‘Aw bless,’ said Janey, suddenly cloudy-eyed. The old guy reminded her of her granddad. He would have loved to have seen her like this.
‘Think they’re smiling on us?’ said Helen, hijacking her thoughts.
‘Who?’ said Elizabeth.
‘Janey’s granddad, your Auntie Elsie and my dad,’ said Helen, cocking her Cornetto skyward.
‘I imagine so,’ said Janey, blowing a kiss up to heaven. ‘I tell you what, he’ll enjoy watching me have this ice cream. I could feel him shaking his head and tutting every time I so much as looked at a lettuce.’
‘Come on, girlies,’ said Helen, pulling her friends to their feet. Elizabeth was looking particularly resplendent in a big, cool orange kaftan top.
‘You know, you look like a space-hopper in that!’ said Janey, dodging the ensuing slap, and together they walked off in the direction of St Jude’s Church hall for their first Parentcraft class.
George met them at the door, tapping his watch. ‘It’s past six o’clock, we’ll be late! Where’ve you all been?’
‘Oh, shut up before you start,’ said Janey.
‘They’ll think I’ve a harem if I walk all three of you in,’ he said.
‘We’ll tell them you got all of us up the duff,’ said Elizabeth, sidling suggestively up to him.
‘Give over,’ said George. ‘I haven’t got the strength to service more than her. You should see some of the things she’s had me doing!’
‘Get in, Casanova, before I make you do them all over again tonight. Twice. With the snorkel,’ said Janey, giving him a push through the door.
George only hoped she was joking.
The church hall was large and echoey, with a stage and a black upright piano at one end and lots of kids’ paintings of the Disciples in fishermen mode at the other. Strangely, one of them appeared to be holding the directional sign for the toilets, which felt a bit irreverent. There were twelve women assembled already and one other brother-in-arms who did a male bob-of-the-head thing over to George that signified both ‘hello’ and ‘help’; they were both slightly nervous to see so many women resembling Peggy Mount in the same room.
Everyone took up their seats, which were set up in a central crescent around a whiteboard with a toy box underneath it; the latter was full of videos and books, a worrying part of a skeleton and a full-term baby-sized doll. The sessions were run every couple of months by one of the local midwives. Sue Chimes said they were very useful for all those little last-minute unanswered questions and socially it was quite fun too when there was a good bunch of women attending, so Elizabeth had stuck all their names down on the list and here they were.
Looking around, she was quite surprised to see that most of the ladies in the group were on the same side of thirty as she was, because she had been sure that she and her friends would be grossly outnumbered by gymslips in this day and age. The ‘teacher’ Mandy made her introductions, welcomed everyone, and gave them all a badge on which to write their names. Meanwhile she wrote What To Buy on the whiteboard, and then listed a few essential items of shopping for the early days.
Helen was okay on that front–the baby’s nursery in the bungalow was equipped like a Boots superstore, not that the room would ever be utilized now. Her mother had started to take things across to the Old Rectory and put them in Helen’s old nursery. Janey too had been buying bits in for a long time, but her parents and her in-laws were causing a world shortage in baby powder. It was starting to give her dreams about the Sorcerer’s Apprentice. Elizabeth hadn’t a clue if what she had been buying for the baby were the right things. She had bought powder and oil in and lotion and Vaseline and some vests and sleep suits, but she knew hardly anything about babies–she had never even changed a nappy in her life, and when did they start eating real food? She scribbled down notes almost desperately, reminders of things to get: cottonwool, baby shampoo (she hadn’t thought they would have enough hair to soap up), a baby bath…
One of the other girls, ‘Carol’ according to the name on her badge, was on her fifth baby and already at loggerheads with the midwife, who was extolling the saintly virtues of breastfeeding to the others when ‘Vanessa’ was asking about the various types of bottled milk.
‘Oh, you don’t want bottled milk when you’ve got two big boobs full of natural breastmilk! It’s convenient, easy—’
‘Can I just say that it isn’t as easy as Mandy is trying to make out sometimes, and I’d recommend getting some nipple-shields in,’ Carol interrupted. ‘It can be bloody agonizing for a while and, personally, I’ve no qualms about bottle-feeding this time, seeing as I’ll have to get back to work as soon as possible.’
‘It’s not always agony,’ said Mandy, afraid that she was losing her captive audience already. She was, after all, the appointed authority in this class, not this Supergob Carol.
‘Very true, but it doesn’t come that natural for a lot of women either, and if you’re going to feed, make sure you ask them to stick the bairn on your boob as soon as they can. They didn’t do that with my first and I went through hell trying to get him to work at me once he’d had an easy feed from a bottle. I felt I was a right let-down to him and tortured myself that I was a total failure, even though he absolutely thrived on Farleys!’
‘But—’
‘With the second bairn I was determined to do it and I did manage it, but it was hard work. I couldn’t produce enough milk and it was agony, especially when I got mastitis…’
A terrified murmur started up. ‘What the hell is mastitis?’
‘Bloody painful, that’s what mastitis is. Don’t let anyone pressure you, girls, into believing that a bottle equals failure,’ said Carol, exchanging militant glances with Mandy, who had just been about to deliver the message that bottled milk was tantamount to Satan’s juice.
‘Scientific research has shown that breastfeeding a child significantly reduces the chance of breast cancer…’ began Mandy.
‘Yes, but scaring people like that isn’t going to help if they can’t feed their baby. I’m not saying mum’s milk isn’t good stuff,’ Carol went on, ‘but getting yourself all stressed and stressing out the babby because you can’t feed it doesn’t do either of you a right lot of good.’
Elizabeth felt sick; she had not even started thinking about the politics of breast or bottle, and judging from Janey’s face, she hadn’t either. Carol, thankfully for the others, was not the type to be cowed by Mandy’s biases. Motherhood had been her main achievement in life and she knew what she was talking about.
‘Get a changing station if you can afford it,’ said Carol. ‘You’ve no idea how much pressure it’ll take off yer back.’
Pens started to scribble wildly.
‘…Sudocrem–top of the list, better than Vaseline in my opinion. And a papoose–it’s lovely to feel the baby all snuggled up next to you whilst they’re little.’
‘No! If you fall, you’ll fall on the baby!’ Mandy protested, not that it stopped any pens adding it to their shopping lists.
‘…And don’t let any of your relatives buy fancy suits for the bairn with no poppers on the crotch.’
Scribble scribble.
‘…Get one of those bouncy things in that hang from the door-frame; you’ll have a right laugh and babies love ’em…Oh, and beg, steal or borrow a rocking chair!’
Janey and Helen nudged Elizabeth and gave her a smug look, and she stuck her tongue out at them both.
‘Right–about nappies,’ began Mandy, wafting away a very red, angry flush from her neck.
‘If you think you’ve got time for terries, you’re fooling yourself!’ piped up Carol, who wished she’d had someone like herself in her first class all those years ago, after Miss Idealistic the Midwife had frightened her to death and made her spend an ill-afforded fortune on so many wrong things. Terries are better for baby and hardly any extra work, my arse!
‘In your overnight bag you need some nappies, cottonwool and baby lotion,’ began Mandy. ‘A few Babygros, some
money for the hospital trolley, a dressing-gown and slippers, maternity sanitary towels…’
‘…And two of the biggest T-shirts you can find for nighties. Get disposable maternity knickers–they aren’t sexy, mind–baby wipes and nappy sacks, some juice, the cooler the better, a massive bar of fruit and nut, a Jackie Collins and your nipple-shields just in case,’ took over Carol.
At the end of the session, Mandy told the girls there was a big box of books and child birth videos available to borrow. She was exhausted from battling her wits against that walking brood mare and could not wait to get in the house, kick her shoes off, put EastEnders on and get a big gin down her neck. Thank God she had no bloody kids to go home to.
‘Don’t borrow ’em,’ Carol whispered to Helen, who had picked up a video. ‘You’ll shit yourself with fear.’
Helen did not like to think about that image. They had all watched a film of a birth at school in which a Frenchwoman had poohed whilst giving birth. It would be her worst nightmare if that happened.
Except for Carol, who bounced off down the road stuffed with springs like Tigger, they all came out of the meeting as meek as lambs.
‘I’ve hardly got any of the right stuff in,’ said Elizabeth, who looked especially dazed.
‘Well, look, at least it’s the weekend tomorrow–you can go get your stuff then, now you know what you’re missing,’ said Janey, feeling a bit sorry for Elizabeth. At least she could send George out if she was short on anything. He would be a fulltime househusband soon; she was going to draft his letter of resignation this weekend.
‘What if I’ve left it too late and give birth tonight?’ Elizabeth replied in a bit of a panic.
‘Do you think we’d not help?’ said George, giving her a big hug, and was surprised that she let him. She did not do her usual pulling-away thing that he always teased her about.
Elizabeth smiled gratefully, but knew she wasn’t ready for this by a long chalk. She wasn’t ready at all.
John was waiting in the car outside her house when she got home; he was in his builder’s gear so it looked like another flying visit.
‘You’re lucky,’ he said. ‘I was just waiting another five minutes then I was off. I thought I’d pop by to see how your class went.’
‘How did you know I was going to a class?’
‘I met George for a pint in the week.’
‘Oh.’
He followed her into the house. She was so stressed she didn’t even put the kettle on and sank on the sofa staring trance-like at the carpet.
‘Well, are you going to answer me or do I have to put it down to one of life’s mysteries, like the pyramids?’
‘It was frightening,’ she said. ‘I realized I haven’t got enough stuff in.’
‘Like what?’
She got the list out of her pocket. ‘Sudocrem, nappies, pram…Can you believe, I forgot I’d need to buy a pram?’
‘I got you nappies!’
‘But have I got the right size? I need to get some of the really tiny ones just in case he comes early. I haven’t got my bag sorted. I haven’t even got a bag to sort! I haven’t got sanit…er…things.’
‘Then go and get them tomorrow. It’s Saturday, you’ve got all day to shop,’ he said gently, trying to stop her panicking. ‘Anything I can get for you?’
He snatched the list out of her hand and she tried to get it back because she didn’t want him seeing she needed big sanitary towels and disposable pants, but he was about twelve foot bigger than her and she got it back only when he had committed most of it to memory.
‘I can manage,’ she said indignantly and embarrassed, and he laughed. She was reforming, but she was still Elizabeth, bloody-minded obstinate independent Collier.
His Elizabeth.
Chapter 40
Janey was tossing and turning.
‘What’s up? Can’t sleep, love?’ George asked.
‘No, I can’t get comfortable,’ groaned Janey from her nest of twelve pillows. They were resting under her bump, in between her legs, under her boobs, behind her bottom, you name it and Janey had a pillow stuck there. George got out the baby oil, lifted up her nightie, clicked on the bedside lamp and began to rub her back.
‘My sexual days are over,’ she said wearily. ‘Please tell me this isn’t your idea of foreplay.’
‘My sexual days are over!’ said George. ‘You’ve worn my todger off!’
They both smiled tenderly, both hoping their sexual days were most categorically not over by a long chalk; not now they had discovered them again and improved on them three millionfold.
Who would have thought my life would be this changed but this good, this time last year? Janey thought, enjoying the sensation of George kneading her back. The massaging was every bit as intimate as the expression of their love in sex. He rubbed her with his big hands until he heard her breathing in that way that told him she was asleep. For an hour or so, until she had to be winched to her feet for the first of her five nocturnal trips to the loo.
Elizabeth put her foot on the stair and realized she couldn’t lift the other one far enough up to climb to the next, for the pain down the middle of her thigh was excruciating. She tried again.
This is ridiculous, she thought. I can’t get up the sodding staircase.
She needed the loo badly, so she attempted the leg-lift again, slowly, but, nope, the pain would not let her. She stood there looking up at the stairs and suddenly understood why so many old people moved to bungalows.
‘This is crazy,’ she said, gritted her teeth and tried again, but as her leg got to that same certain point, the pain shot through her, forcing her to admit defeat. It was so ludicrous she laughed.
‘You!’ she said to the baby, scrunching up a fist and shaking it at him.
She sat on the step and tried to bump up backwards. It took her ages but after a few hundred hours, she managed it.
I don’t believe I’ve just had to do this! she thought, and then, How the hell am I going to get downstairs again? She decided not to even try; the doors were locked and there was just the one light on downstairs that would have to wait until morning to be turned off now. She went straight to bed instead and like Janey, she had cushions and pillows positioned everywhere. She lay on top of the quilt because it was far too warm a night for covers. The window was open and a cooling breeze from outside fanned her to sleep.
Helen woke her up the next morning with a phone call.
‘Do you know how long it’s taken me to get my pants on?’ she said, as soon as it connected.
‘Well, if you think that’s bad, I could hardly get upstairs last night. It was mad. I couldn’t lift my leg up and I had a terrible pain right down the back of my thigh. I ended up having to go backwards upstairs on my bum,’ said Elizabeth.
‘Ah–that’s actually happened to me. The thing to do is kneel forward with your hands on the floor and rock backwards and forwards,’ said Helen. ‘The baby will be lying on a nerve so rub your tum till he or she moves.’
‘If it doesn’t work, you do realize that I could be trapped upstairs for ever,’ said Elizabeth. ‘You’ll read about me in the Chronicle–“local woman discovered, eaten by pigeons”.’
There wasn’t a chapter about that in her Miriam Stoppard.
‘How does it feel when you stretch?’ Helen asked.
Elizabeth lifted up her leg. ‘It still aches but not as much as it did last night, thank goodness. I think I’ll be able to get downstairs without having to call the Fire Brigade, anyway. God help their backs if they have to give me a fireman’s lift out of the window!’
‘Good, because I’m taking you shopping,’ said Helen. ‘Please be ready in half an hour.’
‘Shopping?’ said Elizabeth.
‘You don’t think I am going to leave you in the state you were in yesterday, do you?’ said Helen. ‘I’m going with you to get supplies.’
When Elizabeth came off the phone, she rocked on the floor and rubbed her stomach as i
nstructed by the new Dr Luxmore. It helped lots.
They bought a few of the smaller things on the list that Elizabeth had made in the class, and whilst they were in the queue for the till with a baby bath, a well-timed text came through from John to say, WHERE R U??? HV CHNGING STATION, BATH & PRAM 4 U IN VAN. She showed the text to Helen, who looked at her expectantly.
‘What?’ snapped Elizabeth.
‘Nothing,’ said Helen, with her eyebrows lifted and a sly smile twisting one corner of her mouth.
‘I wish he’d keep his nose out,’ Elizabeth said, about to text him to say as much, but then she stopped. She would tell him off to his face instead.
The assistant in Mothercare measured them both for nursing bras and Helen was thrilled that her 32AAs were now 34Bs, but she was sure she was still growing so she didn’t buy one yet. Elizabeth was thrown into total disbelief on learning that her once 34Bs were now 40Es, and decided there and then that she might as well give breastfeeding her best shot with those Sten-guns in situ. Christ, 40E qualified her for a career as a Bond villain! Either that or she could open a dairy. She bought the nipple-shields at the same time, although she mistakenly asked the assistant for nipple-clamps, which sent Helen into a fit of giggles. They looked like Mexican hats for a mouse fancy-dress party. She had just thought you stuck a baby on your breast and it fed. It was supposed to be natural, wasn’t it, so how complicated could it be? Or so she had naively thought, until Carol had enlightened them on that score and added another heap onto her worry pile.
Janey rang her on the mobile just as they were coming out of the bra department.
‘Do you want to go shopping?’ she asked. ‘You looked in such a state yesterday, I could hardly sleep for thinking about you. Well, you and the backache and the fact that my bladder has shrunk to the size of a walnut.’
‘I’m out with Helen shopping as we speak,’ Elizabeth replied. ‘I think I’ve just about got it all now, but thanks–you’re a diamond.’
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