Worry

by Jessica Westhead

  Sammy looks over at them, his eyes darkening. He raises an eyebrow at Stef, but she gives him the tiniest swivel of her head, and Ruth tries to remember exchanging just one unspoken signal like this with James, but she comes up empty.

  All three girls have turned toward them now too, bright blonde heads tilted attentively.

  “What’s wrong, Mama?” Fern asks.

  “Careful,” Stef murmurs, so only Ruth can hear. “Little ears.”

  The two grown women are squashed together on the little bed. Ruth can feel the heat of her friend’s thigh pressed against hers. “Nothing’s wrong, honey.”

  “I’m just glad you’re all right.” Stef is still holding the zipper tightly, her forearm pushing down on Ruth’s knee. “I’m glad he didn’t hurt you.”

  Somewhere in the middle of the long, silent car ride back to Ruth’s parents’ house, away from the boys and their blanket and the sad hero on TV, Stef had started crying. Ruth’s dad asked if she was okay and she didn’t answer, she just cried harder, so he asked Ruth the same question. “Is Stef okay?” But Ruth didn’t say a word.

  “I was going to come down and get you when he got there,” Ruth whispers to her friend now, in this small room. “I wasn’t going to just leave.”

  Stef is focusing all of her attention on the backpack, refusing to meet Ruth’s gaze, but her hands aren’t moving anymore. They’re completely still. “I know you weren’t.”

  The inside of Ruth’s mouth is still tacky with sugar, the sharp aftertaste of Marvin’s fruit punch lingering on her tongue and teeth. She swallows but it won’t go away.

  She and Stef sit there while their lies float up, knotted together. Drifting over their daughters and out the window, and then they’re gone.

  “I’m sorry,” Ruth says, even though it doesn’t matter now because it’s been a million years. And then, hesitantly, “Are you okay?”

  “Don’t worry about me,” Stef says, and finally looks up. “I’ll be fine.”

  Ruth opens her mouth to say the other words too. She needs to say them because she hasn’t yet, even after all this time. Sometimes when she’s alone and she thinks about it, she’ll convince herself that she must’ve said them already, surely. But she knows she hasn’t. Not out loud. “Thank you, Stef.”

  Her friend doesn’t move. She stays exactly where she is. “Don’t mention it,” she says. And smiles.

  They have known each other for so long.

  “There he is,” Sammy says. “And there he goes.”

  Ruth looks over. “Who?”

  “Marvin.” Sammy glances back at the hallway, furrowing his brow. “When he ran past me before, he said he was done with the party and he was going to the beach. I said, ‘You’re going boarding now?’ Because he sounded hammered. I told him he was being a bad host but he wasn’t listening. He just pushed me out of the way and kept going. Was he crying?”

  Ruth shakes her head. “He shouldn’t do that.”

  “We live in a modern world, Ruth,” Sammy wisecracks. “Men are allowed to cry.”

  “No—” And then, finally, she understands.

  Suddenly Fern gasps. “There you are, you naughty boy! What were you doing, hiding up here without me?”

  Ruth stands up. “You have to go after him,” she tells Sammy. “Don’t let him go.”

  “Fern,” says Stef, “who are you talking to?”

  Sammy’s grin falters. “Why?”

  “Him!” Fern yanks Monsieur Foomay out from the pile of Alex’s stuffed animals and brandishes him triumphantly. “We came in here when Lesley was downstairs but nobody found us so I got bored and found the baby doll.”

  Ruth inhales. The same never-ending breath in that a sad or furious child takes before the blaring wail their parents know will come. And at last, after all this time, the scream that has been buried way deep down, where no one could ever find it, starting out so tiny and weak but growing more powerful every second, uncurls and rips out of her. “Go!” she yells at Sammy.

  His smile disappears entirely then, and he races out of the room.

  “You’re right.” Stef stands up too. “Marvin shouldn’t be out there. What the hell was he thinking?”

  Ruth looks at the night on the other side of the glass. Nothing. That’s all he ever thinks about. But she keeps that to herself.

  Isabelle and Amelia and Fern hurry over to the window. They all clamber to see outside, jostling each other for the best possible view.

  “I see him!” Isabelle hops up and down, holding onto the windowsill.

  The twins and Fern huddle together, watching. Their arms snake around each other, and Ruth can’t tell where they begin or where they end.

  “I’m going too,” she tells Stef, even though she knows it’s too late. She knows he’s already gone. “Can you stay here with the kids?”

  Her friend nods.

  “Bye, Marvin!” shouts Amelia.

  Ruth rushes to the doorway. “Is he wearing his headlamp?”

  No one answers her, and the thin wire between them stretches as far as it will go, and snaps.

  “No, Marvin.” Fern is shaking her head slowly. Back and forth, back and forth. “That is not a very good idea.”

  Nine

  THE MOTHER-TO-BE HAS A SITCOM LABOUR.

  There she is with her big, unwieldy belly in the grocery store, shopping for bread or milk or ground beef or something, and her water breaks all over the floor with a dramatic yet hilarious whoosh.

  And here comes the embarrassed, pimply stock boy rushing at the oozing puddle with a mop, and here is the concerned older-lady cashier who takes her arm and says, “Should we call your husband, dear?”

  And twenty minutes later, there is their car screeching into the parking lot and now the father-to-be is in the store already, and how the hell did he move so fast like that, he’s like Superman, and now he’s bundling the mother-to-be into the passenger seat and apologizing to her over and over and she says, “What? What are you sorry for?” And he says, “I couldn’t find the overnight bag, I just couldn’t find it, so I packed a new one. I’m not sure if I packed the right stuff but I think it has everything you’ll need but if something is missing I’ll just go back and get it for you, okay?”

  The mother-to-be is already extremely annoyed with the father-to-be, way more annoyed than she expected she would feel at this early stage. Aren’t they supposed to be suffused with love right now, or at least until she’s fully dilated and starting transition and she catches a whiff of his peppermint gum and it smells like puke and she screams at him, “Put. That. Fucking. Gum. In. The. Garbage. Right. Fucking. Now.” Which would be okay, that would be understandable, to be irritated by one’s spouse at that point, but this early in the game? To be so filled with fury and with all of it directed solely at him, her beloved life partner, while he’s driving her and their unborn child to the hospital? This does not bode well for her cherished goal of being a united front when it comes to parenthood. But whatever.

  Now the father-to-be is parking their car in a no-parking zone and half carrying the mother-to-be through the sliding doors and now he’s hollering her name at the triage nurse, and now the mother-to-be is in a wheelchair and the father-to-be is pushing her down the hall, frantically listing all of the baby names they’ve been arguing about over the past nine months, but none of them sound right.

  He’s running and they’re going too fast, but hey, if her cervix wasn’t on fire right now it would actually be kind of fun—wheee!

  And now she’s on a bed and the nurse is here, and the nurse sticks her hand into the mother-to-be’s vagina and then the nurse goes to get the doctor, and now the doctor is here and she is sticking her hand into the mother-to-be’s vagina as well, and soon untold medical professionals have inserted their hands or other implements into that same area that was once private but is now very, very public.

  But that’s okay because she’s lying on the hospital bed in the delivery room, listening to nurses an
d doctors murmuring and the reassuring clicks and beeps of helpful machines.

  It’s the middle of the day and the lights are very bright and the sheets are very blue and the room smells red, and she is holding her husband’s hand.

  She’s where she is supposed to be.

  Except now all the professionals are whispering to each other differently, urgently, and the father-to-be is saying, “What’s wrong? Is something wrong?”

  And nobody answers him at first because now the nurse is rushing to attach the mother-to-be to something, and she hears herself asking, “Is that a fetal heart monitor?”

  And the nurse nods and tells her it’s okay, this is the normal procedure when there’s meconium, and the father-to-be says, “Is that when the baby poops inside the womb?”

  And the mother-to-be is so proud of him because clearly he was actually paying attention in their prenatal classes instead of thinking about work like she always figured he was doing.

  More bad things happen and the mother-to-be doesn’t feel like she’s in a sitcom anymore. The baby does not want to come out on her own. The mother-to-be has been pushing and pushing, but apparently not in a useful way. And since neither of them are co-operating and doing what they’re supposed to do, the doctor says, “We’re going to have to use the vacuum, is that okay?” And the mother-to-be says, “Do I have a choice?” And the doctor says, “No.”

  So they use the vacuum and there is no time for an anaesthetic so there is pain, pain, pain, and the mother-to-be is so scared but when she realizes that her fear is not for herself, she becomes stronger.

  She is exhausted but she pushes harder anyway. Too hard. And then, after more pain that goes on forever and ever until it rips her apart, there she is.

  The Long-Sought-After Daughter. Separate at last from the mother’s body, held aloft by the doctor with her bloody latex gloves, and the whole thing is very anticlimactic because the room is completely silent and the Long-Sought-After Daughter is not moving or making any noise at all, and she is blue instead of pink.

  There are more furtive murmurs and suddenly the room is buzzing with activity as the doctor cuts the umbilical cord and gives the baby to a nurse, who takes her away and wraps her in a blanket and lays her on a table near more helpful machines.

  The placenta comes out and the doctor catches it. Everyone is doing their job and working together and it’s all very interesting to watch but there is still no crying, and the mother remembers the enthusiastic, white-haired prenatal-class teacher telling all the anxious parents-to-be that if their baby did not cry immediately after he or she was born, then they should count to ten because in that time, a healthy baby was guaranteed to cry. “Let’s all try it together now!” the teacher had rallied them in her upbeat, chirpy voice. And all the expectant couples had sat there on their uncomfortable chairs with their Styrofoam cups of stale coffee and counted to ten together, slowly. And at the end of it, the teacher clapped her hands and said, “Now, that felt like a long time, didn’t it?” Stunned, fearful nods all around. “But in the grand scheme of things, it’s really no time at all.”

  In the delivery room, the mother fixes her gaze on her silent daughter and wills her to part her tiny lips and let out the wail she knows will come.

  Now the father’s hand is squeezing hers and his mouth is moving along with hers—

  One.

  —but no sound is coming from either of them because they do not want to miss it because it’s going to happen any second now.

  The PA system crackles to life then, startling them, and a disembodied voice says something the mother doesn’t understand, but clearly other people do because the room immediately fills with more hospital staff, all of them crowding around the quiet baby and doing whatever it is they’re supposed to do.

  Two.

  (Her friend’s children are almost two years old now. Isn’t that strange, how they just keep growing?)

  Cry for us, please.

  Three.

  Her mother-in-law knitted a little outfit and her father-in-law bought balloons at the gift shop. Earlier on, the father told the mother about his parents’ funny fight in the waiting room where his mom said to his dad, “What if those balloons pop and make a loud noise and scare the baby? And what if she chokes on the broken balloon skin?” Which of course would never happen, that was ridiculous.

  Four.

  Her own parents are out there too. Her mom brought an old, worn blanket that she’d wrapped the mother in when she was very small. It was pale yellow and trimmed with ribbon that was ragged in places but still very soft. And her dad brought the same book of fairy tales he used to read to her when she was little. They would cuddle together on her bed and their heads would be touching and she’d feel the vibrations of his deep voice through her entire body and know that she was safe.

  The doctor is looking over at the nurse who took the baby away, and that nurse is shaking her head.

  Please stay.

  The father’s parents want to be called Nanna and Poppy, and the mother’s parents want to be called Grandma and Grandpa. They all agreed on that months ago.

  Five.

  The nurse is walking over with the baby now, but before she arrives, someone new appears beside the mother—“the specialist,” she hears another nurse say. He looms over the bed in short-sleeved scrubs with his hairy arms poised and says to the mother, “We need to get you stitched up.” She looks past him to her daughter and imagines how big that needle must be, to be able to put her back together after this.

  “Not yet,” the doctor tells the specialist. “Give her a minute.”

  He nods and backs away, retreating with his sewing kit to a distant corner of the room.

  The doctor’s kind eyes are shining over her surgical mask, which is blue like the sheets but a darker shade than the baby, and her hidden mouth asks, very gently, “Would you like to hold her?”

  Six.

  The mother feels herself nod. She extends her arms and accepts the limp, nearly weightless body, and lays it across her own.

  “Does she have a name?” the doctor asks.

  Don’t go. Be safe and stay here with me.

  “No.” The mother shakes her head. “We couldn’t think of the right one.”

  Her baby’s eyes are closed and her black lashes fan out, impossibly long. The mother rubs one of her daughter’s damp, dark curls between her thumb and her finger.

  “Hello,” she says, but only in her head. The way she used to say things when her daughter was still inside and it was just the two of them.

  Seven.

  The mother’s breasts are already swollen and aching and where will all the milk go now, with no one to feed? She will never be a fountain.

  The father leans closer, bowing his head against hers. “I told you,” he says, so quietly that only the mother can hear.

  Eight.

  So it’s easy to pretend that she doesn’t. Even though she knows he’s right.

  Nine.

  She holds one of the tiny hands against her cheek and it doesn’t move, but she doesn’t care.

  James is sobbing now and he’s never going to stop, so Ruth has to finish counting all by herself.

  Ten

  HERE SHE IS, ALONE ON THE BEACH WITH HER ONLY child. It’s early in the day, and the sun is already so bright.

  Stef and Sammy went out in their boat. They’re out there now with the local police and the volunteer firefighters and most of their neighbours, still searching.

  They left Isabelle and Amelia with Lesley because they know she’ll take good care of them. And the twins will cheer Lesley up too. They’ll make her feel better, at least for a little while. Even though she wasn’t sad when Stef told her about Marvin, in the gentlest voice Ruth has ever heard her use. Lesley just held on to Alex’s baby doll and nodded slowly, as if she was expecting this, and looked out the window. But maybe she was searching too, in her own way.

  After Ruth woke up early this morning, tuck
ed into her own guest bed safe and sound with Fern still sleeping peacefully in the next room, she called James to say they were coming home.

  “Already?” he asked, and when she didn’t answer, he said he was sorry he’d missed all the fun, but he promised everything would be perfect when they arrived.

  “That’s okay,” she told him. “It wasn’t that much fun after all.”

  And he started to say something else, something about Stef, probably, and how Ruth shouldn’t be so negative about their friend who hadn’t been as lucky as they were. But she didn’t want to hear it, so she said goodbye and hung up.

  Then she went and kissed their daughter awake, and they had breakfast with Stef and the twins before they all went to Lesley and Marvin’s cottage, together but separate. Ruth drove behind Stef, their procession small and slow.

  Now Ruth holds Fern’s hand and squints at the sparkling water. Far off, she sees some land. Rocks, an outcropping of green. Maybe Marvin is out there on his own little island. Taking a vacation before he makes his way back home. It’s a nice thought, so she holds onto it and pushes the other thoughts away.

  “Can we go swimming now, Mama?”

  That had been the plan—one more swim before they go—but the waves are so much bigger today.

  “I don’t know if we should, honey.”

  “But it’s so hot, and we’re wearing our bathing suits!”

  “It might not be safe, though. And I packed your floaty in the car.”

  Fern’s shoulders sag. “I miss Daddy.”

  The sky is a shocking blue, not a cloud in sight, and the glare is blinding.

  “I know you do,” says Ruth. “But it’s good to miss people. It’s good to be apart from each other sometimes because then we can see how we really feel.”

  They’re both quiet for a while, and then Fern becomes restless beside Ruth, shifting from foot to foot. “Mama?”

  “Yes, honey?”

  Fern lets go of her and sits down on the sand. She moves her hands around, making patterns. “Why do you hate Auntie Stef?”

  “No.” Ruth lets out a breath. “I don’t hate her. I could never hate her.”