One last secret, p.18
One Last Secret, page 18
I watch these family units with a stiff envy; it causes an ache in my lower back, or maybe that is just the weight of Dottie. I can’t let the envy take hold and solidify either. It won’t help. I kiss Dottie’s head. ‘You have me,’ I murmur.
I’m glad the nurses called a cab for me. Initially I was worried about the cost of the fare and argued that I could take a bus, but they said the cabs have baby seats installed and it is the only safe way to leave hospital. Of course. I should have thought about that in advance. I haven’t bought a car seat because I don’t drive. I thought that was one expense I could avoid at least. Looks like I was wrong about that. I already have the feeling there will be plenty I’m wrong about. Nothing I can avoid.
A cab blinks its lights at me. Relief sloshes through my body.
I am grateful for the specialist taxi company, whose service extends to the driver showing me how to put Dottie in the seat. His hands are confident and assured. Click, click, click. A little tug at the belt to check that she is secure. There is a school photograph of three kids under the age of ten Blu-Tacked to his dashboard. He clocks my face, confused and overwhelmed at the mechanics of the car seat fasteners, at everything. ‘It’s just a knack, you’ll get the hang of it,’ he says cheerfully.
He drives slowly through the slushy streets. I can’t take my eyes off Dottie, who has fallen asleep. The driver offers to help me carry things up to my flat. I live on the second floor and have my handbag and hospital bag with me; with Dottie to carry as well, I have run out of hands. However, I turn down his offer; I am shy about him seeing the communal entrance. Often the door needs to be forced back with a shove because of the build-up of fliers advertising pizza deliveries, the walls need repainting, the carpet is threadbare in places and pocked with stains in others; sometimes it is actually spongy underfoot. I’m not sure why. Probably because the place is damp. The hallway always smells of fried onions. I think it is the family in number 3.
‘I’ll be fine, thank you,’ I say, throwing my handbag into my hospital bag, putting that over my shoulder and then carefully scooping Dottie out of the car seat. She smells awful. I inadvertently pull back from her, wrinkle my nose.
The driver laughs. ‘You get used to that too,’ he says confidently.
I am sweating by the time I climb to the second floor, and Dottie is crying. Crying doesn’t cover it. She is screaming. An urgent, hiccuping hysteria that suggests I’ve let her down. She needs her nappy changing, I need my sanitary towel changing. The moment I open the door to my flat, I drop the bags and collapse onto the only armchair I own. I scrabble to pull out my breast and urgently push my nipple into her mouth. She clasps her tiny rosebud mouth around it, sucks hard. The crying stops immediately. Silence, except for the gentle sucking sound. She doesn’t seem to care about her nappy, happy to sit in shit, which is not an un-useful skill. I stay in that chair for forty minutes, then I wind her, change her, nurse her until she falls to sleep.
The entire process is terrifying. I trembled as I eased her out of one baby onesie and into another; terrified I’d bend her limbs in the wrong direction, that she’d break. I am slick with sweat, and my head is pounding. I forced myself to breathe slowly, as I have been taught to do in the wings of a theatre before a performance. I talked to her throughout. I have enough control over my voice box to at least sound calm. I owe her that. By the time I manage to get to the bathroom, my blood is everywhere. I take off my skirt, tights and pants and leave them on the bathroom floor. I find clean knickers and fresh sanitary products. I put on the nursing nightie that I took into hospital, and two jumpers on top of that. I crawl into bed and close my eyes. Exhausted.
29
Dora
As I was leaving the hospital, someone told me that the health visitor would be calling by the next day.
‘Tomorrow?’
‘Is that a problem?’
‘No.’ I am not confident enough to present problems. Are there new mums who dare to? The thought of a health visitor scares me. An inspection, a judgement. Luckily, late in my pregnancy, I was surprised to discover that the concept of nesting is not a myth, and I cleaned my little flat from top to bottom. I scrubbed floors, windowsills and tiles, I tackled in and behind the old fridge and the oven. Everything about my life is cheap. When I sit on the bed, the mattress groans because it is so thin. Lots of things are old and worn, but they are at least clean.
However, Dottie and I have been in the flat for twenty-four hours now, and nothing looks clean or tidy by the time the health visitor presses the buzzer. As she walks up the stairs, I pull my greasy hair into a ponytail. I can smell my own scalp. I haven’t found time to shower, which I regret but can’t do anything about.
The health worker turns out to be motherly and kind. Thank God. She takes Dottie from me, weighs her, while I stand by, helpless. After twenty-four hours of holding her more or less constantly, I don’t know what to do with myself; my arms feel useless, pointless. I offer to put the kettle on.
‘Oh, don’t bother yourself, dear.’ I pick up a nappy sack and throw it in the bin, but the smell lingers. ‘Oh, don’t worry about the flat, sit down. Rest whenever you can, that’s my advice.’ She says this with a laugh. I begin to hope that she isn’t here to judge me, but perhaps to help. She asks questions and nods and smiles in a way that suggests I am getting the answers right. I am grateful to Dottie for falling asleep, for not screaming. Still, I can hear my own breath, too fast and shallow. The health visitor’s eyes graze the room. ‘You seem well kitted out.’ It is kind of her to see what I have, not what I lack. I’ve done my best to make sure I have all the essential things a baby might need. A changing mat, a baby bath and a bassinet, I do not have a full-sized cot yet, or a highchair. I plan to get those as she gets bigger. I don’t have a pram either; they are too expensive, and anyway, there is no room to keep one in the communal hall downstairs, and how would I get it up and down two flights of stairs? I do have a baby papoose. It cost fifty quid! Two slow shifts in the coffee shop for a sling, but it was cheaper than a pram by a long stretch. I found everything else in the Cancer Research charity shop. I got lucky there. I was picking out baby clothes a couple of months back, and a woman who volunteered there said she had a few bits and pieces that might be useful. After that, she secreted away all the decent baby stuff that was donated. She found me a bottle-sterilising kit, a baby gym, a breast pump, which she assured me was immaculate, lots of clothes, some books and toys. Some of the stuff looks brand new.
‘Well, Dottie is doing brilliantly,’ declares the health visitor. Before I can feel relieved, she adds, ‘I’ll pop in again in a few days’ time, and then every week, just until you find your feet.’ I nod, although I’m unsure as to whether I want this intrusion, but it doesn’t seem like a matter of choice. I am in a system. ‘And how is Mummy doing?’ It takes a moment to understand she means me.
I nod. ‘Fine.’ I’m surprised to feel a knot in my throat. I suppose it is nice to be asked.
Over the next month, I become more used to her visits. I stop worrying about tidying up for her arrival. Actually, I don’t so much stop worrying about the state of the flat; it is more that I stop caring, or maybe even stop seeing the mess. All I can see is Dottie. I am on a carousel of screaming, nappy changes, feeding, burping, sleeping, screaming, changing, feeding, burping, sleeping, screaming, changing, feeding, burping, sleeping. It just goes round and around. She doesn’t like to sleep anywhere other than in my arms, and so I doze in the armchair when she does. Pinned. Some days it is an achievement if I manage to get to the loo. The health visitor’s visits begin to merge.
Today she is talking to me about vaccinations and going to the health clinic for those when she suddenly comments, ‘Dottie is a beauty, isn’t she. Like her mummy.’ My hair is greasy, I am wearing sweatpants, but I guess there is always my bone structure. I know she is trying to be kind, but I don’t know how to react. I stare back blankly. She continues, ‘You’re lucky. Girls your age snap right back.’ I am not sure if she means my vagina or my figure. Does either thing matter any more, anyway? I don’t want to ask which she means. I don’t want to be caught out having trivial thoughts about trivial things like my body shape. It could be a trap. Or at least a test. Am I sensible enough to be a mother, or am I self-involved and frivolous? I keep this thought in my head. It sounds ludicrous, paranoid. A red flag. If they think I am paranoid, they might start to be concerned about postnatal depression. I mustn’t draw attention. The health visitor seems nice, but she is always probing. How am I feeling? Am I coping? Do I feel happy? Content? It is possible to think people are on your side, that they are being nice, but then find that they might not be. I remember my tutor at RADA. I was her favourite student, always bagging the best roles, always being praised for my intuitive acting, my original interpretations, my fierce imagination. It annoyed the other students that I was so clearly favoured. And then, suddenly, I wasn’t.
She called me into her office. The formality was unusual. ‘Come in, sit down, close the door.’ Her tone suggested it wasn’t good news. ‘I want to talk to you about your plans.’
‘My plans?’
‘Well, it seems your circumstances have changed.’
I wrapped my hands defensively around my belly. ‘In what way do you mean?’ She paused, and her eyes dropped to my stomach. I was five months pregnant at that point, and no matter how I dressed to disguise it, it was becoming obvious. I knew I couldn’t hide it forever. I was not denying it, but I was ignoring it. Or rather, I was hoping that everyone else would ignore it. I didn’t want to have to let it go, all the possibility, my dreams, my hopes. I knew that the moment I acknowledged my situation, that was exactly what had to happen.
‘Can we do anything?’ My insides were scrunched up so tight I thought I was going to implode. ‘We’re here to help, but to do that, we need to understand your thinking in order to put in place some sort of plan. We should talk about timings, whether you’re going to take some time off.’ I didn’t reply. ‘Or childcare afterwards? If, that is, childcare will be necessary?’ She was fishing. ‘You might have plans in place. Your mother?’
I bit my lip – it was barely perceptible – and shook my head a fraction. My tutor’s brow furrowed. The window was open, the noises of the street drifted in and her hopes for me drifted out. I showed promise, but then so did many, many many other young female actors. Showing promise was only relevant if it was flanked by one hundred per cent commitment and stringent, single-minded focus. I watched as her face hardened, as her mind whirled.
‘There is insurance to consider. Some of the classes must be taking their toll now. The dance? The ballet? You can talk to me, Teodora.’
‘Do you have a tissue?’
She rummaged in her desk drawer, pulled out a packet of tissues. I took one, handed back the pack. She shook her head. ‘You can keep them.’
‘Thank you.’
I left that day. I never went back. I don’t imagine I ever will. I picked up more shifts at the coffee shop. I was on my feet all day; my back ached, the skin across my belly stretched so taut that I thought it might burst.
The health visitor brings me back to the room. What is she saying? I have to tune in. I must listen and stay in the now. ‘She’s a good little feeder, isn’t she?’ I nod. ‘And that’s been straightforward for you? No problems?’ I don’t confess to how much I like it, Dottie’s hungry, urgent tugging at my breast. I let her stay on my boob for as long as she likes; sucking at first furiously, then contentedly, then sometimes losing interest, sometimes falling asleep. I am worried that it might sound weird or just lazy if I tell her this. But as there is never anyone to see us, I don’t always feel the need to unlatch her, put my breast away and pop her into her crib. I just let her stay there, joined to me, needing me. Me needing her. I like feeling her so close. The health visitor weighs her. ‘Oh, very good.’ She writes down the weight gain, nodding with approval. I feel like I’ve just won an Oscar. ‘And you? Are you eating?’
I smile, nod again. ‘I have a huge appetite too,’ I reassure her. ‘I’m starving the whole time.’ I am, because I’ve rarely managed to stumble out of the flat since we arrived home from the hospital. Getting groceries on a regular basis is proving harder than I imagined. The corner shop, downstairs and two doors along, charges prices that make my eyes water. Literally. The supermarket, a Tube stop away, might as well be in the Sahara desert, it seems that inaccessible to me right now. I drink my tea black, eat cereal without milk. I wonder what I’ll do when the cereal runs out, when the paltry stack of tins does. Before Dottie was born, I built a pile of nappies so high it was a tower. I remember thinking I’d overdone it, that we’d never use them up. I am down to my last four.
‘Is there anyone dropping food by, helping out?’
‘Oh yes,’ I reply, smiling. ‘Lots of people.’ I lie because I don’t want to appear friendless or hopeless. A person without friends is suspicious. I am glad that she doesn’t ask who, exactly.
I change Dottie’s nappy and she seems appreciative. She kicks her legs and gurgles. I swoop down on her and kiss her, over and over again. Her face, head, tiny body and chubby thighs, her arms, her wrists and hands. Her skin is like butter left out in the sun, so soft. She loves me kissing her this way and laughs. I could kiss her all day, every day. I could really. And that doesn’t cost anything. But after a bit, my lips seem dry and scratchy, and she seems bored. I have to think of something else to do with her.
30
Dora
The man next door, who is in his thirties, basically ancient and a sad fuck because he plays video games all night, bangs on the wall because she is screaming and has been for four hours straight. Or two weeks straight. I am not sure. I’ve fed her, changed her, burped her. She won’t stop crying. I’ve cried too. It didn’t help, but maybe it did. When he bangs on the wall, I hammer right back, hard. Really hard, so my hand hurts.
I yell, ‘Fucker, sad fucker, you sad fucking fucker. I’m on my own here. I’m doing my fucking best, you fucker.’ Almost certainly, that excessive amount of anger is not really directed at him, and I feel guilty as soon as the moment of rage passes. So I cry some more.
I’m not sure whether it is me or Dottie who stops crying or falls asleep first. Both things must happen at some point, though, because at five in the morning, she starts crying again and wakes me up. ‘OK, baby, OK, Dottie,’ I murmur, and pull her to me. My body aches to the very bone, especially my hand. I flush with shame as I remember hammering it against the wall, and hope the gamer didn’t hear me calling out expletives. I don’t want to be that person, and if I am, I don’t want anyone to know. Turns out he did hear, though, because at 8.30 in the morning, there’s a knock at my door. It’s him. He’s carrying a pint of milk, eggs and some orange juice.
He looks to the floor, not at me or nosily past my shoulder. I’m glad of his social awkwardness; anyone looking past my shoulder would see how bad things are getting inside my flat. It looks like it does under various London bridges, where homeless people have to make settlements. His nose curls involuntarily. My flat smells funky. The smell of nappy sacks is almost as repellent as the smell of actual faeces; sort of sanitised noxious lemon and plastic. Besides that, there is the smell of milk, first time around and regurgitated, feet, armpits, hair. People always talk about the new baby smell. I guess they don’t mean a new baby trapped inside a two-room flat, a few metres square, with a mother too exhausted and alone to find time to shower regularly. If I had a bath, we could have got in there together. I don’t. So when I want to get clean, I have to lie her on a towel on the cold lino floor of the bathroom while I shower as fast as I can. She screams throughout the process, missing my arms. It is exhausting and heartbreaking, so I don’t bother unless I know the health visitor is stopping by. ‘Sorry,’ he says.
I nod. I am too. About a lot of things. I don’t know where to start. I eye the groceries greedily; could they really be for me? He follows my gaze and offers them up. Whether that was his initial intention or not, I grab them, too done in to be proud.
‘Can I do anything?’ He looks exactly like you imagine a man who plays video games all night might look: he is tubby, sweating, he wears glasses and is prematurely balding. A year ago, I would have been freaked out by having him as a neighbour; I’d have thought he was a creep. Lizzie and I might have made up stories about him drilling holes in the bathroom wall so that he could watch me shower. There would have been no need for any evidence of this in order for us to make up these stories. Being giggly, over-imaginative, fairly self-obsessed girls, stuff like that leapt into our minds. We rarely believed the nonsense we made up; we were just amused by it. After we’d talked about how weird it was for a man his age to play video games all alone, night after night, we might have talked about a new album, or our punishing rehearsal schedule; we might have discussed something in the news or a storyline on a TV show. Our minds were able to flit around from thought to thought with glorious, speedy freedom. It is different since Dottie’s birth. My mind flits as though I’m being subjected to shock treatment; I am fried. I can’t hold onto thoughts even when I want to. I don’t watch the news or TV shows. There is no time to do so, and yet there is nothing but time.
At this point in my life, the gamer doesn’t look like a weirdo; he looks like a port in a storm. I don’t have any loo roll, or instant coffee. I really need a coffee. I couldn’t ask him to buy me coffee and loo roll, could I?
‘Write a list. I’m going to the supermarket at eleven, I’ll pick up what you need,’ he instructs. It is exactly what I want to hear, but I can’t just agree to it.
