‘And you expect me to wear one of that stupid cow’s shirts to work, do you?’
‘Well, you said you needed a clean shirt, and sure isn’t that a clean one? I was only trying to help.’
‘Help!’ roared Lucy, losing her cool. ‘By offering me your ex-girlfriend’s clothes? How am I to know she doesn’t come up and stay and that’s her regular drawer? I notice I don’t have a drawer. Your bloody ex-girlfriend does but I don’t. I have to traipse around carrying spare knickers and a toothbrush in my bag. I’m sick of it, Donal. I’m sick of living out of a suitcase,’ Lucy announced dramatically.
‘But we nearly always go back to your place,’ said Donal, looking puzzled. ‘You hardly ever stay here.’
He had a point – they almost always ended up in Lucy’s place, because she preferred it that way and he didn’t care where they were. Having sex in Lucy’s bed rather than his was fine with Donal.
‘Well, I’m here now, and you’re foisting your ex’s clothes on me.’
‘I’m not foisting anything on you. If you want a drawer, take one. Help yourself to any drawer you like but stop shouting – it’s too early for shouting.’
‘Why are you keeping her stuff? If it’s over, throw it out. As a matter of fact, I’m going to do it for you,’ said Lucy, grabbing Mary’s things from the drawer and throwing them into a plastic bag.
‘While you’re cleaning up there, would you mind giving the place a bit of a Hoover and maybe throw on a wash if you have time?’ said Donal, grinning, as he snuggled back under his duvet.
‘Funny? How would you like it if you found my ex’s clothes hanging in my wardrobe?’
‘If he happened to be the same size as me and I needed a shirt, I’d be delighted.’
‘That cow is twice the size of me and I’m the farthest thing from delighted. I don’t like surprises. I don’t like having your past shoved in my face. I’m too old for this crap. I want my own bed and my own shower and my own bloody wardrobe. Here,’ said Lucy, tipping the bag upside-down on Donal’s bed, ‘clean up your own mess.’
Later that afternoon Donal called Lucy for a chat. ‘Howrya?’
‘Busy,’ she said coolly.
‘Just wanted to check what that scene was earlier – I’m not very good at reading women’s minds. Were you pissed off about Mary’s shirts being in the drawer? About me thinking Mary’s shirts would fit you and you thinking you’re much thinner than her? Or about you not having a drawer in my wardrobe? If it’s because the shirts were there, I’ve thrown them out. If it’s because I thought they’d fit you, well, I’m not very good at women’s clothes and judging sizes, and if it’s a drawer you want, you can have one, in fact you can have two. I just want to be clear which issue I’m dealing with. Or did I miss the point entirely, and were you doing that thing where women pick fights about something when they’re actually pissed off about something completely different?’
Lucy smiled despite herself.
‘Lucy? Are you there?’
‘Yes. Look, I was just tired and hung-over and I was annoyed to find Mary’s stuff still in the drawer. It felt like I was a stranger in your house or something. All this spending the night in each other’s places is becoming a drag. Not having our stuff in the same place is just hassle, really,’ said Lucy, dropping large hints without actually asking him to move in.
She had been thinking about it all day. They spent almost every night together – mostly in her place – it would be so much easier to move in together. It would mean Donal wouldn’t have to rush home to get changed for training and she wouldn’t have to go to work in a stained shirt, and it’d be nice to wake up together every day. She really liked Donal. Truth be told, she was falling in love with him, but she wouldn’t ask him to move in with her. It seemed too keen, too pushy.
‘Ah, sure it’s not so bad. I’ll buy you a toothbrush today and if you tell me what size you are I’ll get you a shirt to hang up in the wardrobe too. How about that?’
‘Fine. I have to go,’ said Lucy, raging with him for missing the point.
An hour later, a huge package arrived at Lucy’s office. It was one of the large wooden drawers from Donal’s wardrobe tied in a red ribbon with an envelope taped to the inside. She opened the envelope and a key fell out. The note said, ‘Subtlety was never your strong point. I’d love you to live with me.’
She called him. ‘Hi.’
‘You got it, then?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, are we moving in or what?’
‘Only if you move into my place. It’s much nicer.’
‘I can’t, Lucy. Annie has her room all done up in my place. It’s the only home she knows and I don’t want to uproot her again.’
‘Of course,’ said Lucy. Damn, she hadn’t thought of that. She couldn’t force the issue: Donal’s little niece needed stability. She’d have to move into Donal’s house. ‘I understand, but I’m getting decorators in. Your place needs serious work.’
‘That’s fine with me. I’ll see you later. We’ll ring Annie at school tonight to tell her. She’ll be thrilled.’
She’s not the only one, thought Lucy, as she beamed out the window, flipping the key in her hand. Finally, a proper boyfriend, one who understood her and wanted to live with her!
When she called over to her new home later that evening, they phoned Annie at her boarding-school. Donal told her the good news and Lucy could hear her screaming on the phone. But they weren’t happy screams: she was screaming blue murder.
‘No way,’ she roared. ‘She’s not moving into my house. That’s our house, Donal, it’s for you and me and no one else. I don’t want her moving in and changing everything. You’ll never have time for me any more. It’s not fair. It’s not what you promised. You said it’d just be you and me after Mum and Dad died. I’ll kill myself if she moves in, I swear I will. I don’t want her in my house. I hate her. I hate you. You’ll get married and have babies and then I’ll be ignored.’
‘Jesus, Annie, calm down. I’m not getting married and I’m not having any babies. Lucy is just going to move in is all. She stays almost every night anyway. It’ll make no difference to you. You got on great with her when you met. I thought you’d be delighted.’
‘Well, you were wrong. I’m not. I don’t want her in my house. I don’t want anyone else in my house. You’ll abandon me just like Mum and Dad, I know you will,’ screamed the hysterical Annie.
Lucy shrank back into the couch. Christ, Little Orphan Annie had a big pair of lungs for one so young. She, too, had thought she’d be pleased. They had got on well when they met. She’d thought the kid liked her, but now she was causing havoc.
‘Come on now, Annie, calm down, nothing will change, I promise. I’ll always put you first, you know that. Have I ever let you down? Well, have I?’
Put her first? Lucy didn’t like the sound of that. She felt sorry for the child being orphaned and all, but she didn’t want to play second fiddle to some hormonal brat who apparently hated her.
‘No,’ admitted Annie grumpily.
‘And I don’t intend to start now. Lucy’s going to move in for a month or two and we’ll see how it goes. I’m sure we’ll all get on famously. When you come home in a few weeks we’ll go out and talk about it. If it doesn’t work out Lucy will move out,’ said Donal, winking at Lucy in an effort to reassure her. ‘This is your home first and foremost, you know that, kiddo. Come on now, calm down, it’ll all work out.’
‘Fine, she can move out when I come home, then. Tell her not to unpack. She’s not staying, and if she dares go into my room, I’ll kill her.’
‘OK, I’ll give you a call on Saturday,’ said Donal, desperately trying to get off the phone before any more damage could be done.
‘That went well, I thought,’ said Lucy.
‘She’s a bit highly strung. She’s terrified I’ll have no time for her now I’ve you here. She’s never had to share me with anyone before. You’re my first official lodger,’ sai
d Donal, smiling. ‘Don’t worry, she’ll come round.’
He didn’t sound convinced and Lucy knew how awful teenage girls could be. Suddenly their cosy cohabitation looked distinctly rocky.
Lucy finished telling me the story and took a slug of wine. She looked pretty shaken. On the one hand she was chuffed that she and Donal were getting so serious, but she hadn’t planned for the sweet Annie to turn into such a monster.
‘Just ignore her,’ I said. ‘She’s a mixed-up kid who’s scared that Donal will stop paying her attention if you move in. She doesn’t mean it, she’d be jealous of anyone he loved. I’m sure it’ll be fine. You’ll just have to be super-nice step-girlfriend-surrogate-aunt-thingy. How often does she get out of school?’
‘One weekend in six.’
‘Well, that’s not so bad. On those weekends you can come and stay with us.’
‘Thanks. I’m afraid I might be more Cruella de Vil than Mary Poppins. I’m not very good with kids. At least if it was you, you’ve had experience dealing with a younger sister.’
‘You can borrow Babs any time. She’d try the patience of a saint. I’ll send her over to you tomorrow for some practice. Annie will seem like Pollyanna after Babs.’
32
I woke up in the recovery room after the laparoscopy with Mr Reynolds smiling down at me. I felt wonderful. If this was what class-A drugs were like, I was definitely a candidate for drug addiction. I felt as if I was floating and had the urge to laugh loudly. Mr Reynolds said that the procedure had gone very well and that nothing unusual had been discovered. I appeared to be perfectly ‘normal’ inside. He went off to tell James I was awake, while a nurse took my blood pressure, pulse and temperature.
Two hours later I was back home in bed with James fussing around me. He made me cups of tea and filled hot-water bottles and brought me magazines and books and kept plumping my pillows. The sight of me being wheeled off in my backless gown had obviously shaken him. What might have been only a small procedure was still an operation and James was upset by it. ‘How do you feel now?’ he asked me, for the millionth time.
‘I’m fine, James, honestly. Sit down and relax. You, on the other hand, look like you could do with a drink.’
He smiled. ‘Sorry, darling. Seeing you being carted off to theatre gave me a bit of a fright. I hate you having to go through all this. It’s so bloody unfair.’
‘Yeah, I know.’ I sighed. ‘And, to be honest, I’m disappointed they didn’t find anything. I wish they had – then at least they could have fixed it and we’d know why I haven’t been able to get pregnant. Now we’re just back to square one again. I hate the fact that it’s all so vague and inconclusive. Anyway, it looks like IVF now.’
‘We don’t have to do this, you know,’ said James, stroking my hair. ‘We could just take some time out, go on hols and try to forget about it. Give you a rest.’
‘No, I want to keep going,’ I said. ‘I’m on a roll now. I’m a bit scared of IVF, but loads of women go through it and have babies, so it’s worth a shot.’
‘But what if it doesn’t work?’ said James. ‘What then? Do we just keep trying?’
‘I don’t know. I’m happy to give it one shot, but I’m not sure if I want to do it loads of times.’
‘Are you sure you want to go ahead with it?’ he asked again, his face full of concern.
‘Yes. It’s worth trying but if it doesn’t work I think we should consider adoption. I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately and I think it would be a good option.’
James didn’t say anything.
‘What do you think?’ I pushed.
‘I think we should take one step at a time. Adoption can be tricky.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, it’s not your own flesh and blood. It’s someone else’s child and you don’t know what those people are like. The child could be damaged in some way.’
‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, look at Mia Farrow and all her lovely children. They always seem really happy in the pictures you see of them.’
James looked at me in shock. ‘I hardly think Mia and her brood are the ideal family. Didn’t Woody end up having sex with his adopted daughter? It’s not exactly a normal family unit.’
‘OK, well, maybe that was a bad example, but look at, uhm …’ Damn, I couldn’t think of anyone – my brain was still fuzzy from the anaesthetic. ‘I can’t think of them now but there are loads of successful people who were adopted and loved and went on to achieve great things. I’ll think of them in a minute,’ I said, racking my brains to come up with some names.
‘Look, get some rest. You’ve just had an operation and you need to take it easy. Call me if you need anything,’ said James, kissing my forehead as he switched off the light. The conversation was over. I’d think of some adoptees tomorrow, I thought, as I fell into a deep sleep.
Two weeks later we were back in Mr Reynolds’s office. He went over the findings – or lack thereof – of the laparoscopy, and told me all my bits were essentially in the right place. I had ‘unexplained infertility’. There was no reason for me not to get pregnant, except for the small fact that, despite my best efforts and some fairly strong drugs, I couldn’t seem to. I was a prime candidate for IVF, said Mr Reynolds. My chances of success were high.
‘What exactly is the rate of success?’ asked my now alert and professional note-taking husband.
‘The internationally accepted success rate of IVF is seventeen per cent per treatment cycle,’ said Mr Reynolds. ‘However, with youth and health on your side, your chances are much higher. I would say you have a twenty-five per cent chance of conceiving first time. This can be considerably higher if you’re having acupuncture in conjunction with the treatment. I hope you’ll keep up the acupuncture, Emma.’
I nodded. Of course I’d keep it up. It was the only part of the process I didn’t dread.
‘I do, however, have to warn you that it is expensive and there are risks involved.’
‘How expensive?’ I asked.
‘You’re looking at about six thousand euro per treatment.’
‘What risks?’ asked James.
‘Fertility treatment can result in an increased risk of multiple pregnancies. Ectopic pregnancies are twice as common in IVF pregnancies and ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome can occur, but only in very rare cases. However, these are all very unlikely outcomes,’ said Mr Reynolds, smiling at us.
James looked at me and asked me if I was sure I wanted to go ahead with it. I nodded. It was too late to back down now. I wanted to give this a go. I was going to give it my best shot. I wanted a baby.
‘What exactly happens?’ I asked. ‘Is it really painful?’
Unfortunately I had been on the Internet chat-room sites and had read some pretty dire reports about the pain and emotional trauma of IVF. I had also read of the miracle babies, but as usual had fixated on the pain and stress.
‘We’ll give you drugs to stimulate your ovaries into producing more eggs, not dissimilar to the drugs you’ve been on. These will need to be injected – which is where your husband comes in. Once the drugs kick in and the eggs mature, we’ll retrieve them and fertilize the good ones in a test tube with your husband’s sperm and then implant them in the womb.’
‘But how do you get the eggs out?’ I asked, as James, on learning he had to inject me, had gone very quiet.
‘Once the eggs are mature we’ll begin the retrieval. We’ll put you to sleep and I’ll insert an ultrasound probe, with a fine hollow needle attached to it, into your vagina. Under ultrasound guidance, the needle is then advanced from the vaginal wall, punctures the back of the vagina entering each follicle and sucking out the fluid, which contains the egg …’
My insides began to squirm at the thought of what lay ahead. Jesus Christ – puncturing? Did he actually just say puncturing and then follow it with sucking? And not even bat an eyelid? Were all doctors just sadists in white coats?
‘This fluid will be given to the
embryologist, Dr Bradley, who will examine it under a microscope and count the eggs. When all the follicles are emptied you’ll be taken to the recovery room to rest. The whole procedure takes about forty minutes and you’ll be out for the count so you won’t feel a thing.’
I was speechless. The mere description of it all had left me reeling. I glanced at James, who was looking decidedly peaky. Dr Reynolds appeared oblivious to our discomfort and went on to describe the procedure for the embryo transfer. I had to have a full bladder; a speculum would be inserted to clean the cervix. A catheter was to be placed through the cervix into the lower segment of the uterus. A fine plastic catheter into which the embryologist had transferred the embryos would then be placed through the outer transfer catheter and advanced near the top of the uterus. Once the placement was correct, the embryos would be expelled from the catheter and inserted into the uterus.
‘And then we let nature take its course,’ said Mr Reynolds, having the gall to smile at us again as we sat white-faced with shock.
I tried to swallow but my throat was dry. ‘Am I under general anaesthetic for the embryo transfer?’ I croaked.
‘No, there’s no need. It’s very straightforward. We can offer a mild sedative if you like. Some of my patients take Valium. It’s up to you.’
‘Put me down for the maximum dose,’ I said.
Mr Reynolds then gave us a fact sheet about IVF, prescriptions for all the drugs I needed, and made an appointment with the nurse to show James how to inject me with the hormones. He recommended we wait until my next cycle to give my body a rest after the laparoscopy.
Six weeks later we were in the bathroom at home, and after an hour of painstaking measuring of the vials, analysing the needles and re-rereading of the instructions, James had finally filled the syringe and was now aiming the needle at my thigh. His hands were shaking and sweat was forming rapidly on his brow.
‘Ouch. What the hell are you doing?’ I snapped, as he hit me on the thigh with his free hand.
‘Flicking the area to numb it before I inject,’ he said, pointing at the instruction leaflet on the floor to defend his actions.
The Baby Trail Page 23