Read Not What They Were Expecting Online
Authors: Neal Doran
They’d been reassuring though, that it wasn’t that unusual for waters to break early, and she’d be underway with full labour before she knew it. Although that idea filled her with as much fear as it did excitement. They’d done all the usual checks, and asked if she had her bag and anyone to take her into the maternity hospital she was due to give birth in. That was the first of several times she had to admit that no, she didn’t have her bag, even though yes, she had been advised to bring it in for every appointment for the last few weeks. It felt like forgetting her PE kit, and she was waiting for someone to tell her that she’d just have to give birth in her vest and pants.
She’d also had to explain that there’d be nobody to take her across to the hospital, and she couldn’t even drive herself as she’d taken the bus in. That was fine, they’d said, although Rebecca was sure she’d seen a few looks exchanged between the midwives. Before long one of those non-emergency ambulances she usually expected to deposit elderly people from place to place was there to transport her. And now she was here, in the maternity unit to have the baby, but not really having the baby yet. After all the excitement of earlier she was having some kind of adrenaline crash, because all she really wanted to do was sleep.
‘So any reasons for this raised blood pressure at home?’ Maureen asked with practised cheerfulness. ‘That husband of yours causing trouble?’
‘We’ve separated.’
It was weird to say that to a person.
‘It’s a stressful time,’ said the midwife, unfazed. ‘Have you told him what’s happening?’
‘I’ve texted.’
And he hadn’t responded, Rebecca noted. That seemed weird to her too.
‘Think about giving him a call. We all have rows, you don’t want it to spoil something forever.’
Rebecca guessed there were probably half a dozen guidelines on patient safety and privacy that Maureen was breaching with this homespun advice, but Rebecca didn’t want to say anything rude. It was like being nice to pushy waiters because you were afraid of what they might do to your dinner. Maureen was in a position where Rebecca didn’t want to piss her off.
‘We’ll get someone in here to have a look at you in a minute. Are you OK for water?’
Rebecca gave her a thumbs up, and wondered what made her think to do a thumbs up. She was being plucky, plucky, plucky…
As she left Maureen pulled the curtains from around Rebecca’s bed, and she was facing the rest of the ward again. For a second she imagined herself on
One Born Every Minute
, or one of those other reality maternity ward shows, and could almost hear a narrator in her head:
‘First-time mum Rebecca is alone in the hospital, after wetting herself on a bus’.
She glanced around at the four other beds with women looking equally large and not entirely thrilled to be here. It felt like a ward full of mums-to-be that hadn’t quite been doing it right. They nodded smiles as Rebecca looked around and hoped none of them would be big talkers. She was dying to close the curtain, but wasn’t sure if she was allowed, and didn’t want to look like the haughty new girl.
‘Rebecca’s feeling shy, and having trouble fitting in with the other ladies on the ward.’
But she didn’t have much time to worry that the TV voiceover in her head was never going to go away before she heard a more familiar voice getting louder in the corridor.
‘C’mon kids, this way. Leave that alone, it’s not a potty. Stop pointing at the pregnant lady, it’s rude. Look, that’s a breast-feeding guide not a story book. C’mon kids, please. Around this corner and there’ll be more chocolate.’
Her heart accelerated as she heard her husband’s voice, and she prepared herself to be strong and to hold her ground as he came in. She didn’t have time to think too much about the strange things he’d been saying as he marched into view, holding hands with Kam’s kids.
‘James, what the fuck are you doing with these children here?’
The eyes of the other women on the ward swivelled her way. And the kids’ ears pricked up too.
‘I mean, hiya Hannah! Hiya William! Are you having a good time with Uncle James?’ she said to the kids, before adding to James, ‘Get that curtain around. Now.’
Hannah, who Rebecca knew was always the chatty one, started telling her about a trip on a train, and doing a maze in the hospital, and about her being a secret agent and rescuing William like a burglar, and having lots of Smarties even though they hadn’t had their lunch or a banana yet. William chipped in with the occasional murderous muttering about James breaking his truck, and happier sounding references to riding escalators.
Rebecca marvelled to the kids about their big adventure before turning to James. She was still so angry with him, but so relieved to see him too. But she was going to be strong on this, once she worked out what the fuck was going on.
James stood there, taken aback by how talkative Hannah had suddenly become. It had been nods and headshakes the whole time he’d been minding her. Except when she was reprimanding him for messing with his privates. And now she was talking at the rate of a horse-racing commentator. He still couldn’t get a word William was saying, although Rebecca didn’t seem to be having a problem. He did think he could catch the occasional ‘fuck’ in there now though, thanks to Becs.
He looked around and saw the Bomp bump, and the monitor attached to it, and figured with a sigh of relief that he hadn’t missed the birth yet. Watching Rebecca’s face flitting between bewildered and concerned he thought it was best to fill her in on some of the details.
‘I was looking after these two rascals when I got your message.’
He was trying for upbeat and jovial, but he realised he wasn’t going to be able to pull it off.
‘Jesus, Becs, it was a nightmare. I got your text just as William locked himself in the house. Me and Hannah were outside. I upturned every plant pot in case they left a key, searched about for one of those catalogue rocks for hiding spares. Nothing. I tried every door I could…’
‘That poor boy!’
‘He was fine. He was having a great time waving at us, and playing with his toys, using his crayons on the patio doors. Hannah was a bit worried she might get into trouble, but once I convinced her I’d take the rap she went to play on the trampoline. While she was bouncing I had an idea. I saw the little bathroom window was open on the en suite next to Kam and Kate’s bedroom.’
‘You didn’t make her jump into the first floor?!’
‘Jesus, I’m not crazy,’ James said. ‘It just made me think maybe the downstairs loo window wasn’t locked, just pushed shut, and I got lucky. A good shove and it swung open a decent way. Enough for our little secret agent to squeeze through, wasn’t it?’ he said turning to Hannah. He thought he saw her smile as she played with the edges of the sheets on Rebecca’s bed. ‘She was able to run to the kitchen and open the doors and save the day!’
‘Wow! And you climbed through the window? And didn’t get stuck? Or hurt yourself with a big fall onto the floor on the other side?’ Rebecca spoke to Hannah in an awed voice, although even James could tell the questions were more aimed at his stupidity than Hannah’s achievements. Still, he’d noticed that while they were talking about this, things were back to normal and he was going to hold onto that for as long as he could.
‘I go to gymnastics with my friend Britney. And ballet. Britney has four Barbies,’ Hannah told Rebecca, by way of explanation.
‘My goodness,’ said Rebecca.
‘She was a superstar,’ said James, ‘I’ve told her she could be an acrobat in the circus.’
‘And did you not think of calling one of their parents to see if a neighbour had a key, or if they could get back to let you in?’
‘I was panicking! All I could think was I needed to get here,’ James replied, deciding at the last second to not point out that the baby had evidently not yet arrived, despite the implication it was on the way.
‘I was in a rush to get here, so hailed a taxi. But he wouldn’t take us ’cos I didn’t have the right car seats. We’d shut the front door, so I couldn’t get back in the house so we had to take the Tube.’
‘You didn’t want to climb in the window again?’
‘I think I mentioned I was panicking? But the kids loved it, even though it was a bit crowded because of some earlier delays. The fact William had done another huge poo meant we got a decent bit of personal space though.’
From the look on Rebecca’s face he could tell that the boy, who still hadn’t been changed, was making his presence felt. James couldn’t really tell how bad it was, he’d sort of got accustomed to it.
‘I’d forgotten William’s change bag. In the house…’
Again, he thought he caught the traces of a smile. On Rebecca this time, rather than the little girl. But that passed pretty quickly. He looked into Rebecca’s eyes, but she looked away immediately. His stomach lurched and dropped in fear at the thought he could lose her. Lose this family. The physical reaction was so strong he thought he might actually be sick. He needed to say something big. Something that would get across how he felt, and how sorry he was. He took a deep breath and hoped for the best.
‘Rebecca—’
The curtain swished back.
‘We’ll need to keep these open,’ said the midwife James recognised from earlier hospital visits. Maureen, he thought it was. She seemed to be sizing him up.
‘Dad’s here now. Is everything OK?’
This got a nod from Rebecca, and an enthusiastic ‘great!’ from James, which seemed to satisfy her.
‘There’s no visiting even for the devoted daddies at this time of day, so you’ll have to wait in the public areas. Are these your little ones?’ she asked James.
‘A friend’s,’ he said. ‘Babysitting.’
‘I think that lovely boy has something for you,’ she said sniffing the air. ‘If you speak to the nurses’ station they should be able to point you in the right direction for hazardous waste.’
‘Right, right. Of course.’
As he left he locked eyes again with his wife.
‘We’ll talk soon, yeah? I’ll be back?’
She nodded, but her eyes gave away nothing.
‘Are you all right there?’ asked Maureen as she and Rebecca were alone again.
‘Great!’ said Rebecca with a forced smile.
‘I think we’ll be down in the labour ward before you know it, and he’ll be able to come back to your room then. If you want him to.’
As Maureen again tinkered with the monitor and checked Rebecca’s blood pressure they were joined by the doctor, who introduced herself as Francesca Broad. She was young, elegantly dressed, with gorgeous long hair. It seemed a cruel thing for her to do, pick a career that would put her in a room full of large pink and sweaty women. But she seemed so friendly Rebecca soon forgot to resent her. She did start resenting her a bit though, once the examination got underway. She was a bit rough with her beautifully manicured fingers…
‘As you know, the waters have broken. You’re far enough along that that’s not a problem in itself, but it does increase the risk of infection. We could wait a while to see if labour starts naturally, but I think we’d be best getting you on a drip and start inducing you. It’s a fairly gentle start if we do it this way.’
Rebecca was a little worried about this doctor’s definition of gentle after the last prodding, but she didn’t want to wait any more.
‘Let’s go for it.’
‘Great. See you later. You never know, you might even have a baby by then.’
With that, the glamorous doctor was gone, and Rebecca was left wondering how on earth she was going to get her nightie.
These were not the circumstances in which James thought he’d be changing his first nappy.
As he’d settled down a bit and adjusted to his new surroundings, he’d been able to get directions to the shop where he could buy nappies and wipes and that sort of paraphernalia. Plus comics because the kids started demanding them, and sweets, because he’d promised. He’d checked his phone to see nearly a dozen missed calls from Kam and Kate.
Shit, he thought, probably a good idea to tell them where their kids are.
When he phoned his friend, Kam had been pretty frantic at first, although as James filled him in on the details he managed to regain some of his cool.
‘Sounds like they had an adventure,’ he said, ‘which is character building. But seriously, sending a text that just says “headed to the hospital. Talk later” when you’re in charge of someone else’s kids? I’ve been shitting myself.’
Like father like son, thought James.
‘Mate, you don’t do that to someone. You’ll know yourself soon.’
James could hear him quietly sniggering at the other end of the line.
‘God help that baby,’ he continued. ‘And God help you if Kate gets hold of you before she’s calmed down a bit.’
‘You’ll explain to her, right? That everything was always OK. And it was an emergency?’
‘What’s the worst that could happen? I asked myself as I went out the door. You pretty much answered that.’
‘I think I’ll withdraw my job application,’ James said.
‘You think?’ said Kam. ‘Listen, good luck with the baby. And with Rebecca. Try and get this fixed. I’ll be there for the kids in twenty minutes. Try not to lose one of ’em.’
Putting his phone away, he told the children that daddy would be here to get them soon. He’d expected cheers, but they barely looked up from their comics while they lay on the waiting room’s benches.
James checked his phone as it vibrated in his pocket.
Being induced. Could you get my bag from home?
Well, that’s progress, he thought – on the baby, and that she’s talking to me about stuff. The only problem was he couldn’t leave until Kam arrived to pick up the kids. But then he had an idea.
All sorted
, he texted back. Then added
xx
for good measure.
Rebecca wished she’d had her hospital bag with her as she changed back into her clothes to take the lift one floor to get to the labour ward. There was no way she was moving between the two, bare arse pressed against the wall in the backless gown she’d been given when she came in. With all the poking and examining she was feeling like her body wasn’t her own at the minute, but not so much that she could subject every passing professional and patient to an eyeful without taking some responsibility.