“Ruby . . . that’s a strange name,” she continued after a while. “I mean, would it not be a bit odd to be called after jewelry? I am never sure about that name and it’s becoming very common these days . . . Ruby . . . Ruby . . .” Her voice petered out.
The plane rattled as we touched down in Liverpool Airport, an announcement about arriving before landing time filled the aircraft, and the air stewards fixed their hair. We ground to a screeching halt. Ruby and I were jolted forward and then back. The rubbish was collected in a fierce hurry. Mobiles were switched on before the seatbelt sign was off, so there was another near-unintelligible announcement scolding the bold passengers. Then the fumbling of looking for bags overhead and under seats began.
The miserable lady with the mean lips and the thin frame sprang out of her seat and grabbed her frayed brown suitcase from overhead. Then she turned her head ever so slightly to the left and muttered “God bless”.
“Bye now,” I replied. “Have a nice time in Liverpool.”
“Huh!” was the extent of her response, offended no doubt that I had not even enquired about the reason for her visit.
“Let’s wait until all these people go,” I whispered to my little girl. She was very still now.
I looked out the small window. The sky was grey and threatening, the fields were lush. I sat still on my seat.
“Ruby, we have arrived – we’re in Liverpool. Both here for our first time – on a girls’ outing in Liverpool – not the type that you would ordinarily choose but, as they say, or as your grandmother would say, ‘You have to make the best of a very bad lot’.”
I didn’t know anything really about the city. I had no connection with it. I had no views on it one way or the other. I was here as a means to an end. It was not the city that perplexed me, but rather the day that lay ahead.
I felt as if was already bedtime. My body was aching and my mind exhausted. The whirlwind tour of my life had left me dog tired . . . and her exhausted or so it seemed. I hoped that she had enjoyed it.
“You can do this, Afric, the worst is over, the waiting is done, just a few more hours and it will be fine. It will be fine, in the end,” I whispered to myself.
The plane was almost empty by now. The suits with gadgets stuck to their ears had quickly evacuated the area. Two grey frail-looking ladies, both in wheelchairs, sat there looking vulnerable. I hoped someone kind and gentle would come to get them soon – they looked totally bewildered by all the chaos surrounding them. A mother was wrestling with her son who was howling his head off because he wanted to take the seat belt with him. His frustrated mother was not even bothering to explain why he couldn’t. Both he and she were red in the face, him with rage, and her with embarrassment. It was not a good day for them.
My little angel had just woken and I could feel a very faint movement just below my belly button.
“Ruby, time for us two to get moving, to lull you back to sleep. Please don’t kick, not today of all days – please, please don’t kick your mum any more – it makes me so sad, so sad. Shh, baby, it will all be over soon, very soon, quiet now, go back to sleep for your mummy.” I placed my left hand on my rounded stomach. “Shh, my little girl, go back to sleep now.”
I stood up and waddled down the narrow aisle of the plane, to the back exit.
In front of me was a beautifully made-up air stewardess. Her eye-shadow was the same two-tone colour as her uniform: matching pale-blue and turquoise-green. Her nails were also two tones: white and pale pink. She looked like a perfect pretty happy little doll. She smiled a mass-produced smile, one that all departing passengers were subjected to. “Have a nice day, now.” She rattled it off at me in the same way that they tell you to ‘mind the gap,’ but really they’re not too bothered if you do or if you don’t. They were just words without meaning.
I squeezed my eyes tight, very tight, then opened them and stepped out onto the steps of the plane. I took a deep gulp of Liverpudlian air. My left hand grasped the hand-rail of the steps. I slowly descended onto the tarmac, my right hand caressing my protruding bump. Thankfully she had fallen asleep again. It was only 14:20.
“Ruby, say hello and goodbye to Liverpool,” I muttered.
The tide was out on the Mersey, the riverbed was bleak, desolate and lifeless, and it was a dreary drizzly grey day. Apt, I thought, for my angel’s second last day on earth.
Chapter 10
A Monday in June, 2013
We walked to the reception of the Foetal Unit Department, Ruby and I. It was not that far – the lady said it was just down the corridor along the cream walls and turn left. She said Jane would be there.
She had big kind welcoming eyes, but they looked just a little bit sad. I wondered was that why they gave her the job, because of her calm dreamy green eyes? She had black curls – they were like perfect springs on a bed, except they had the odd wisp of grey running down them. On the left-hand side of her white tunic was a lopsided gold badge which read ‘Jane’. It felt like weeks since I had talked to her, but in fact it was only two days ago.
“Lynch is the surname, Afric Lynch.” Then I offered additional information, I have no idea why. “The address is Apartment 1, Coliemore Road, Dalkey, County Dublin. I arrived here last night.”
“That’s great, thank you. Let me have a little look here, darling, to see who you are booked in with.”
“Lynch, Lynch, Lynch,” she muttered to herself as she scrolled down a long printed paper list. “Of course, I spoke to you on Saturday morning . . . just let me find it here . . . Lynch, oh, here it is. Afric, is that what you said?” Her kind green eyes looked up at me.
“Yes, Afric, Afric Lynch,” I replied, having gained a little confidence.
Just then Ruby started moving.
The lady, Jane, had more sense than to tell me I was welcome.
“What a lovely name – Afric. What a beautiful name! It’s really a beautiful name,” and she repeated it to herself again – “Afric, Afric,” – testing how it sounded when she pronounced it.
“Thanks. It’s an Irish name, a very old Irish name – it’s been in our family for generations.” I gently patted my lower tummy in an effort to ease the movement, but the motion got stronger and stronger. My little girl seemed to want to be acknowledged. Fair enough, I thought. It was, after all, her day too.
“Right, let’s get you comfortable. You must be tired after the last couple of days. Are you travelling alone?”
“Yes, there’s just the two of us, Ruby and me.” I paused, not sure if this was the correct answer.
“Oh, another lovely name – though not an Irish one. You know, over the years we’ve heard so many unusual names that we started keeping a list of the ones we like and, with more and more Irish arriving here every day, the list is getting longer and longer. You know, we joke amongst ourselves that one of these days we’ll publish a book with all those great names and it will be a bestseller. Where better to sell the book than right here in one of the largest NHS hospitals in the UK? Ruby is beautiful too – there’s a great song by the Beatles – written in the late sixties – that would be well before your time – what’s it called? Ruby . . .” Her green eyes fluttered as she struggled to remember it.
“‘Ruby Tuesday’ is the song,” I replied, “but it was a Rolling Stones’ song – Mick Jagger sang it.”
“That’s the one – ‘Ruby Tuesday’ – how does it go?” Jane had by now abandoned her paperwork.
“God, I don’t have a note in my head!” I giggled – but I had a shot at singing a few lines for her.
“That’s right, that’s the song – it’s a great song, isn’t it?” She had more sense than to comment on my voice. “Funny that,” she continued. “Depending on how the medication goes you might even give birth on Tuesday to your little girl – and we can sing the song together to her.” She got up from behind the desk. She was much shorter than I expected her to be.
I smiled gently at her, to thank her for making me feel more a
t ease.
Jane came around to the front of the desk. She stretched out her arm and pointed to the door. “So, if you want to follow me . . .” She led me to a door which she then opened gently. “This is your consultation room in here.”
The room had four chairs and a coffee table. On the wall there was a plastic shelf that held various pamphlets on the NHS.
“It’s private, just for you – there won’t be any other patients in here. There is a small bathroom just outside the door – next door on the right – and the next door down on the same side is the tea and coffee station – do you see, there to the right? Just help yourself whenever you like. The team that are looking after you will be in very soon to talk to you but, in the meantime, sit down and try to relax.” Then she looked me straight in the eyes and said: “Afric, there is nothing to worry about – you are here with us now, the hard bit is over – we will take the very best care of you – there is nothing more to worry about now.”
I peered up at her like a lost child who had just been reunited with her mum.
“Are you sure?” I asked.
She sat down beside me and put her wrinkled hand on my left knee. Her hand had small sun spots on it. She wore a simple gold band on her wedding finger. She squeezed my right knee tight.
“Darling, you are in the best place you could possibly be – we do this every day and sometimes three or four times a day. Now you relax and the midwife will be with you soon.” She rose and turned on her heel to leave. Then she looked at me once more. “I’ll be just in reception – if you need anything just pop out to me.” She closed the door behind her.
We were alone, just Ruby and I. We sat down.
The room was small. It was painted cream. They paint walls in hospitals cream and light green because those colours are meant to have a calming effect on patients. The combination of the colours and Jane’s green eyes had had a soothing effect on me and Ruby: the kicking had stopped.
There was a large window at the side of the room. It looked out on to the hospital garden. Just below the window was a large rockery, planted with low-size shrubs. All the shrubs in the rockery were different: different shapes and sizes and various shades of green. One of the greens reminded me of my school uniform in secondary school; it was that same bottle green. Green like a Heineken bottle. For years after, I never wore that colour – not because I didn’t like school – I couldn’t quite figure out why I never wore it – maybe because it reminded me of being institutionalised.
“Now, my little angel, it’s going to be time for us to say goodbye very soon. Well, I suppose that it’s not really a goodbye, because you will always be with me no matter where I am or what I am doing. My little angel will be with me, but only in spirit. Ruby, you and I are going to do things a little differently: you are going to look after me instead of me looking after you. We’re doing it the other way around – arseways, I suppose. I really hope you don’t mind taking care of me. I think that it should be pretty low maintenance so it shouldn’t take up too much of your time. Though sometimes I lose my temper with your dad because he doesn’t listen to me, so maybe you could help me with that, and maybe you could help him to listen. Sometimes I say to him: ‘Luke, I don’t know why they gave you ears because you never use them.’ When I say that it drives him crazy. Do you think that he might react more positively if I said something nice instead of saying something critical? What do you think, Ruby, should I try it? I should, shouldn’t I? Can you help me, please, when you’re up there?
“You know, driving is another problem – speeding fines – maybe you could help me to slow down just a little bit or maybe I should just buy a slower car – yes, maybe that’s a better idea, rather than bothering you with that task – I mean, you already will have lots of people asking you to help them. Yeah, forget that task – I’ll get an old crock this time when I get home.”
I gazed out the window into the shrubbery. A crisp packet was stuck in between two of the dark-green shrubs. I wondered how many other heartbroken women had sat in this room as their lives changed forever, how many lives were shattered inside these cream walls. I opened the window a little, as the heat in the room was oppressive. I rubbed my stomach in an anti-clockwise direction. The crisp packet fluttered in the warm summer air. I stared blankly at it.
“I hope that you don’t think it selfish of me – it seems that I’m getting off easy, doesn’t it, not having to care for you or mind you? I won’t have to clean any of those stinky nappies or get up in the middle of the night when you’re teething. I won’t have to worry about rushing you to hospital when you have a fever, and I won’t need to worry when you fall over and hurt your head. I won’t have to worry – I won’t have to worry about anything, only that you are okay wherever you are. I wonder where you’ll go? You’ll be up in the sky, won’t you? Just above my head.”
I got up and moved to another cream chair, one that was nearer to the window, where the breeze was refreshing.
“Before we have to say goodbye let’s see what one more doctor has to say. This is our last hope, our final chance to maybe save you, Ruby. Do you think that he will tell me that a miracle has occurred and they have found a way to get rid of all the problems with the chromosomes? Maybe they might be able to get the number right – I mean, they only need to count to forty-six – to find forty-six of them and then just make sure that they are arranged okay? Sure it can’t be that difficult? Can it? Really? Maybe, Ruby, just maybe. It’s worth a try, isn’t it? You know, miracles do happen. Maybe because you’re so rare you might be a miracle, who knows? You might be a miracle child.”
I peered at my rotund stomach; it didn’t reply or indicate that it was listening.
“What do you think, Ruby? You tell me: are you meant for this world, or are you destined for a happier place, where you float around all day and check things out? I can imagine you as an angel with beautiful chocolaty eyes like your dad’s, and elaborate gilt-edged wings. Will you be that beautiful angel just behind my shoulder? You need to tell me which shoulder you’ll be on, so that I know, so that I don’t bang you by accident, on a press or something, when I’m in the kitchen.”
The crisp packet filled with air. It floated up towards a prickly dark-green bush but got caught on one of the sharp ends of the leaves on the way up. It got stuck. It looked safer there.
“Maybe you’ll come back again, only next time your body and soul will both work. We need to get you a proper body, so maybe the next body will be perfect, like all those other tiny bodies in pretty little buggies that other happy mums have, where all the bits are in the right places.”
The tears streamed down my face and landed on my swollen belly. There were darker pink patches on my shirt, just above my belly button. It looked as though Ruby had been crying too through my skin and onto my shirt. But the tears were mine, for her.
“Afric, Afric,” called a gentle voice.
I looked away from the crisp package to see a low-sized middle-aged lady standing just inside the door. It was Jane.
I had not heard her enter the room. I was so preoccupied that I hadn’t heard the door open. I looked from the crisp packet to the shrubbery to her, into her kind eyes.
“Are you okay? Are you ready to see the obstetrician?”
“Sorry, I didn’t hear you come in. Yes, I’m ready. I was just telling Ruby what’s happening.”
Jane’s arm was outstretched once again, inviting me to come with her.
The three of us moved, taking those final fatal steps together. No one uttered a word.
The screen was a state-of-the-art fifty-inch TV screen, a kind of a thing that the average Irish male would want for watching sport and mindless thrash like American wrestling. Luke would have loved it. In fact, he would have adored it. It was a screen that took up a lot of the room. This monitor made Mary’s one look pathetic.
The room was dark. I would have felt more comfortable if it was a bit brighter.
A medium-sized man, with rimles
s glasses, a white coat with a silver pen in the top right-hand pocket, stood up when I entered the room. But not to greet me, just to tilt his TV screen so that he didn’t have to strain his neck. Then, he moved away from the screen, walked around the examination table and stopped in the middle of the room – as though the centre of the room was neutral ground, safe, away from the scanning equipment and out of range of the intimidating screens.
“I’m Doctor Gimenez. Nice to meet you.”
Another ‘nice to meet you’ person. I wished that I had never met any one of these happy-go-lucky doomsday obstetricians, who seemed to be lining up to greet me with fatal news. I wanted to tell him to piss off. It was not nice to meet him. Not unless he was going to tell me that my child was a miracle, that they had disappeared – all those extra chromosomes. Instead, I told myself to shut up, that I was looking at a last-chance saloon. Give it a chance, I told myself – isn’t it worth one last chance?
His eyes didn’t seem pleased to meet me. They were devoid of emotion, cold, displaying no sentiment.
“Thank you,” I replied. “Thanks for agreeing to see me at such short notice.”
He didn’t acknowledge my gratitude, barely my presence. He was purely a process man.
The lady with the kind eyes and wrinkled hands motioned for me to lie on the examination table.
He looked only at the screen and seemed to be oblivious to me. This doctor most definitely had not been chosen for his warm bedside manner.
I wanted to ask him was he long at this, looking at babies and delivering tragic news to devastated mothers? I wanted to ask him did he have perfect kids himself? I was intrigued as to why anyone would choose a career where several times day you are faced with telling mothers that their children are incompatible with life. Surely, I thought, no money would pay you for that? Instead, I said nothing.
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