She could be describing my life.
“That was my fairy tale and I didn’t doubt it would come true, but I was wrong and there’s no one to blame. It wasn’t my fault, or Nicky’s.”
Agatha toys with the gun, turning it in her hands. “It’s not just the absence of a child, but everything that goes with it. The rites of parenthood—the mothers’ groups, school-gate chats, Saturday sports on the sidelines, class dinners, school fund-raisers, and speech days. For you, these things are so commonplace you don’t give them a second thought. For me they are everything I’ll never have. I am an outlier. I am the incredible disappearing woman. I am childless. Less of a person. Not in the club. You take those things for granted.”
“No, I don’t.”
“I’ve heard you complaining to the other wives. You’re all the same. You tell each other about daily dramas, sleepless nights, lazy husbands, fussy eaters, messy rooms, and food allergies. I used to hate you for that.” She pauses. “No, I’m sorry—‘hate’ is too strong a word. I thought you were ungrateful.”
“They’re just stories,” I say. “Everybody complains. I know I’m lucky. And I know I shouldn’t take my life for granted.”
“But you do. I bet when you see a woman my age without children you automatically wonder if she left it too long, or put her career first. You think maybe she was too selfish or too choosy.”
“I don’t think that,” I say, but in my heart I know she’s right.
Feeling lightheaded, I swap Ben between breasts. He belches quietly, leaving a thin trail of milk on my skin.
“I didn’t have children to make you feel bad, Agatha. And it’s not my fault that you couldn’t have a baby, or you lost one. I know it’s painful. I know you feel cheated. But you’re not the first woman who couldn’t fall pregnant, and infertility isn’t the worst thing in the world. I’ll tell you what’s worse. Having a child go missing is worse. Lying awake at night, not knowing if he’s alive or dead. You have an empty womb. I had an empty cradle. Mine is worse.”
Agatha’s eyes flash. “Would you swap your life for mine?”
I shake my head.
“I thought so.”
My thumb brushes over Ben’s forehead. His eyes are open and he’s gazing at me, already falling in love.
Agatha is right. Up until a few weeks ago I had no idea what it was like to be infertile, or to lose a child. I understand that now.
“What are you going to do?” I ask.
Agatha looks at the gun in her lap. “I haven’t decided.”
“You could give that to me.”
She shakes her head.
“Please, don’t do anything foolish, Agatha.”
She sighs tiredly. “I’ve been doing foolish things my entire life.”
AGATHA
* * *
Meg rearranges her bra and buttons her blouse. Rory has fallen asleep on her lap, his belly full.
“You should go,” I tell her.
“What about you?”
“I’m going to stay here for a little while.”
“You could come with me.”
“No.”
Meg hesitates, wanting to argue, but she has what she came for. She says she understands how I feel, but I know that’s not possible. She can sympathize, but not empathize. Few people can truly appreciate what it’s like to give up a child. I was fifteen when it happened to me and I didn’t just give up my newborn. I gave up the one-year-old and the two-year-old and the three-year-old and every other year-old that she became. I surrendered every Christmas morning, every visit from the tooth fairy and school concert, every Mother’s Day, birthday, and kiss good night.
How can Meg comprehend that? Maybe if she had miscarried, or woken next to the cold, marble-cold body of a baby girl, or lived with a cruel creature twisting inside her, she’d understand.
Why should she have three children when you have none?
That’s her good fortune.
She’s one of them—part of the chorus.
Meg isn’t like that.
She’s everything you hate. A smug mummy blogger who is pandered to by advertisers and politicians.
No!
She said an empty cradle was worse than an empty womb. What she meant was “You wouldn’t understand because you’re not a mother.” Arrogant bitch!
Meg is sliding her arms into her coat.
She thinks her experience invalidates yours. She thinks she’s better than you are.
No!
Stop her!
It’s too late.
“I’m going to leave now,” Meg says, holding Ben against her chest. “Thank you for bringing him back.”
I nod. She’s staring at the gun.
“Do you want to say good-bye?”
I shake my head. A single tear rolls down my cheek and falls onto my knuckles where I’m gripping the gun. The small clear teardrop looks like a jeweled bead, magnifying the skin beneath, creating a tiny curved reflection of the ceiling.
Each step takes Meg farther away.
She doesn’t love Rory like you do. She doesn’t know him. Take him back!
I can’t.
Yes, you can. Raise the gun. Pull the trigger. It’s easy.
She reaches the pillar and changes direction, heading towards the stairs.
I look down at the gun. The single tear has rolled along my forefinger and brushed against the trigger.
It is so strange, this life we lead. We search for happiness, but so much is about survival. Existence. We try to manage expectations, but really we’re treading water, wasting time, or contemplating lives we might have led. Pretty soon we’re like every other godless, money-hungry, backstabbing, jaded, jealous human being, wishing we were richer, prettier, younger, luckier, or could do it all over again.
For me there is no such thing as forgetting. I used to see a psychotherapist every week—Nicky’s idea—who told me that I had to take all my negative thoughts and low self-esteem and lock them in a metal box like a pirate’s chest with multiple chains and padlocks. I had to bury this box deep in a desert so big that I could dig for ten thousand years and never find it. I tried to do that, but the memories seeped out like nuclear waste with a half-life that lasts millennia.
No matter how hard I try, the creature will always be with me, skulking at the edges of every clearing, waiting for the fire to burn down or the lights to go off before creeping towards me. I can’t even be sure whether these are my thoughts or if the creature is thinking for me. I don’t know how much of me there is left.