by Maria Goodin
Libby sat back on her heels, returned her lollipop to her mouth and looked at me quizzically. Then she started to giggle.
“You can breathe, you know.”
I took in a gasp of air with a sense of relief.
“That wasn’t three seconds,” I grumbled, feeling stupid.
“Yes it was. I did one Mrs Hippity, two Mrs Hippity—”
“It’s not Mrs Hippity, stupid, it’s Mississippi, like the river.”
“No, it’s not.”
“Yes it is!” I laughed loudly, partly because it was actually funny, and partly to cover my own sense of awkwardness.
“It is Mrs Hippity!” insisted Libby.
“Who’s Mrs Hippity?”
“I don’t know!”
“Mrs Hippity!” I howled, falling back onto the grass.
“You’re silly, I’m going home,” said Libby, sulkily. She stood up and stomped off through the grass.
I lay on my back, laughing up at the bright sunshine. Once I’d recovered myself, I glanced over at Libby’s bag of sweets and thought about how her lips had tasted of cherry. It hadn’t been too bad, being kissed by a girl, although I couldn’t see myself doing it again any time soon. Maybe if I breathed next time, I decided, it might be better.
I reached over and helped myself to all the sweets she had won from me.
I remember standing there in shock; my knees shaking, my T-shirt sticking to my back, my stomach clenched. I’d read the books, known what to expect, and still it had been terrifying.
The baby was out. He was finally here. I was meant to be important, but I felt like a spare part, standing around awkwardly, being given little jobs to try to involve me. I felt patronised and overwhelmed.
So this was it. Now we had to listen out. Because the first cry meant he was breathing. That he was alive. And it seemed to be taking an eternity.
The nurses were fussing, doing something with him at the side of the room.
Him. My son. It didn’t feel real.
I watched the clock on the wall. The seconds ticked by. Eleven, twelve, thirteen… Nobody said anything, but surely we were all thinking the same thing. Why wasn’t he crying? I opened my mouth to ask the question, but I couldn’t. Maybe I’d got it wrong. Maybe it wasn’t meant to happen that quickly. I didn’t want to look a complete idiot, but I was sure the cry should have come by now. That’s what I’d read.
The first cry is synonymous with breathing…
If he wasn’t crying that meant he wasn’t breathing, and for a split second I experienced a violent twist in my gut – not fear or desperation, but guilt. Because if he wasn’t breathing that meant it was all over.
It meant I was free.
Fourteen, fifteen, sixteen…
This wasn’t right. I knew it wasn’t. They were meant to cry. I wanted him to cry. Didn’t I? Didn’t I? What was wrong with me? Surely I had to at least want that.
But I couldn’t make myself wish for it, couldn’t will it to happen.
When the baby cries, his airways are ready to take in that first, big gulp of air, allowing him to breathe on his own…
Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen…
However hard I’d tried to get my head in the right space for this, however hard I’d tried to accept what was to come, I knew that I’d never accepted it at all. It was never meant to be like this, not yet, not now, and I realised in a sudden rush of anguish and self-disgust that I didn’t want the cry to come.
I just wanted this to all disappear.
Twenty, twenty-one…
And the silence was shattered.
A painful wail, a chug, a splutter and another wail.
He had taken his first breath.
“There we go,” said the midwife, cheerfully, carrying the bundle towards the bed.
I glanced at the other faces in the room, all smiling. None of them surprised or afraid, as if none of them had endured the agonising wait that I had just experienced.
I felt crushed by the weight of some unidentifiable emotion. Disappointment? Self-disgust? Relief?
The nurse in the corner, gathering up towels, glanced at me with an expression of concern. She knew what I had been thinking, I was sure of it. I turned away, red-faced. Could everyone see right to the core of me?
I had wanted him dead. Hadn’t I? I had wanted it to be over. No, no, I hadn’t wanted him dead. Of course not. Not really. I just…
“You have a beautiful, healthy son,” said the midwife, smiling encouragingly at me.
I couldn’t see inside the bundle of towels without stepping nearer, but my legs were like jelly. I couldn’t move an inch.
I glanced at the clock again.
It would soon be Monday morning. Less than nine hours to go until class started. Maths. There had been days when I thought a Monday morning couldn’t get much tougher than that.
Yet here I was.
I remember my mum asking: “Do you understand what asthma is, Jamie?”
She sat next to me at the kitchen table, her head cocked quizzically to one side, her face a picture of maternal solicitude. I had been given a glass of chocolate Nesquik as a treat, which was strange because I wasn’t even ill.
I sucked on my straw and nodded, wide-eyed and sad-looking, playing up to the increased care and attention. I wasn’t exactly sure what asthma was, but any explanation was bound to be boring, and stuff happened all the time that I didn’t understand without it ever seeming to matter. Besides, my sister was in the corner of the kitchen angrily spreading Marmite onto a piece of toast and I wasn’t about to expose my ignorance to her. It sometimes felt like her very reason for living was to mock and belittle me as much as possible.
My mum gave a little smile. “So what’s your understanding of it?” she asked gently. “Tell me what you know.”
I sighed quietly and felt myself physically deflate in the chair. I should have known she would call my bluff, she always did. It was the teacher in her, always double-checking other people’s understanding. Is this what she did with her students, even though they were all grown-ups? They must have found her really annoying.
“You can’t breathe,” I mumbled, unwilling to attempt any further elaboration.
“Wow, everyone’s right, he really is a genius,” mumbled Laura, through a mouthful of toast.
“Laura,” said my mum sternly, glancing in her direction, “I wasn’t speaking to you. And use a plate please.”
“I can’t even see what all the fuss is about,” said Laura, ignoring my mum’s request, “loads of people have asthma. It’s not like it’s even a big deal.”
“I didn’t say it was a big deal.”
“Well, why are you even talking about it then?”
“This doesn’t concern you, Laura.”
“Why is everything such a big deal when it involves Jamie? God, I could try to hang myself from my window and no one would sit down and have a heart-to-heart with me about it.”
“Don’t you have something you need to go and do?” asked my mum, tersely.
“Yeah, Laura, me and Mum are trying to talk,” I risked. I would never normally goad Laura, but Mum and I felt like a team right now. Or at least I thought so, until she shot me one of her warning looks.
“Shut up, you little dweeb,” my sister muttered scornfully.
“Laura!” snapped my mum. “Go do something. Homework, for example, if you can remember what that is. And, for God’s sake, stop rolling your school skirt up like that, I can practically see your knickers.”
“No, you can’t,” Laura sighed theatrically. With a roll of her eyes, she made for the door, cramming toast into her mouth and poking me hard on the back of the neck as she stomped past, the scent of body spray and Marmite wafting after her.
“Ow!” I shrieked, grabbing my neck as if I had been stabbed and looking to Mum for justice.
My mum just sighed and rubbed her forehead.
“So, anyway,” she began again, attempting to re-establish her air of co
ncern, “it must have been a bit scary, what happened at school today.”
I stared at her, unsure which way to go. I was quite enjoying the sympathy and could easily milk that, but at the same time I was nine now and didn’t want to look like a sissy. I took the middle ground and shrugged, which was the most accurate reflection of how I was really feeling. I hadn’t actually given the whole “incident” (this is how it was described to my mum when she arrived at the school) much thought. In fact, I’d quickly been distracted by the hunt for a two-headed magpie that Tom swore he’d seen up on the roof of our classroom. Perhaps the “incident” had been scary for the short time it lasted, but I assumed it was a one-off thing, like a nosebleed. Those seemed to appear out of nowhere, for no good reason, and could be scary, all that blood dripping onto your white school shirt. But they passed, just like the asthma had. I figured that, like nosebleeds, asthma was “nothing to get your knickers in a twist about”, as my dad would say.
My mum reached out and stroked my hair.
“It must have been quite worrying when you didn’t know what was happening. But it’s not something you need to be scared of if it happens again. Quite a lot of children have it. It’s not uncommon. It just makes it a bit difficult to breathe for a while. The airways get a bit inflamed, a bit unhappy, and that makes them go a bit narrow.” She made a tiny space between her thumb and forefinger to demonstrate her point. “There’s medicine for it, to make it better, like a little pump, and it’s nothing the teachers haven’t seen before. Mrs Dray didn’t seem too worried, did she?”
This was put out there more as a statement than a question, so I shook my head because I could see my mum was trying her best and I didn’t want to contradict her. In fact, Mrs Dray had started to look a bit flushed and her voice had gone all high-pitched, just like the time Annabel Woods’s hair got tangled up in the climbing rope during PE and Mr Craven, the caretaker, had to cut her lose.
My mum patted my hand, which seemed to signal the end of our conversation. She made a move to stand, but I didn’t want her to go. These moments between us seemed so rare now. She was working on some big project called a PhD, and I was halfway through constructing the Millennium Falcon out of Lego, so we both had our commitments. Plus, I’d noticed that the older you got, the less your parents fussed over you. Not so long ago, whenever I fell over, I would be scooped up into strong arms, kissed and told I was a brave boy. Now I got told to stop being so clumsy and look where I was going, or my dad would ask me if I’d had a nice trip, which was only funny the first five times.
“How do you get asthma?” I asked quickly.
My mum settled back into her seat, reluctantly it seemed to me, and shrugged. “You can be born with it. Or develop it.”
“Can you catch it?”
“No.”
“Can you give it to someone else?”
“No.”
“Can you still do normal stuff if you have asthma, like running and football?”
“You can still do everything, Jamie.”
She ruffled my hair and stood up. She was off to do her own thing, whether I liked it or not.
I slurped the last of my Nesquik, images of the “incident” at school today coming back to me. I supposed it had been pretty horrible. I pushed the images away. It was nothing serious or scary, I would try to remember that.
Still, that night I couldn’t sleep. Every time I closed my eyes, all I could see was Mrs Dray with her flushed cheeks. “Breathe,” she was saying again, “breathe, breathe.” And she was taking deep breaths herself, demonstrating how it should be done, as if the problem stemmed from forgetfulness.
“Breathe. Just breathe.”
Chapter 3
Action
When Michael’s name flashes up on my phone, I’m in two minds whether to answer. The thing is, I’ve decided on a plan of action, and I’m nearly almost certain it’s the right one. So I don’t want him talking me out of it. I don’t think.
My mood swings easily with the weather, and today, with a bit of sunshine, I might have been feeling more confident about my plan. But although it’s a warm day, there are grey clouds in the sky and I’m plagued by a sense of something ominous approaching. Perhaps I should turn back.
In my hand, my phone continues to ring.
The canal water is dark and murky, dotted with the odd drinks can and limp crisp packet. A coot bobs along, searching hopefully for something to eat.
Red for moorhen, white for coot. Don’t forget it.
I never did.
I pass a narrowboat tied alongside the towpath, an algae-stained laughing Buddha on the deck. I look away, not wanting to see inside those little windows, not wanting to be reminded.
“Hey,” I say, quickly answering my phone before it rings off. All of a sudden I just want to hear a familiar voice. And maybe, just maybe, be talked out of this.
“Hey. You all right?” asks Michael.
“Yep. You?”
“Yeah, good. You on a job?”
“No. I took the day off.”
“You what? You never take a day off. What you doing?”
“I’m just… I’m out.”
“Out?”
Oh go on, I think, just tell him. Not because I want to be talked out of it, because I don’t, almost certainly, but maybe a second opinion…
“I’m down by Camden Lock,” I tell him.
“Oh, yeah? Stocking up on yet more incense and leather bondage gear?”
“Yep, you know me.”
“Too well, clearly. Seriously, what are you doing there?”
“I’m just… there’s a… like, an art exhibition thing I want to go to…”
There’s a confused pause.
“What?”
“An exhibition. Like where artists show their paintings.”
“Yes, I know what an exhibition is, thanks, mate. What are you going to that for?”
Not far ahead, people are standing about on the towpath. Are they looking at paintings? Is this it?
I look over my shoulder, back along the section of path I’ve just walked. The van’s parked just ten minutes away. I could be home in fifty.
“Libby’s exhibiting some of her work,” I say.
There’s a long silence.
“How d’you know that?”
“I found her. I just did an internet search. She’s got a website.”
Again a long pause.
“So… what? You’re there to see her?”
As if he’s already talked me out of it, I find myself grinding to a halt. I even take a couple of tentative steps back in the direction I’ve just come.
“Yeah, that was the plan.”
Was? Is! Is the plan.
“To talk to her?”
“Yeah.”
“And say what?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“Well, I haven’t exactly mapped it all out.”
Why did I answer my phone? Now I’m getting doubts in my head. I make a swift turn and head back in the direction I was going in the first place. I know what I’m doing. I do.
“So you were really serious about this?”
“Yes, I told you I wanted to find her—”
“No, you said you’d been thinking about finding her, not that you were going to do it.”
“Well, I thought about it a lot. And I decided to do it.”
“Are you sure about this?”
“Look, you’re the one who told me I had to sort myself out.”
“Yeah I know, but I thought it would be more of a mental thing, like working through some stuff in your own mind. Not so much… doing.”
“If I could just work through it in my own mind, I would have done that, wouldn’t I?”
Michael falls silent.
“You told me I had to move on from the past,” I remind him. “You said it. And you’re right. I do. I need to tie up some loose ends. Make my peace with the past, or whatever, and move f
orwards. A fresh approach. And I don’t know why, but I feel like she’s the first person I need to see in order to do that.”
“The first person?”
I sigh and look up at the clouds. I think it might start raining soon. Is that a sign? Michael clearly thinks this is a bad idea anyway, so I might as well tell him the whole story, everything I’ve decided on. And I have decided.
“After I’ve seen Libby, I’m going to see Tom. And Max. There’s just… there are things I need to say, to just… get out.”
Another pause on the line.
I notice I’ve stopped moving again. I shuffle in circles on the towpath, looking at my feet, risking the odd glance up ahead.
That’s it. That’s the exhibition. As the people ahead of me shift, I catch sight of the paintings and my stomach flips.
“Okay,” Michael says, clearly unconvinced, “well, if that’s what you need to do—”
“I don’t know,” I say, suddenly confused again. “I don’t know what I need to do I just… I need to do something.”
“Okay,” he says, more encouragingly, “okay, then I hope it goes well, I guess. I hope you get whatever you need from this.”
I rub my eyes. I shouldn’t have answered my phone. I’ve always been terrible at making decisions, and now this feels like a bad idea, even though last night, lying in bed unable to sleep again, I was sure it was the right one.
I put my phone in my back pocket and stare out at the water, searching for confirmation that I’m doing the right thing. I try to recall my conversation with Michael last week, the moment I realised something had to change.
We’d been driving in my van, the scene for many of our deeper and more meaningful conversations. Or, more accurately, we’d been stuck going nowhere in my van after hitting a traffic jam on the way back from IKEA, the new wardrobe Michael wanted laid out in the back. It’s not that we can’t hold a meaningful conversation face-to-face, but stuck in a small space without distractions, our eyes diverted by the road ahead, thoughts and feelings flow more freely, and this was one of those times. Plus, it was raining. I always say too much when it’s raining.
“What do you think’s brought it back on?” Michael asked, sounding concerned. “I mean, it’s been, what, nearly ten years, since you’ve had those kinds of symptoms?”