Sydney Harbor Hospital: Zoe's Baby

by Alison Roberts

  Alisi was sobbing already. ‘But what’s going to happen?’

  ‘If it is what I think it might be, there are several courses of action. Chemotherapy, radiotherapy, laser therapy or surgery. That’s not for me to decide, though, Lisi. There are people who know exactly what they’re doing. The cure rate is very, very high. Nine out of ten kids make it through this.’

  ‘But I can’t just send him to Sydney with you.’

  ‘Of course not. You’ll come as well. And Kali.’

  ‘I’ll help,’ Zoe had put in then. ‘I’ll help you look after Kali and, if you’re not at the hospital with Sefa, you can stay with me.’

  Teo’s nod and smile had been approving. Distant, perhaps, but Zoe could understand why he needed to pull the mantle of his profession around him like a cloak right now. He had dealt with Sefa’s toenail like this, hadn’t he? Putting the barrier up so that he could do what had to be done without having decisions and actions undermined because the patient happened to be someone very special.

  He was being a tower of strength and Alisi certainly needed that.

  And Zoe loved him for it.

  When she tore her gaze away from Teo’s head, it travelled only as far as the row of seats behind him. There were three children in that row, tucked up with the airline’s pillows and blankets and all of them sound asleep. Sefa had been so excited at the prospect of an extra holiday with his Uncle Teo.

  ‘Can we go to the beach again?’ he begged. ‘And play football?’

  Such a dear little boy. Zoe stood up and leaned over the seats to check that the children were all fine. Very gently, she smoothed a corner of blanket away from where it was half covering Sefa’s face. Her heart ached at the thought of what he might have ahead of him in the next few weeks.

  Kali was flat on her back, her lips a cherub’s bow and slightly parted as she snuffled in her sleep. Emma was curled up on her side, with one hand tucked under her cheek. The ache in Zoe’s heart intensified and morphed into something new. Something so wonderful she could hardly believe she was experiencing it.

  Mother love. The feeling that this tiny person was the absolute centre of her universe. That she would—and could—do anything it would take to protect her.

  There was so much love to be found in this small space of a few rows of seats. Teo and Emma, of course, but also Sefa and Alisi and Kali. These people were her family now and she loved them all.

  She could draw strength from that love.

  It was the new anchor in her life and Zoe knew she would need it in the days to come.

  When was it that the way Teo could distance himself and be so utterly professional started ringing alarm bells for Zoe?

  Maybe it had been there, right from the very beginning. When he had been standing behind her to look at the pictures on the computer. He’d been touching her. Nuzzling her, even, and then he had simply stepped away and he hadn’t touched her since. Certainly not with his hands or his lips. Not even with a look that held any kind of special connection.

  They’d arrived in the middle of the night and, of course, she would have expected Teo to take his cousin and the children back to his apartment. It wasn’t as if there weren’t any number of other places Alisi could use as a base given the amount of family they had in the city. At least Alisi was desperately keen for Zoe to stay involved.

  ‘That would be wonderful,’ she said, when Zoe offered to be with her when they took Sefa into the hospital later. ‘If you’re sure it won’t interfere with your job?’

  ‘I’m only casual. Doing holiday relief and sickness cover. I can just tell them I’m unavailable at the moment.’

  Surely Teo would approve of her dismissing work in favour of being there for her adopted family? Or was it reminding him of her own dysfunctional family relationships? Out of kilter with her sleeping patterns now, Zoe found herself awake for a long time when she reached her own house. She even found herself with a pad of paper and a pen in her hand. Maybe Teo was right in the importance he placed on families. It was up to her to try and build a bridge and see if there was any chance of making a connection to her own roots again. She’d received a card in response to her letter to her parents telling them they were grandparents. Maybe she could take the next step and invite them to visit.

  She wanted to tell Teo about the invitation she’d sent when she saw him the next day but it wasn’t the time or place. Alisi needed her as an interpreter. It wasn’t that her English wasn’t perfectly fluent but Zoe could understand the medical jargon better and that way Alisi didn’t feel stupid when she had to keep asking the same things over and over, to try and get her head around everything that was happening.

  And Finn Kennedy was a scary person for someone like Alisi. Zoe would have been just as terrified, listening to the way he put things straight out there, without hesitation. Not that he was so forthright in front of Sefa but the little boy was already in the paediatric ward, being spoilt rotten by every nurse he smiled at.

  At one point during those first couple of days Zoe went with Alisi for an appointment in Finn’s office. The director of surgery had been behind his desk. Alisi and Zoe sat in chairs in front of it. Teo stood to one side.

  ‘We’ve ruled out things like Coat’s disease and toxocaracanis,’ Finn announced. ‘And the abnormalities are strongly suggestive of retinoblastoma. We’re not sure yet if there’s any optic nerve involvement so the next step is to do an MRI. I’ve also contacted a friend of mine in Brisbane, who’s prepared to fly down for the surgery. He’s a world-renowned expert in the field.’

  ‘S-surgery?’ Alisi stammered. ‘What kind of surgery?’

  ‘It may be possible to remove the tumour. It may be necessary to remove the eye.’

  Alisi gasped and grabbed Zoe’s hand.

  ‘We’ll know more after the MRI,’ Teo put in. ‘It may also be possible to start treatment with chemotherapy and if it shrinks the tumour there’s another kind of procedure where it can be frozen. It’s still possible that we can save not only the eye but the eyesight as well.’

  He sounded as calm as Finn, Zoe thought. This was Sefa he was talking about. It just didn’t seem right.

  ‘We need you to sign consent forms for a lumbar puncture and a bone-marrow examination,’ Finn continued.

  Zoe’s mouth went dry. So far, the worst Sefa had had to endure had been blood tests, an ultrasound and a general anaesthetic. She couldn’t imagine how she’d feel if she had to sign forms giving permission to have a sample of Emma’s bone marrow or spinal fluid taken. No wonder Alisi was crying quietly now. She squeezed her hand.

  ‘They’re needed to check for any spread of cancer cells,’ Teo told Alisi. ‘We’ll know more when the paediatric oncology team has reviewed the case later today.’

  The case. It’s Sefa, she wanted to shout at Teo but she couldn’t because her throat had closed up in sympathy with Alisi. Tears were forming in her eyes and threatening to spill over at any moment.

  ‘The odds are excellent.’ Finn looked away from the distressed women. ‘Isn’t that right, Teo?’

  ‘It is.’ The affirmation was confident. Calm and steady.

  So much so that Zoe looked up to see that Teo had stepped closer to Finn’s side of the desk. The two men couldn’t look any more different, Zoe thought. Finn was angular and rugged. He looked like he hadn’t shaved for days and there was an intensity about him that was great if he was your doctor and was determined to cure you but there was no warmth of any kind of empathy there.

  Teo was big and solid and…so much softer. She had seen this man play with children and cuddle babies. She had been made love to by him so she knew how gentle he was. How caring.

  And yet, at this moment, the expression on his face was almost an exact match of the one on Finn Kennedy’s face.

 
Determined.

  And detached.

  Chemotherapy for Sefa was started the next day. It was a major procedure because the cancer-fighting drugs were administered by a tiny tube that was put into a big artery and then threaded up into the optic vessels. Everybody hoped that the treatment would start getting results quickly but now that the initial rush of diagnosis and treatment decisions had been made, it was a matter of getting on with it and waiting.

  It was hard on everybody and Zoe knew she was being selfish in letting it affect her so much but, with every passing day, she was feeling worse. She knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that however good a front Teo was capable of putting up, he was having to deal with something very difficult and personal. Maybe it was unreasonable to expect him to make time to spend alone with her but…she loved him. She desperately wanted to be allowed close enough to offer some comfort. Just to be there for him.

  But he didn’t seem to want or need her.

  His department was only too keen to bend over backwards to help and he allowed that to happen. Sefa had a private room and there was a bed for Alisi in there as well. She was allowed to keep Kali with her most of the time and there was always someone available to help when she needed to be with Sefa for his treatment.

  Word had got out amongst the Samoan community too and there was an endless stream of visitors and rules about the numbers allowed in a room at one time were often broken. These people brought gifts for Sefa and food for Alisi and they brought their love and laughter and prayers. While the friendship between Zoe and Alisi had deepened markedly over this period, Zoe’s company was needed less often and that meant not even catching a glimpse of Teo when he was on the ward, tending to his small patients.

  ‘You could go back to work,’ Alisi told her. ‘I’m fine, honestly. They seem to think that this treatment is working and I have Aunty Hina and everybody to help now. It’s not that I don’t love having you around but I’d hate it if we were making your life too difficult.’

  It wasn’t Alisi making her life too difficult. It was Teo.

  What was happening between them felt like rejection and…it hurt. OK, life had happened and disrupted what had begun on the island but something had begun, hadn’t it? Surely it wasn’t just her imagination that had made her feel that it had been far more than some kind of one-night stand? If this was Teo’s way of letting her down gently, it was unkind. It simply didn’t fit with the man she was so sure he was, but if that was the case and she was going to have any chance of dealing with it and getting on with her life, she needed to know.

  When she saw Teo out near the lifts as she left that day, Zoe took a huge breath, summoned her courage and walked straight up to him.

  ‘We need to talk,’ she said quietly.

  There was a haunted look in Teo’s eyes. ‘I know,’ he said. ‘Look, I’m sorry. Things have been…’

  ‘Difficult, I know.’ Zoe wanted to reach out and touch Teo’s arm but something held her back. ‘But please don’t shut me out, Teo. I want to help.’

  He was shaking his head slowly. As if there was nothing she would be able to do to help him.

  Zoe swallowed hard. Found some more courage. ‘I don’t understand,’ she said softly, taking a swift look around to make sure no one was within earshot. ‘I thought we were… On the island…’

  Teo’s gaze slid away. He actually shut his eyes for a heartbeat. ‘That shouldn’t have happened.’ He opened his eyes again. ‘I’m sorry, Zoe.’

  ‘I’m not.’ Zoe’s heart was breaking but she could still feel the connection between them. Teo might not want it but it was there. Strong. Pulsing with life.

  ‘Teo, I…I…’

  I love you.

  But the words caught. The connection might still be there but this wasn’t the Teo she knew and loved, was it? There was a barrier between them that was as wide as an ocean. Unanswered questions about how and why he felt the need to treat Sefa as if he was just another patient. The child of a complete stranger.

  ‘I just don’t understand,’ she whispered.

  ‘Don’t get me wrong.’ A flash of something she recognised came into Teo’s dark gaze and Zoe felt her heart lift. ‘I think you’re an amazing person, Zoe, and you’re going to be a wonderful mother. You are already. Always have been, only you couldn’t recognise it.’ He sucked in a breath. ‘You need a partner who can be everything you need him to be. Someone who can love you the way you deserve to be loved. I’m not that man. I can’t be.’

  The words came out before Zoe could salvage any pride. ‘Why not?’

  ‘It’s not you. I can’t love anybody like that.’

  But he could. He did. He loved his family. And, just for a night, she had been so sure he loved her.

  He must have seen the denial in her face. ‘I won’t let myself love anybody like that,’ he said fiercely. ‘It’s a luxury I can’t afford.’

  Zoe had to take a step back from that vehemence. She shook her head in disbelief. Teo had shown her what love really was. She had opened her heart and, to her amazement, had become the mother she’d wanted to be, as well as this man’s lover. And now he was pushing her away? What had she done that was so wrong?

  Been estranged from her family? Well, she was trying to fix that, wasn’t she?

  Was it because she’d been the one to spot the sign that something was wrong with Sefa? No. They all knew it was lucky to have been found at this early stage.

  Zoe tried to swallow the lump in her throat. ‘We all need that kind of love,’ she whispered.

  ‘No.’ Teo was rubbing his forehead so that she couldn’t see his eyes. ‘It makes you blind. You can’t look after people.’ He was actually moving away from her now. Towards the ward. Towards people he could look after?

  Zoe fought the tears she knew would come. She opened her mouth to say something but Teo didn’t give her the chance. He looked back at her and his words were very quiet and utterly final.

  ‘I loved my mother like that,’ he said. ‘And that’s the reason she died.’

  CHAPTER NINE

  SOMEONE had once told Zoe that people get sent into your life for a particular reason.

  Remembering that gave her something to think about while she waited for the kettle to boil to make tea for her unexpected visitors.

  If it was true, then Teo had clearly been sent into her life so that she could fall in love with her own baby.

  There were moments of such joy to be found now.

  The soft, silky feel of Emma’s skin when Zoe stroked a finger down a chubby little arm or leg. The miracle of those tiny fingers and toes and nails. The way her baby’s gaze locked onto hers when she was being fed. Her smile and, even better, the gurgle of her laughter. Zoe was getting very good at blowing raspberries.

  Those moments would always be here from now on. Zoe knew that now her love had been unlocked, it would never go away, it would only get stronger. Of course there would be times of frustration and sadness, anger and probably fear, but that love would be there as an undercurrent. Something she could tap into for strength whenever she needed it.

  She had Teo Tuala to thank for that.

  But the price she now had to pay was so high.

  Yes, there was joy to be found in hearing Emma laugh but there was pain as well. Would she ever be able to hear that sound without seeing Teo on the beach that day? The way he had swooped her up into the air and bounced her, showing Zoe the real joy of being alive for the first time?

  Her love for her daughter would always be there.

  But so would her love for Teo.

  And she simply didn’t understand why he was pushing her away. What on earth had he meant by saying that his love for his mother had been the reason she’d died?

  Zoe could remember the conversati
on she’d had with Alisi that day on the beach. Every moment she’d been with Teo and every conversation with, or about, him seemed to be etched into her memory with startling clarity. Alisi had told her that his mother had already been sick when she’d come to Australia but she hadn’t realised it. That by the time they’d found the cancer it had been too late to treat it. He’d still been a child then. Did he think that it was somehow his fault that the disease hadn’t been picked up early enough to provide a cure?

  No. There was more to it than that. It had more to do with his other strange statement about love making you blind so you couldn’t look after people. Somewhere there was the key to the way he could distance himself and be so completely professional when he was dealing with a member of his own family, like Sefa.

  Zoe could understand why he felt he needed to be distant to provide medical care but she still couldn’t get a handle on how. She could have done it herself, in the early days with Emma, when her love had been in her head and not her heart, but now…there was no way she could distance herself. Just thinking about what Alisi had had to go through, being with Sefa while he had a lumbar puncture and bone-marrow aspiration, was enough to bring tears to her eyes. If it had been Emma, she’d have felt everything herself and it would have been infinitely worse, seeing it happen to her precious baby.

  Finally experiencing the kind of love a parent could have for a child had changed Zoe for ever.

  Being close to Teo, even for such a short period of time, had also changed her. His pride in where he came from and the way his family was such an important part of his life had been the catalyst for writing that letter to her parents.

  And now, here she was, making a pot of tea to take back into her living room where her parents were sitting, taking turns holding their granddaughter.

  Had they been sent back into her life for a particular reason?

  No. Zoe had summoned them back, hadn’t she, with that letter she’d written inviting them to come? And when her father had rung today to say that they were in a motel in Sydney, having come all this way to meet Emma, her first reaction had been one of horror.