‘When’s the due date again?’ I ask over my shoulder.
‘The twelfth of September.’
Of course. I remember Grace being really smug about the fact the baby will probably be the oldest in its year at school.
‘It’s too early,’ she says, her voice breaking. ‘It’s too early, Mia.’
‘No, it’s not,’ I say firmly. ‘I was early, remember, and I was fine.’
Grace lets out another growl. Audrey, curled up at the end of the mattress like a cat, doesn’t even stir.
‘Oh God,’ Grace cries. ‘It hurts, Mia! It really hurts!’
‘OK, OK, I get it. What should we do? Ring an ambulance?’
‘How?’ she wails. ‘There’s no signal, remember?’
Shit, she’s right.
‘Auds?’ I say. ‘Audrey, wake up.’
The body at the end of bed squirms. ‘What’s wrong?’ a scratchy voice asks.
Grace answers by letting out a long moan.
‘We think the baby might be coming,’ I say.
Saying the words out loud unblocks a fresh wave of panic. Because this is actually happening. We’re all alone, miles away from home and Grace is in real-life labour.
‘What?’ Audrey cries, sitting bolt upright. ‘Seriously?’
‘Yes.’
I swallow.
Now what?
Help, that’s it. We need help.
‘Now, listen to me, Audrey,’ I say. ‘When you tried to get some phone signal earlier, how far did you go?’
‘Oh my God, I can’t believe the baby’s coming! This is so exciting!’ she says, bouncing up and down.
Grace yowls in disagreement.
‘Audrey, focus,’ I say. ‘How far did you go?’
‘Um, er, let’s see, I walked for about fifteen minutes one way and another fifteen the other.’
Not the answer I was after. There’s no way I can send Audrey out in the pitch black, not to mention the fact it’s still absolutely chucking it down outside.
Think, Mia, think.
‘How far away was the nearest house?’ I ask Grace. ‘Do you remember from the drive up here?’
She responds by grabbing a handful of my T-shirt and wailing.
‘Light,’ I say. ‘We need some light.’
Audrey leaps off the bed and relights the candles.
I thought the light might be comforting, but somehow everything was actually a whole lot less scary in the dark. The flickering light reveals the sweat pouring down Grace’s face and the terror in her darting eyes. I can make out the wet patch on the mattress. It smells faintly of Mum’s baking, which is just plain weird. According to Grace’s book, some women experience ‘a trickle’, others ‘a gush’. Grace is clearly in the ‘gush’ category.
Wait a second. The book. Of course.
‘Audrey,’ I say. ‘Find the keys and go down to the car. On the back seat there’s a book. Bring it up here.’
She springs into action, pulling on her hoodie and Converse and grabbing the torch.
‘Hurry, Audrey,’ I say.
She stands up, her laces still undone, and clatters down the stairs and out the front door.
I turn back to Grace. ‘Here, drink this,’ I say, thrusting a bottle of water in her face and holding it to her lips. Most of it ends up dribbling down her chin.
‘Mia!’ she yells. ‘Be careful. It’s going all over me.’
‘I’m bloody trying!’ I yell back. ‘You keep moving about.’
‘I don’t have my bag,’ Grace says, looking frantically about the room.
‘It’s right here,’ I say, pointing at her handbag.
‘Not that one, my hospital bag.’
‘Well, what was in it?’ I ask.
‘Everything!’ she bellows.
‘There’s no need to shout at me!’
Audrey bursts back into the room with the book.
‘Keep drinking,’ I instruct Grace, shoving the bottle into her trembling fingers.
I snatch the book from Audrey’s hands and flick through its pages until I find the chapter I’m looking for – ‘The Labour’.
‘Torch!’ I bark.
Audrey slips the torch into my hand. I shine it on the page, my eyes skimming the words.
‘OK, contractions,’ I say. ‘How far apart are they?’
‘How am I supposed to know?’ Grace cries. ‘I haven’t been counting. I just know it hurts. A lot.’ As if to demonstrate, she lets out a howl of pain that sounds like she’s being murdered.
‘OK, I think that was probably one,’ I say. ‘Audrey, start counting.’
‘What?’
‘Counting. You know, one, two, three …’
‘Oh! OK.’ She starts to count.
‘Sam,’ Grace says. ‘I want Sam.’
‘I know you do. But he’s in Cambridge and we have absolutely no way of contacting him right now so you’re stuck with us for the time being, OK?’
She starts to cry. So presumably not OK, then. I try to block her out and keep reading.
Oh God. Oh no.
‘What is it?’ Grace asks between her tears. ‘What does it say?’
‘You need to check if part of the baby is showing,’ I say.
Grace is still in her stripy top from yesterday and a massive pair of maternity knickers. ‘In that case, you’re going to have to help me take my pants off,’ she says.
‘What? You want me to look?’
‘Well, I’m hardly going to be able to, am I?’ she says, gasping with pain.
For the next few seconds communication is impossible because Grace is screaming so loudly.
‘How long was that?’ I ask Audrey.
‘How long was what?’
‘The contraction?’
‘Oh! I don’t know,’ she admits. ‘I got distracted by all the noise and forgot where I was.’
‘Audrey!’
‘Sorry,’ she says, her lower lip wobbling.
Which is all I need. Both of them in tears.
‘Shit, sorry, I didn’t mean to shout. Where were you roughly?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe about sixty?’
‘OK. Fine, we’ll go with that.’
‘Go see if you can find some towels,’ I say, mainly because that’s what they always seem to request in old-fashioned films – towels and hot water.
Audrey nods and races out of the room again, taking the torch with her.
Removing Grace’s knickers is harder than I thought it would be. She’s too busy groaning to listen to my instructions, making it tricky for me to manoeuvre them over her bent legs.
At first I think she’s shat her pants because there’s brown sticky stuff all over her knickers. Gross. The second I’ve got them over her feet, I fling them as far away as possible.
‘Right,’ I say, steeling myself for the actual looking-at-my-sister’s-vagina bit.
‘Oh my God!’ Grace cries, her eyes widening.
‘What?’
‘Fire!’
I whip round. Over by the window, Grace’s pants are aflame.
‘Shit!’ I cry, racing over to them. The stupid things must have landed on one of the candles.
I stamp up and down on them, dousing them in water for good measure, totally soaking the bottom of my pyjama bottoms in the process.
‘What am I supposed to wear now?’ Grace asks as I poke at her fried knickers with my foot.
‘Trust me,’ I say. ‘You did not want to put those back on.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘Because they were covered in brown goo!’
‘That’s. The. Mucus. Plug,’ Grace gasps in ragged bursts.
‘The mucus what?’ I guess I haven’t got to that bit in the chapter yet.
‘Mucus plug! It clogs up the cervix to keep fluid from escaping.’
I clasp a hand to my mouth. ‘Oh my God, you’ve basically just described vagina snot.’
‘Mia!’
‘Well, that’s what it so
unds like!’
‘Shut up about the mucus plug and look between my legs!’
‘Stop yelling at me!’
‘Mia!’
I peer between her legs, terrified I’m going to see a baby’s head hanging out or something. Luckily I see nothing of the sort, just Grace’s vagina and absolutely no baby.
‘Well?’ she demands.
‘Nothing yet.’
She flops her head back on Audrey’s travel pillow. ‘I want Sam,’ she says again.
Audrey returns with a bundle of towels in her arms, her eyes bulging when she spots that Grace is half-naked.
‘Where are your pants?’ she asks, frowning.
‘Don’t ask,’ I reply.
We arrange towels on the bed and sit on either side of Grace, holding one hand each. We take long deep breaths and try to encourage Grace to join in with them, mainly because that’s what I’ve seen on television and I’ve run out of ideas as to what else we can do. I still feel quite daft though, like a children’s TV presenter, as I chant ‘in and out’. At some point Audrey takes my other hand, so we’re sort of sitting in a little circle, like we’re conducting a séance. We continue to time the contractions, each one bringing a fresh wave of bloodcurdling screams. Now that I’ve seen her vagina once and know what to expect, I keep peeking between Grace’s legs every few minutes just in case, every time stupidly relieved the baby appears to staying put, at least for now.
Even though the book is full of assurances that it’s perfectly normal, I wasn’t prepared for how much blood and other weird sticky stuff there’d be. It’s everywhere, on the towels, on the wall, on Grace, on my clothes and hands and arms and cheeks.
Sweat is pouring down Grace’s face, the heat radiating off her like she’s a human hot-water bottle.
‘You’re absolutely boiling,’ I say, tugging at her top. ‘Maybe we should take this off.’
We have a go at pulling it over her head but she’s too exhausted even to lift her arms.
‘Hang on!’ Audrey says. She jumps off the bed and rummages in her backpack.
‘What’s that?’ I ask.
‘Dad’s Swiss Army Knife.’
‘Get you, professional runaway,’ I say.
Carefully we cut through Grace’s top until it falls away from her blazing hot skin. Before she got pregnant, Grace was always a bit prudish about nudity, favouring one-pieces over bikinis and always wearing a bra, even when she was just chilling around the house, so it’s all a bit odd and very unGrace-like to see her totally naked, splayed out on the bed, gigantic belly, legs akimbo, wailing like a banshee.
That’s when things go up a gear, Grace’s yells taking on a new intensity.
‘I think I want to push,’ she cries.
‘But you can’t!’ I tell her. ‘If you push, the baby might come out.’
I can’t deliver a baby, I just can’t. Under absolutely no circumstances.
‘I want to push,’ Grace insists, clambering onto her hands and knees, her bare bottom in the air.
‘But you can’t,’ I say. ‘Tell her, Audrey.’
Audrey just gapes at me. ‘I’m scared,’ she mouths.
I pretend not to understand her. Because if I do I’ll have to acknowledge that I’m scared too, and if I do that, I’m not sure I can take it back.
‘You just need to hold on a bit longer,’ I say to Grace.
Just until it gets light enough for me to send Audrey to get help. Professional help.
‘I can’t, Mia,’ Grace screams, almost deafening me. ‘It’s coming!’
I throw a look at Audrey. Her eyes are wide with fear.
‘Should I go?’ she asks, looking out the window.
The sky is slightly less black than it was earlier but it’s still basically dark out. At least it’s stopped raining so hard.
Grace lets out another scream.
‘OK,’ I say. ‘But stick to the main road. And if you need to knock on someone’s door to use their phone, don’t go inside, but insist they bring the phone to you, OK?’
‘OK,’ Audrey says.
‘And Sam!’ Grace yells. ‘Ring Sam.’
‘I will,’ Audrey promises, grabbing the torch and her mobile.
‘Be careful,’ I yell after her.
The door slams shut behind her, leaving Grace and me alone.
I grab the book, my eyes struggling to focus on the relevant page. Not that it’s all that much help right now seeing as it assumes we’ll be tucked up in a nice, safe hospital full of medical equipment and people who know what they’re doing at this point. There’s certainly no handy how-to guide for amateur midwives at the back for me to refer to.
Grace lets out another scream, almost dislocating my wrist as her body twists and writhes.
‘Fuck!’ I cry, peeling her fingers away. ‘That really hurt!’
She doesn’t even reply, just growls in my face like a wild animal, spit flying everywhere.
Hurry, Audrey, hurry.
The growling goes on for another twenty minutes, intermingled with the odd swear word and episode of screaming, the contractions now so close together I’ve given up counting.
I have another look at her bottom end. This time it looks different. I can see something.
‘Oh my God, Grace,’ I say. ‘I think I can see the top of its head!’
Grace doesn’t answer, just continues to wail.
I grab a clean towel. ‘I think it’s time,’ I say.
She nods, gripping onto the headboard and gritting her teeth.
I get into position. Is this really happening to me? I haven’t got time to decide.
‘Push, Grace,’ I say. ‘Push like you’ve never pushed before.’
She lets out a roar and all of a sudden the entire head is poking out of her vagina. It’s without doubt the weirdest, grossest thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life. I put my hands out ready.
‘Yes!’ I cry. ‘Just like that! Another one just like that, Gracie!’
She pushes again, and again, the shoulders suddenly visible, then the torso, until suddenly the entire baby slithers out like an eel and I almost drop it.
And there it is. An actual baby, tiny and warm and writhing in my arms, umbilical cord still attached. It’s covered in blood and goo and looks like a horrible little alien with hair, but I don’t care, it’s out and it’s alive. There’s a moment of horrible silence before it lets out a mewing cry, a bit like the noise next-door-but-one’s cat makes when it’s hungry.
Grace collapses on her side before rolling onto her back. ‘Is it OK?’ she says. ‘Please tell me it’s OK.’
‘It’s crying,’ I say.
And crying is good. Because crying means it’s breathing. And breathing is most definitely good.
‘What is it?’ she gasps.
‘Um, a baby.’
‘No! Boy or girl?’
‘Oh. Hang on.’
I peek under the towel I’ve wrapped it in. ‘It’s a boy, Grace,’ I say, placing him in her arms. ‘A really fucking beautiful baby boy.’
I can hear sirens in the distance. Then my legs sort of give way and I sink down on the floor, my bum hitting the floorboards with a thump.
That’s when I start to cry.
37
‘Is he OK?’ Sam asks.
I peer into the hastily purchased car seat next to me. Elijah William Brendan Castle is fast asleep beneath a fleecy blanket, his tiny hands balled up into fists on either side of his crusty little face.
‘For about the thousandth time, he’s fine,’ I reply.
Sam grins sheepishly. ‘Sorry,’ he says.
Even though he was on the small side at five pounds exactly, on our arrival at the hospital the midwife declared Elijah perfectly healthy, and after a day and night of observation, he and Grace were allowed to leave after breakfast this morning.
The five of us are squeezed into Sam’s car. We’ve left Mum and Dad’s parked at Frankie’s, to be retrieved at a later date. Frankie was very
nice about everything when we finally managed to get hold of him on the phone, even refusing Sam’s offer to buy him a brand-new mattress and set of towels, despite the fact they’re totally ruined.
We’ve been on the road for three hours now, sticking to the slow lane at Grace’s insistence. Having reportedly spent most of last night sitting on the edge of her hospital bed gazing at Elijah, she’s finally surrendered to sleep, snoring away in the front passenger seat. Audrey is asleep too, dribbling on my shoulder.
‘Are you not tired?’ Sam asks.
‘I’m OK.’
I managed to grab a few snatches of sleep last night, but I had crazy dreams about Grace being in labour and kept waking up, sweaty and confused.
Everything after the ambulance arrived is a bit of a blur. I know the paramedics must have delivered the placenta and cut the umbilical cord, but I don’t remember any of it. All I remember is the crazy relief I felt as they swooped in in their green uniforms, armed with medical equipment. In the ambulance, Grace held my hand and didn’t let go until we arrived at the hospital in Kendal.
I take another glance at Elijah. I keep trying and failing to equate the baby in the car seat next to me, all clean and dressed and sweet-smelling, with the sticky, bloody thing that slithered into my hands not even forty-eight hours ago.
‘Is there a John Lewis bag back there?’ Sam asks.
I spot one squished at Audrey’s feet.
‘Yeah,’ I reply. ‘Why?’
‘Take a look inside it,’ he says.
I reach for it, frowning as Sam watches me in the rear-view mirror. I empty the contents on my lap. The cuddly lizard from John Lewis tumbles out.
‘When did you get this?’ I ask.
‘That day we went to Waterside. I ran back to get it while you were in the loo.’
I look down at the lizard. Its eyes have been stitched on wonkily.
‘Anyway, it’s yours,’ Sam says.
‘Mine? Why?’
‘Consider it a totally insubstantial thank you gift.’
I shake my head and can’t help but smile.
There’s a pause.
‘Sam, would you be offended if I regifted it?’ I ask.
He grins. ‘Course not.’
‘Thanks.’ I nestle the lizard next to Elijah in the car seat. It’s almost as big as he is.