by Gary Owen
In our case, a win is very likely indeed.
First thing, before court is a sort of meeting,
Up at the Heath. They talk for hours and basically
Tell me what happened to me, but in a way that makes it seem
Nothing was their fault. And when it’s finished the lawyer says
Well that went fantastically.
And I say, did it? Cos I can’t tell.
He says, oh yes,
It won’t even get to court.
You press, they’ll settle.
There should have been a midwife in the ambulance with you, you see.
And now they’ll have to pay.
How much, I say, are they gonna have to pay?
The lawyer says, the average payout in maternity cases is
Two hundred and seventy-seven thousand pounds.
You should expect to receive rather more.
And I think what all that money would mean.
Get me a house.
Get me a car.
Get me by; for years and years.
And Kev says – we’re going to win Eff!
And all these fuckers can fuck themselves!
I wander down through to the shops, buy –
The first thing I see, that I want. A box of juice.
And I sit, and sip it. And –
And across the way I see
The midwife. She’s been in the room all morning but kept her mouth shut.
She stares at me a bit then looks away, stares, looks away, stares –
Like she knows she mustn’t look at me but she just can’t stop herself she says
I just want you to know, I’m so very very sorry for your loss.
But the thing is, Effie,
I couldn’t have saved her, even if I’d been with you
What your little girl needed was
To be born in hospital. In a special care unit.
Where we’d’ve had the facilities, to look after her.
You were only in that ambulance cos
We didn’t have a special care bed left.
We don’t have as many special care beds as we used to
Cos of all these cuts. And what do you think happens,
If we have to pay you?
I say, you learn a fucking lesson love.
She says if we pay you, we’ll have to cut more.
And more old people will die before they should.
More young people will never get a chance to live.
And more mums, just like you, will lose –
I say I don’t know what you’re crying about, bitch – apart from your job.
Kev says – that is bullshit the hospital will have insurance, that’s
Where the money comes from, bound to.
And I know Kev’s right
Or I sort of think he must be –
But my room is full of clothes
Sleepsuits and babygrows, that I picked out of piles
At jumble sales and charity shops;
Washed in the bath,
Hung on the radiator to dry,
Then tucked away snug into drawers.
And there’s a cot. And toys. And a buggy that doesn’t fit through the door.
And Nan says – do you think money will even help you?
I say I know it won’t bring her back, I’m not fucking thick
She says no. No. Listen, for once.
I said, Effie: the state you are in, will money help you?
And I know. I know.
But then what will help? Because I need something, I really fuckin do
And she says, you know.
You know that too.
And so.
And so.
I drop the case.
I don’t, make anyone pay.
Because there are years and years ahead of me
That were gonna be filled with loving her,
And getting loved back.
And that broken brick road to the sea
Not a mile away.
I could walk it any day.
And what stops me
What gets me through is knowing
I took this pain,
And saved every one of you, from suffering the same.
Your baby gets sick, she gets well
Because of me. Your mum gets ill
She gets healed, because of me and still:
You see me, pissed first thing wandering home
And all you think is, stupid slag. Nasty skank.
When what you should be thinking is,
Christ Effie, thanks. You took the cut, for all of us.
And I wander home, past
The pubs that shut, the library they closed,
The swimming pool got knocked down,
The bingo hall they burned
So they could turn it into flats.
More and more people packed in this little plot of land,
While they cut everything we need to make a life.
And we can take it. The hobbled soldier,
Limping to his little girl. The fat mum,
Wrestling her buggy out the rain. The pensioner,
Working night shifts at seventy again.
We can take it cos we’re tough, the lot of us.
But here’s the fucking rub.
It seems, it’s always places like this
And people like us who have to take it,
When the time for cutting comes.
And I wonder: just how long
Are we gonna have to take it for?
And I wonder –
What is gonna happen
When we can’t take it any more?
by the same author
Violence and Son
9781783198931
A Soldier in Every Son – The Rise of the Aztecs
Luis Mario Moncada
translated by Gary Owen
9781849434706
Perfect Match
9781783190607
Mrs Reynolds and the Ruffian
9781849430654
Blackthorn / In the Pipeline
9781849430708
Love Steals Us From Loneliness
9781849430548
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