by Carmen Reid
Jo nodded.
‘So how Green are you?’ Savannah put to her. ‘Am I allowed to ask that? Or is it like therapy and only you get to ask the questions?’
‘Oh, well, I suppose it is like therapy. I like to at least pretend I’m neutral,’ was Jo’s reply.
‘But are you really? The things you write about every week indicate a certain sympathy with us, surely?’
‘You could say that,’ Jo admitted with a smile.
‘Ooh . . . a politician-like answer.’
‘Sorry, am I being cagey? I don’t want you to think you’re getting an easy ride.’
‘But I’m not! Look how severely you’ve twisted my arm to get that picture out of me.’
Jo gave a little laugh.
‘I’d just like to know if you’ve ever thought of going Green, politically.’
‘I’m very impressed with what you’re trying to do. OK?’ Jo decided on finally. ‘That’s all you’re going to get out of me on this. And that’s strictly off the record!’
When lunch was over, Jo ordered a taxi to take her to the station, despite Savannah’s pained expression.
‘I’ve got to rush if I’m going to make the 2.30 p.m.,’ Jo told her, justifying the decision.
The women shook hands on the doorstep and Jo wished Savannah well. ‘I really hope you do it,’ she said. ‘It’ll make the House of Commons much more interesting. I’ll be watching on the night. . .’
‘Thank you,’ Savannah said and held her hand. ‘I look forward to reading your article . . . I think!’
Chapter Fifteen
The authors of a new report claim Spring began four weeks earlier in 2004 than it did in 1920. Spring 2005 could be the earliest yet.
The Sunday Times
Friday: 2.10 p.m.
As soon as Jo was in the taxi, she rang the newsdesk. Jeff’s deputy, Mike picked up and, not caring if it was bad form, insubordination or whatever, she said a pleasant hello and then asked if she could talk to Jeff. It was just simpler this way. She didn’t want any of the Chinese whispers, misunderstandings, messages lost in translation that speaking to Mike often resulted in.
She waited a moment or two, then Jeff came on the line: ‘Jo, what have we got? Anything interesting?’ he asked as if she’d been to some rubbishy old press conference that might make a paragraph on page 22.
‘Anything interesting?!’ she retaliated. ‘More like everything interesting. Her parents were killed in a plane crash, she was devastated, never got over the loss. She’s full of really radical ideas: taxing rubbish, building mines to store all our waste plastic in, paying everyone in the county a “citizen’s income”—’
Jeff interrupted with: ‘Yes, but have you found out about her love life?’
‘Jeff! Please, can’t we try and stay just a teeny tiny bit on the highbrow side with this?’
‘Maybe, Jo, but I’ve got some very interesting information for you. I’ve just had a call from your little protégé, Aidan.’
‘Oh yeah.’
The taxi was making good time. She was being whizzed through side streets and would easily catch the train.
‘He has some names and dates you might like to write down if you’ve got a free hand. Are you in a cab?’ Jeff asked.
‘Yes.’
‘Well, you might want to tell the cab to turn around and take you straight back to Savannah’s house.’
‘Aha.’ Why did she have a sinking feeling about this? A feeling that it was going to get messy. Had Aidan unearthed some boyfriend who had moaned about what a terrible lover she was and now she was going to have to go back and ask Savannah about it? How horrible.
‘Stop your cab,’ Jeff reminded her.
‘Just a sec then.’
The driver was grumpy about the request and complained that he already had another job lined up in the centre of town.
‘Look I’m sorry . . .’ She put her mobile to the side and took the few moments necessary to promise him extra money on top of the fare.
‘Right,’ she resumed the conversation with Jeff. ‘What have you got for me?’
‘A birth certificate,’ he replied: ‘14 November 1996, Felix Martin Teyhan. Father, Philippe Teyhan, engineer, mother . . .’
He didn’t need to say it, she already knew: ‘Savannah Tyler, scientist.’ Oh my God. She felt the lurch in her stomach as she guessed what was coming next.
‘And a death certificate,’ Jeff said, but with understanding, not any sort of ‘wow what a great scoop’ note of triumph in his voice: ‘6 June 1998, Felix Martin Teyhan, respiratory failure. PM and toxicology report, no abnormal indications.’
‘Jesus. A 19-month-old toddler. Where did this happen?’
‘Felix was born in Wainwright, Alaska. His death took place there as well.’
‘She said she’d worked in Alaska.’ Jo was doing the maths. Savannah’s parents seemed to have died in the same year. How absolutely dreadful, no wonder she never talked about this. Presumably she and the baby’s father had long split up as well. There hadn’t been any photos . . . any indication . . . and that was when Jo recalled the tiny picture frame. The small smiling face was Felix: Savannah’s dead son.
When the taxi pulled up in front of Savannah’s house, Jo took a moment to collect herself. She had done this hundreds of times before, knocked on someone’s door hoping to be granted an interview about something very difficult. But it didn’t get any easier. In fact, she sometimes thought it got harder. When she was younger, she was more thirsty for the story, less concerned about how her interviewees might feel. Now, she cared a lot more, she worried about doing the right thing and trying to tread the fine line between public interest and the right to privacy.
As she paid the taxi driver, she could feel the bubble of her heart in her chest and the dryness of her mouth.
She tried to run the words of one of her very first news mentors through her mind: ‘People always think they don’t want to talk about difficult things, but they do. They really do. You’ve just got to make them realize that.’
She knocked on the door and waited for it to open.
Savannah’s face registered surprise to see Jo there again. ‘You could have phoned,’ Savannah said, ‘I’d have answered any questions on the phone, you know.’
‘I’m sorry. I’m really sorry to be here again like this. But I just took a call from my office and they’ve sent me back to see you. Someone has spoken to another one of our reporters and passed on some information . . .’ Jo took a deep breath and broke the news: ‘Savannah, I know this is really hard. Awful. But would it be possible to speak to you about Felix?’
Savannah was still looking Jo directly in the eyes; she didn’t break the look, so Jo saw the change in expression take place. The friendliness, the colour and the relaxed happiness left Savannah’s face almost immediately, to be replaced by a look of shock.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Jo added. ‘I can’t imagine anything worse.’
Jo was a journalist, yes, but she really, really liked this woman and had real sympathy for her. Also, Jo understood that Felix was the clue to Savannah. The unreachable, untouchable part that had been missing before. Before this revelation, there was a whole side of this woman Jo didn’t really get. How could someone so striking be single? Someone so mumsy be childless? How could someone so nurturing be alone? Now it fell into place.
Savannah was a mother who’d lost her child: the worst kind of bereaved, someone living every day with a hurt that would not heal.
Savannah took her eyes from Jo’s face and looked up to see the taxi making a three-point turn in the narrow street and heading off, as instructed by Jo. Best to make it look as if she was sure Savannah would invite her in again, she’d decided.
‘You’re going to miss your train,’ Savannah said in a voice that sounded dry and strained.
‘I know. But I couldn’t have spoken to you about this on the phone.’
‘No.’
For a long moment, Savann
ah stood on the doorstep looking lost. She gazed past Jo into the distance and seemed to slump, shrink up inside her vibrant outfit. Jo waited, realized she was holding her breath.
‘OK,’ Savannah said finally. ‘Maybe you should come in again.’
Jo didn’t dare make a reply, she knew from experience that even the wrong tone of ‘thank you’ might land her back outside again on the wrong side of a slammed door.
Savannah stood in her sitting room, still looking dazed. Jo kept a distance, didn’t presume to take a seat.
‘How did you find out about this?’ Savannah asked, but not harshly, with some genuine curiosity.
‘One of my juniors has a contact in Oxford, I think. The newsdesk have acted on his tip and done a records search in Alaska. They’ve found the certificates relating to Felix. I’m so sorry,’ Jo added. ‘You’ve been very open and honest with me about the things you wanted to discuss. I don’t like the way I’m forcing your hand here. But you’re standing for election and everyone’s interested in you. Look,’ she went on, gently, ‘I can totally understand why you didn’t want this public, but stories like this have a habit of coming to light.’
‘He’s not a story,’ Savannah said, voice strained to the verge of tears now. ‘He was my son.’
‘Savannah, I’m so sorry. . .’ Jo repeated. She was within reach of the little picture on the mantelpiece. ‘Is this him?’ she risked.
Savannah nodded.
‘He’s lovely.’ Jo looked at the picture more closely and saw that what she’d taken for bright red rosy cheeks were in fact cheeks covered with a vibrant rash. She put the frame down gently.
‘Why don’t you sit down . . . can I make you some tea?’ Jo offered.
‘Maybe . . .’ Savannah wiped a tear from her cheek with the back of her hand. ‘I’ve no idea how to play this . . . This wasn’t part of the plan.’
‘The interview plan?’ Jo asked and Savannah nodded.
‘Why don’t you tell me a little bit about Felix and what happened and we’ll work out together how to fit it in with the rest of the interview.’ Jo wasn’t being dishonest.
Green Queen’s dead baby heartache
was, yes, probably going to be the headline and top item of the story, but there were ways of playing it, nuances, other elements she and Savannah had control over. This great big revelation didn’t have to run away with them.
‘Will I make you tea?’ Jo asked.
‘No, just a glass of water, please.’
When they were seated on comfortable chairs in the sunny sitting room, facing one another, Jo gently coaxed the story from her. Savannah took regular sips of water, as if that made it any easier.
She told Jo about moving to Alaska for an important research job, of her happiness at meeting Philippe out there, of the joy of deciding to have a baby together and succeeding surprisingly quickly.
‘Felix was beautiful to us. Of course he was.’ Savannah couldn’t meet Jo’s eyes very often as she talked. She preferred to settle on the middle distance, on the little picture of her baby, anywhere but on the person asking her these hard questions.
‘But soon after his birth,’ Savannah continued, ‘it was obvious that he wasn’t in good health. He had terrible eczema, he had bouts of wheeziness, his face would puff up and we couldn’t work out what was causing all these problems. I know so much more about it now: multiple allergy syndrome. But I didn’t know anything then, and the doctors we took him to, time and time again, weren’t much better.’
‘Eczema is just hell on earth for a small child,’ she explained. Jo, once a nurse, knew this. ‘As soon as he could co-ordinate himself to scratch, that’s what he did. He would rub his hands up and down against all the sore, weeping patches of skin, rub his legs against the seams of his clothes, zips, cot bars, whatever would give him some relief from that terrible itching. He would wake up howling with frustration three or four times a night and we’d find him in blood-soaked Babygros. There were open sores on the back of his knees and other folds of his skin that never healed. Never had the chance to heal because he kept scratching them open.
‘He had this scary look about him – puffed-up eyes, dry, dry skin; he looked middle-aged. Not like a baby. There was the awful knowledge of pain in his eyes. And something else, something I interpreted as the question: “why can’t you help me?” That was what I felt accused of every time I looked into his eyes.’ Savannah took another sip to steady herself.
‘He was in and out of hospital,’ she continued. ‘Wet wraps, overnight bandaging. His little hands tied to his bed so scabs would have a chance to form. Oh dear God, it was inhumane. Not just for him, for me and for Philippe too.
‘I would have done anything for him. Given anything to make him better.’
She took a long drink from the glass, leaving just an inch of water at the bottom.
‘You’re a mother,’ she directed at Jo. ‘You know. You know how much you love and sympathize and how much you worry.’
Jo gave a nod.
‘My skin broke out in sympathy. I never got a full night’s sleep, because Felix didn’t. I was barely rational. Of course I couldn’t go back to my job, Philippe was struggling to cope with his . . . Maybe if I’d had some peace of mind, I’d have been able to find out more, do some research . . . come to an understanding of what caused this condition, what was making it worse and what might have helped to make him better. But instead, I was busy all day and most of the night trying to cope with him. Just trying to exist from one week to the next.’
Jo heard the gasp in Savannah’s voice, as if she was struggling now to hold back tears.
‘It’s OK,’ she soothed. ‘Just take your time. Shall I bring you more water?’
Savannah nodded.
When Jo was in the kitchen, above the sound of water rushing from the tap, she heard Savannah blow her nose. Not for the first time, Jo wrestled with misgivings about the ethics of her job. There was no doubt this was a great story, but what else was it? A private misery. A misery she felt uncomfortable intruding on.
She brought the glass through to Savannah, who took a drink and continued: ‘There’s so much more help now and information about allergies. I’d be told about a special diet, cutting out high allergy food, I’d get advice on washing powders, anti-allergy clothing, bedding, non-toxic household cleaners.
‘There are even special organic cotton padded pyjamas with built-in mittens and feet you can buy now to soothe eczema. All this sort of thing might have given him a chance . . . But then again, maybe not. Maybe he was over-exposed to toxins in the womb. The job I was doing when I was pregnant, the chemicals I was in daily contact with. Looking back, it was utter stupidity.’
Tears were falling down her cheeks, hanging from her chin and then dripping noiselessly onto her shoulder, but she managed to carry on talking in an almost normal voice.
‘It’s what’s known as the cocktail effect. No one big single exposure that someone can point a finger at and say “it was the lead” “it was the mercury” or whatever. But both Philippe and I were working with all kinds of slightly toxic things all the time. We were living in a brand new apartment with new carpeting, new kitchen, lots of electrical equipment. I mean, it seems so obvious now that this was totally the wrong environment for a hyper-allergic baby, but I didn’t know any of that and neither did Felix’s doctors.’
‘Did your parents have the chance to see Felix?’ Jo asked.
‘Luckily yes,’ Savannah managed. ‘We were in Argentina for the two Christmases we had with Felix. Philippe’s family came over to meet him as well.
‘The plane crash happened in April and we took Felix to Argentina for a third time for the funeral.
Philippe went back to work and I stayed on for many weeks because Felix seemed to improve there. I thought it was the sunshine, the drier climate, but you know, maybe it was because we were outside a lot and we weren’t living in a brand new box laced with chemicals.
‘Felix was walki
ng,’ she went on. ‘He was talking really well for a one and a half year old. He loved the cows. He loved his uncle, he had two little cousins to play with. The fact that Felix finally seemed to be getting better was the thing that I held onto, that kept me going through that terrible time.
‘But of course Philippe missed us and we missed Philippe.’ Savannah was twisting the paper tissue between her fingers into a tight, tight strand. ‘So, after eight weeks or so, we packed our bags and went back to Alaska.’
Without much of a pause, in as steady and matter-of-fact a tone as she could manage, Savannah delivered the words: ‘We’d been back fifteen days when Felix had a fatal asthma attack.’
Jo felt a shudder pass over her at those words. She didn’t like to think of what that really meant: watching your baby suffocate to death.
‘In the hospital?’ she asked, almost not wanting to know.
‘He died at home, before the ambulance could get to us,’ came the steady reply. ‘We were in a very remote place and the doctor was on another call fifty miles away.’ Savannah wasn’t crying any longer. Her eyes had taken on something of a glaze as she fixed on the picture of her son on the mantelpiece.
‘At night?’ Jo probed.
‘No. On an ordinary Tuesday morning. An ordinary, sunny Tuesday morning. Philippe was at work. Felix was with me . . . You should understand that I fought to save him.’ Savannah was rocking slightly, eyes still fixed to the mantelpiece: ‘I did everything our doctor had taught us, everything the ambulance operator talking at me down the line calmly, over my screams, could recommend. But when I saw . . .’ and here her voice faltered, seemed to dry up for a moment, before she managed: ‘When I saw he was going, he was really going . . . I had to stop. I had to put the phone down, stop battling and just hold him for one moment longer. Let him go in some sort of peace.’
Jo felt tears of her own slip down her cheeks. ‘I’m so, so sorry,’ she whispered.
Her instinct was to go over to Savannah and put an arm round her. But she worried about whether or not it would be welcomed. And then her mobile intruded on the moment.