, and Charlie, we’ve got your back, Gemma, I promise.’
That just made Gemma want to cry. But everything made her want to cry today. When they’d brought her breakfast, when the midwife had done Lola’s final check, when Charlie had phoned, as he had every morning. Gemma felt like one giant tear duct.
‘I don’t know what’s wrong with me, Helen. I’ve been so happy until now, I’ve been on a high, and now I feel . . . sad, and I don’t understand why I’m feeling sad, because I’m not sad, I’m happy, so happy, and I love Lola so much, so why am I feeling so sad?’
‘It’s just the baby blues,’ said Helen. ‘It’s completely normal, everyone gets them.’
‘Oh, I think Phoebe read me something about that the other day, but I was only half listening. Will they go away?’
‘Of course they will,’ said Helen. Hopefully. Usually. ‘I promise you, you’re going to feel better once you’re home. Why don’t you go and have a shower, and I’ll pack up your things so we can get out of here.’
‘But what about Lola?’
‘I’ll watch her.’
‘But you’re going to pack.’
‘I promise, I can manage both . . . and Lola will be my priority,’ she added quickly, seeing the angst on Gemma’s face.
‘What if she needs feeding?’
‘I’ll knock on the bathroom door and let you know.’
Gemma bit her lip. ‘I haven’t given her a bath yet.’
‘That’s okay, I’ll give her a quick wash.’
‘Will that be enough?’
‘Enough for what?’
‘For the trip home?’
‘You know,’ said Helen, ‘I think she’ll be fine.’
She eventually shooed Gemma into the shower and told her to take her time. But that was impossible; Gemma was convinced every distant cry of a baby throughout the hospital was Lola. Someone had told her that a mother could distinguish her own baby’s cry. Bullshit. Or maybe she was a hopeless mother. That was probably more to the point. She started to cry herself; poor, precious, beautiful Lola had drawn the short straw, and landed a mother who couldn’t even tell her cry from any Jane Doe.
Gemma came out of the bathroom, still dripping, certain by now that Lola was hysterical, imagining Helen had left her on the bed and gone to start packing the car. But Lola was sleeping soundly in her crib, all wrapped up snug in that way that only nurses seemed to be able to do, and Helen had collected all of their flotsam and jetsam into various bags and lined them up neatly along the bed, ready to go. Gemma could feel tears welling again. She wanted to be like Helen – capable, competent, calm – instead of harried and hopeless.
‘Gemma, you’re all wet,’ Helen said.
Gemma looked down. Her robe was soaked through and she was making a puddle on the floor. She couldn’t even look after herself, much less a tiny
baby who was totally dependent on her.
‘Look, I’ll take a load down and bring the car around to the entrance,’ Helen suggested, ‘and that’ll give you time to get dressed, okay?’
She made four trips to the car while Gemma managed to dry herself, more or less, and put on some clothes, rather haphazardly. Her hair was still dripping onto her shoulders when they finally walked out through the main entrance of the maternity wing. Gemma felt the tepid, non-conditioned air, the sun on her skin. And she froze. This was it: she was all alone. She was leaving the safety net, flying without a parachute. She knew she had people around her, but in reality, when all was said and done, Gemma was on her own. Lola was solely her responsibility. And that was terrifying.
She felt Helen’s hand on her back, gently propelling her towards the car. ‘Let’s go home.’
Despite her mother’s protestations, Gemma had insisted she wanted Helen to take her home from the hospital. Trish in turn had insisted she would wait at the house, and that she would supply lunch. In truth, her favourite caterer supplied lunch, and when Gemma and Helen arrived home, the kitchen table was covered with platters of gourmet finger sandwiches, miniature rice paper rolls and tiny savoury tarts, along with some decadent-looking cakes and slices. There was enough to feed a small peace-keeping force, although there were only the four of them. Gemma was so happy that Phoebe had taken time off work to come, she wanted to cry.
‘Okay ladies,’ said Trish, getting their attention. ‘It’s time for the unveiling.’ She crossed to the doorway, and stripped away the plastic sheet with the flourish of a magician.
Gemma stepped tentatively into the room so that she got the full effect. It was a pleasant surprise. Trish had curtailed her tendency towards excess and gone with a less-is-more philosophy. The sofa picked up the colour of the feature wall, where a simple timber shelf-unit housed the few ornaments, keepsakes and photographs remaining after the big cull. There were matching end tables and a coffee table, and unfussy timber blinds adorned the windows.
Gemma was overwhelmed: it was all so beautiful. Life was beautiful. Her baby was beautiful. She was sure to screw it all up. She wanted to cry.
‘I can’t even believe it’s the same room,’ said Helen, who was only getting to see it finished for the first time as well. Trish had been like a guard at Guantanamo Bay the last couple of days. No one had been given a look-in. ‘It’s wonderful. I don’t know how to thank you, Trish.’
But Trish shrugged it off. ‘Now, this is your father’s and my gift to you, Gemma,’ she announced, swanning around the one new piece of furniture in the room, as though she was a game-show hostess. It was an overstuffed, sumptuous-looking day bed, covered in plain cream cotton canvas. ‘So you can be comfortable when you feed the baby.’
‘Oh, Mum,’ Gemma protested feebly, her throat tight, ‘you’ve already bought me enough gifts.’
‘No, they were all for Lola,’ Trish dismissed. ‘Now, come and see the nursery – it’s my pièce de résistance.’
Don’t cry, don’t cry.
Gemma walked into Lola’s room and caught her breath. Her mother had not restrained herself quite so much here, but still it wasn’t overdone. The transformation was amazing. The walls were a lovely light sherbet lemon and all the woodwork and the ceiling were glossy white. The cot had been ‘refurbished’ to look like new, also painted white and made up with pretty lemon and white linen. The old bench had been converted into a change area, with everything Gemma would need lining the shelves within arm’s reach. There was a thick white shag-pile rug on the polished floor, a rocking chair, a simple white wardrobe and chest of drawers, while a matching white bookcase fitted neatly into the alcove of the outer door, effectively sealing it off.
Perhaps the best feature of the room, at least for anyone who had known it in its previous incarnation, was the bright, clear window which, while it didn’t afford much of a view, did allow light into every corner.
Gemma couldn’t speak. She was still looking around, awestruck.
‘Well, darling, what do you think?’ Trish finally prompted her.
‘I think it’s absolutely beautiful, Mum,’ she said, tears springing into her eyes as she turned to throw her arms around Trish’s neck. ‘Thank you so much, thank you for everything,’ she sobbed. ‘I’m sorry for all the shit I’ve put you through . . . If I can be half the mother you are . . .’
‘Oh, dear, you’ve got them bad, haven’t you?’
Gemma lifted her head. ‘What?’
‘The baby blues.’
‘You know about them?’
‘Of course, everyone gets them, darling, you needn’t think you’re anything special.’
For once Gemma appreciated Trish’s unique way of stating the facts.
‘Come along then, enough waterworks. Let’s open that champagne and wet the baby’s head, shall we?’
Gemma glanced at Helen. ‘Is it all right for me to have a drink?’ she asked her.
‘A glass won’t hurt, just make sure you have some food with it.’
There was no shortage of that, and the women spent the next couple of hours eating and drinking and talking and laughing. Except for Phoebe, who had her head buried in another baby manual for much of the time, reading out tips and interesting facts at intervals, until Trish, after she had a couple of champagnes under her belt, picked up the book from Phoebe’s lap and tossed it across the room.
‘Don’t read too many books, darling,’ she confided to Gemma. ‘You’ve got to work some things out for yourself.’
‘Such as?’ Gemma asked.
‘Well, for example, you’ll never read in a baby book about what to do when your fifteen month old smears the entire contents of her nappy throughout her cot during the course of an afternoon nap.’
Gemma’s jaw dropped. ‘Who did that?’
‘You, of course,’ said Trish. ‘I thought you’d been asleep for an unusually long time. I kept coming close to the door to listen, but there wasn’t a peep. Then finally you started to call out. When I opened the door, it was the smell that hit me first.’
Gemma and Phoebe squealed in horror, but Helen just laughed knowingly.
‘You were standing holding the side of the cot,’ Trish went on, ‘covered in poo from head to foot. The sheets were covered in it, the bumper, the cot itself, all your little rattles and toys hanging off the sides, your teddies . . .’
‘How can one little baby do so much poo?’ Gemma asked, glancing down at her angelic infant daughter.
‘Wait till Lola fills one of her suits,’ said Helen, ‘and you see it oozing up over the collar.’
Phoebe looked like she was going to pass out.
‘I had to take everything outside and hose it all off,’ said Trish. ‘Including you. Ben joined in, he was only three, and you both had a lovely old time dancing naked under the sprinkler. That was in the days before water restrictions of course.’
‘So I was always getting myself into the shit, even from that young,’ said Gemma wryly.
‘Not at all.’ Trish shook her head. ‘You were a darling little thing. Always happy, full of beans, and you were my best sleeper.’
Gemma could feel tears coming on again. Her mother had never said nice things like that about her before. Or maybe she had, and Gemma just hadn’t been listening.
Trish continued to regale them with tales of their childhood antics. Apparently once he was out of nappies, Ben liked to expose himself as often as he could get away with it; while as a crawling baby, Phoebe developed a taste, if not a craving, for bugs and snails and anything gross, and Gary once had to stop her determined little fist on its way to her mouth clutching a crusty dog poo.
Throughout the afternoon Gemma remained ensconced on her day bed, like a queen, feeding the baby at intervals while everyone waited on her. Lola was a contented little thing, so far, Gemma had been pleased to discover. And so exceptionally beautiful, she had trouble tearing her eyes away from her at times. She was still myst
ified as to how she had managed to create such an exquisite little being. She was just going to keep her head low and be grateful and cross her fingers that nothing bad would ever happen to her her whole life.
As the afternoon wore on, Gemma began to fade, almost nodding off in what was an extraordinarily comfy day bed.
‘Well, I think that might be the signal for us to take our leave, Phoebe,’ Trish declared as she began to bustle around clearing plates and glasses.
‘Leave that, Trish,’ Helen tried to insist.
‘It won’t take us a minute to clear this out to the kitchen at least. Save you a dozen trips back and forth.’
‘I don’t know why I’m so tired,’ said Gemma, stifling a yawn. ‘Was it the alcohol, do you think, Helen?’
Helen smiled. ‘I suppose a glass and a bit could hit you hard when you haven’t touched the stuff in a while. But coming home from the hospital really takes it out of you, Gemma, you’d be surprised. You should have a nap after they leave. I’ll watch Lola.’
Gemma had to be persuaded, but in the end she slept the full hour and a half till Lola started to fuss for a feed.
Helen brought her into Gemma’s room. ‘I have to pick up Noah from preschool.’
‘Oh, okay,’ Gemma said sleepily, sitting up in the bed. ‘Right now?’
‘No, it’s okay, take a minute to wake yourself up,’ said Helen, swaying Lola in her arms.
‘How long will you be?’ Gemma asked.
‘Not long, the usual.’
She nodded faintly.
Helen was watching her. ‘You probably won’t be finished feeding her by the time I get back.’
Gemma couldn’t answer, for fear she was going to cry again.
‘You can come with me if you want, for the drive.’
A knock sounded at the door.
‘I’ll get it,’ said Helen, ducking out again.
Gemma realised she felt overwhelmed by the idea of being alone in the house with Lola, even for twenty minutes. She had an inordinate fear that something would go wrong and she wouldn’t know what to do. She knew she had to get over it. She knew she had to learn to cope on her own. But did she have to do it so soon?
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