The Baby (8 page)

She's doing really badly. She knew all along that she
couldn't cope.

By half past midnight Nicola feels like a corpse in a trance. She's become so used to Eliza screaming that she can't hear anything else. She's made tracks in the carpet from pacing. She needs help but she doesn't know who to ask. There is, in the early hours of a cold March morning, nobody.

The collar around Eliza's babygrow is wet from one of their tears. Her knees are drawn high. Her voice is squeaky from so much screaming. She is starting to sound like an animal in pain. Her skin is hot and damp from her distress.

Nicola is standing at the window wondering desperately if she should call a doctor. Eliza's knees bump against Nicola's ribs as her mum pushes open the door. This is what Nicola has been dreading. She steels herself for the barrage of criticism which is bound to follow. ‘
You can't cope
.', ‘
Where did you ever get the idea that this would be easy?
', ‘
You've made your bed – now you'll have to lie in it
.' etc. etc….

Her mum looks old. She's wearing a nightshirt which is inside out and has a coffee stain on the front. She's barefoot and there are lilac veins which stick out at her ankles. Her hair is wild and messy and her mouth is as sour as vinegar.

‘Sorry, Mum – I can't seem to stop her—'

But she's interrupted. Interrupted and shocked when, instead of standing in the doorway shouting abuse, Nicola's mum takes some steps forward. Forward, towards the baby. Her arms are outstretched and her fingers angle in to slide between Nicola and Eliza.

Her voice is amazingly kind. Tired, but kind all the same.
‘Give her here,' she whispers. Nicola watches as her mum draws Eliza into her chest like she was used to it.

Immediately, there's a softening in the whole of her mother's body. Her spine seems to sag, her shoulders sink and her face somehow gains curves. Nicola can't believe what she's seeing. But she knows she shouldn't say anything. Nicola's mum, if nothing else, is a very proud woman and in all her seventeen years of life, Nicola has never known her to admit that she's wrong or go back on her word.

So, clamping her mouth tightly shut, Nicola watches wide-eyed as grandmother and granddaughter start to rock to and fro.

At last there's a slight rise to Nicola's mum's lips. Eliza, surprised at this new pair of arms, begins to quieten down.

‘I think she's got colic.' Her mum whispers gently into the face of her granddaughter.

‘What's that?'

Another gentle smile. ‘It's like baby indigestion. You got it all the time when you were her age.' Her mum offers a smile.

‘Really?' Her mum rarely talks about when Nicola was a baby. Nicola gets a feeling that this was a bad time for her mum. She thinks it might be because this was when her dad moved out.

Her mum nods. ‘You'll need to get some colic drops from the chemist tomorrow. I think she's old enough to have them. But you'll have to check.' She rocks. She coos. She smiles.

Nicola just stares.

As the screams turn to murmurs and Eliza's eyes begin to
droop, her mum looks up at Nicola by the window. ‘You look worn out. I'll take her for a bit. Let you get some sleep.'

Too shocked to argue, or even to string a sentence together, Nicola nods. She watches as her mum cradles Eliza in one arm and picks up the Moses basket with the other.

‘Just for an hour or so. I'll be fine after that …'

But her mum's already left the room and there's this layer of silence in her bedroom which feels like the softest feather quilt.

Not caring that she's still got her jeans on and they're digging into her waist; not bothering with a feather stalk in the pillow which juts into her temple; without taking off her make-up, applying spot cream or cleaning her teeth, Nicola flops on to her bed, where she gives in to everything.

And she sleeps.

And she sleeps.

And she sleeps.

Several days later, on a cold day, with a few flecks of snow left in the March air, two figures and a buggy move down the road.

To Nicola, it is like finding her old self again. Like discovering a missing jewel from a favourite bracelet; like losing your phone then finding it; like not sleeping in your bed for seven weeks and then being able to sink into it. The feeling of walking down the road with your oldest, most trusted friend is equal to nothing on earth. And Nicola's lungs feel like bursting with it. She can't stop smiling. She wouldn't know how to stop. Olivia seems just as happy, if a little quieter about it.

Nicola pushes the buggy. Eliza, more used to the outside air and the light now, is blinking happily. Nicola wishes the walk could last for ever.

‘You sure he won't be there?' she asks nervously.

They are about to embark on step one of Olivia's mission. And although anxious, Nicola would follow Olivia through a pit full of snakes if it meant that she could have her friendship back.

Olivia nods. ‘Yeah – Saturday afternoon he goes out running. Don't you remember?'

Nicola doesn't like to say that life before Eliza is pretty much forgotten mush.

Olivia glances at her friend. ‘And the bag's got anything she'll need?'

‘Think so. If she needs a bottle then there's one made up. But we're not going to be long anyway, are we?' Her voice wavers slightly.

Olivia shakes her head. ‘Just enough time to get the message across.'

Nicola fixes her eyes on the top of Eliza's head and watches the vision blur. She wonders what it must feel like to be as strong as Olivia.

The sun slips briefly between some clouds. It throws their shadows across the road. They look long and rangy and assured. Like two grown-up women with a pushchair.

Jonty's bungalow is five minutes away. It's a small semi, in a cul-de-sac which backs on to a field dotted with cows. Like all of its neighbours, the bungalow sports three white plastic
windows at the front and a chirpy looking pot by the door. They stand on the gravel path leading up to it. The wheels of the pushchair make a crunching sound then come to a halt, which Nicola isn't used to. It's easier to drag the buggy backwards.

At the door Olivia glances at Nicola. She raises her eyebrows. ‘Ready?'

Nicola's shaking. The quiver in her forearms flutters down to her hands, which in turn are on the handles. She watches the way the buggy vibrates. But she inhales and nods.

Olivia, before reaching for the doorbell, presses her fingers on to Nicola's wrist. ‘It'll be OK. He needs to take responsibility.'

Nicola feels the tender pressure on her arm and remains unconvinced.
Not sure about that
.

The doorbell is brash. Its electronic loudness inside the house widens Eliza's eyes. She looks especially cute today in a padded red coat designed to look like a ladybird. It was donated by a charity. Nicola's not sure which one.

A moving blue haze behind the frosted glass.

Nicola feels her mouth go dry. Jonty's nan is one of those small, wiry women who seem to have energy and strength beyond their age. She has orange lipstick smeared on her lips and her eyebrows are drawn on to her forehead with pencil. Her hair is yellow and fuzzy, cropped close to her head. She might be intimidating and pushy, but the smile on her face when she catches sight of Olivia through the glass immediately softens the atmosphere. She throws wide the door.
‘Olivia, well how are you?'

Olivia smiles back. ‘I'm fine, thank you.'

It sometimes feels like everybody likes Olivia.

Nicola watches the older woman scan iron-grey eyes over Olivia's features. Nothing, Nicola realizes, gets past this woman. After a couple of seconds she looks towards Nicola and Eliza. Her expression falls for a split second but brightens when she looks back at Olivia. ‘To what do I owe this pleasure then? Jonty's out you know?'

Olivia nods.

‘Yeah … I know … we thought he might be.' Her elbow bumps against Nicola's.

She's nervous
.

‘Are you feeling all right today?' Olivia continues. ‘I mean, do you want to sit down or something? Because what I've got to say might come as a bit of a shock.'

Jonty's nan frowns. Glances from Olivia to Nicola then down to the baby. Then she looks away.

‘I'm fine,' she mutters. But her fingers grip fiercely on to the latch of the front door. This woman might be made of stern stuff, but her knuckles are shell-white.

Several tense seconds where a blackbird explodes into song in the shadows of the terracotta pot. Nicola can't believe its bad timing.

Olivia takes a breath. She waves her hand at Eliza whose jewel eyes stare ahead at the elderly woman by the door. ‘Um, Mrs Jones. I'd like you to meet Eliza.' All three pairs of adult eyes bathe the baby. Eliza squirms happily. ‘She's Nicola's.
But … but … also she's Jonty's.'

Nicola watches the colour drain from the old lady's skin, the fingers grip tighter on the door. She's scared.

But Olivia goes on, the information streaming out of her.

‘We were wondering if you might like to have her for an hour. To see how you get on. We'd only go down the road. Just to get a few bits. Nappies and stuff. We'd be back very soon. Only we thought you might like to meet her. With her being your great-granddaughter and everything …'

It feels cruel, on this bright, blustery March afternoon, to watch a very proud elderly woman struggle to find her words.

So cruel in fact that Nicola has to look at the ground instead.

Maybe Alice is a bad person. All her parents want is for her to have some friends. Maybe she is doing something wrong.

So, she spends her breaktime doing the same thing that she does every morning: a toilet stop. (This is normal. Everyone has to go to the toilet. Even popular people with blonde, perfect hair and pink lip gloss like Julia Smythe have to urinate.) And then she stays as long as she can inside the cubicle. Depending on who else is in the toilets, this can be as long as the full twenty minutes. These times are good. She can sit with the toilet lid down and inspect the walls for new graffiti or think about her animals and prepare for when she gets home.

But it is not always as easy as this. Sometimes – if, for example, Julia Smythe comes in with all her friends – people start to realize that someone is spending longer than the appropriate time in the cubicle. They might start to bang on the door or kick at it. Or even, as happens today, stand on the toilet next door and poke their heads over the side.

There is a shriek of laughter and one of Julia's lip-gloss friends shouts. ‘It's weird Alice.'

‘What's she doing?' Alice recognizes Julia Smythe's voice. She is probably looking at herself in the mirror. She does this a lot. Maybe because she is worried that she is developing teenage acne. This is common in year eight students.

Lip-gloss girl stares at Alice, and Alice finds herself going red. Olivia would be ashamed. She would know exactly how to react. She certainly wouldn't go red.

‘Being weird, of course.'

Alice grabs the strap of her school bag and bites her lip,
thinking. She has to make a break for it. She has no way of being able to see through doors; the human eye has not evolved enough for this yet. So she doesn't know how many girls are out there. But she hazards a guess at four or five. This is the usual number of girls who walk around with Julia Smythe.

Her fingers are trembling as she tries to unlock the door. This is a symptom of fear. Lip-gloss girl laughs. ‘Weird Alice,' she says.

Alice decides against eye contact. On this occasion, if she walks straight out, they might choose to ignore her.

The whole toilet now smells of the body spray which girls like Julia Smythe tend to wear.

Julia Smythe is the first person Alice sees when she eventually masters the lock and opens the cubicle door. She smiles. But it is not a smile of friendship. It could be described as a smirk. Julia is propped up on a sink and she is fiddling with some body spray. She squirts the spray at Alice but Alice does not need it. She used her own deodorant this morning just as Olivia showed her at the beginning of year seven. She told Alice that it was not a good thing to have a BO reputation at secondary, this was very important. BO stands for Body Odour as she found out when she googled it.

After the spray, Julia Smythe jiggles her leg up and down and laughs. ‘Don't they have special schools for kids like you?'

Alice feels a hot sensation in her mouth. The best thing to do is just leave the room and find the second thing to do on a
drizzly April breaktime.

She shuts the door behind her, but even in the corridor she hears the hoots of unkind laughter.

She keeps to the walls, knowing that this way she will stay out of the way of boys running about. Boys in particular can knock her down and not even notice.

People are not allowed inside the school at breaktime unless it is wet break. In which case there are allocated wet rooms. (The rain is not heavy enough today.) So everyone has to be outside, except when using the toilet.

Alice makes her way through the double doors into the drizzle. She wishes she could see her sister. Olivia might be in a kind mood and perhaps suggest that she stay with her until the bell goes. But Olivia is rarely in Alice's playground. She has her own sixth-form area and lots of her own friends. It would also be nice to see Olivia's friend Ben. He is a kind and patient person who listens. Her sister's friend Nicola is also a good person but unfortunately she is not at school at the moment because ten weeks ago she gave birth in the bathroom to an illegitimate baby.

The person she does not want to see is Jonty, Olivia's ex-boyfriend. He is not a nice person and commits domestic abuse. Although nobody else seems to realize this. At least she
thinks
he is Olivia's ex-boyfriend. He still comes around to the house every so often and pleads with Olivia to take him back. Two nights ago, when her mum and dad were at Tesco, as Alice was grooming her horse, Malachite, she could hear the sounds of male crying coming from behind Olivia's door.
Alice hopes and prays that her sister does not take him back.

Alice shelters against a large wall close to some other pupils who do not seem to have many friends. This is a good wall to stand by as there is an overhanging piece of roof which provides shelter and also some shade.

She looks around her and wonders how you make friends. It would be a very good thing to bring a friend home. But she has never done it. Her parents have told her that she is very clever and this can be off-putting to the people around her. Alice does not see why; it is probably just another one of those things which she will never properly make sense of. It is not like she goes up to people to tell them how to work out the thirteen times table without writing it down. You have to keep things like this to yourself. Olivia is always telling her. There are so many rules that she has to learn.

She checks the time on her waterproof watch, holding it into the drizzle just to give it a quick test. Five more minutes before she can go back to the safety of a classroom. At least there she can immerse herself in what she is learning and avoid comments about being a loser or a loner.

Lunchtimes are not quite as bad. There is Rocket Club on Mondays and Gifted and Talented Maths on Thursdays. The rest of the days she can eat her lunch and then go into the library where there is a lovely corner in which she can sit down and read a book. She is going through the alphabet at the moment: A-Z of authors. She is currently on C. But that is all right because she is only in year seven and there are at least six more years left at this school, should she make it through
each day.

She spots a gang of year sevens who play in the netball team. She shrinks back against the wall. These netball girls hate her almost as much as the lip-gloss girls. She knows this. She was once forced to play as Goal Keeper by Mrs Heaney, the PE teacher, who was short of players. Alice's height caught the teacher's eye and she was made to stand under the goalpost with her arms at a sixty degree angle over her opponents' heads. She let in thirty-eight goals. A school record. She has never been forgiven by the rest of the netball team. Mrs Heaney has not asked her to play again. Yet Alice was extremely accomplished at working out a sixty degree angle without the use of a protractor. But nobody seemed to notice.

Alice presses herself against the wall. There does not seem to be an escape route. She swallows and waits. Kimberley White is the captain. She plays Centre and is very good at footwork. She stops a metre away from Alice.

‘Hey Alice. What you doing?'

Alice hides her hands behind her because they are trembling. ‘Um. Waiting.'

Kimberley takes a step nearer. ‘For what, exactly? Your hundreds of friends?'

Alice shakes her head. ‘The end of break, if you must know.'

There are titters of laughter from the rest of the netball girls. They stand behind Kimberley, giggling through fingers. Kimberley puts her left boot against Alice's right shin. Alice can feel it scrape on her sock. ‘Nice shoes.'

Kimberley is being sarcastic. Alice is sure she does not really like her shoes. So she does not say anything. She hopes something might happen to distract the girls. A fire bell. An earthquake, even though they do not live on a tectonic fault plane. The bell for end of break.

Alice likes her shoes. She got them in the summer holidays when she did not know what the girls in secondary school wore. She is pleased with the purchase because the country is recovering from a double-dip recession and nice shoes are definitely a luxury item. They have bright buckles which shine when they have just been polished. Alice likes the shine but she thinks they might be too bright for Kimberley. Kimberley is wearing wedged boots even though the school rules state plainly that these are not allowed. She does not like how close Kimberley's face is to hers. She can smell prawn cocktail crisps.

‘Where'd you get them?'

Alice gulps and wonders if this is perhaps one of those times where you can lie. She wants to sound fashionable. This seems to impress some people. ‘Jimmy Choo.' She plucks the name from something Olivia once said.

There is a peal of laughter from the netball team. Two of them bend over in amusement. Alice does not understand why they are laughing.

‘Is that a section in Primark?' Kimberley asks with prawn-cocktail breath.

Alice stares glumly. She is not sure what else to say. The laughter makes her hot. She looks over Kimberley's left
shoulder hoping against hope for a friendly face.

There isn't one.

The netball girls crowd round Alice. They make her squirm. So many faces, so close up, make her feel scared. Her fingers press against the brickwork. She feels a nail bend back, then break.

She notices that the pupils beside her have left the wall.

One of the girls shoves her in the shoulder. It hurts a bit. She bites her tongue. She remembers how Olivia said it was important not to cry in these situations. So she forces back some tears.

‘Ow,' she mumbles.

‘Weird Alice,' one of the girls taunts. ‘Where are your friends?'

Alice screws up her eyes so that she cannot see and then snaps them open. The light dazzles her for a second but then she spots someone she knows. Someone who is older and stronger than the whole of the year seven netball team. Over the heads of the five netball players she sees Jonty. He commits domestic violence but on this occasion she might need him.

‘Ooow!' she cries again as Kimberley stamps on her left foot. She hopes that she is shouting loud enough so that Jonty can hear. He is walking quickly across the playground, his head bent very low. He looks deep in thought. But he looks up towards the shout. He spots Alice. She is sure.

Jonty is strong enough and old enough to scare the year seven netball team. All he needs to do is move towards them
and they will scatter like frightened sparrows. But he does not. No, her sister's ex-boyfriend looks over with interest at the commotion. He narrows his eyes at Alice and falters for a second. If she was telepathic then she would be sending him the signals to be rescued. But she is not telepathic and she is almost sure that he isn't either.

And then Jonty turns away. More than this, he walks away. Away from the wall where the year seven netball girls are determined to make a living hell out of the last three minutes of Alice's breaktime.

She feels one of her shiny buckles get torn from her left shoe and sees its brightness get kicked over into the playground. It skitters, then lands in a murky puddle, where it stays for the rest of the day.

Alice is in the bathroom. It is half past nine and her mum has said that she should go to sleep, but she has too much to think about. The horses need their last groom before bedtime and besides, she has started to worry about school the next day.

She likes it in here. It is warm by the radiator and it smells of Olivia's deodorant. Also, if she puts her head against the wall there is a small hole where the pipework from the radiator feeds into the cavity and from here she can hear her sister. She has never told anyone this. She does not know if anyone else realizes it. But it is too important a piece of information to share.

Olivia is talking to her friend Ben. He came around about an hour earlier and they have been in the bedroom talking all
this time. He has not been around for a while. Since the baby was born in the bathroom, a lot of things have changed.

Alice sits on the floor and rests her head against the wall. She looks around her with the gentle tones of her sister in her ears and tries to relax. It is difficult to calm down, because this is the same room where Nicola gave birth to the illegitimate baby and it still feels strange. Her mum spent a long time cleaning up the blood and the other stuff and she knows for a fact that she threw away two perfectly good towels.

It is difficult to forget the images and sounds of Nicola moaning and screaming on the floor. But her sister's voice is comforting.

Ben's voice is lower than Olivia's but that is because of the male hormone testosterone. Boys' voices break during puberty. So Ben must have reached this.

‘I don't even know how you can consider it,' he says.

She hears her sister sigh. She has been doing a lot of sighing since her best friend gave birth to the illegitimate baby. ‘Because he pleads with me. Because he's desperate. Because he begs. Do you know he has cried every time he's come here since it happened?'