There were a couple of gulps of air and more than a hint of the melodramatics when Milly raised up both hands before lowering them slowly with palms down as she released a long, slow breath. ‘OK, I’m fine. I just … I just love him, Mum. He’s my brother and I love him and I don’t care what I get for Christmas now because this is the best present ever!’
Helen did her best to ignore the hurt. She sighed dramatically and said, ‘And there I was thinking you could come back into town with me so I can resume my Christmas shopping. Instead of hiding your presents this year, I thought you might want to help pick them – unless you want a surprise?’
Milly gave her a knowing look. ‘Not your kind of surprises, Mother.’
‘OK then, and maybe afterwards we can call in to see Julia and Paul,’ said Helen, trying not to think about the cocktails she had been planning with Phoebe, which would go down a treat right now.
‘I can show them the photos of the baby, look,’ Milly replied, taking her phone from her pocket.
Helen had no option but to look and she wrinkled her nose. ‘You’ve got to admit, newborn babies are pretty ugly.’
Milly rolled her eyes. ‘Muuummm,’ she said in one lyrical note.
‘OK, he’s gorgeous, I’ll admit it but can you do me a favour? Let’s not shove this under Julia’s nose, or Paul’s for that matter. You know how much they want a baby of their own and even though it’s wonderful news and everyone’s happy for John and Eva and you, it’s still tough to hear when someone else gets the one thing you want more than anything else.’
Milly was looking at the photo of her brother again and held the phone as if the baby were still in her arms. ‘Understood,’ she said.
‘Good girl, now come on, sister Milly. We need to hit the shops before everything’s sold out.’
Leaving the hospital, Helen felt an unexpected sense of emptiness and again her thoughts turned to Julia. Her friend wasn’t the only one capable of feeling broody and at least Julia was trying for a baby whereas it was going to take another Christmas miracle for Helen to conceive a child.
As these desires wrapped around Helen’s chest and pressed against her aching heart, Milly was wrapped up in her own thoughts and completely forgot that she was too old to hold her mum’s hand. Never was it more noticeable how fast her daughter was growing up than when she held her hand. Milly was no longer reaching up, and they both had to twist their arms to match each other’s height. It was still a lovely feeling and one she knew she should appreciate more. This was what Julia was missing and little wonder she got so mad when Helen started complaining. This sudden epiphany did have a downside, and as they headed into town, Helen had a feeling that Milly was going to get all the Christmas wishes her credit card would allow.
When Julia had read the text from Helen proposing to call in that afternoon with Milly, she had been expecting the worst. Milly was supposed to be at her dad’s so she warned Paul that they may have to intervene once more.
‘You two look in need of something to revive your energy levels,’ she said brightly when they arrived laden with shopping bags. ‘And fortunately for you, I’ve been baking.’
Milly’s eyes lit up. ‘Chocolate cake?’
Julia lifted up the skirt of her apron, which was covered in dark chocolatey smears and a dusting of icing sugar for good measure. ‘What gave it away?’
‘Great, I’m starving!’
‘I just hope Paul hasn’t eaten it all.’
‘I heard that.’ Paul had appeared from the kitchen and raised an eyebrow at Milly. ‘Hello, trouble,’ he said and then turned to Helen. ‘Hello, double trouble.’
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ Helen said primly.
When the two shared a look that Julia couldn’t interpret she felt unnerved. ‘What? What am I missing?’
‘Nothing,’ chorused Paul and Helen.
Their open smiles suggested that whatever it was, it didn’t deserve the bad thoughts that had briefly invaded Julia’s mind and she silently admonished herself for letting her growing sense of insecurity get the better of her. Her inability to produce a baby for her husband was slowly turning her into someone she didn’t recognize any more.
‘You didn’t mind us calling around, did you?’ Helen asked when Milly had disappeared into the kitchen with Paul. ‘Not frantically wrapping up last-minute Christmas presents?’
‘Unlike you,’ Julia said, cocking her head towards the mountain of shopping bags Helen had dumped in her previously uncluttered hallway, ‘I had Christmas boxed off at the end of November.’
‘You missed some good bargains then,’ Helen answered smartly.
Julia caught herself before launching into a lecture about being more organized. It wasn’t simply the difference in their personalities that meant Julia was the more prepared of the two. They had distinctly different lifestyles too; where one needed more hours in the day, the other had both time and love to spare. You only had to compare their homes to spot the differences. Unlike the homely chaos that greeted visitors to Helen’s home, the house Julia and Paul had moved into a year before they married was all clean lines and understated style. The sum total of Julia’s Christmas decorations amounted to a handmade wreath on the front door, the requisite tree which wouldn’t look out of place in a department store window, and a lush garland of holly and ivy draped over the mantelpiece with twinkling crimson lights that gave a gentle, sophisticated nod to the season. There were no garish strips of tinsel, tacky dancing Santas or musty handmade decorations like the ones Milly insisted on putting up each year, some of which Julia had helped her rescue from the bin last January when Helen had tried to throw them out.
‘Come on,’ Julia said and was about to lead her friend into the kitchen when Helen put a hand on her shoulder to stop her. From the kitchen, they could hear Milly’s excited chatter and while it was impossible to follow the one-way, high-speed conversation, the word ‘baby’ was being mentioned often enough to forewarn Julia. She braced herself for the news, and to her shame felt a twinge of disappointment that her friend’s visit wasn’t to give Milly another dose of her motherly advice after all.
‘Eva had the baby,’ Helen said softly.
Julia let her head drop forward. ‘Oh,’ she said simply.
Helen squeezed her shoulder and by some small miracle, when Julia lifted up her chin there was a smile on her face. ‘Are they both well?’
Nodding, Helen said, ‘I wanted to tell you in person although …’ Her eyes were drawn in the direction of her daughter’s voice. ‘I hadn’t expected Milly to get so excited.’
‘I’m fine, Helen, and it was nice of you to think of me, but I’m not so wrapped up in my own world that I can’t be happy for someone else.’
‘Nice speech,’ Helen sniffed. ‘Shame I don’t believe it – and if it helps, I’m feeling a bit shitty about it too.’
The comment took Julia by surprise and she was about to ask her what she meant but Helen was already pushing her towards the kitchen. Unlike Julia, her friend wasn’t going to find catharsis by talking through her issues. She preferred distraction.
‘Come on, I want cake,’ Helen said.
There was still enough mess to prove that Julia had indeed made a cake from scratch and not simply put a shop-bought one on a plate and dusted the counter with icing sugar to suggest otherwise – as Helen had been known to do. The only deceit in Julia’s kitchen was that she’d had no intention of baking that day until Helen had sent the text message.
‘The kettle’s on,’ Paul said to Julia.
She held his gaze and wouldn’t have been surprised if there had been an audible buzz to trace the telepathic messages streaming between them. After the drunken debacle at the Elephant, Julia and Paul had settled their differences and there had been no acting involved when they had presented themselves as a united front during their consultation with the fertility specialist earlier that week. They hadn’t expected to be given answers there and then, nor had they received them, so although s
he and Paul were now speaking to each other and living for the moment, their plans for the future were still a sensitive issue and one to be avoided. They relied on non-verbal messages to understand how the other was feeling and they were becoming quite adept. When he blinked, she knew he was asking if she was all right, and her pursed lips let him know that she was holding up. Julia had had worse days.
Oblivious to it all, Milly said, ‘Did Mum tell you, Julia? Eva had the baby this morning and they’ve called him Ollie.’
‘Oliver,’ Helen corrected.
Milly huffed. ‘Well, I’m calling him Ollie – and probably other things too when he starts being a proper annoying boy. But he’s so tiny and I was allowed to hold him,’ she said to Julia. ‘I think he’s just so perfect with tiny, tiny fingers, but Mum says he’s ugly.’
Julia turned to Helen. ‘You’ve seen him?’
‘Only a photo.’
‘Here, look,’ Milly said.
It wasn’t only Julia who tensed, but Paul and Helen too as Milly turned her mobile towards her. There was a blur of pink flesh and blue blanket but Julia’s focus fell short of the screen and she concentrated on the impassable space between herself and the newborn.
‘He’s lovely,’ she said.
‘Hey, why don’t we go into the living room, Milly?’ Paul asked. ‘I was about to watch Elf if you’re interested?’
Once Julia had handed out generous slices of cake, Paul disappeared with Milly while she and Helen sat down at the kitchen table. Facing each other with their elbows resting on the table and their hands wrapped around mugs of coffee, there was no escaping each other’s scrutiny and it was Helen who beat Julia to the first question.
‘Are you OK?’
‘I’m happy for John and Eva, although I might hate their guts just a little bit for making it look so easy. So what’s your excuse?’
‘Oh, I don’t know. Nothing probably.’
Julia waited for a better response.
‘You don’t have a monopoly on being broody, you know. I went to the hospital to pick up Milly and when I saw John there, it brought back memories, that’s all. Memories I know I’m lucky to have,’ she added, reacting to her friend’s thoughts before Julia had even acknowledged them herself.
‘You don’t have to apologize for having Milly,’ Julia said as kindly as her frayed nerves would allow.
‘Well, I do have to apologize for my daughter’s insensitivity. But enough about John and bloody Eva! Tell me more about your visit to the clinic. What haven’t you told me?’ Helen asked, clearly dissatisfied with the updates Julia had provided so far.
‘Nothing, more’s the pity, unless you want me to repeat our consultant’s quite lengthy description of a sperm’s epic journey to the egg, which he compared to jumping into the Mersey and swimming to New York?’ When Helen shook her head, Julia said simply, ‘There’s no magic solution on offer, Helen.’
‘Not yet,’ Helen said.
Helen spoke with a confidence that Julia would once have shared but not of late. Time, and more specifically, Julia’s age were against them and she didn’t need a consultant to tell them that their options would be limited. ‘If you say so,’ she managed to say. ‘First, we both have to undergo all kinds of tests where we’ll be thoroughly prodded and poked, or in Paul’s case, he’ll do his own prodding.’ They both pulled a face before Julia continued, ‘And we’ll know more when we get the initial results, hopefully by the end of January.’
‘Initial results?’
‘There could be more tests and there could be drugs we could take. There are procedures we could go through or there could be more radical options. Could be, could be, could be,’ she said with a sigh.
‘And until then, your decision to hold off trying for a baby continues.’
‘For Paul’s sake, and the sake of our marriage, yes,’ Julia said. ‘But we’re such a long way off from knowing what treatment we can have, if any, not to mention whether or not we would want to pursue it. If we do go for fertility treatment and that fails, on top of the time we would have wasted trying, we would then have to wait for up to a year before we could be considered for adoption. Part of me – the impatient part of me – is tempted to accept it’s all my fault, give up trying and go straight to plan B.’
‘I know I joked about it, but maybe I could be some kind of surrogate. You want a baby and I’m feeling broody. You have a husband and I don’t have the means to have another baby. We could share!’
For the first time since arriving, the smile on Julia’s face reached her eyes. ‘You want to share my husband?’
Helen’s face contorted with disgust. ‘Have you never heard of a turkey baster?’
‘I have one.’
‘There you go then, we’re already ahead of the game.’
‘And what about the baby?’ Julia said in a tone that made it clear that she wasn’t taking Helen’s suggestion at all seriously, although a part of her was sorely tempted.
‘Oh, I don’t want the baby, not really,’ Helen admitted. ‘Seeing John today just made me realize how much I want what he has, the same as what you want, really. A nice, neat family package. We each have one half of that.’
‘Ah, so you are talking about sharing.’
‘We already do, don’t we? I borrow your husband when I need a man with power tools and you enjoy spending time with Milly.’
‘Sounds like we should be grateful for what we have.’
Helen lifted up her mug. ‘I’ll drink to that.’
Gales of laughter erupted from the living room. ‘Shall we join them?’ Julia asked.
Once Julia had settled into an armchair with her half-eaten cake on her lap and a fresh cup of coffee, she felt a certain sense of fulfilment that surprised her. Helen’s arrival with glad tidings ought to have floored her but there had been something in Helen’s summation of the four of them that comforted her. They were a family unit of sorts, and when Helen caught her watching them rather than the TV, there was something in her eyes that suggested she recognized it too.
13
The Accident
Two hours after her shift had officially finished Anya was ready to leave, but rather than heading home she felt compelled to pay a quick visit to the Critical Care Unit. Julia Richardson had been drifting in and out of consciousness all day and each time she woke she asked about her friend. Anya had done her best to put her mind at ease but could offer only limited comfort. The reports on Helen Butler were far from promising, and Anya faced the prospect of a sleepless night herself unless she found out a little more about this friend who Julia appeared to have much more of a connection with than she did the husband she was still refusing to let near her bedside.
Anya’s feet and calves ached as she hurried through the hospital while chomping on a Mars bar and swallowing it back with a double espresso to give her enough energy to keep going. Turning the last corner she spied a dishevelled-looking man outside the CCU. He had his eyes closed as he rested his forehead on the wall with his hands in his pockets.
Although she had no idea who he was, Anya immediately recognized him for what he represented. He was one amongst many other relatives roaming the corridors in confusion and in some cases, despair. Without exception, they wore dazed expressions that suggested their brains hadn’t quite caught up with the day’s events. They couldn’t yet comprehend how it was possible that the loved ones they had casually waved off that morning should now be fighting for their lives, or worse.
At the sound of her approach, the man straightened up and turned towards her. Seeing only the uniform, his eyes widened in fear and apprehension. ‘My wife …’ he began and then shook his head. ‘I mean, my ex-wife and her friends were involved in the accident. What should I do? I don’t know what to do.’ He glanced over his shoulder, drawing Anya’s gaze to another figure approaching from the opposite direction.
Anya watched the young girl walking slowly up the corridor. She had her head down as she gave her undivided a
ttention to the two plastic cups in her hand. Nothing else existed except those cups of water; nothing else was going to invade her consciousness or add to the distress that had already turned her complexion ghostly white and her nose bright red.
‘What do I tell my daughter?’ John asked.
14
Christmas in the Butler household was pretty much the same as always; lots of frantic preparation and panic followed by a general sense of anticlimax. Milly had been spoilt rotten despite Helen’s best intentions and this fact was driven home on New Year’s Day when Helen was searching for her gloves and found her daughter’s brand-new and ridiculously expensive iPod shoved down the side of the sofa. In Milly’s eagerness to get to her dad’s the day before, she hadn’t thought to pick it up. It was becoming more apparent by the day that Milly hadn’t been exaggerating when she had said the baby was the best Christmas present ever.
‘Do you want to borrow my gloves?’ Phoebe asked as they strolled around Sefton Park Lake, her words floating on a cloud of crystal white vapour.
‘No, you keep them. I’m fine.’
Ignoring her, Phoebe peeled off her green and orange striped mittens and handed them over. Helen was too cold to object. ‘All right, but you can have them back just as soon as I get the feeling back in my fingers.’
Even as Helen was pulling them on, an arm extended into the space between them. At the end of that arm was a broad, bare hand holding out a pair of men’s leather gloves. ‘Here, Phoebe, wear these. I’ve got padded pockets.’
When Phoebe looked as if she were about to refuse, Helen made a grab for them and forced them on her friend. ‘There, I can keep yours now,’ she said.
‘If I’d known you needed gloves, Helen,’ Julia said from behind them, ‘Santa could have brought you a pair.’
‘I’d say Santa was generous enough as it was,’ Helen replied.
They continued their walk in a silence that was broken only by the occasional quack of a disinterested duck, which had already been overfed that morning. It had been Helen’s idea to go for an early morning stroll followed by breakfast in a local café, but things hadn’t exactly gone to plan and Helen was blaming her daughter. Milly had declined the invitation to join her for the usual raucous New Year’s Eve party at Helen’s mum’s in favour of a quiet evening in with John, Eva and the baby. Helen’s lack of maternal responsibilities had resulted in her waking up in an empty house on the first day of the year with a stinking hangover that she had well and truly earned the night before. She could vaguely remember playing vodka roulette with her cousins and dancing barefoot in the street. By the time she could focus her bleary eyes on her phone, she had already missed numerous calls and texts from her friends asking where the hell she was. It had been one o’clock by the time they had reached the park, at which point their favourite coffee shop had already closed up for the day. They were going to have to make do with bacon rolls back at Julia’s, which was fine by Helen. Anything was better than going home alone.
The Goodbye Gift Page 13