The Baby (6 page)

She places them in the basket underneath the buggy and tries hard to swallow the feeling that she's playing at being a mum.

She buys crisps and nappies in the supermarket. She'd like to buy the magazine she used to get and a pack of Oreos. But she can't afford it now. Not now she has to buy nappies and milk and baby clothes. She avoids the stares of a spiteful shop assistant; instead she uses the till operated by a teenage boy
with pimples on his chin, who doesn't give Nicola so much as a glance.

She even goes to the greengrocer to buy apples.

It's good to be out in the fresh air. And Eliza's a dream. She gurgles and murmurs in the bright sunshine. Her cheeks look pink in this light. Pink and healthy.

But when she's in the chemist she gets a surprise. When the thing that wasn't meant to happen happens.

Nicola's scanning the shelf of baby wipes and nappy sacks when she catches a familiar frame in the corner of her eye. There's nothing she can do. She and Eliza would make too much of a commotion if they tried to hide. She can't slip anywhere with a great big buggy.

So she just stands there. Like an idiot.

Olivia stands there too. They glance at each other and Nicola sees a tight smile reach the corner of Olivia's lips – it's not her usual warm smile.

‘Hello,' Nicola says shyly. She can feel her heart battering at her ribs. It's horrible being scared around her oldest friend.

Olivia nods, fiddles with a bottle of conditioner. ‘Hello.' She seems a bit thinner and her hair has been cut short.

They stare at each other until Olivia sighs. She shakes her head and closes her eyes.

Someone sneezes in the queue by the counter. Nicola thinks about pushing the buggy out of the shop. Battering people as she goes. Escaping. Anything other than standing stupidly like this.

Eventually Olivia speaks. ‘Well this isn't awkward.'

This makes Nicola smile. Olivia's always been able to do this. There's something about her which makes you feel at ease, even when you've done something as stupid as sleeping with her boyfriend. It makes Nicola realize again how amazing Olivia is. How much she's missed her. There's a small sob threatening at the back of her throat.

Eliza gurgles some more and they both look at the pink-cheeked baby who squirms happily. Nicola jiggles the buggy.

‘This is Eliza.'

Olivia crouches into Eliza's eyeline. ‘Oh God,' she brushes her hand over the blanket on Eliza's legs.

Nicola holds her breath.

‘She's … gorgeous. She really, really is.'

‘Thanks.'

‘Just like her mum.' And then Olivia lifts up her head and says what Nicola feels to be the bravest four words in the entire universe. ‘Not like her dad.'

So that's it then. Just as she'd thought. Olivia knows all the facts. Either Ben must have told her or she worked it out herself. It isn't a nice feeling.

‘A little bird told me that you've split up with him.'

Olivia gets up. One of her knees clicks. Her face is blank but her eyes are honest. ‘It's sort of on and off at the moment. It's not quite final yet.' She takes a deep breath, tilts her head. ‘How is Ben? I hope he's OK. I miss him.'

Nicola trembles happily when she thinks of him. ‘He's been brilliant. So nice. He's really good with Eliza.' She puts her head to one side like Olivia. ‘Why don't you see him any
more? He wouldn't tell me.'

Olivia pulls a face. She shrugs. ‘I don't think he approves of my choices.'

‘He loves you, Olivia. He's as confused as us all. It's sad that you aren't friends. It's sad that
we
aren't friends.'

The conversation has become too heavy too quickly. Nicola clings on to the buggy handles. Olivia twists the cap of the conditioner. They look at each other, and then look away. A homeless man comes into the shop; he carries three bulging bin bags. The pharmacist behind the counter looks nervous.

Olivia drums her fingers on the bottle. ‘Um, I'd better go. Got Biology in ten minutes.'

Nicola nods.

Olivia trills a hand towards Eliza. ‘Bye Eliza.' And she's gone, leaving a scent of honey and her favourite body spray so wonderfully familiar that it makes Nicola's throat ache.

When Alice next comes over, Nicola decides to ask. They're sitting at the bottom of the bed changing Eliza out of her baby-grow and into a cute pair of donated jeans. Alice likes doing this sort of stuff.

Nicola is careful. ‘Um, how's Olivia?'

Alice looks up, then back down. Her eyes flash for a brief second. She fiddles with the baby jeans. ‘She's all right, thanks.'

‘Does she still have everyone coming round to see her?'

Alice shakes her head. ‘Jonty's stopped. It wasn't very nice when he did come. They kept crying. The horses used to hate it. They were so noisy.'

She puts a lock of hair behind her ear. Squeezes her eyebrows together. ‘Mum says they have officially split up now. But she said to Dad that she doesn't know why.'

Alice's hoodie is too short for her. It makes her arms look long and awkward. She eyes a feeding bottle hopefully. Nicola knows that she loves feeding Eliza. She's actually quite good at it now.

‘Did they—'

But Alice has more words to come. Her chest is bursting with them. ‘And Ben doesn't come round any more either. He got cross one night. I was supposed to be asleep but I could hear everything. He said to her that sometimes you had to be a bigger person. Which I didn't really understand. And that best friends mean the world. But I didn't understand that either. Besides, my animals were so noisy that night, it was hard to hear everything.'

Nicola feels a small hopeful jolt in her stomach. It's soft and glowing. Ben standing up for her? It's lovely. Saying nice things about her to Olivia.

She lets Alice pull up the jeans over Eliza's little nappy. Eliza looks so cute it's hard for Nicola to take her eyes off her. But then she thinks of her best ever friend, and the betrayal. She finds herself grimacing. ‘I bet she's lonely.'

Alice nods as she pulls at the baby jeans. ‘Yes. It's very quiet in the house. No you, no Jonty and now no Ben.'

‘Poor Olivia.'

Eliza starts to grizzle.

*

‘You can go out if you like.'

‘What?'

Nicola eyes her mum suspiciously. She's just spent the last hour wrestling with a grouchy Eliza. Bathing her, feeding her the bedtime bottle and trying to get her to sleep. It's eight o'clock.
Eastenders
is on. Her mum's legs are on the coffee table and she has a cup of steaming liquid in her right hand. She looks grey and tired. This week the school has had an Ofsted inspection and Nicola knows how much pressure her mum has been under.

Nicola can't quite believe that her mum has just said this. It's hard not to sound shocked. ‘What?' she says again.

Her mum repeats the words, her eyes still on the screen, her head resting on a fading purple cushion. ‘You can go out if you want to.'

Nicola gives in to a gape. ‘Where would I go? You mean without Eliza?'

Her mum gives a harsh bark of laughter. It shakes her cup of tea. ‘Wherever you like, I don't know. To Olivia's or that bloody gay boy's. And yes. I mean without Eliza.'

Her mum is a constant surprise. Nicola has never dared ask. She's never once requested help. Never once asked if she'd take Eliza for a second. Knows only too well how she'd say something along the lines of, ‘She's yours for life now. She's your choice. You gave up that kind of life when you decided to keep her.' She's mentioned too many times how the father needs to cough up some money. How he's got off ‘scot-free'. Nicola knows her mum too well. Her mum can be the scariest,
most scornful, saddest person alive.

Nicola blinks, unconvinced at the state of her clothes, the state of her greasy hair.

She's almost breathless at the thought of seeing Olivia. ‘I'll only be an hour. Two at the most. I could be home before ten. Before she needs her late-night bottle.'

Her mum nods. Her eyes still on the screen. ‘It's been seven weeks now. I've been impressed.'

Nicola feels her jaw drop again. She knows how difficult these words must be.

Before her mum can change her mind she finds herself rushing to the mirror in the hallway. Grabs her mum's hairbrush from the windowsill, even pinches some mascara. She could do with her phone and her purse, but they're in her bedroom and nothing on earth would make her disturb the peace behind her bedroom door.

She pulls the brush through her hair.
Please be home, Olivia. Please be home
.

Nerves like a siren, Nicola battles down the road. After seven weeks with a baby attached, she feels strange. As if she's missing a limb. No phone and no money, she walks quickly along the pavement which she's used since she was seven years old. Past the hawthorn hedge, along the parade of shops now empty except for the supermarket, which pours a blue light on the stretch of road. Then around the corner of the cul-de-sac where Olivia lives. One, two, three houses, and then Olivia's, lit up like a Christmas tree. Four windows of orange light and
an outside lamp.

She stands at the front door. Holds her breath, fills her lungs with anxious oxygen. And before she can think about it she presses the doorbell. Her finger wobbles.

Thirty seconds or so pass in which she sees shadows and hears laughter from behind the frosted glass of the front door. This house is hardly ever silent. It feels like there is almost always life inside it. It's a stark contrast to the hush of her own.

Olivia's dad opens the door. The smile which cracks his face heartens Nicola. ‘Hello stranger,' he says, his eyes sparkling. ‘How's my favourite crazy teenager?'

No mention, she notices, of the last time she was here. She gulps down a strange sensation when she realizes that she's about to enter the house where she gave birth to Eliza.

Olivia's mum peers over her husband's shoulder. She's smiling, but Nicola can feel an awkwardness rock under her ribs when she remembers the last time that they met. ‘How are you, sweetheart?' She looks past Nicola as if to enquire where the baby might be. ‘How's the little one?'

‘She's fine. Thanks, by the way … for what you did.'

Olivia's mum half smiles in a way which makes Nicola think of Olivia. ‘That's OK. You'll have to bring her over sometime. I'd love to meet her properly.'

Nicola flexes her foot against the front step. ‘I will do. One day, when she's not asleep. Is Olivia in?'

Olivia's dad widens the door. ‘Sure. She's in her bedroom.' He nods at the stairs. ‘Go on up.'

It feels odd walking up the stairs. She hasn't done this for
seven weeks. Is it weird to miss stairs?

At the top, she forces herself to knock and turn the handle on Olivia's bedroom door, next to the bathroom. The bathroom where her baby was born. She pushes the thought to one side. If she doesn't do it now then she might just walk right back down the stairs and forget about the whole exercise. Possibly for ever.

She pokes her head around the door and fixes a smile upon her lips. ‘Hi.'

Olivia's on the floor. Her back against the radiator, her laptop on her knees. A glow of unflattering blue light patterns her face. The familiar smell of Olivia's room fills Nicola's lungs like honey and freshly baked biscuits. She could breathe it in for ever.

Unsure of her welcome, she loiters in the doorway.

Olivia shifts the laptop off her knees, straightening her legs as she does so. ‘Oh, hi.'

‘Can I come in? Are you busy?'

Flickers of emotion pass over Olivia's eyes. Nicola wishes she could read them. But they're too quick and the light isn't that good.

‘No. I'm OK. Come in.' She nods to the bed for Nicola to sit.

There are several seconds of agony between them. Above everything, Nicola regrets this. Never, in all their years of friendship, has there been awkwardness like this.

She can hear Alice speaking to her animals across the landing and some sounds of the TV downstairs. She kneads the quilt on the bed with her fists. Her hair falls over her cheeks.
There are hundreds of words to speak, but she can't manage to say any of them.

She nods at the doorway. ‘Your sister has been coming over.'

Olivia rolls her eyes. ‘Yeah. Is she making a nuisance of herself?' Her hands move about nervously.

There's another silence and then Nicola shrugs. ‘No, she's great. She's actually a big help.'

Olivia nods and stares into the corner of the room. ‘That's good.'

Nicola feels like her throat is clogged up with cotton wool, but she knows she has to say it. Say the words which she'd do anything never to have to speak.

She coughs.

She fiddles with the duvet cover. One that she's never seen before.

It's hard to breathe.

‘I'm sorry, Livvy.' They come out croaky. She wonders if she might cry. There are certainly tears blocking up behind her eyes and her nose and her mouth.

Nothing. Just a nod. Looking closely, she can see grey smudges under Olivia's eyes. She looks scrawny and drawn, hunched up by the radiator.

‘I'm really sorry to have screwed you over like I did.'

Olivia nods again, gazing into the distance behind Nicola's left shoulder. ‘I wondered …'

A sob surprises Nicola. It comes from her throat. ‘It was the most stupid thing I ever did. I don't know what I was thinking.'

Olivia still doesn't look at her but her voice is suddenly direct. The words are strong.

‘He said it was only the once. But I've been thinking about it. I've been thinking about it a lot. And I'm not that sure any more. Can you tell me? Can you tell me how many times you had sex with my boyfriend?'

All of a sudden the tears escape. They stream from Nicola's eyes, sliding over the contours of her cheeks and chin, dripping on her jeans, making dark, unhappy stains. She brushes them away but still they come. Her nose drips and she can taste the salt, even though her lips are clamped shut. Her throat feels wide and hot.