by Karin Baine
Only back then, with her rose-tinted spectacles on, she hadn’t predicted that she’d be awake the night before going back to work, doing hourly feeds because Morgan wouldn’t settle. She hadn’t expected that the very second she’d decided to strap Morgan into the car for her commute to work Morgan would have an almighty nappy explosion and would need to be taken back inside the house to be bathed and have everything changed.
Nor had she forecast that she would get caught in an endless traffic jam, tapping her fingers impatiently on the wheel as she glanced at the London Grace Hospital—so temptingly close, but unattainable—as she sat bumper to bumper between a four-wheel drive and a large white delivery van, listening to people sounding their horns. She was wincing with each one, hoping that the noise wouldn’t wake her daughter, who was finally—thankfully—asleep.
Beside her on the passenger seat her mobile phone trilled with a message, and as the traffic wasn’t moving she decided to check her hands-free device.
It was Kelly.
Where are you? X
She couldn’t respond. Not behind the wheel. Even if she was stuck in traffic. She’d seen enough evidence of what happened to people when they drove and texted. The cars might move at any moment. She could be texting and have someone rear-end her and give her whiplash as well as a late mark for her first day.
Not only had she to find a space and park the car, she also had to get Morgan to the hospital crèche.
An event she’d been worrying about for weeks.
It had seemed such a simple thing when she’d first planned it—I’ll just put the baby in the crèche. But what if her baby didn’t like it? What if she screamed the place down? What if she clung to her mother and refused to let go?
She’d never left Morgan alone with a friend, let alone in a crèche for ten hours a day. Eric had seen to it that she’d lost touch with most of her friends. Had isolated her until no one was left. So that when she had walked away, when she had broken free, she’d felt so ashamed about what she’d allowed to happen she’d felt she couldn’t call anyone.
It had just been her and Morgan. And that had been enough. Till now.
Snakes of anticipation coiled in her stomach at the thought of leaving her daughter, and she was just contemplating sounding her own horn when the traffic finally began to move and she could make the turning into the hospital car park. Free, she zoomed up to the barrier, wound down her window to let in the mixed aroma of exhaust fumes and recent rain, swiped her card over the scanner and watched the barrier slowly rise.
For the first time ever she could take advantage of the parent and child spaces on the ground floor near the lift, and she pulled into an empty space. ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you...’ she muttered to any car park god there might be, and got out of the car, opening up the boot to assemble the buggy.
She got Morgan into it in record time, and without tears, and headed on over to the lift.
As the lift slowly took her up to the floor she needed she contemplated what it would be like to work a shift without Jen.
Jen had been a recent friend. But an amazing one. An unexpected treasure Brooke had located when she’d first started working at the London Grace. At the time she had still been with Eric, but she’d been having serious doubts, starting to be sure that she would have to walk away from him, but struggling with her conscience about the best way to do it with her pride still intact.
Her mood had been low and pensive as she’d stood in the staff room one day, dunking a tea bag over and over. In had walked a woman with a bright streak of pink in her short blonde hair—a shade of pink that had matched the stethoscope draped around her neck.
She’d taken one look at Brooke, walked right up to her, put her arm around Brooke’s shoulder and said, ‘Whoever he is, dump him. No man should make you look like that!’
It had been the beginning of a beautiful friendship, and when Brooke had dumped Eric, and then found out a few weeks later that she was pregnant and Eric wanted nothing to do with her or the baby, Jen had been the one who had picked her up, dusted her down and taken her to a show where there’d been masses of gyrating male strippers and lots and lots of hot, writhing, perfectly muscled flesh.
Brooke smiled as she recalled that night. Jen had been an absolute diamond. Rough-cut, maybe, but still one of a kind. And when Jen had discovered that she too was pregnant, and that they had due dates within days of each other that had just solidified their friendship all the more.
Jen’s husband Matt had been in the army medical corps, and hardly ever at home, so she and Jen had grown their babies together, comparing bump sizes and ankle swellings and seeing who could hold their pee the longest before having to wobble off to the bathroom.
But I don’t have Jen to pick me up any more. No one to pick me up if the day turns out to be the biggest mistake of my entire life.
As the lift pinged open and Brooke began striding down the long corridor that would take her to the hospital crèche she tried not to go over that phone call once again. When Kelly had called to let her know that Jen had died during the birth—complications from eclampsia.
At the time she herself had just delivered Morgan. Had been home for just three days and struggling to get her daughter to latch on. Frustration had been building and the sound of the phone had been a welcome distraction. A few moments to gather herself and calm down. Contact from the outside world.
And then...
She swallowed back tears. She could not cry today. It was stressful enough without going over Jen’s death all the time. Life moved on. You couldn’t stop its inexorable march. Jen was dead. Brooke was alone. Again. She was back at work. Late. She needed to get a move on or she’d have a cranky boss to deal with too.
She buzzed at the door and a staff member let her in.
‘I’ve brought Morgan Bailey. It’s her first day...’ She tried to sound braver and more together than she really felt.
The crèche nurse wore a bright tabard decorated in a multitude of teddy bears, with a name badge that said ‘Daisy’. Like the flower, she seemed bright and sunny, as if her face had a permanent smile upon it.
Behind her, Brooke could see children playing in a small ball pit, others daubing painted handprints onto a long strip of what looked like wallpaper, others at a table drawing, another group listening to a story. Beyond was another door, labelled ‘Baby Room’, and as she looked the door opened and a tall man with a military demeanour stepped out.
But she had no time to concentrate on him—despite the fact that some tired, exhausted part of her sex-starved brain still worked and had registered how attractive he was. The bossier part of her brain—the exhausted, sleep-deprived, worried-about-being-late part—overrode all other messages.
She unbuckled Morgan from the buggy and lifted her out. ‘She’s been up most of the night, I’m afraid, so she might be a little grumpy. There are bottles in the bag...’ she unhooked the baby bag from the handles of the buggy and handed it over ‘...with expressed milk. I’ve labelled them with her name, so you can give her the right ones. There’s a teddy in the bag, that’s her favourite—Mr Cuddles. She likes to sleep with it. You usually have to wind her twice before she’ll go to sleep, and if you sing her “Baa-Baa Black Sheep” she’ll cry, so please don’t do that. And...and...’
She couldn’t help it. The tears that had been stinging the backs of her eyes now readily began to fall. The moment of having to hand her daughter over was too much. Her little girl had been the one to keep her together these past few months. She was all she had, and now...
Morgan, sensing her mother’s distress, began to cry, and now Brooke was feeling worse about leaving her baby. She stood there clutching her daughter, hiccupping her way through her own tears, as if giving her up to the crèche meant certain death.
I can’t do this! I don’t need to work, do
I? I could wait a little longer, take some more time off. I—
Daisy reached forward to take the crying Morgan. ‘We’ll be fine—don’t worry. Have you got the crèche app on your phone?’
The hospital crèche had developed its own app, so that parents could click in at any time during the day and receive updates about their child—whether they’d slept, when they’d eaten or had a bottle, what the child was playing with. There was even an option to access the crèche’s webcam.
Grateful for the fact that Daisy was ignoring Brooke’s embarrassing tears, she tried to breathe. Sucking in a breath and dragging a tissue from her pocket to wipe her nose, Brooke nodded. ‘Yes.’
Daisy was still smiling and bobbing up and down as she gently swayed Morgan, trying to soothe her. ‘You go off to work, then, Mummy. Don’t worry about us.’
Morgan looked sickeningly distressed to be in a stranger’s arms, which was disconcerting for her mother. ‘I’ve never left her before. You’ll call me if there’s any problem?’
‘Of course we will.’
‘Anything at all?’
Daisy nodded, but as Brooke opened her mouth to ask another question she felt a firm hand upon her arm. The man she’d seen before looked down at her with intense blue eyes and said, ‘It’s best to just walk away. Don’t look back.’
Brooke looked up at him hopefully, gratefully, with her ugly crying face still at full throttle, dabbing at her tears and trying to hold on to his words of wisdom. Had he done this, then? Did he know what he was talking about? He’d just come out of the Baby Room, so perhaps he’d just dropped off his own child?
‘Really?’
‘Really. Come on.’
He had a stern, no-nonsense tone to his voice. A voice that was used to issuing commands and having them obeyed without question. It was clear he expected the same from her. He gently draped his hands over hers, forcing her fingers to release the death grip she’d had on the buggy since letting go of her daughter, then took the buggy from her and parked it in the buggy bay. With a guiding hand in the small of her back, he purposefully escorted her to the exit.
Brooke was desperate to turn around and make sure Morgan was okay. She could still hear her baby wailing. Her daughter needed her. But the man blocked her view and ushered her out through the door and into the corridor like an expert collie dog herding a reluctant sheep.
‘But I need to—’
He held up his hand for silence. ‘No. You don’t.’
Brooke stepped away and looked him up and down, irritated that he thought he knew what she needed. Sniffing desperately and wiping her nose with the tissue, she wondered just who this man was, anyway. She’d never seen him before at the hospital. But, then again, she’d never had reason to come to the crèche before and the hospital was a big place. He might work anywhere. He might be a new employee.
Wiping away the last of her tears, she stared up at him. He was a good head taller than she. With very short dark blond hair, longer on top. Piercing blue eyes. Trim. Oozing strength and quiet, confident dominance. That was something that usually rubbed her up the wrong way. Eric had been overbearing. Had tried to control her. It was the kind of thing to send up the warning flags.
‘Look, I appreciate that you’re trying to help me, but—’
‘If they sense weakness it makes them more upset.’
She wiped her nose again for good measure, sure it was now probably as red as strawberry jelly. ‘The babies?’
He gave one curt nod.
‘She’s five months old. The only thing she senses is hunger, tiredness and whether she’s wet or not.’
‘You’d be surprised.’ He began to walk away.
Narrowing her eyes, Brooke followed after him. He was going in her direction anyway. She needed the lift again, to go down a couple of floors to A&E.
She pulled her mobile from her pocket to check the time.
Damn it!
The man got into the lift ahead of her. ‘Which floor?’
‘Ground level.’ She noticed he’d pressed the ‘G’ button, but no other. Frowning, she realised that he must work on her floor. He might work anywhere, though—A&E, the Medical Assessment Unit, Nuclear Medicine, Radiology...
He was looking at her. Looking her up and down. And, sickeningly, she noticed his gaze appeared to be centred on her chest. Men! Feeling her cheeks heat, she stared back at him, trying to make him lift his gaze a good few inches upwards, towards her face.
‘Is there a problem?’
‘You...er...might want to get out of those clothes.’
‘Excuse me?’ He had some front! He’d only just met her!
What is it with men? They do you one tiny favour and suddenly expect you to drop your—
‘You’ve got milk on your blouse, something questionable on your skirt, and you appear to be...’ he smiled and looked away, as if he was preserving her modesty ‘...leaking.’
Leaking? Brooke looked down at herself and instantly felt her cheeks flame with heat. She was indeed in a state. Her boobs had leaked milk—no doubt due to Morgan’s cries—she had a smear of what might possibly be poo at the top of her thigh from the earlier explosion, and there was indeed a smelly, sour milk stain, crusting away on her shoulder.
‘Oh, God...’
She reached into her handbag for wipes, but she didn’t have any. They were all in the nappy bag that she’d left with Daisy down in the crèche. She couldn’t work looking like this! She’d have to put some scrubs on. Making her even more late!
The lift doors pinged open and both she and the military man stepped out and turned left towards A&E. Frowning, Brooke looked at him once again, noting his proud bearing, his march rather than stride, and the fact that they were both most definitely heading towards the same department.
‘Do you work in A&E?’ she asked, curious.
Had she embarrassed herself in front of a new work colleague? Staff did come and go frequently. It was a pressured environment—stressful. Some people couldn’t hack it. But Brooke could. She loved it there.
‘I do.’
‘I work there, too.’
He stopped in his tracks immediately and looked at her, this time with a single raised eyebrow. ‘This is your first day back after maternity leave?’
How did he know that? Unless her friends had mentioned it to him... ‘Yes.’
His eyes widened. ‘You’re Dr Bailey?’
She nodded, surprised that he knew her name. ‘Yes. Who are you?’
He didn’t answer right away, and it took him a moment before he held out his hand. ‘Major Matt Galloway. Jen’s husband.’
She was unaware that her mouth had dropped open. But she numbly reached forward and shook his hand anyway.
She’d meant to call. She’d meant to. Only... Life had got in the way and she’d been struggling to cope herself. Life was harder and busier than she’d suspected it would be with a baby, and she was doing everything alone. Jen’s death three days after she’d given birth to Morgan had made her postnatal blues a lot worse and she’d been grieving herself.
Trying to get herself together just to get dressed and out of the house had seemed an insurmountable task—and then there was the fact that she’d never met Jen’s husband. She’d thought it might be awkward if she just turned up at their house on the other side of London. So she’d put it off and put it off, and when finally she’d thought that she really ought to go and offer her condolences and help so much time had passed she’d just felt that it wouldn’t be right.
It had made her feel incredibly guilty, and now the last person she’d expected to run into at work was Jen’s widower.
Had he just dropped off Lily?
She hadn’t even been able to make it to Jen’s funeral on time. She’d misjudged how long it would take
her to get ready and out of the house, and when she’d got there the funeral had already started. She’d slipped into the back of the church and huddled in a pew at the back. Then—naturally—Morgan had begun crying and, not wishing to disturb the service, she’d crept back out. The only thing that would settle her daughter was being pushed in her pram, so she’d gone for a walk.
Returning to the church long after the service had finished she had stood looking down at Jen’s grave, tears dripping down her cheeks. Feeling so alone.
She’d thought maybe that Jen would have forgiven her for being late. It was the kind of person she’d been.
But Matt...? She had no idea how he’d feel. All she knew from Jen was that he was a stickler for rules and regulations.
‘Erm...hello.’ She managed a smile, aware now that he had seen her at her worst. ‘I didn’t expect to see you here.’
‘I work here.’
He did?
‘I’ve taken up Jen’s post. I needed to be working after—’ He stopped talking suddenly, his eyes darkening, and looked away.
‘I’m so sorry for your loss. I did make it to the funeral. And I tried to stay, but...’
‘But your baby started to cry and you took her outside.’
‘You noticed?’
He nodded, looking at her strangely. ‘I heard.’
‘I tried to make it back, but by the time she’d settled you’d all gone.’
‘That’s okay. I imagine you had your hands full.’
‘Well, I’m sure you did, too. How are things with the baby? It’s Lily, isn’t it?’
‘Yes. They’re difficult. She’s teething. Not sleeping very well.’
Morgan had just started teething too, so Brooke knew the misery of that. ‘It gets easier, they say. Let’s hang on to that.’
He continued to look at her carefully. ‘We should show our faces, seeing as we’re both late.’
She nodded. ‘Yes—yes, you’re right. Don’t want to anger the boss on the first day.’
‘You haven’t angered me.’