No, it simply wasn’t possible. Where would Rosie have picked it up? It was chicken pox that was going around the school. Not...
Unless...
My thoughts turned then to the other sick child, Clara Cooper. Who, according to Christine, wasn’t vaccinated against serious childhood illnesses.
Just like Rosie.
Clara—who had been sent home from school three days ago with suspected chicken pox.
Except she hadn’t. This wasn’t chicken pox.
This was out-and-out measles.
6
“It’s OK, petal, we’re going to make you feel better,” Madeleine soothed as she hovered over Clara’s bed.
On Tuesday morning, while in makeup at the TV station, her worst fears had been realized with a text from the school principal confirming that Clara was indeed sick. Talk about timing...
She’d given her some acetaminophen after all the coughing and sneezing the night before hoping to nip whatever it was in the bud, but noticed at breakfast that her youngest was still a bit off. But she really couldn’t keep her at home that day, she had the TV thing to do, and Tom had already left for work hours earlier...
So Madeleine had very quickly weighed up the odds and decided that she’d chance sending Clara to school, and would rush straight back once she’d done her thing at the studio. It was a gamble but what choice did she have? She couldn’t cancelMorning Coffeeat the last minute;the show aired at eleven o’clock and she needed to leave right after the school drop-off.
Chances were Clara would be fine—kids were always up and down with these things and usually rallied well—but just in case there was any decline, she could mitigate the risk by asking Lucy to do her a favor. No point (or indeed time) in getting her husband to trek all the way home from Dublin, and she couldn’t ask her mother-in-law for help, either, because Harriet didn’t have a car.
Ever the trouper, Madeleine’s friend immediately agreed to collect Clara just after eleven o’clock and stay with her at their house until she got back. “It’s no bother. Knock ’em dead and Clara will only love being able to watch you on TV.”
The two had been friends forever—Lucy’s eldest was the same age as Jake, so she and Madeleine had shared the whole Newborn Mania thing—and routinely helped each other out when it came to their offspring, often alternating school runs and sports practice drop-offs. Her friend was also decidedly nonjudgmental about Madeleine’s columns, something that was rare enough in Knockroe. Many of the other women in her circle (in particular Christine Campbell) had already been a bit suspicious and defensive about how Madeleine had mostly kept to herself when Jake was born—very quickly dropping out of local mother/baby groups, and unwilling to get into discussions about the trials of sleepless nights or feeding routines, or engage in the seemingly endless debate between breast and bottle.
At the time, she’d felt it was hard enough getting to grips with the huge changes a newborn wrought without overanalyzing every last aspect. Their own parents’ generation didn’t have that luxury, and for the most part just took things as they came, which suited Madeleine down to the ground. She hated how motherhood was so damn competitive and judgmental. She’d heard about that aspect from other friends before, of course, but nothing could have prepared her for just how damaging and destructive it could be to insecure newbies. “There is no ‘right way,’” Madeleine’s mother used to tell her, when in the very early days with Jake she fell into the trap of worrying and comparing herself to other women who seemed so sure about what they were doing. “Same as marriage, you just take it one day at a time. But the most important thing of all, pet, is to enjoy it.”
It was the best piece of parenting advice Madeleine had ever received. Thankfully, Tom, too, held little truck with outsiders interfering or undermining, and agreed that the two of them should trust their instincts for what they did know and just research anything they didn’t.
Some days were great, others absolute shit, but from then on Madeleine refused to put pressure on herself to make everything “perfect” or “normal.” Like her mother said, to a baby every experience was their perfect and their normal, so no sense tying yourself up in knots about it.
Lucy was of a similar mind in some aspects, but was also much better than she at finding common ground with others who didn’t share the same philosophy. Whereas Madeleine’s own failure to do so had driven her to find solidarity with like-minded mums online via her blog, rather than suffer her more judgmental local counterparts who refused to admit that motherhood could be anything other than unicorns and rainbows.
Though she admitted she’d gotten thingsbadlywrong with Clara this week and, worse, hadn’t she known deep down that her daughter was coming down with something—especially when they’d heard a virus was doing the rounds?
She probably should have kept her at home—and on any other day would have—but if she’d canceled at the last minute, theMorning Coffeeproducers would likely never invite her back.
As it was, the team was delighted with the reaction to her appearance on the panel and had already asked her back for another stint. It could only lead to bigger and better things as the show’s viewers were exactly her target audience and, following the slot,Mad Mum’s blog and social media engagement had skyrocketed. Good all around, apart from the fact that that journalist Gemma Moore seemed to have taken an immediate dislike to her, which she couldn’t understand. Everyone knew how these things worked and surely Gemma realized that Madeleine was purposely hamming it up for entertainment?
In any case, based on the social media response, it had worked.
So while she still felt terrible for sending Clara to school when her daughter truly was ill, all in all Madeleine stood by her decision to bite the bullet and take things as they came. Tom had agreed with her, which made her feel somewhat better at least.
“Don’t be so hard on yourself—sure, for all we knew, Clara was just coming down with yet another bout of the sniffles,” her husband reassured, kissing her on the forehead, when Madeleine had remonstrated with herself for the decision.
There was no denying the various iterations of coughs and colds had indeed seemed endless since the kids started school, and in fairness their youngest was strong as an ox most of the time...
Clara coughed violently then, and Madeleine stroked her little girl’s hair, feeling guiltier still. She truly hadn’t believed there was anything to worry about, and even now, a few days on, there was no sign of any telltale sores.
But if her daughter did in fact have chicken pox, there was nothing to do now but wait it out and let the thing take its course. Heartbreaking to see her little girl so ill, though, she thought, softly caressing Clara’s cheek. At least she only had one sick child to concentrate on—Jake had had it before, so Madeleine sent him to school the next morning without the worry at least that she would get another recriminating phone call...
At that moment, her mobile phone sounded from where she had placed it on Clara’s dresser, and a sudden surge of panic rushed through her. Hell, what if she’d just jinxed herself and her sonwasin fact now down with something, too?
But when she looked at the caller ID, she felt herself calm down. It was Lucy. Likely calling to get the scoop on Clara. She was a good friend and, after picking her daughter up from school on Tuesday, had gone out of her way to reassure a panicky Madeleine that all was in hand. “No need to break any speed limits on your way back. Take your time—she’s fine.”
