by Sofie Laguna
A baby? I didn’t want a baby. I wanted it to be gone, out of me.
I saw another wave coming, made of dirt and stones, big enough to finish me.
‘Justine, come on. Get up. Come on.’
I had to stand. There were two nurses now; they pushed me up but I was dropping, falling into their hands as the wave rolled over me.
‘Okay, onto the bed.’
They lifted me onto another bed. I watched the ceiling change as they rolled me along the corridor, the wheels bumping over the ground. Another mountain came thundering towards me, as if it wanted to crush me again. Two nurses I didn’t know hovered over the bed. They were old like Mrs Turning, their bodies in layers under their black costumes. They knew what happened with Jamie Worlley. It was wrong. It was my behaviour. The mountain of stones and froth and churning earth crashed over me. I was under it alone. There was no one that I knew. Nothing to save me.
The nurses wheeled me into a room and put a sheet over me. Another wave came, carrying the pain of a thousand rags all at once, and I screamed as the acid burned holes through the skin in my throat. Then, over the top of me, beside the faces of the matron and the nurses I didn’t know, was Nurse Patty. She said, ‘Oh, Justine,’ and I could see she wanted to cry, and so I cried instead, in place of her, and she took my hand and said, ‘Justine, you have to breathe.’
I heard the words outside of me but there was nothing I could do. I was in a battle, holding my breath was the only way to stay alive.
‘Justine, hold my hand, squeeze my hand as hard as you need. Breathe this time.’
I opened my eyes and Nurse Patty said, ‘With me, okay?’ and she took a breath and let it go, so I did too.
I went deep into the heart of the mountain. It didn’t care that I was there. Nobody did. I was in there alone. ‘Aren’t you needed upstairs, Nurse Patricia?’ One of the older nurses said to Nurse Patty.
‘Dr Rogerson said he’d rather I had the experience in the birthing ward, Nurse Undine,’ Nurse Patty answered.
‘Alright then,’ said Nurse Undine as if she knew Nurse Patty had won. ‘Her ankles, please.’
Nurse Patty tied my ankles to steel pedals. ‘I’m sorry, Justine,’ she said softly, keeping her eyes on my face.
Another wave bore down on me.
‘Shhh,’ said Nurse Patty. ‘It will be okay, Justine.’
There were no windows in the room. It was as if the room had left the hospital and was just a room on its own, not part of Yolamundi or Geelong, not belonging to anywhere, just a room with me inside it in a battle. The doctors and the nurses could come and go, while I couldn’t. The pain and me, in a war like the one Pop fought against the Japs. This was what changed him; this was what took the meat from his bones.
Then the shape of the pain changed. ‘Nurse Patty, I need to go to the toilet,’ I told her.
‘You don’t need to go to the toilet,’ said Nurse Patty. She looked excited. ‘It’s the baby.’
‘No, it’s not,’ I said. ‘I need to use the toilet!’ I couldn’t talk anymore. I sat forward and went to the toilet. Then the pushing stopped and I lay back, panting like a dog.
‘That’s it, Justine,’ said Nurse Patty. ‘You’re doing well.’
Nurse Undine gripped my leg. ‘Not yet,’ she said. Nurse Undine placed her hand on my stomach. She leaned in and looked between my legs. She pushed her fingers up between them, and pressed down. ‘She isn’t to push. Wait till I say.’
‘I need to push, Nurse Patty,’ I said. ‘I need to push.’ But the words were broken. It was as if I was being pushed from the inside. I made sounds I’d never made before—screaming and grunting. I didn’t want it. I didn’t want it inside me or outside me. I wanted to be in my keepout. I wanted to drive my river-truck to the sea.
‘Push now,’ said Nurse Undine. ‘Hard as you can.’
Nurse Patty was beside me, looking down between my legs. There was sweat on her face and her cheeks were pink. I held her hand and squeezed when another push came. ‘That’s it,’ said Nurse Patty. ‘That’s it.’
The baby was tearing me as if it held a knife in its teeth. I didn’t want it to come out. I didn’t want to see it or push it.
‘Now again,’ said Nurse Undine. ‘And keep pushing this time, even when you want to stop. One more big one.’
I pushed. The other people in the room moved around like ghosts outside of me. They didn’t count. Only Nurse Patty’s hand in mine counted.
I felt it holding me open, I was prised apart, splitting like my mother before me. It was the breech—first I did it to her, and now it was being done to me, like punishment.
‘I can see the head now,’ said Nurse Undine. ‘The next contraction should see us there.’
I pushed again, the biggest push of my life, and then something rushed from me, wet and slippery as a Murray eel.
Nurse Patty gasped. ‘Justine,’ she said. There was crying in her voice. ‘You did it.’ There were tears in her eyes.
‘What?’ I asked, my voice croaky.
‘The baby is here, you funny thing,’ she said. She put her hand on my forehead.
I lifted my head and saw Nurse Undine holding the outline of a body. I watched as she laid it on a tray.
‘They’re weighing him,’ said Nurse Patty.
I couldn’t see his face, only his outline, his side. I heard crying.
‘It’s a boy,’ said Nurse Patty.
‘Patricia…’ Nurse Undine warned.
‘A boy?’ I said.
‘Yes. Do you want to see him?’
‘Patricia, that’s enough!’ Nurse Undine said.
Did I want to see him? Did I? ‘Yes,’ I said.
Nurse Undine huffed. ‘Look what you’ve started,’ she said to Nurse Patty.
Another wave was coming. Was it more? Was it another one?
‘It’s the placenta,’ said Nurse Undine. What was that? Was it another baby?
‘It’s okay,’ said Nurse Patty. ‘Just the last bit, Justine, then it will all be over. One more push.’ I started to cry. I couldn’t hold on. The baby cried louder than me. It was a boy. ‘Come on, Justine, nearly there.’ I pushed and then something slid from me, smaller than the baby, and at last I was empty. I heard more crying.
‘Can I see him?’ I asked.
Nurse Undine was carrying the baby, wrapped in a white blanket, to a glass box.
‘It will do you no good to see him, dear. And it won’t do him any good either.’
A tall man wearing a white coat came into the room. ‘Nurse, you are needed in ward eight. All hands.’ He spoke quickly.
‘Is it the Smith girl, Dr Rogerson?’ Nurse Undine asked.
Dr Rogerson nodded. ‘I’m afraid so.’
Nurse Undine put the baby into the glass box.
‘Help this one wash up, Patricia,’ she said. ‘Nurse Withers will be back in a moment.’
‘Yes, Nurse Undine,’ said Nurse Patty.
Nurse Undine left, and Nurse Patty and me were alone in the room. ‘Can I see him?’ I asked her.
‘Oh, Justine.’ Nurse Patty chewed at her lip. ‘Nurse Undine is right.’
‘I want to see him,’ I said. I kept my eyes on the baby in the glass box. I had never thought of the baby as a boy or a girl or a person. It had been something growing in me, but not a person.
Nurse Patty shook her head. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘I want to see him,’ I said. ‘Nurse Patty, can I see him?’
Nurse Patty looked towards the door. ‘Oh dear,’ she said.
I tried to stand.
‘You stay there,’ she said, pushing me gently back down.
‘Please, Nurse Patty…’ My voice was worn and quiet.
‘Oh dear, how can I say no?’
She crossed the room to the glass box and she wheeled him to me. He was wrapped in a white blanket. His blue-grey eyes were open. I sat up and leaned down to him. He looked at me and started to cry and I felt where he had been inside me, now
empty. It was as if the whole time he had been there I hadn’t known it—I only knew it now. And now he was out of me in the glass box and when I looked at him I wasn’t as young as before. I had been fourteen, but I was older than that now.
Nurse Patty said, ‘Justine, you are still bleeding.’
I lifted the baby from the box and held him to my chest and I grew even older, as if years were passing. I grew older than Mrs Turning, older than Nurse Withers or the matron, older than my grandmother Lizzy. I was the oldest holding the youngest. I kissed his round cheek and his forehead. I closed my eyes and breathed him in and even though I didn’t have a mother it didn’t matter now because I was one.
‘Justine!’ Nurse Patty held out her hands.
I could’ve kept looking into the baby’s eyes for a long time. I didn’t want or need to stop. He went on behind his eyes, the way Michael Hooper did, as if the eyes were only the surface and by looking into them I could go to a world where there was room. Where I was needed.
‘Justine,’ said Nurse Patty. ‘Come on.’ She put her hands on him.
I said, ‘Can I give him a name?’
‘Oh dear,’ said Nurse Patty again, looking towards the door.
‘Can I?’
Nurse Patty sighed. ‘Oh well, I don’t see the harm…’
‘What should I call him?’
‘Whatever you like,’ she said. She patted my shoulder. Then she looked at the door. ‘Be quick, Justine.’
I didn’t know what to call him. What names were there? What names for boys did I know? I closed my eyes. Black Beauty ran towards Joe Evans. He was the horse’s best friend. Joe never gave up. In the end he said, I knew we’d be together again, Beauty. ‘Can I call him Joe?’
‘Whatever you like, Justine.’
‘Joe Michael?’
‘Yes, you can call him Joe Michael.’
‘Thank you, Nurse Patty,’ I said.
‘That’s no problem,’ she said. She wiped more tears from her cheek. ‘You have to give him back to me, Justine.’
‘Do I, Nurse Patty? Do I have to?’ The baby didn’t belong in a box; he was too new to the world. He belonged with me, the one place he knew.
‘You do.’
‘But…’
‘Justine, you have to give him back.’
‘Alright,’ I said. I held him one more minute, and all the warmth of life was in the hold—there was nothing missing or wanting. It was as if the baby Joe had lit Pop’s fire inside me and made me warm.
‘Justine? Justine, you have to give him back to me now. I am sorry…’
I gave him to her.
Nurse Patty laid the baby back in the glass box then she checked the sheet on my bed. I kept my eyes on the baby in the box; I’d never had anything before, and now I had a baby.
‘Lie down now, Justine. We need to clean up this blood.’ She ran to the door. ‘Dr Rogerson!’ she called. ‘Matron!’
I was in a dream with the baby. Things around him went cloudy. Only he was sharp and clear. I could see his eyes from where I lay. I didn’t care about the bleeding or Nurse Patty moving quickly around me, or Dr Rogerson coming back into the room. I didn’t care when Dr Rogerson cleaned me, looking between my legs; I didn’t care when Nurse Withers took the bloody sheets from under me, or when Nurse Patty left the room. In the dream I was with the baby, with Joe. We were together. It was my job to look after him so he wouldn’t be alone. So he wouldn’t wonder what he had done wrong. In the dream it wasn’t hard. It was easy. It was the right way and I knew it, for the first time.
But then Nurse Undine went to my baby in his box and began to wheel him out of the room. He couldn’t see me anymore and my dream was broken. He was taken away from me. He started to cry as Nurse Undine wheeled him through the door. ‘No, no!’ I cried out.
Nurse Withers rolled me over and put a needle in my backside.
53.
When I next woke I was in a different room. I saw pink roses through the window, growing towards the glass. All the beds were empty except the one beside mine, where a girl lay sleeping. I put my hand on my stomach; it felt soft and empty.
Everything was slow. I heard sounds coming from outside the room, metal on metal, wheels, voices. The room was quiet. I kept listening. I took a breath and let it out slowly, and then I heard him. Not a sound outside me—a sound inside, a crying and calling.
The girl in the bed beside me sat up. ‘When did you have it?’ she asked.
I closed my eyes to see the baby’s face again. His eyes were shining grey like the Yolamundi light, shot through with the blue of sky. There wasn’t an end to them; they kept going, like water. I sat up, awake now.
The girl said, ‘You lost a gallon of blood. That’s two milk bottles. I lost a lot too, but not as much as you—I heard the nurses. You’re lucky you’re still alive. What’s your name?’
I turned my face away. I had to listen for Joe Michael.
‘I’m Candy,’ she said. ‘It’s not my real name, but I like it more than Margaret. I’ll go home tomorrow. Once they can stop the milk from coming.’ She pressed her hands on her chest. ‘It’s disgusting. And it hurts like hell. They’ll give me a pill soon and it will stop like magic. What did you have?’
I didn’t want to talk. I wanted to listen for Joe Michael.
‘I had a boy,’ she said. ‘They told me he’s already got a home. The mother and father were waiting for me to have him, providing everything was normal.’ She sat up in bed and drank from a glass of water. ‘Ten fingers, ten toes.’ She held up her hands, spreading her fingers. ‘I asked Nurse Undies if they’ll ever tell him about me, or will they trick him and say she was the mother, and Nurse Undies said they wouldn’t tell him, that he deserves a good start no matter where he’s come from.’
Candy had a lot to say. I had nothing. Words were in my head, but I couldn’t speak them. He’s already got a home. It was as if I was only understanding now, even though I’d known all along. Mrs Turning said I was slow; was this what she meant? Things were taking time to catch up. Candy knew her baby had a home. What about my baby? I wished I could hold him again. I put my hands to my chest; it didn’t hurt like Candy’s. Did I have milk? I wished I could see my baby. I wished it more than anything. Did somebody else want him? Had they been waiting? Why did Candy know and not me? I closed my eyes to hear his cry; it was still there, calling for me from inside. I had to go to him. I had to find someone to help me.
‘Where is Nurse Patty?’ I asked Candy.
‘Who?’
‘Nurse Patty.’
‘I don’t know any Patties. Is she nice?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Yes, she is.’
‘I only get the mean ones,’ she said. ‘Like Nurse Undies. Or Nurse Withered-up. I wish the milk would stop. It’s awful.’ She squeezed her chest. ‘I wish they’d give me that pill so I can get out of here. I’ve got a job waiting for me. It’s in the business park just outside town. I’ll be answering the phones. It’s a new system; they have twenty phones ringing at the same time. I’ll get my licence soon.’
I could hear Joe crying, calling for me, under the other hospital sounds. Nothing had ever called for me before. Joe wanted me more than anyone. I was his only one, and he was mine. I wished I could be with him. I wished I had Pop’s Mauser. That baby belongs to me, nurse. Give him back.
Nurse Undine came in and looked at the clipboard at the end of my bed. ‘I need to check your pad, Justine,’ she said. She lifted my sheet and checked between my legs. ‘You need to keep changing these, you know. You need to stay clean and dry to prevent infection.’ She tapped a white box of pads that had been sitting beside the bed. ‘Your mother will need to have plenty ready. It goes on for a while. Go to the bathroom now and give yourself a wash with soap and water. You need to do that every day, twice a day. Hot water and soap. Go on.’
I got out of the bed and Nurse Undine showed me to the bathroom. There was a shower with a plastic chair underneath it. I sat down in t
he chair and listened. I could still hear Joe calling me. I wished I could hold him.
When I looked down I saw blood smeared on the white plastic of the chair. But I didn’t want to turn on the shower in case it muffled the sound of Joe’s cries. I had only ever said I love you to Silver. I wished I could say it to the baby, into his ear. I’d say it over and over. I love you, Joe. I love you, Joe. I love you. It didn’t matter what he did or where he went or what happened to him, he’d always know it, because I told him so many times, so deep into his ear that he’d never forget. I love you, Joe. I love you. The words would be a song. I love you I love you I love you, Joe, I love you and the song would never end, it would be under all sounds, all movement, all change, the way his crying was now.
The nurse called through the door, ‘Go on, get the water going. I don’t want to have to come in and do it for you.’
I turned on the tap, and water dripped over me, but I kept my head out for the sound. ‘Joe Michael,’ I whispered. ‘Joe Michael, where are you? Are you still here?’
That night Nurse Patty came to me for the first time since I’d had the baby. Her face was as smooth as ever and she wore a white ribbon in her hair. I sat up straight in the bed. ‘Justine,’ she said. ‘How are you? I wanted to come sooner but Nurse Undine kept me busy.’ She sat down on the side of my bed and looked into my eyes. ‘Are you okay? You did so well.’
‘Where is my baby?’ I asked her.
She frowned. ‘Oh, Justine…’
‘Where is he, Nurse Patty?’
Nurse Patty put her hand on mine. ‘You don’t need to worry about that,’ she said.
‘Did they find a home for him?’
She shook her head. ‘No…no they didn’t. Not yet. But, Justine, I’m not sure that—’
‘So he’s here? He’s still here—in the hospital?’
‘Yes, he is, Justine. He is alive and healthy. You don’t need to worry about a thing.’
He was still here! My baby was still here at St Jude’s! He wasn’t with me in the bed, I couldn’t see his eyes or hold him or smell his skin, I couldn’t sing to him or feed him milk, but he was here, in the building. Breath that had been trapped inside since Nurse Undine took Joe Michael finally left my body. ‘Could you take me to him?’