What Goes Around

chapter TWELVE

Gloria

They’re talking about discharging Eleanor and the baby tomorrow.

Eleanor’s got support (me).

The baby is taking its feeds now (from me) and isn’t requiring top ups and has reached her birth weight.

They hope that in a home environment (mine), Eleanor might respond better to the baby. She’ll be kept a close eye on by the health visitor and GP (which again really means me) and if things don’t pick up then they’ll look at getting her into a mother and baby unit but they’re a bit hard to get into.

I don’t think they’re ready to go home.

I know I’m not ready to go home.

It’s bedlam there at the moment. There’s Bonny, Alice and Hugh and I’ve got Eleanor’s other two kids coming and going and now Eleanor wants to come home with me.

Which means, to top it all off, I have to make room for a newborn baby.

As much as I love having the girls home…

I stop myself there.

The truth is - it’s driving me mad having them home.

Does that make me a terrible mum?

Perhaps.

But I swear it’s easier here in the hospital.

It’s so much easier to hide.

Eleanor is in a single room and she just sleeps most of the time and I take care of the baby and watch some daytime TV. To tell you the truth, I'm enjoying the peace. I’m enjoying not having to deal with it all; I know what Bonny and Alice can be like. Yes, it's their dad, but how can they be so sure it's what he would want?

The church.

The hymns.

The readings.

I know I haven't seen him for an awful long time but he never really cared about that sort of thing.

It was me who worried about all that sort of stuff.

Still, I’m staying right out of it.

Or I was trying to, until Alice rang to say that Lucy might be stopping by with Charlotte to visit the baby later this afternoon. I was about to say I’ll come home, because I really can’t stand the thought of coming face to face with Lucy, but then Alice uttered the immortal words - ‘What’s happening for dinner?’

Honestly! You raise three independent girls, yet as soon as they cross back over the threshold, it's like having teenagers again. After he left, when I had to muster everything I could, just to get out of bed, the question would be the same.

Every night.

When I’m home, I am cleaner, chef, coffee maker, grief counsellor and sounding board and frankly, today, I'd rather face Lucy.

‘Surprise me,’ I say and hang up the phone and then I feel a bit mean, they have just lost their dad.

I’ve lost him too.

I sit there in the quiet.

I lost him a long time ago, I remind myself.

But it hurts.

Perhaps rather more than it should.

And there’s no one I can tell.

It’s the same as the first time really – I just have to carry on.

I see my granddaughter stirring; see her little eyes open. She's such a good baby, she doesn't wake with a cry, she just pops in her thumb.

I actually want her to wake up just so that I can cuddle her, she’s been my only saving grace this week.

Apart from Paul.

I pick her up, even though she’s still asleep and it must be wind but I swear she’s smiling as I stand there holding her, blushing like a teenager as I recall.

Paul kissed me last night.

I was starting to think that maybe we were just friends, that maybe I’d got it all wrong but last night, when he dropped me home from the hospital, as I went to get out of the car, he stopped me.

My face is on fire as I remember the shock of a kiss that got just a little bit out of hand.

I thought I was past all that.

I was sure I was past all that.

Maybe I’m not.

I let out a small laugh.

She’s awake now and she’s such a dot, she’s just gazing up at me and I smile down to her.

‘Oh, the stories your Nanny could tell you,’ I say to her.

It’s not wind.

I swear she smiles back at me.