‘No, but they had their first snog—’
‘Their only snog. Fuck.’ Another contraction hits. The pain is getting worse.
‘Breathe through it.’ Adam takes slow, comical breaths but at a loss for anything else to try, I match my breathing pattern with his. The pain begins to ease.
The door swings open and Helen bustles back into the room. ‘Let’s have a little look at you.’ She snaps on gloves and I let my knees flop apart; I lost my dignity hours ago.
‘You’re almost ready.’ She pats my thigh. ‘I’ll be back in another ten minutes or so.’
‘Shit. Ten minutes.’ The harried expression on Adam’s face makes me forget my own discomfort.
‘You’ll be an amazing dad, Adam.’
‘I don’t know…’
‘I do,’ I say firmly. ‘You are brave and selfless and—’
‘I can be a selfish git—’
‘Shut up.’ I sit up and reach forward, holding his face between my palms. ‘When it comes down to it, you always put others before you, even…’ My voice cracks. ‘Even if sometimes I wish you didn’t, you’re my absolute hero. I’m so proud of you.’
‘Anna.’ His finger lightly runs across my wedding ring. ‘My wife. I love you so much.’
‘I love you too and I’m sorry we had a rough—’
‘It’s not important. The here and now. It’s all we have.’
I nod, too overcome to reply. If only he knew how true that was.
‘Right.’ Helen bustles back into the room. ‘Are you ready?’
‘Wait!’ Adam rummages around in his rucksack and pulls out a CD. ‘On the tour of the maternity unit we were told we could bring music?’
‘Yep. You could have had it on earlier.’
‘No. This is just for now.’ Adam smiles as Helen slips the disc into the player. I’m half expecting a mix of Eighties music, a selection of the terrible songs that played in the bar in Alircia the night that we met. Madonna singing ‘True Blue’ as Nell handed me a bright pink cocktail decorated with umbrellas and pineapple. Instead, Elvis croons ‘Love me Tender’, our wedding song.
‘Oh, I love this!’ Helen says.
‘You might not if Anna doesn’t push this baby out pretty damn quickly. The track’s on repeat for ninety minutes.’
‘That wife of yours might be tempted to throw the CD player at your head. Right.’ Helen has a quick check. ‘Ready? You will shortly become parents.’
My body is splitting in two. I huff and puff. Panting when Helen instructs me to, Adam panting beside me. Pushing when she says it’s time, squeezing both of Adam’s hands in mine. This time he doesn’t complain. ‘Love me Tender’ is still playing so it has not yet been ninety minutes. It feels like ninety hours. Helen and I definitely have different definitions of how long the time span ‘shortly’ should cover.
I’m tired now. Sweat slicks my skin, the sheet under me drenched. Sporadically, Adam smooths my tangled hair away from my face. Runs a damp flannel over my lips. The ice chips have long since melted.
‘I. Am. Never. Having. Another. Baby.’ I don’t even have the energy left to cry. ‘I can’t do this. I can’t.’ My hands cling to Adam’s T-shirt. I give him a feeble shake. ‘Make it stop now.’
‘Anna—’
‘I’ve changed my mind!’ I am shouting now. Trying to swing my legs down. Wanting to walk away from it all. ‘I can’t do it.’ My chest is heaving with dry sobs. I feel a complete and utter failure.
It’s too hard.
Too painful.
Too everything.
‘One last push, Anna,’ Helen shouts.
‘You hear that, Anna? One more and it will all be over. We’ll meet—’
‘If you say Gregg, I’ll fucking kill you.’
‘Get ready,’ Helen barks. ‘Deep breath and… push!’
I screw my eyes, grit my teeth, use the last ounce of my strength to push. Just when I feel my head will explode with the exertion, there’s a give.
‘Take a break, head’s out.’
‘Did you hear that, Anna?’ Adam’s excitement is palpable. ‘It has a head! Can you tell if it’s a boy or girl yet, Helen?’
‘If I could tell that from the head, you’d make medical history,’ she says. ‘Ready, Anna, you’re doing really well. Deep breath and… push.’
I clench my hands into fists, the room swimming from lack of air until Helen tells me to take a break again.
‘One more push should do it,’ she says.
I prepare myself and when she tells me to push, I do until she tells me to stop.
‘Good girl. It’s all over. You’ve done brilliantly. Two seconds and…’
A sharp cry fills the air.
A baby.
My baby.
‘Well done, Anna. You were amazing.’ Adam presses his lips hard against mine. He’s crying. I’m crying. His face is shining with joy. His eyes bright. Again, he is the boy I first met. The boy from the bar. The intervening years where we bickered and took each other for granted melt away. I am twenty-four once more. Falling deeply into a love that is absolute.
‘I love you,’ I sob.
‘I love you too.’ He wipes my eyes, his eyes. ‘I was doubting it would ever happen.’ He slapped both hands on top of his head. ‘I’m a dad!’
And I am a mother. So many emotions battle for prominence inside of me and while I am trying to unpick them, Oliver’s voice penetrates my blur of exhaustion and exhilaration and pain – he’s begun to count down.
Ten
No!
Nine
‘Quick.’ I beckon for Helen to bring my baby over.
Eight
Hurry!
Seven
I have to see my child.
Six
Hold them.
Five
‘Is it a boy or a girl?’
Four
‘Congratulations, Anna.’ Helen takes a pause.
Three
‘You have a perfectly healthy…’
Two
‘…baby—’
One
I am back.
Chapter Fifty-Two
Oliver
‘No!’ Anna shouts as Sofia tries to help her off the patient table. She wrestles to snatch the goggles back, her nose streaming with blood. ‘I have to know. Send me back. Send me back right now!’
‘Anna.’ Oliver hurries forward. Sofia steps back, rubbing her wrist while Anna glares at Oliver with pure hatred.
‘I understand that—’ he begins.
‘You don’t understand anything. I was just about to find out. One more second. Why couldn’t you have waited? One. More. Second.’
Oliver passes her a tissue. She presses it against her nostrils. Instantly, it turns crimson.
‘Anna, let’s go and talk.’
She shakes her head and winces at the movement.
‘Please come with me.’ He offers his hand to help her down. She brushes it away and Oliver is ashamed as he watches her struggle from the table, her face pinched with pain. He had lost sight of the unquestionable truth that love is something science can’t predict. Can’t control. How could he have been so stupid as to think this would be a nice experience for Anna, visiting Adam the way you would visit a friend? Happy to see them, okay to leave them. He thinks he has, perhaps, made a dreadful mistake.