Go to Sleep (11 page)

‘What thoughts, Rachel?’ Her poise has slipped. She’s uneasy and unsure. She withdraws her hand to her lap, a reflex action that she’s quick to temper, knocking a stray thread from her tunic before placing her hand back on my wrist, but barely holding it there now, conscious of the skin shivering between us. ‘What kind of thoughts?’

And now I don’t want to tell her any more. Tears are nettling my eyes. I shake my head, do my best to resist.

‘Hey, sweetie. You can tell me – that’s what I’m here for! Tell me what thoughts you’ve been thinking, darling.’

‘Home. I just want to go home. Please?’

I shift my focus on to Joe, make a paltry pretence of
fussing over his blanket. I can feel her scrutinising me. I dry my eyes and shut up shop. I don’t even make eye contact, now. When I look up again, she has gone.

Darkness is pressing at the windows. Most of the other mothers on the ward have gone home, their beds awaiting new arrivals. Tomorrow, as soon as the doctor has been to check Joe’s hearing, they’ll let me go. It’ll be just me and Joe. Alone in the house. The thought fills me with dread. The tea lady hauls her trolley to the top of the ward, collects the empty cups.

‘Get some sleep, love,’ she trills. ‘Be the last chance you get before you go home.’

But Joe has other plans. He cries and cries. I roll over and ignore him. His crying amplifies into one trembling, quavering, hideous bout of prolonged and unbearable sobbing. I drag myself up and out of bed, heavy of heart, and pluck the tiny rebel from his cot. I pace the ward, rock him, swaddle him, sing to him, beg him.

‘He’s starving,’ a girl screams from beneath her covers. ‘Fucking
feed
him!’

And as much as the playground bully in her voice incites me to stand up to her, I know she’s right. Joe
is
starving, but he won’t take my breast and he’s not just rebuffing it, he’s outright recoiling from it, his cries growing more and more demented each time I push myself towards his angry mouth. Is he rejecting my milk or is he rejecting me?

* * *

I take us off to the bathroom, lock ourselves in. I stare down at his snarling, betrayed face. His wild, disoriented eyes dart back at me, tiny livid red face squashed tight in its tantrum. It’s no good. I look down on the thrashing Joe, crying so passionately his whole body is vibrating. I lower my face to his.

‘Go on! Cry all you like. What are you going to do?’

He yells out with renewed violence, the sheer force of it rippling down his backbone. I hold him right up to my face and cry back at him. This completely freaks him out, his rasping cries screeching out so loud now that they treble out into one shrill and dissonant note. It maddens me. I can’t stand it. I think of James. If he was here now, he’d soon shut him up. Shut him up. I start to cry. Hands trembling wildly, I wrap Joe in a towel and, unsteadily, place him in the sink, ensuring he’s bound tight by its perimeter. I plug my ear holes with toilet tissue and try to take deep breaths. Still I can hear Joe’s tormented wails, but it’s tolerable through the muffled delay of my ear stops.

I confront myself in the mirror – wild-eyed, dishevelled hair, dark depraved patches around my eyes telling out my pain. I squeeze a nipple gingerly. Nothing. I pinch tighter and squeeze again, and this time a rich yellow jet sprays the mirror in one fierce phallic spurt. I
am
producing! It’s all there, my breasts are bursting with it, so why will the fucker not take it? Too frightened to venture back on to the ward and incur the wrath of those
girl-mothers and their perfect, sleeping babies, I stay holed up in the bathroom while Joe wails on.

And suddenly, from nothing, the first slashes of dawn are tearing at the purple-blue night sky. Did I sleep, there? Did we? Reading my thoughts, Joe moves to quash my hopes, readying himself for another outrage. I’m dragged sideways by a sudden wrench of desperation. I have no choice, here; I
have
to have him sated and settled before daylight exposes us. We can’t stay here, in the washroom. And we can’t stay in this place a day longer, either. Joe and I
have
to be discharged today – Joe and I. I assure myself he’s settled and secure in the padded dip of the sink. I steal back to the ward, pocket the loose change from my purse and take a lift to the ground floor. He’s left me no choice.

The hospital shop is not yet open. I stand at the huge window next to the revolving doors and let the first fingers of sunlight poke my chest. The slowly stirring city looks beautiful in its remoteness, and it pains me that I’m no longer a part of it. A flickering blue-white strip light judders behind me, throwing the view outside into darkness. The shutters of the shop clatter open, but I stay there by the doorway, fantasising about how easy it would be to just step outdoors and walk away from all this. Only the computerised chime of the till reins me back in, reminding me why I’m here.

I buy the ready-prepared formula and a brand-new feeding bottle, excuses at the ready. But no questions are asked; of course no questions are asked. All the way back my heart flaps with the deviant thrill of what I’m about to do. I exit the lift and head back to the washroom.

‘Bet you never thought he’d be this dark, did you?’ It’s the sleeping beauty from our ward – the black princess. She looks different. She’s dressed from top to toe in black. And even though there’s no one else around, it still takes me a moment to register that it’s me she’s talking to. She laughs wildly now. ‘You lot!’ she gasps. ‘You’re all the same.’

I’m thrown – completely stumped. I barely murmur a response.

‘My lot?’

‘All of you . . .’ She comes closer, her eyes all mad and wide, wide open. All I can see is menacing white eyeballs as she looks me up and down. ‘Women like you – you don’t know how fucking racist you are until you’re holding your babies and you’re not feeling what you should be feeling.’ I back away from her. Joe begins to shuffle in his lair. The princess follows me, calmly enunciating every dire syllable. ‘You’re not feeling it, are you? He don’t look nothing like you and you can’t bond with him cos of that.’ I close my eyes and shake my head, wishing her gone, now. But I feel her breath on my face as she strikes her killer blow. ‘Your kid feels like an
alien
to you, don’t he?’

‘You bitch!’

Crazed, incensed, I lash out at her. My fist connects with the wall, snaps me to. There’s nobody there.

I rush to Joe, sweep him up close to my bosom, cover his little face with kisses. For a second it seems as though he smiles at me. I kiss him again and this time make a den for him on the foam changing mat, the towel again swaddling him. I sterilise the bottle under the hot tap, scalding the tips of my fingers, and I empty the carton in, unsure how much a new baby might need. I pick Joe up, hold him in the crook of my arm and edge the fake nipple towards his mouth. Part of me is willing him to turn his nose up at it, to reject it in the same way he rejects me; but he takes to it instantly, guzzles greedily and gratefully, slaking the whole dose in minutes. My breasts, solid as stone, well up in jealous torment; they leak runny tears all the way down my stomach.

Joe is out for the count. I bury the feed bottle deep among the wet paper towels and shuffle him back to the ward. When I release him from the warmth and softness of my arms to his cool, stiff cot, he does not stir. I lie on the bed for a while, studying him through the visor. You’re your daddy’s boy, all right. Beautiful. Trouble. If only you’d sleep. If you’d only sleep, I could love you well.

* * *

I turn away, slip down beneath the bedcovers, limp with guilt and exhaustion, but unable to chase away the spectre of my tormentor.

He don’t look nothing like you.

Her words drill through me again, clipping at distant misgivings. I should have told Ruben. One day I shall.

If this were a movie I, sweat still cooling from the raging and purgative sex I have just enjoyed, would already be anxiously awaiting a sign from Ruben, some indication that we’ll be doing this again, soon – and that he wants this as much as I do. If this were a movie there’d be an awkward silence as I hope he’ll ask for my number. But this is no movie. This is Ruben and me and, with that needle-sharp intuition we always had, however briefly, we both know the moment we’re done that this was a vital and necessary purge; this was closure.

We had barely got through the huge front door of his block before we were dragging and clawing at each other’s clothes. So furious was our need that when he ripped the condom out of its foil, both of us urgently, clumsily rolling it down over his twitching dick, I knew I’d nicked
it with my nail getting it on him. But he was in me, lifting me up with two giant hands and pushing me against the wall and I knew there was no way we’d stop.

So now, afterwards, rather than any will-he, won’t-he moment, it was more a case of recognising the least abrupt moment to make my departure. I kissed him on the lips and turned to make my way out.

‘Hey.’

For the second time in my life I was on the staircase as Ruben summoned me back to take his number. This time I was heading down, not up. This time he wasn’t sure at all as he stood there, acting nonchalant, hoping I’d come back. I wasn’t sure, either. I smiled and took two steps back towards him, stopping short and stretching out to take the scrap of paper. We both had smiles that said ‘maybe we will, maybe we won’t’ and we giggled at the awkwardness of it as I paused, then plunged back down to the big porch door.

It felt fantastic, walking out into that bitterly cold winter night. I was radiant. The best sex I had ever known; that I would ever know.

My world, my universe, my every chance of any kind of fruitful future with my sleepless son now depends upon the word of the audiologist, and I can’t decide what I want him to say. If there’s even a minor problem with Joe’s hearing, then it explains everything – and where there are explanations, solutions lie too. But any complications with him, and who knows how long Joe and I might be staying? I can’t stand it any more. I have to get us out of here.

So I’m lying back, doing my level best to give off a sense of calm, of responsibility – a woman in possession of the facts about her ailing baby and perfectly ready to face up to the challenge. I shall not shrink away from my duties; I shall thrive as Single Mum, Up Against It! I try to read the body language of the various medics
huddled around Joe’s cot, discussing him without involving me – but they’re giving nothing away. He could have a sniffle or a terminal disease for all that they seem to care. They just stand there, nodding, nodding, nodding. I want to scream.

The audiologist doesn’t even stay long enough to deliver his verdict. A midwife sits me up, pats me down and hits me with three pieces of information. I have a perfect, healthy son. There is no illness or malfunction to correct or cure because this is just what they do, babies like Joe. They cry. The third thing she tells me is that I can leave just as soon as anyone can get here to pick me up.

So, I can go. Simple as that. I thought there’d be more to it, it really is as simple as phoning your dad for a lift home. I’m overjoyed to be getting out but fearful, too. I dress quickly, and like all those women I once pitied in the changing rooms, I negotiate the ritual in such a way as to shield my body from its own shell-shocked gaze. At least it’s a small consolation that there isn’t someone waiting for me back at home, to scrutinise me and offer sentiments of encouragement.

You’ll soon get your figure back!

No, my body belongs to one man only now. And oh, how needy he is.

Jan and Dad come to collect me, all smiles. He straps Joe into the miniature car seat he’s bought – basically, a
padded bucket – and goes to carry him away, Jan cooing down at Joe. They hold hands and twinkle at one another, completely excluding me from the happy ensemble. I tap Dad on the shoulder and he grins apologetically. He passes the baby seat to me.

‘Let me film this. Let me film my two babies stepping out together into the big, wide world for the first time.’

A sudden stab of memory. The camera. Where is it? I haven’t seen it since Dad brought it in; and then it hits me. James. He
was
here.

Jan misinterprets my hesitation as vanity.

‘You’re
supposed
to look like you’ve done battle, darling! Those women who walk out in their size zero jeans and their faces intact, they look ridiculous.’

Yeah, and you’d know, with your cheekbones and your boy’s bum. Bet you’ve had your boobs done too, you vain . . . Dad seems to read my thoughts. He shoots me a pleading look.

‘Come on, Rache. Jan’s right.’

He’s willing me to let them in – to let
her
have a role in all this. I’m trying. I’m trying . . .

‘I couldn’t care less about how I look,’ I smile. ‘It’s just that I’ve packed all Joe’s nappies around the camera so it’s protected.’

Dad buys this and smiles. Jan shoots me a look, unsure.

As I make my final journey down the ward there’s none of the usual bonhomie from the other women, none of
the ‘Good luck girl! Keep in touch!’ No matter how insincere the platitude, I ache for someone to wish me well. But no, a collective silence descends over the room, burst the second I turn the corner by a gabble of excitable whispering. They’re all glad to see the back of me. Of us. They don’t even wait until I’m out of earshot. Long live the Sisterhood.

Outside, the sky is wild. But any fledgling sense of liberation is quelled at seed as the cold air slaps Joe awake. He prises his eyes open, gives me a wonky look – and screams and screams and screams. I’m opening and shutting my mouth, but nothing comes out. I can picture precisely how I must look – deranged, bewildered; not coping. Jan comes around the front of the car, takes Joe from my arms and starts laughing – genuine peals of amusement.

‘Look at you! Look at this angry little man! My, my.’ She ducks her head down to him. ‘So you think you’re in charge, do you? Well, let me tell you something mister. You’re not!’

And he stops. He just stops and stares at her and I’m numb, now. I’ll take the silence, thanks; I’m not even jealous.