Cathy Kelly 3-book Bundle (117 page)

‘I’ll leave you to get settled,’ Sister Veronica said. ‘Dinner’s at seven. Carla will tell you everything, won’t you, Carla?’

‘Can’t tell her everything, Sister, or she’d walk out!’

Sister Veronica just laughed. Rae had never witnessed a nun in school behaving in such a free manner. She put her things on the floor beside her bed and went to sit on Carla’s.

‘Yes, I
am
huge,’ Carla said as Rae stared at her belly. She wore a grey tunic that was stretched to ripping point across her swollen midriff. ‘I’ve still got three weeks to go. The midwife says it’s going to be a huge baby. Sister Fran says it’s a boy because I’m carrying low. Ashling – you’ll meet her later – says it can only be an elephant ‘cos I’m so big. It might be two, who knows.’ She gave her belly an affectionate pat. ‘He’s certainly wriggling around enough for two.’

Rae laughed and it was such a relief to share a joke that she couldn’t stop laughing.

‘It’s not that funny,’ Carla said with amusement.

‘It is,’ Rae replied. ‘I haven’t laughed in months.’

‘How many months?’ asked Carla.

‘Five and a half.’

‘You’re small for five months,’ Carla commented.

‘I’m tall.’ Rae shrugged. ‘Made it easier to hide it. And how far along is she?’ Rae didn’t want to say Sive’s name out loud for fear of offending her. ‘She has no bump. Has she had a baby?’

‘She’s pregnant all right and everybody in her family knows ‘cos it’s her daddy’s.’

Rae inhaled sharply.

‘She’s not eating properly. If I were her, I probably wouldn’t eat either. You’d never get over that.’

Rae shook her head. She resolved not to feel so sorry for herself any more. Whatever had happened to her, at least it wasn’t that.

For the next two weeks, Rae felt at peace for the first time in ages. There was no tension in the hostel and most of the girls shared a real sense of camaraderie. This was a safe place where nobody shouted at them for being pregnant.

Rae loved spending time with Carla. The little redhead was feisty and funny. She was seventeen and had been in the house the longest.

Sometimes they talked about boys, clothes and films, as if they hadn’t bellies swollen with pregnancy. Carla loved the Beatles. She didn’t like John Lennon at all.

‘Hate those glasses.’

But Paul, he was gorgeous.

What nobody talked about was afterwards.

One night in bed, Rae couldn’t sleep and she lay in the darkness, thinking of how she’d love to turn a light on so she could read, but she wouldn’t want to wake the other girls. She shifted in her bed and then Carla whispered:

‘Are you awake?’

‘Yes,’ Rae whispered back. ‘You OK?’

‘No.’

For the first time ever, Rae could hear fear in her friend’s voice.

‘I’m thinking about afterwards. You know, when the baby comes. What then?’

‘We can worry about that later,’ said Rae, which was what
Sister Veronica had said to her that first day.

‘That’s the line Veronica uses,’ Carla said, with a hint of bitterness. ‘They don’t want you to think too much about it because they’ve plans for the babies.’

‘What do you mean, “plans”?’

‘Adoption,’ Carla said. ‘We can hardly look after our kids, can we?’

‘I’m going to,’ said Rae with determination.

‘And you’re going to use what exactly as money? Wake up, Rae. We’ll have to give our babies away. It’s the best for them.’

‘Says who?’ Rae was shocked.

‘Veronica. I went into her this afternoon and she said she’s got this great family in Donegal who’ve already adopted one baby and they’d love another. They’ve got a farm, the first baby is a little girl and she’s nearly two. Another one, a little boy, would finish it off nicely. I wonder if it is a boy? I said, “I’m not sure about the farm, thing, Veronica.” I came from a farm, and much good it did me. Getting away from it with a boy from the town is what got me in here.’

Rae got out of her own bed and crept along to Carla’s. Her eyes adjusted to the darkness and she sat on Carla’s bed, shifting until she got comfortable. She was six months pregnant now. Sister Veronica had a midwife who came weekly to check the girls.

‘You’re coming along well,’ the midwife said that week. ‘Into the final trimester.’

‘What’s that?’ Rae had asked.

‘Medical language,’ the midwife said dismissively. ‘No need to worry about it. You stay healthy, that’s all, and it’ll soon be over.’

Now she sat on Carla’s bed, feeling the baby move inside her. He or she was always more alert at night, she didn’t know why. Nobody ever talked about the actual pregnancy in the home, so her knowledge was a bit sketchy.

She reached for Carla’s small hand and held it.

‘I’m scared about having him,’ Carla said quietly. ‘It’s going to hurt. I hate pain and Joely – she was gone before you came – she said the midwives here can’t give us pain relief. That’s only in hospital.’

‘We’re not having the baby in hospital?’

‘Having a baby is the most natural thing in the world and you don’t need to do it in hospital,’ said Carla, parrot-fashion. ‘Except giving it up isn’t. Do you think that afterwards we’ll go back to the way we were before?’

Rae bit her lip. ‘How can we? It’s all different now. We can’t become people who haven’t had babies.’

‘We won’t have the babies, though. Nobody will know.’

‘I’ll have my baby,’ Rae said simply. ‘And
you’ll
know. You’ll know you’ve had a baby. You’re not going to forget that.’

Rae put away Jasmine’s little vest, climbed out of the attic and slid down on to the staircase with a resounding thud.

In her bathroom, she peered at her red face and splashed water on it. She couldn’t go to work looking like this. Hands shaking, she applied a layer of foundation to hide the blotchiness. That done, she went downstairs, blindly grabbed her jacket and keys, and left the house.

In Titania’s, she spoke to no one, put her jacket away, and went out to work the till.

The elderly American lady was choosing a bran muffin. What her name was, Rae couldn’t remember for the life of her.

‘Can I get you something to drink? asked Rae, and the effort of talking made her cry again. It was as though touching Jasmine’s little vest had opened the floodgates and now they couldn’t be shut.

‘Rae,’ said a voice.

Through her tears, Rae could see the American lady’s concerned face.

‘You need to sit down for a minute,’ the woman said in a calming voice.

‘OK.’ Eleanor caught the eye of one of the other members of staff who was watching Rae in shock, and she came to take Rae’s place at the till.

Eleanor led Rae to a quiet booth near the back. She took Rae’s hand in hers and rubbed it. Normally, she wouldn’t touch a patient. But Rae wasn’t a patient and this wasn’t normal.

‘You can talk to me,’ she said softly.

Rae looked into Eleanor’s warm eyes and knew that she could. ‘I don’t know what to do,’ she said, and began to cry again.

There was nobody close by when Rae went into labour. She was lying on her bed in the small dormitory, trying to ease the pain in her back, when it came on. A searing pain that started in her pelvis and ripped up through her whole body.

‘Carla!’ she called out in her confusion, but Carla wasn’t there. Her baby, a little scrap of a thing that Carla had called Paul after Paul McCartney, had gone to the sweet farming couple in Donegal. Carla had painted on make-up like war paint the day she left, although the eyeliner kept sliding down her face with the tears. ‘See, I can fit into my old clothes,’ she said, half crying, half smiling. She wore a leather jacket that Rae had never seen before and jeans that hugged her body. ‘Back to what I was before. Stay in touch.’

Rae realised she didn’t mean it. Carla never wanted to see any of them again because they would remind her of Blessed Helena and little Paul, the baby she’d kept with her for only one night before he’d been taken away by another nun, one they’d never seen before.

‘Carla, I wish you were here,’ Rae thought when the contraction passed and she lay panting on the narrow bed.

She staggered out to the top of the stairs to call someone,
and within minutes, Sister Martin had installed her in the delivery room on the second floor. ‘Can you call the midwife?’ shrieked Rae as the second contraction ripped through her. ‘Don’t be silly,’ Sister Martin said. ‘You’ve hours to go.’

Six agonising hours passed before the midwife arrived.

Whipping up Rae’s gown, she exclaimed: ‘You’re getting ready to deliver, nearly fully dilated. You should have called me earlier, Sister.’

It was still another half an hour before the baby’s head crowned. Rae had never felt such pain but she knew she had to go through this for her beloved baby. She would, she could.

If only Carla were here, or Shelley…Rae cried through the pain. It was like being torn in half. What she wouldn’t give for a friend beside her, holding her hand, helping her. Or even her mother.

‘One more push, be brave now, Rae. Come on, you can do it!’

With one huge force of effort, Rae pushed and felt the baby’s body slip like a fish out of her body.

‘A little girl!’ said Sister Martin triumphantly. ‘God bless her.’

‘Let me see, let me hold her.’

‘Wait a while, now,’ fussed the midwife. ‘We need to weigh her, check her out.’

Finally, wrapped in an old hospital blanket, the baby was passed to Rae. In wonder, she took in the tiny red face with the screwed-up eyes, the damp black curls clustering her skull, the skin as soft as silk. It was like holding a beautiful little doll, she thought in awe, touching her baby’s face.

Jasmine. That was her name. For months, Rae had held it in her heart if the baby were to be a girl and now, seeing this darling, beautiful baby, she knew it was the right name. Jasmine. Kissing the soft face reverently, she murmured, ‘My baby, I love you.’

The midwife had to go.

‘You did well,’ she said, pleased. ‘She’s a big girl. Nearly eight pounds. I thought we’d have to call the ambulance there for a while, but you got through it all right. I’ll be back later to check you out and I’ll have the tablets to dry up your milk.’

Rae didn’t hear her. Her mind was full of Jasmine. It was as if there was nobody else in the room.

Rae pulled down the top of her nightgown and let Jasmine’s tiny rosebud mouth close around her nipple. Instantly, as if guided by an ancient magic, the baby began to suckle. It felt like the most natural thing Rae had ever done in her life. This body wasn’t for her, it was for her baby. She closed her eyes and let herself sink into the peace of breastfeeding.

‘Rae,’ said Sister Martin sharply. ‘You’re not supposed to do that. We’ll feed the baby formula.’

‘Jasmine,’ said Rae softly. ‘Her name is Jasmine, and I have to feed her. She’s hungry, look.’

She looked at the downy dark head nuzzled close to her and the waves of love washed over her. Jasmine, her baby.

Nobody had mentioned the pure joy of breastfeeding. Rae felt as if some part of her body was dancing on clouds. Carla had said that breastfeeding made your boobs all saggy, that’s what her mother used to say. She hadn’t breastfed her baby.

‘It’s not a good idea,’ Sister Martin insisted. ‘You’ll get too attached.’

Rae jerked in surprise and the baby’s tiny mouth came off her nipple. Jasmine began to cry but Rae didn’t tend to her. Instead, she stared at the nun. ‘She’s my baby, I am attached to her.’

‘Lord help us, Rae, will you be sensible! They’ll never let you keep her,’ Sister Martin said. ‘The authorities don’t want kids having kids. She’ll be taken off you and who knows where she’ll end up while they sort it all out. In a home, perhaps. Wouldn’t it be better to let her have a decent life somewhere, a new start with good parents from the beginning?’

‘Like the people Carla talked about?’ Rae said bitterly. ‘The family with the farm and the little girl? Are they all farm families with little girls or little boys, depending on the story required?

‘It’s for your own good and for the child’s own good,’ insisted the nun.

‘That’s what people say when they want you to do what they want,’ spat Rae. Jasmine began to cry loudly. Rae cradled her close and tried to get her to latch on to the nipple again, but it was no good. Little Jasmine sensed her mother’s distress. Rae tried to calm herself but it was hard, her heart was beating so fast, threatening to leap from her chest. She would keep her baby.

‘You’re making a rod for your own back,’ Sister Martin said. ‘How much harder will it be to let her go now that you’ve bonded with her.’

‘I won’t let her go!’

The nun stared at her pityingly. ‘You will. They all do.’

Eleanor held on to Rae until she stopped crying. It was like holding a husk of a person, someone who’d let all the pain spill away with the life force. Eleanor wanted to cry herself. She’d never felt that way before when a patient cried and perhaps that had been her problem all along. She stood stoic in the face of other people’s pain. When Ralf had died, she had been unable to let go of herself and cry. For the first time since then, she wanted to sob her heart out.

They were both in the depths of grief. Rae had never been allowed to grieve for the baby she’d given up for adoption. Eleanor had been too locked into being the perfect strong woman, the psychoanalyst who knew everything, to grieve.

‘Do you want to stay here?’ Eleanor said. ‘You could come to my apartment.’

Rae nodded. It was bad enough that she’d broken down in Titania’s. At least if she left now, the rest of the staff would
be able to concentrate on work and not keep staring at her anxiously. She stood and went to fetch her jacket.

‘Rae, are you all right?’ said Phyllis, who’d worked in Titania’s forever.

‘Fine,’ said Rae, doing her best to look semi-fine. ‘Just had a shock. Eleanor’s so sweet, she’s talked me out of it. I think I’ll go now. Don’t phone me at home, though,’ she added hurriedly. ‘I don’t want to worry Will.’

They crossed the square together, the tall dark-haired woman with the tear-ravaged face arm in arm with the equally tall silver-haired old lady who walked with the cautious steps of a frail person. Rae waited while Eleanor fiddled with her key in the lock and then followed her in. Normally she would have looked at the apartment with great interest, but today she didn’t. She sank on to a couch as if she wanted to hide inside it.