Cuckoo (22 page)
Polly sank back into Rose’s chair. ‘I can’t believe it. I’m so sorry.’
Rose knelt down beside her and took her hand. ‘I know you are,’ she found herself saying.
‘Gareth is really angry at me,’ Polly said. ‘He says we have to go, and I don’t know what I’m going to do.’ Her lower lip shook, then her face broke. ‘I don’t know what we’re going to do, Rose.’
‘Shhh, shhh,’ Rose said, holding her.
‘I’m so sorry. I’m so stupid. Please, please forgive me? You’re the one person that I’ve got left, Rose. I need you more than you could ever imagine. We’ve known each other forever and there’s nothing –
nothing
– we don’t know about each other – and I couldn’t bear for Gareth to throw all that away, to come between us like that and ruin it all. I don’t know what I’d do . . .’
nothing
– we don’t know about each other – and I couldn’t bear for Gareth to throw all that away, to come between us like that and ruin it all. I don’t know what I’d do . . .’
Rose looked into Polly’s eyes.
‘I don’t know what I can do to make him change his mind,’ Polly went on. ‘Don’t know what I’d say . . .’
Behind the pleading and the guilt, Rose saw something glittering, steely. Was it determination, or was it something more?
‘What do you mean, Polly?’ she asked.
Polly grabbed Rose’s hand and rubbed the scar on her index finger against her own. She knew more about Rose than anyone else. She knew things that could threaten everything, everybody’s happiness.
Rose shook her head and blinked. She was being stupid – wasn’t she? Polly wouldn’t tell on her. She had sworn, after all. Bloodsworn. They were best friends. They were like sisters.
‘The boys are beside themselves with worry about Flossie, about what’s going to happen. Gareth has been shouting at me in front of them. Yannis is frightened, Rose. I don’t know what’s going to happen,’ Polly went on.
Rose had to stand up. She knew she couldn’t take any chances. She was feeling dizzy. She saw what could be at stake here.
‘Look,’ she said, turning away. ‘It’s a mess. I’m going to talk to Gareth, and we’ll have to take it from there. You go now, go and wait in the cafe. I’ll talk to him.’ She was so tired, she was nearly hallucinating. Something like a smooth, round pebble had lodged itself in her throat, holding back things best left unsaid.
‘Thank you. Oh, thank you. You’re doing the right thing, Rose, believe me.’ Polly kissed her on the cheek then skittered away across the ward.
A little while later, Gareth returned, bringing a cup of tea for Rose.
‘So,’ he said, handing it to her.
‘So,’ she said, looking up at him.
‘Let me guess. You told her you’d have a word with me,’ he said.
‘Hmm.’ Rose stroked Flossie’s belly.
‘She’s a little witch,’ he said. ‘She’s got a hold on you.’
‘Look, Gareth, I’m as angry as you are. She was careless and stupid. But despite all that, it was an accident. She hasn’t had a baby to look after for a long while. She’s forgotten what they can do. And she’s strung out; she’s ill. Perhaps I was to blame more than her, for leaving her with Flossie. I should have known.’
‘Shhh,’ Gareth said, putting his finger on her lips.
‘I should have known.’ She took his hand and held it. ‘It’s just the boys. Can’t we give her another chance for the boys’ sake?’
He sighed and put his arm round her shoulders. ‘Rose, Rose, Rose,’ he said. ‘I don’t know what to think. It’s all gone a little crazy again, hasn’t it? I was so mad at her . . .’ He sat down and ran his fingers through his hair. ‘Look. Just for you, I’ll talk to her. And tomorrow I’ll let you know how it goes. Tomorrow. But right now, we’ve got more important things to concentrate on,’ and he turned to look at Flossie.
‘How’s Anna?’ Rose asked.
‘Why don’t you ask her yourself?’ A voice came from behind her.
Rose turned and saw Kate standing there, holding hands with Anna.
Anna was making a brave fist of putting on a cheerful face, although she was clearly shocked at the sight of the tiny, wired-up scraps of humanity that were dotted around the room.
Rose jumped up and ran to her girl, hugging her so tightly it almost hurt.
‘Thanks, Doc,’ said Gareth, getting up and kissing Kate on the cheek.
‘No problem. I have to pick my kids up anyway. One more didn’t make any difference.’
‘I don’t know what we’d do without you,’ Rose said.
‘For you,’ Anna said, presenting her mother with a box of Roses chocolates. ‘They’ve even got your name on them!’
It was a well-worn joke, paraded every Christmas, birthday and Mother’s Day, and it never failed to make Rose smile.
‘Thank you darling.’ Again, Rose pressed Anna to her. But Anna couldn’t stay that way for long. She was too concerned about her sister, and she moved away to approach the box.
‘Can I touch her?’ she asked Rose.
‘If your hands are clean and if you’re very careful.’
Rose and Gareth watched as Anna laid a finger on Flossie’s cheek, then bent over and kissed her forehead.
‘I love you, Floss. Get better soon, now. I can’t wait till you walk and we can have lots of fun together,’ she whispered. ‘Can she hear me?’ she asked Rose.
‘I’m sure she can,’ Rose said as calmly as she could. But the pebble that had lodged in her throat when she was with Polly was expanding. Very soon, she thought, I will explode.
Kate went off to talk to the nurses, and Gareth and Anna settled in around Flossie. Gareth handed the rucksack he was carrying to Rose.
‘Why don’t you go take a bath? Take a break. There’s enough of us here to hold the fort for Flossie.’
His words brought back a fleeting image of the day before, when everyone had been charging around the grassy ruin, oblivious of what was to come. How she wished she were back there again.
She took a bit of persuading: her instinct was not to leave Flossie. But, in the end, she took herself off to the bathroom.
She glanced at herself in the mirror and splashed cold water on her face. She looked ten years older than she had the day before, when the world had been in the right place.
Her body reeked of the sour milk that seemed to cling to every pore, and her hair had absorbed the stress of the past twelve hours and turned it into dirt. Gareth had packed a bottle of her bath oil, so she filled the parents’ bathroom with scented steam, then lay in the bath and tried to clear her head.
She put on some clean clothes, and her favourite socks and slippers. Her newly cleansed body felt an incongruous shiver of pleasure as she thought about how, despite the anger and the worry he was feeling, Gareth had put so much care into putting this bag together.
When she came out, Kate had returned and she, Gareth and Anna were seated around Flossie’s box.
‘You look a million times better.’ Gareth jumped up and let her take her seat again.
‘Fabulous!’ Kate said. ‘And they’re really pleased with how young Floss is doing. It’s all going well.’
‘Look, Rose,’ Gareth said, ‘we’re going to have to get back now. Simon’s got the boys and I need to pick them up and feed everyone.’
‘There’s a stew in the freezer,’ Rose said.
‘Don’t worry. Dad said we could have takeaway pizza tonight,’ Anna told her. Despite all of Rose’s cooking, Anna’s professed favourite food of all time was a Domino’s Meateor.
‘Are you still here?’ a small voice asked. Rose turned to see Polly, who had crept up behind them. For a second, everyone stopped talking and looked round at her, as if a collective breath were being held. Then, with a sigh, the moment was broken.
‘Right then, I’d best be off.’ Kate stood up and put on her coat. ‘Or my family will forget what I look like.’
‘Thank you for everything,’ Rose said.
‘Don’t mention it,’ Kate said as she breezed away. She had completely ignored Polly.
‘I guess you’ve been waiting for a lift?’ Gareth turned to Polly.
‘Sorry,’ Polly said. ‘I don’t know about the buses.’
‘There aren’t any buses, Polly,’ Anna said. ‘We’ll take you back.’
‘We’re just going. Come on,’ Gareth said, and he and Anna stroked Flossie, then kissed Rose, and then they left.
On the way out, Polly turned to Rose. ‘Thank you,’ she mouthed. But she didn’t smile. Not even a bit.
Nineteen
That first night in the hospital was long, overheated and uncomfortable. The armchair bed seemed too small, and the covers too heavy for Rose. She woke herself up every half-hour to check on Flossie, who showed no signs of change one way or another.
Morning came. Or rather, the dim pools of light that glowed around each baby in its station were replaced by a sharp blue overwashing of fluorescent strip-lighting. Rose had a headache and, after checking that a nurse would keep an eye on Flossie, she shuffled off along the corridor to get coffee and a doughnut. She was beginning to feel the fug of the hospital seep into her. Her skin was becoming pasty, her movements slower. It took an effort to imagine another world outside those walls.
She could just about see the children back at home, sitting eating their pizzas in front of the TV, as they would have done last night. But she had difficulty picturing what Polly and Gareth would have been doing while that was going on. The way they were when they both left last night: what sort of evening could that have led to? She had never seen Polly like that. It was as if the wind – the very fabric had been sucked from her sails. And Gareth had been
so
enraged – that, too, was rare.
so
enraged – that, too, was rare.
Perhaps it was because she was having difficulty thinking straight any more, but Rose didn’t know what to pray for – that Gareth had stuck fast and sent Polly away, or that he had changed his mind and said that she could stay. And then there were the boys. Perhaps Polly could go, and the boys could stay? Surely that would be the best thing for everyone? Even as she dismissed this thought as ridiculous, part of Rose wished for it.
She went back to the ward, clutching her scalding cardboard coffee cup. The other parents looked up at her as she went past. She tried to smile, but her face wouldn’t work. Was there a way you were supposed to behave in these situations? She felt scrutinised by the others, as if there were some rules that she didn’t know about; as if there were a race of worried parents of infants that she didn’t belong to. To Rose, they all looked the same – greyscale and drawn. How long would it take until she became one of them?
She was glad to get back to Flossie, to be able to focus the beam of her attention on what was most important. Relieving the nurse, she sat and drank her coffee and chewed on her doughnut. She hadn’t realised just how hungry she was.
She tried to read her book. Gareth had carefully packed it with a marker where, two nights ago, she had turned it face down on the floor by her side of the bed. But it was useless; her eyes kept running over the same words, and nothing went in. She flicked through a magazine from a pile the nurse fetched for her. But the dog-eared pages with their full-colour clamour and pictures of expensive clothes offended her. How could they be here, in this room, where her daughter lay so ill over there? Instead, she switched on the TV and watched the parade of tragic lives on
The Jeremy Kyle Show. My Best Friend Drugged My Baby and Nearly Killed Her
would make a pretty impressive episode, she thought.
The Jeremy Kyle Show. My Best Friend Drugged My Baby and Nearly Killed Her
would make a pretty impressive episode, she thought.
Drop by drop, Rose’s will and self-determination sapped from her. Her world shrank to the tiny bubble of air that contained her, Flossie and the TV. She was just beginning to doze off when a commotion set off across the ward. It was the morning round of consultant and hangers-on. The consultant, a tall, sharp-nosed woman Rose had not yet met, made straight for her.
‘So this is Baby Cunningham,’ the consultant said to the nurse who was at her side.
The nurse handed her the clipboard that lived on the end of Flossie’s bed. Rose had earlier tried to make out what the notes said, but despite her Biology A-Level, she had been able to make neither head nor tail of the marks and graphs that defined Flossie’s progress.
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