Bridesmaid Blitz (10 page)

“You needn’t have come at all,” I snap. “Clover’s here and I’m fine. And the baby’s going to be fine too.”

Dave looks taken aback. “I came because Art asked me to. He thought it would be a good idea in case it’s a long delivery. Sometimes these things can go on for hours.”

Just then a nurse walks toward us. “Dave Marcus?” She looks at Dave.

He nods.

“Can I have a word? It’s about the Green baby.”

“Of course. Can you keep an eye on Alex, Clover?” he says, before turning back to the nurse and explaining, “Because if it’s about the baby, Amy needs to be kept up to date too. It’s her brother or sister, you see.”

The nurse smiles. “I understand.”

“Thanks, Dave,” I say, feeling a bit guilty for being spiky toward him.

We leave Clover with the babies and walk over to the edge of the waiting area. Dave squeezes my shoulder while the nurse says, “The good news is that the baby was delivered quickly and safely. Dad wants you to know it’s a little girl, and Mum’s doing just fine. However, there’s a slight complication. Dr. McKenna and the pediatric team are with the baby now, and as soon as there’s any other news, someone will come down and tell you. Dad’s still in the delivery room with Mum.”

“What kind of complication?” Dave asks. “Jaundice? Lungs? I’m a nurse at Vincent’s. Is there more you can tell me?” Then he looks at me. “Amy, would you mind?”

It’s my cue to leave. I walk slowly back toward Clover, but I can still hear them.

The nurse is saying, “She’s not pinking up properly and her blood pressure’s erratic.”

Dave looks concerned. “Heart?”

“Dr. McKenna’s ordered some tests, but yes, he thinks it’s the heart.”

“Is it serious?”

The nurse pauses for a second, then says, “We’re not sure at this stage. But she’s a strong little thing — there’s every chance she’ll pull through.”

I gasp.

Clover looks up from playing trains with Alex on the floor. “What is it?” she asks me.

“The baby’s sick,” I say. “There’s something wrong with her heart.” My face crumples and tears start flowing down my cheeks.

Clover throws her arms around me, pulling me to her chest and stroking my hair. “Oh, Beanie, I’m so sorry.”

I hear Dave’s voice behind me. “You heard that, didn’t you, Amy?”

I say nothing. I can’t — I’m crying too much.

“Then you also heard the nurse say that the baby’s strong — that she’ll pull through. Unfortunately, lots of premature babies have problems. Their little organs haven’t had enough time to develop. Once the test results come back, they’ll be able to tell us more. Until then, we just have to sit tight and play the waiting game.”

An hour later, Dave’s gone home with Alex and Evie, and Clover and I are still waiting, jittery and knife-edged anxious for information. Finally Dad appears at the door.

“Dad!” I jump to my feet and hug him around the waist, starting to cry again.

“Amy, it’s OK.” He strokes my hair. “I’m so sorry I haven’t been down sooner, but Shelly needed me.”

“How’s the baby?” Clover asks.

“Better. She’s in the neonatal intensive care unit now, and the doctors and nurses are taking good care of her. Let’s sit down.”

When we’re seated, Dad to my left, Clover to my right, he says, “They’ve run a few tests already, but it looks like she has a small hole in her heart that needs to close up. With normal full-term babies, this hole closes naturally as soon as they’re born, but in the case of our little one, it hasn’t happened yet.”

“So what now?” Clover asks.

“They keep her in intensive care until the heart matures and closes over itself; if that doesn’t happen for some reason, they give her drugs, or worst-case scenario, they operate.”

“Is she tiny, Dad?” I ask.

“Yes. But she was a reasonable weight, just under five pounds, and she’s a fighter. Dr. McKenna says she has every chance of living a perfectly normal life once her heart has been fixed.”

Relief floods through me and I feel a little faint. “She’s going to be OK?” I whisper. “She’s not going to die?”

“Oh, Amy, no, no, no. Is that what you’ve been thinking? Come here. They’re both going to be just fine.” He hugs me tightly against his chest and I can feel the waffle material of his golf shirt against my cheek. It smells slightly sweaty, and piney from Dad’s aftershave. After a moment, I pull away and he smiles at me. “OK, now?”

I nod. “I think so.” I realize I’ve lost all sense of time — it’s been such a heady day I don’t know if I’m coming or going.

He strokes my hair. “And what do you think of the name Grace? As you know, Shelly was hankering after Wallis or Willow, but we both think Grace suits her better. Only if you approve, though.”

I think for a second. “I’ll have to see her first — make sure she looks like a Grace.”

Dad smiles. “I’ll check with the nurses, but I’m sure that would be fine. It might not be for a few hours, though. Can you wait?”

“To meet my new baby sister?” I say. “I think I can wait.”

It’s almost seven before I get to see her. By then Clover’s gone back to our place to help Dave put Evie and Alex to bed, and Mum’s sitting with me in the waiting room. She feels really bad about turning her phone off earlier. She said she’d wanted a totally child-free day. Apparently, when Dave’s babysitting he’s always ringing her with inane questions: “Where are my keys?” “Where are the nappies?” “Does Alex eat raisins?”— that kind of thing. But after she listened to my bombardment of panicked messages, she swore she’d never leave it off again.

“Sylvie.” Dad walks into the waiting area. “Thanks for coming.”

“How are you holding up, Art?” she asks.

“I’m all right now, but things were a bit shaky earlier, before we knew what was wrong,” he admits. “When the poor baby’s skin stayed blue . . .” He presses his hands together, puts them against his lips, and gives a deep sigh. His eyes are wet. “I was so scared, Sylvie.”

Mum gives him a hug and rubs his back. They stay like that for ages, with Dad clinging onto Mum as if his life depended on it. Suddenly, I remember how it used to be, when they actually loved each other, before all the fights. For a split second I watch them hopefully — maybe they’ll realize what they’ve lost; maybe we can all be together again — but I know it’s just wishful thinking. Everything’s different now, and we don’t live in a fairy tale.

Dad draws away and rubs his eyes. He seems a bit embarrassed, and giving a cough, he turns toward me. “Ready to see your baby sis?” he asks.

I grin.
“Absolument!”

We follow him down a lemon-colored corridor that smells of bleach, up two flights of stairs, and through a pair of swing doors. He has a word with one of the nurses in the nurses’ station, and she buzzes us through more doors into another bleachy-lemon corridor. Dad stops halfway along in front of a huge plate-glass window. “This is where they keep the tiny ones,” he explains. “See if you can pick out your sister, Amy.”

I stare through the glass at the little plastic cots inside. They remind me of the incubators we used to hatch eggs into chickens in primary school. Each plastic pod holds a baby. Some of the babies have spaghetti-thin tubes sticking out of their mouths and round white stickers attached to their chests, with wires snaking out of them. They’re all wearing these teeny-tiny doll nappies, and some have white cotton beanies on their miniature heads.

I study them all carefully, and finally my eyes rest on one particular baby. She has a scrunched-up raisin of a nose, a round face with a strong chin, and a few wisps of strawberry-blond hair. There’s something about the shape of her face that looks familiar.

With a start I realize she looks like me — in my baby pictures, I mean. And you know something, she’s not a Wallis or a Willow or even an Amber. They all seem too flippant and Hollywood for such a serene and peaceful little tot. Grace is just perfect. Still, it’s slightly too formal for such a tiny dot. It just needs one little tweak.

I point at the cot. “There. That’s
Gracie
, Dad. That’s my little sis.”

“Gracie,” Dad says, smiling. “I like that. Gracie, it is.”

By Wednesday, things have started to calm down a bit. Baby Gracie is doing well and the doctors think she may not need surgery after all, which is a huge relief to everyone, me included.

Seth made me a baby card with “Congratulations on being a big sister (again)” written inside and a P.S.: “Hope she doesn’t cry and poop as much as your other sister!” Polly’s test results are due back on Friday and he’s trying not to think about it too much, he says. He’s putting on a brave face, but I know deep down he’s worried sick.

Dad’s taken some time off work to be with Gracie and Shelly — which is a first. Apparently, he took a half day when I was born (big wow!) and was back at his desk at eight o’clock the following morning. Mum has every right to feel a bit put out, but she’s being very philosophical about the whole thing. “We just have to be thankful that Gracie’s going to be all right,” she said at breakfast this morning. “That’s the main thing.” But I know she’s finding Dad’s new-man act a bit hard to swallow.

I haven’t spoken to Dad much this week, beyond a couple of quick updates on Gracie’s progress. I guess that’s kind of understandable, though. Shelly’s still in the hospital and mobiles are banned in the intensive care unit, so finding time to ring or text me back is difficult. At least that’s what I keep telling myself. To be honest, I feel a bit left out. I haven’t seen Gracie at all beyond that quick glance in the intensive care unit. Dad has promised I can visit her on Saturday. Clover’s going to tag along too. She’s dying to see her as well. Clover’s been unusually down in the dumps lately and it might cheer her up a tad. Tiny babies have a way of making you all gooey and smiley inside — or maybe that’s just me.

Luckily for Seth, who is practically a basket case with nerves by Friday, Dr. Shine is as good as her word and calls Polly into the hospital on Friday afternoon. Polly refused point-blank to let Seth go with her and forced him to go to school. He’s been like a cat on a hot tin roof all day, and eventually Miss Lupin let him out of French class early. (Sometimes I think the teachers know more about our family lives than they let on.)

Seth promised to contact me as soon as he knew the test results. At half five I’m sitting at my desk, pretending to do my homework but finding it utterly impossible to concentrate, when finally,
finally
my mobile rings.

It’s Seth.

“Well?” I ask, my hands shaking.

“Polly has some bad cells in the same area as before, but the good news is the cancer hasn’t spread to anywhere else.”

I let out my breath in a whoosh. “That’s fantastic, Seth!”

“I know. The doctor’s talking about putting her on a new drug to block the growth of the bad cells. It’s part of a clinical trial and Polly was a bit concerned it won’t work, so she spoke to Dave —”

“Dave? You mean my Dave?”

“Yeah. He rang Polly last week — got her number from the hospital’s files, apparently — and they’ve been talking pretty much every day since. Polly only told me about it today. She says he’s been amazing and has really listened to her. She was able to ask him all the silly little things she didn’t want to bother her doctor with.”

Now I really am stumped. Why didn’t he say anything to me? I’m literally speechless. Luckily, Seth isn’t. In fact, he’s almost gabbling. He hasn’t sounded this happy for a long time. “Dave says Polly should go for it,” he continues. “Dr. Shine knows what she’s doing. He checked and the doctor’s put Polly into the intervention group, not the control group, who just get a placebo — basically just a fake drug that does nothing. Dave says these drugs’ll give her a real chance of beating this thing. So I think Polly’s going to do it — which means I can go to Paris happily now and not be worrying about her the whole time!”

“Seth, that’s all brilliant news.” And yes, of course I start crying again. But this time they’re tears of relief about Polly and joy at the Paris news.

It’s been quite a week!

On Saturday, Dad’s sitting waiting for Clover, Mum, and me in the cramped hospital hallway. He folds his paper along the creases and stands up. “Morning, girls.”