by Rosie Lewis
Zadie might be without her family but she had us, and I was going to make sure she had as much love and support as she needed to get her through.
Later that evening, after going home to give everyone the good news, I returned to the hospital, delighted to hear that Zadie had been transferred to a ward. The teenager looked colourless as she lay in bed, half-propped up against several white pillows. She was surrounded by tubes and there was a free-standing monitor beside her bed emitting a soft bleep.
Zadie’s dark hair was clamped tightly to her head by the elastic of the oxygen mask on her face. I curled my fingers around her hand and leaned over her, careful not to dislodge the crocodile clip attached to her index finger. Her hand was cold, the skin flaky and dry. Her eyelids flickered and her long lashes seemed reluctant to part, clinging at the ends as she slowly opened her eyes. She blinked several times and frowned, swallowing hard.
‘Hello, honey,’ I said, smiling.
She parted her lips and tried to speak but all that came out was a croak, the oxygen mask misting up. She closed her eyes and shifted her weight on the pillow, angling her head up. Her mouth twitched again. I leaned in closer and gently eased the mask to her chin, my ear to her mouth. A sharp antiseptic tang rose to greet me. ‘Where is it?’ she asked, her eyes travelling over me, as if the baby was concealed beneath my coat.
‘The baby? She’s with the nurses outside. Would you like to see her?’
She shook her head and sank her head back to the pillow with a sigh. I nodded and replaced her mask, noticing the single tear running vertically from the corner of one of her eyes. Outside, there was the rattling of trolley wheels, the comforting, soft clomp of nurses’ shoes.
‘You’ve been through so much,’ I said softly, brushing the hair from her face. ‘You were so brave.’
She forced a smile but seemed distant somehow. I hoped it was a combination of the drugs and tiredness and not a reluctance to meet her baby. It wasn’t as if I couldn’t understand the turmoil she must feel. Her life had altered in ways she probably could never have imagined a year earlier – as well as the sense of loss at losing her family, what she had gained in its place was a huge burden of responsibility; a wonderful, precious burden but one that was bound to weigh heavily nonetheless – it was such a strange situation; happy and sad, all at the same time.
‘Has Papa been told?’ she asked quietly, her eyes averted. She picked at invisible threads on the white sheet beneath her fingers.
‘I’m not sure, honey. I did call Peggy to let her know. Would you like me to find out?’
Seeing the hurt in her eyes as she glanced up made my own heart begin to ache. She shook her head slowly but I could see that she wasn’t sure. After everything that had happened, she still wanted the comfort of a loving parent. It was amazing that she had enough capacity in her heart to forgive him and I wasn’t sure that he deserved such devotion. I wondered whether he felt any regret when he had heard the news, whether he would feel loss knowing that he wouldn’t hold his newborn grandchild in his arms. Filled with a sudden anger that I couldn’t swallow down, I turned away from Zadie and started tidying the tall cabinet beside her bed.
‘I think I would like to …’ I heard her say as I swapped the position of a box of tissues with a lamp for no good reason. I turned towards her and she pulled the mask off, over her head. Still hissing faintly with wisps of white gas, it lodged itself in one of the gaps in the metal-framed headboard.
‘What, honey?’
‘I think I do want to see her,’ she said quietly, ‘but I’m scared.’ Her chin trembled.
‘I understand,’ I said, grabbing her hand and giving it a squeeze. ‘But I’ll be right here beside you. One little look can’t hurt you.’
A few minutes later a midwife with a greying bob, curled under at the ends, silently wheeled a transparent crib through the double doors. Giving me a half-wink, she turned and left us alone.
I pulled back the white sheet that was draped over her loosely swaddled form and gently lifted the baby up to my shoulder. Resting my flat palm on her back, my fingers formed a cradle to support her head and I laid her back in my arms. She yawned and looked up at me, her tiny mouth forming the shape of an ‘O’, her small fists resting, one on each cheek. I glanced towards Zadie who had stilled in quiet, anxious watchfulness.
‘There. Go to Mama,’ I whispered.
Zadie opened her arms awkwardly, holding them out in front of her like a child expecting a present. Leaning over, I laid the baby, wrapped in a cellular blanket, in her arms. The teenager stared down, her anxious frown instantly replaced with a look of tenderness. Mesmerised, she took the little hand in her own and then leaned down, planting a soft kiss on the tiny fingertips. My heart filled at the sight, swelling in my chest.
‘It feels strange to be called Mama. I don’t feel like her mummy,’ she said, her eyes fixed on the sleepy baby.
‘Well, from where I’m standing you certainly look like it,’ I said. ‘You’re handling her like an expert.’
‘Really?’ she asked, her eyes shiny with tears.
‘Really, really,’ I said, patting her on the shoulder. ‘I’m so proud of you, Zadie.’
And that was it. Her shoulders slumped and the floodgates opened. She cried and cried, her tears rolling down her cheeks and onto the baby’s soft hair. Easing the swaddled form from her arms, I laid her gently in the crib and took Zadie into my arms.
‘I want to give her all the love that I never had,’ she sobbed into my shoulder. Heartened, I stroked the back of her head, daring to nurse the hope that the worst was truly behind her.
It was chilly when I left the hospital that evening, only a little above freezing. Sofia had accompanied Nadeen to the hospital to meet her niece and, knowing that they would stay with her until the end of visiting hours, I didn’t feel like I was abandoning her. Nadeen seemed to hold no bitterness towards her family and I was sure that her natural positivity and quiet determination would help to buffer Zadie from the pain of being estranged from her other siblings and her father. Before I left I thanked Sofia for all she had done for us, and, as we hugged, Zadie made an announcement – she had decided to name her daughter Nailah, after her mother. Nadeen, cradling her niece in her arms, dissolved into happy tears.
As I drove home the image of Zadie cradling her daughter so lovingly stayed with me and I felt buoyed, optimistic. The streets seemed to shine with radiance as if they had been spring cleaned and then outlined with a black felt-tip. Our local shops shimmered with an unfamiliar glow, as if everything around us had been given the chance of a fresh start.
Zadie spent the next three nights in hospital and was finally discharged around lunchtime on the second Tuesday in November. She hobbled slowly to the car wearing the robe she had arrived in, although her hair was loose. It was the first time I had seen her outside of the house without a headscarf on and I wondered whether she had made a conscious decision to leave it off. Her face was creased with discomfort from the caesarean scar and I suspected that she was too uncomfortable to give much thought to anything else, especially something as irrelevant as clothing. She stared around her on the journey home as if she too was seeing everything for the first time. Sitting in the back of the car, she held her daughter’s small hand in her own and gazed down at her with such tenderness; it was clear how much she loved her.
Peggy was her first visitor. She bustled into the living room, wheezing with the effort of carrying a wicker basket filled with bits and pieces for the baby. Her dedication brought a swell of admiration to my throat. It was one of those times when I understood why the British care system was so highly respected all over the world. Often, through high-profile cases that are reported in the media, we only hear the worst examples, but the way Zadie had been cared for, not only by social services but also the NHS, was exceptionally good.
After Peggy we received a steady stream of visitors throughout the day. Jenny, Liz and Rachel turned up unexpectedly, eager t
o catch a glimpse of the new baby. The neighbours popped in to see us, each of them bearing flowers or chocolates or little sleep suits for the baby. The newborn was passed around like a parcel, closely watched by Zadie who hovered in front of whoever was holding the precious package. She kneeled politely in front of our friends, ready as a safety net, should anyone be clumsy enough to drop her.
Towards the end of the afternoon Zadie began to wilt. She smiled politely and tried her best to chip in with the conversations going on around her – mainly revolving around our visitors’ own experiences of childbirth – but her eyes became glassy and her voice slowed, almost to a slur. I remembered how tiring it was to entertain visitors after having a baby and so I tried to usher them out as graciously as I could, reluctant though they were to leave.
Later that evening I drew the curtains in Zadie’s room and tucked her in, the baby asleep beside her in the Moses basket. Her eyes were heavy and she looked exhausted but she rejected my offer to keep the baby in with me so that she could get a full night’s rest. Standing at the doorway, my eyes ran over the small soft toys that had been given as gifts throughout the day. Zadie had arranged them carefully on the shelves above the changing table, the Mother Goose quilt from my mum taking pride of place, hung up on the far wall near the crib.
The next few days seemed to pass in a blur. Megan was coming up to four months and could already roll onto her tummy and back again. I could no longer potter from room to room and rely on her being safe, so I couldn’t turn my back, even for a second. She was so strong that she was already able to sit unaided for several seconds before sinking back onto a pile of cushions – something that caused her and Jamie no end of amusement.
Zadie, face puffy with hormone-induced tears, was mostly oblivious to all that was going on around her, submerged as she was in a struggle to establish breastfeeding. I could see by the panic in her eyes that Nailah’s crying was upsetting her but to her credit she stuck with it, transferring the baby to all different positions, singing, bobbing up and down on the spot. Her dark eyes were shadowed with deep fatigue and, remembering my own struggles to feed Emily, I was full of admiration for her determination to keep trying. As a new mum I had read somewhere that babies born onto their mothers’ tummy and left to their own devices managed to move their limbs enough to crawl towards the breast, latching on and feeding unaided. That small nugget of information had caused me no end of frustration at the time; it just wasn’t as easy to pull off as it should have been.
At the end of a particularly long day about four days after leaving the hospital, Zadie came to me in the kitchen. The baby was screaming, her face ruddy with fury as she beat her small fists on Zadie’s shoulder. ‘Why won’t she stop?’ she asked tearfully, swaying back and forth with Nailah in her arms. Tears were rolling freely down her cheeks and her eyes were narrow, swollen with tiredness.
‘She may be a little hungry,’ I said, as gently as I could. The midwife who had called in to see Zadie earlier that day had been a little concerned the baby may be at risk of dehydrating. With a devotion I could hardly believe, Zadie had carefully sterilised a tiny spoon and was giving Nailah regular sips of water, but what she really needed was some milk. ‘Maybe your milk isn’t fully in yet.’
A cloud crossed her features, as if she felt she was responsible for the delay. ‘It’s nothing you’ve done,’ I said, rubbing her shoulder. ‘Meg said that there can be a bit of a delay after a caesarean but what you’re giving her now is more important than milk.’
‘The colostrum?’ she asked.
‘Yes. It will protect her from all sorts of things so it’s wonderful she’s had that. Tell you what, though. You might find your milk comes a bit quicker if you get some rest. Why don’t you let me take over for a while?’
Zadie sagged in reluctant acceptance and handed the screaming baby to me. Nailah, the rascal, stopped crying almost immediately, probably because she could smell milk on Zadie. Instinct told her she wasn’t going to get any out of me.
But Zadie took it personally. ‘I don’t think she likes me,’ she choked, fresh tears rolling down her cheeks.
‘Don’t be daft, love. She’s just a bit hungry. Babies are supposed to cry when they’re hungry.’
‘But formula milk is really bad for them. She already has a chance of something being wrong with her,’ she sobbed miserably. I presumed she was talking about the dangers for a baby born from incest and I found myself running through the symptoms I had researched when I discovered that her brother was the father: genetic disorders, higher than usual infant mortality, reduced immune system function. The list went on, and so it wasn’t surprising that Zadie, a new mum, should worry, especially with the proliferation of nightmare stories she had probably read on the internet. But it was clear that Nailah was absolutely perfect.
‘I think it’s about time we thought a bit about what might be good for you, as well as the baby. You matter too, honey.’
She looked at me and sobbed. ‘But I will have failed her. I wanted to be the perfect mother.’
‘Oh, honey. The perfect mother doesn’t exist, however good our intentions. If truth be told, most of us just muddle through. At least, that’s what I’ve spent the last 16 years doing,’ I said, transferring the now sleeping baby into the crook of my other arm. ‘Who was it who said that if you’re not making mistakes you’re not doing anything? Much of motherhood is discovering what doesn’t work before you find out what does.’ I laughed. ‘Only don’t tell social services I said that.’
She cocked an eyebrow. ‘Really? Did you find it as hard as I do?’
‘I was a mess when I had Emily. Didn’t brush my teeth for the first three days, and it was a whole week before I got time to change my underwear.’
Zadie laughed through her tears.
‘Honestly, I was terrified that something bad was going to happen to her. She seemed so tiny, too vulnerable. I almost wished her first few months away, just so she’d be more robust, safer. I was paranoid and so tense. I was probably a nightmare to live with at the time. And yet what I wouldn’t give to bundle her up in a blanket and hold her in my arms now.’
Zadie smiled, wiping her eyes. ‘I just never knew how hard it would be. No one ever says.’
‘I know, honey, I know. When Emily was born I wondered why people didn’t send cards saying, “Oh dear, you’ve had a baby, you’re in for a year of hell.” It’s exhausting and frustrating and sometimes so monotonous.’ I stroked her hair. ‘But it’s also just about the absolute best thing in the whole world. And they grow up so fast,’ I said, surprised to find my own eyes damp. ‘You have to try to savour every minute. And I’ll help you all I can.’
As it was, the bottle did most of the work for us. The formula worked like a glass of sherry on my mother; she was flat out for the next five hours, and so was Zadie.
Des made us his last visit of the day. He seemed a little nervous as he offered his congratulations to Zadie, unusually deflated. Later, when Zadie had gone to bed and Emily and Jamie were watching television, we went into the dining room to talk. We sat at the table.
‘I’m leaving at the end of the week, Rosie,’ he said almost as soon as I had taken the seat opposite. His eyes were downcast, voice gravelly.
I felt a small stab of pain in my chest. My lips twitched with the effort of summoning a response. ‘Oh,’ was all I could say. I had been so busy that I had filed his plans in an unwanted information bubble at the back of my mind.
He was studying me closely, as if he was trying to work something out. After a moment his lips parted as if he was about to speak but then sealed shut again. I fidgeted, drawing horizontal lines across the tabletop with my fingernail. ‘Right,’ he said eventually, slapping his denim-covered knee. ‘Pack up everyone’s things. You’re coming with me.’
I laughed, taking it as the joke I thought it was.
Des didn’t smile. He reached across the table and scooped my hand up in his own, holding it with a firm grip. ‘Or
give me a reason to stay, Rosie.’
I glanced away, thinking about the way Des had always slotted so well into my ever-changing family, the banter going back and forth between him and the children, all of the laughter. It was probably only a second or two that his words hung in the air between us, but he was staring at me so anxiously that it felt like much longer. To see a man who was usually so comfortable in his own skin acting nervously was so endearing and for a split-second it was tempting to leave everything behind. I have always longed to go to the US, and the thought of starting somewhere new, with someone else to rely on other than myself, was more than a little appealing. But then, absurdly, I thought of the chicken in the bottom of the fridge that had to be used by the end of the week and the tea-towel marked with pasta sauce that I had left in the sink for a soak. And then the thought that trumped everything; I pictured Emily’s forlorn expression at the breakfast table when Jamie had told me about their father’s unexpected announcement.
My throat tightened around the words I wanted to say to him. I wasn’t quite sure how to explain. I’m not even sure I understood myself.
‘Right then,’ he said softly when I didn’t reply. His eyes lingered for a moment longer and then before I knew it the front door was open and he was walking down the path. I stood at the window watching as he climbed into his car, my fingers tapping on the glass, though too softly for him to hear. I wrestled the impulse to fly up the path after him. Don’t be so ridiculous, Rosie, I told myself, you’re not a teenager any more.
I let my hand fall and watched the mist from the warmth of my fingers shrink and slowly disappear.
That evening I felt a sort of ecstatic relief. I think that, though I felt a tug at my heart knowing that I might never see Des again, I was so glad and relieved to know that I had meant something to him. I supposed that it wasn’t just children that craved a sense of belonging; everyone needed to feel wanted, and I felt a flicker of joy that Des’s regard for me wasn’t a figment of my imagination.
