Queue. I never used that word before we came here. Impossible to spell.
My breathing slows. I look around the room to see what else I can count and I learn that we’re sitting in “Sukie’s Tea Nook” according to the sign painted on a worn wooden board and hanging on the wall from a reproduction of a brass coat hook reclaimed from the waiting room of a fictional, but very old, steam railway station. Emma Bridgewater and Cath Kidston are having a turf war in here. A lot of polka-dots had to die to decorate this room. There are pheasants and strawberries on every plate and mug. And napkin. And pillow. Some fabric flowery bunting is draped with meticulous haphazardness over a distressed wooden china cabinet with glass doors. She doesn’t keep dishes in there. Just her collection of new-but-vintage sugar bowls. I count. Nine out of twenty-two are labeled sucre because they are “French.”
Parallel to Sukie’s Tea Nook is Sukie’s Extremely Expensive Retro British Kitchen complete with an Aga and new-but-old Smeg fridge. All the appliances are in matching cream and chrome. The floor-to-ceiling wooden cupboards are the perfect shade of lemony white with newly tarnished, battered brass drawer pulls and cabinet handles. A pastel blue KitchenAid mixer dominates the corner of the counter, ready for when Sukie needs to really mix the shit out of something. And if you follow the gleaming creamy granite countertops along the wall to the entry of the corridor, you’ll see hanging, to the right of the lemon-yellow doorway, above the vintage school chalkboard hung with twine displaying Sukie’s shopping list (Chard, Agave, Beetroot, Tamarind, Mint, Gin—ha!), the ceramic casting of the baby’s footprints. Framed in a very light blue, slightly distressed wooden frame. The little feet are perfect. Like everything else in this house.
I know I’m jealous. Because I feel inadequate. Because I can’t even give the baby a bath every day, much less take him to a pottery shop to have his footprints recorded for eternity. Harry would say that it’s “envious,” not “jealous.” A tip for anyone who needs/wants to piss off an American: correct our English. Works every time.
I reach for my glass of water on the coffee table, avoiding the cakes and homemade scones. I notice a jam jar covered with a red gingham cloth and tied with a piece of twine. It’s labeled Sukie’s Sumptuous Strawberry. Wow. That’s an alpha move. It might as well be labeled Eat My Jam, Bitches.
I have a crystal-clear memory of me and Frankie sitting at our Formica kitchen table with a loaf of Wonder bread and jar of Goober. Goober is peanut butter and jelly (or English people say “jam” because jelly is actually Jell-O to them: it gets complicated). Anyway, Goober is PB and J swirled together in one jar. It solves the problem of remembering to buy two products instead of one and also of needing to use two knives to make one sandwich. American ingenuity. Sukie wouldn’t approve of Goober.
God, I want to go home so bad. New York home, I mean.
Rocky’s asleep in my arms. The worst of the wave has passed now but my hands still tingle. I lower Rocky to my lap so that I don’t drop him. So that they don’t go home and tell their husbands about the fat American one who dropped her baby. I hold him closer and try to match his breathing.
Sukie says, “Well, I say, bring on the cake, ladies. The midwife said I need more carbs in my diet to fatten up the baby, so I’m relaxing my usual standards.”
“Oh, has being gluten free affected your milk? I hope you don’t need to top up with formula.” That’s Georgina. Talking with one boob out, as usual, even though the baby stopped eating five minutes ago and he’s asleep in his pram. But it’s good to know she’s prepared.
Sukie crosses her lean legs so that the long line defining her thigh muscle is clearly visible, camera ready. Her lovely, slim feet have been newly pedicured. She says to Georgina, “No, no, my milk production is fine, it just burns so many calories. We need those carbs! Humphrey’s doing very well, no formula needed, thankfully.”
Humphrey. Sharon would laugh her ass off if she heard that one.
“Well, that’s lucky for you then, isn’t it, Sukie. Isn’t that fantastic,” Tracy pipes up as she pointedly puts a cap on her baby’s bottle. She’s had a hard time with the feeding. I know she’s also pissed that the two pounds Sukie gained in pregnancy have fallen off her. There’s an extra nervy kind of edge in every word she says with that accent so you can’t tell if she likes you or if she’s about to kick your ass. She really forced herself into those jeans today. I can tell by the way she keeps pulling them up at the thighs. I saw her undo the button to sit down when she thought no one was looking. That’s why I like her.
Sukie takes a sip of her herbal tea from a Yummy Mummy mug dotted with hearts in different shades of pink. “But ladies, I think the key was having the nighttime nurse for the first four weeks. I haven’t told anyone aside from you about it for fear everyone will think me terribly spoilt, but I do think she saved us. She was absolutely worth the money.”
“You were so clever to think of doing that! Charlie and I argued constantly about whose turn it was to get up. Luckily Sophie’s slept through from twelve weeks, so at least we’ve got over that hurdle quickly,” Fiona says. I admire that little bomb she just dropped about the sleeping through at three months. Artfully done.
Georgina sips her decaf with almond milk and says, “Well, that’s good for you and Charlie, I’m so glad Gina Ford worked for you, but I personally, and this is just me, I couldn’t do it. I don’t think I could put Rosamund through that just to get some sleep. The guilt! I mean, I can see that it works for your family, Fi, I really do, but I love feeding her when it’s just the two of us and everyone’s asleep. We’re up a lot in the night, true, but she knows I’m there. I wouldn’t give that up, d’you know what I mean? Not that you’ve given anything up, Fi, by regimenting your baby, it’s not that, it’s just—not for us, I suppose.” Impressive. Even though Georgina would cut off her arm right now if it meant getting a full night’s sleep, she still found the strength to make that little speech.
I leave Fi to reply because on the next sofa Tracy’s giving an update about her stitches. “So I go for the six-week checkup and the midwife says, ‘Well, how’s it all feeling,’ and I say, ‘Great, never better,’ as if, and she has a look at the war zone in my pants and she says, ‘You can tell your husband it’s safe to have sex now if you’d like to,’ and I said, ‘Of course it’s safe for him, he hasn’t had his vag stitched up to his arse!’ ”
Everybody laughs and Becky says, “Stop, I’m gonna wee on Sukie’s lovely sofa!”
“I already did, sorry, love!” says Tracy, doubled over. And even Georgina and Fi have to loosen up and smile. We’re all laughing, and for a minute I feel almost normal, like it’s not just me, everybody’s got something they’re dealing with. I’m about to say something, something funny about sex or men or piss but then:
“Well, lucky for you, Gigi, you didn’t have to go through any of this, did ya! Vag put through the shredder and pelvic floor dropped to your ankles!” Tracy says, and the ladies laugh again. Before I process what she means Georgina says, “Yes, Gigi, you certainly saved yourself, I’m sure Harry’s grateful.”
Oh. That’s what they mean.
“Oh, but ladies, wouldn’t you rather have your war stories?” Becky, the Australian one, breaks in. “It was the toughest thing I ever did but choosing to just take the pain, well, I would do it again in a heartbeat.”
“That’s ’cause you’re a nutter, Bex! No, I’m afraid I’d have to go Gigi’s route next time, lots of drugs, too posh to push, that’s the way forward. Not putting the va-jay-jay through this again,” Tracy says, winking at me. But her face changes because I’ve started to cry; I didn’t know I was going to but I am so I say, “I’m sorry, hormones I guess.” But it isn’t hormones. It’s something much stronger than that.
Fi, who was always in the take-all-possible-drugs camp, comes over and puts a skinny arm around me. “We all have
our babies, it doesn’t matter how we got them, does it, Gigi. I think taking the easy route makes us smarter, don’t you?” There are communal looks of concern and cups quickly put on tables and shuffling of maternal bodies on sofas to get closer to me and surround me with support.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to make you upset,” Becky says. “I guess we’re all just proud of ourselves for how we earned these babies. How stupid of me, the loss you must feel, that was really insensitive of me.” I know she feels bad. But she doesn’t feel bad about what happened to me. She feels bad for me that I’m not like her.
Sukie leans forward to put her thin, manicured hand with its diamond engagement ring stacked on diamond wedding band stacked on diamond push-present band on my rounded knee. “You poor thing.”
They all look at me. I look down at Rocky. The lava wave is over but now the sweating has started. I stay focused on the miniature perfection of his face. Little eyebrows. He has Harry’s beautiful long lashes. The tiny nose, just like mine. Well, not really, it’s the space below his eyes, the curve of his cheek in that place before it becomes his cheek, the space we don’t have a name for—that came from me.
“Well—” I start to say, to stammer out some kind of answer, but Georgina interrupts: “Are you upset about the breastfeeding? I mean, it must be upsetting for you. I would be devastated.” The ladies nod in sympathetic agreement.
Fiona says, gently holding my elbow, “You know, there’s something to be said about persevering. You can still do it if you want to. I had some trouble with Sophie. The latching on was a disaster in the beginning but we hired a lactation consultant and it made such a difference. I could give you the number.”
“Hey, guys, why don’t you let her speak. You’re all on top of her,” Tracy says. She’s right. Sukie touching my knee. Fiona at my elbow, smiling supportively. Georgina staring at me, head tilted in concern. Becky turned toward me, attentively, even while she’s feeding her baby. They’re concerned, yes, but they’re also proud of themselves, taking credit for something they don’t know was never in their control. They think it was them—their strength, presence of mind, birth preparation, their life-sustaining breasts—that got them here. They don’t know that birth and life and death are just chance. Who gets what has nothing to do with us.
Rocky stirs. In his sleep he raises a tiny fist in the air and stretches and yawns. His hand lands under his little chin and his head tilts to the side, dreaming. I look up at the well-meaning women around me. I didn’t choose this. No one would choose this. Unless the choice was life or death, which it was. I survived and so did he. So I think that’s a win, Becky, not a loss. I’m not devastated about the breastfeeding, Georgina. I’m devastated that I don’t love this baby as much as I loved Johnny and Frankie and I don’t know why. The last thing, Fiona, that I need is another consultant or midwife or doctor to touch me and confirm that I’m inadequate, my motherly resources insufficient.
I could say all of that. I could give them the details and horrify them with my birth story. I could tell it in such a way that they would understand that I endured more than anyone. I could shatter their illusions that they earned anything. But they’re just women, doing what women do—seeking validation. Getting it by comparing themselves to other women. Supporting the ones they know are struggling but secretly satisfied that they are not.
I decide, instead, to let it go. Let me be the one who’s done everything wrong. The one they can think of when they’re scared and insecure so they can say to themselves, “Well, at least I know I’m better at this than her.” I can be that one that helps them get through the day because no matter how hard things get, at least they’re not fat, broken, bottle-feeding Gigi.
I break the silence. “Thanks, ladies, but I’m OK. I’ve done this before, remember, with Johnny, and anyway, I’ve got to go pick him up. Thanks for the tea, Sukie. Sorry, I’ve got to run.” I get up carefully with Rocky and gather my stuff.
I put my phone down on the coffee table while I pack the baby bag and Sukie, Georgina and Fiona see the Oprah screen saver on my phone. I like to keep Oprah close to me for strength. It’s a picture of her from the eighties that a non-American might not recognize at first glance. The Oprah I watched every day after school.
Fiona asks, “Who’s that?” which really means, Why do you have a picture of a Black woman on your phone instead of your newborn baby?
“Oh—” I think for a second. “That’s my mother,” I say and pick the phone up before they can look again. I see them stop and quickly scan the afternoon’s conversation to make sure they didn’t say anything racist now that they think my mother’s Black and that I might be too, or at least biracial. Georgina shifts in her seat and I can tell she’s remembering that thing she said earlier about how Filipinos make great nannies, as do Poles, but one must be careful about the “others.” I can see Fiona’s face change, an internal cringe when she remembers what she said about the “extraordinarily imbalanced make-up” of the state high school by her house. Becky scans my face to look for signs of Blackness. There’s an uncomfortable ripple through Sukie’s Tea Nook.
I didn’t say I’d let everything go.
Tracy gathers her stuff too and says, “I must be getting off as well.” Then she turns to me and whispers, “It’s too early for Johnny to get out of school, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, it is.” I look up for a moment and meet her eye.
“Do you want to come to mine then? I’ve got cake. Apparently, that’s what keeps this lot so skinny.” She wants to be my friend.
“That’s real nice of you but I should be going, go to the supermarket to get dinner before I go to pickup.” I settle Rocky in his stroller and stuff a muslin in my bag when Tracy takes my hand.
“Hey, I’m sorry. Too soon to joke about it, yeah? Did you have a really bad time? I see you’re not that same girl who used to vomit in our classes and then make us all laugh. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have made all those jokes, it’s just my way, trying to make light of it all.”
She gets that something happened to me on the sofa. Maybe I can try. “Yeah, I guess, I mean, it was pretty bad, I’m still trying to—” But her phone rings and cuts me off. I push the words back down.
“Yes, I’ll be right there, sorry, I’m so sorry,” Tracy says into the phone. She turns to me. “I’m so shit, he’s got his jabs today, I forgot, another time, eh? I need to run down to the clinic now, shit.”
“It’s OK, don’t worry about it, you’d better rush,” I say.
“We’ll talk another time, yeah?”
“Yeah, sure.” I turn away, but she steps in front of my stroller to catch my eye and says, “No, really, promise?”
Whether we do or we don’t doesn’t matter; she asked. I’m grateful just for that. I almost smile. “Yeah. Thanks. See you next week,” I say and push Rocky out the door, my scar pulsing with every step.
London, May 2016; Baby, 5 months old
“Hey, Jeej, how does the water in the sea stick to the Earth even when it’s on the part that’s upside down?” Johnny doesn’t say hello when I pick him up from school. He unleashes a wave of questions from the minute I hug him hello. A day will come when he’ll stop talking to me like this and I won’t know about all the corners of his little world. I wish his energy would infect me, make me burst into a smile when I see him, but instead I feel drained, exhausted by the walk home before it starts. I’m so heavy but he’s a little cloud of wonder. I try not to weigh him down.
“Jeej? How does it do it?” He looks at me with his big dark eyes. His buttons are askew after changing for gym; there’s a blotch of ketchup on his shoe.
“Gravity,” I say, taking his schoolbag. I hook it on the stroller and start the slow walk home.
“What’s gravity?”
“It’s the force that keeps things on the ground.”
“Where does it come from?”
“The Sun.”
“How?” He holds the handle of the stroller like a surrogate hand.
“Radiation and magnetic waves or something, I don’t know, ask Harry when he gets home.”
“Did you know that Saturn is just gas and it’s so light that if you put it on our ocean on Earth it would float?”
“What?”
“Do you know how?”
“No, do you?”
“No, I mean, do you know how it does that, Jeej?”
“Listen, you’re going way over my head here. I never heard that before in my life. Have a cookie.” They don’t say “cookie” here. They say “biscuits,” which never sits right in my mouth. Biscuits are white fluffy things that people eat with gravy in movies about the Deep South.
“And also did you know that Pluto is a micro-planet?”
“What? It’s not a regular planet anymore?”
“Jeej, why isn’t it a planet?”
“I don’t know, you’re the one who brought it up.”
“Jeej, you don’t know very much about space.”
“Yeah, well, sue me. What else happened today?” And he goes on and on. Who chased who, who played spies, who wouldn’t let go of the ball.
“What’d you have for lunch?”
“I don’t know. Jeej, I got a sticker for perseverance!”
“Wow, that’s cool. What’d you do to get that?”
“I dunno. Jeej, what’s perseverance?” As I explain it to him and he thinks of another ten questions to ask me, Rocky, who’s been sitting up, listening, gurgling his own answers to Johnny, drops his giraffe somewhere. Johnny stops mid-sentence and says, “Jeej, where’s Jeffrey?”
When I Ran Away Page 19