‘You’re a good man,’ I tell him. ‘I’m very proud to call you my son.’
He blushes and I give him a quick hug before he escapes my grasp with the excuse of going to make me a cup of tea.
Soon it is just Daniel and me in the room. A stand-off to end all stand-offs.
‘It was only two nights, Daniel,’ I say.
I am rewarded with the most expressive side-eye I’ve ever seen – one that screams of not being one bit impressed with me.
‘And you had Adam, and Jodie, and didn’t you get out to the beach with Lazlo?’
There is the tiniest flick of his tail at the mention of Conal’s dog, before he remembers he’s officially huffing and returns to side-eye mode.
‘And Granny came round with treats. I hear you got chicken for your tea.’
Normally the very hint of the word chicken would set his tail in major helicopter wags, but no. He’s being what my mother would lovingly call ‘a stubborn wee shite’.
I’m not sure what he wants me to do to make amends. Some self-flagellation perhaps? The promise of the noisiest, squeakiest, most annoying toys the pet shop can sell? Extra walks at whatever hour he decides?
‘C’mon, pup,’ I plead, patting the sofa beside me. ‘Come and get a cuddle. Can we be friends again?’
Slowly, his head still low as if he has been wronged in this life and the last to an egregious level, he stands and plods over towards me before jumping onto the sofa and lying down with a sorrowful ‘boof’.
‘And the Oscar for best dog in a dramatic role goes to…’ I start, as I begin petting him, only to be interrupted by Adam coming back into the room, his face ashen.
It’s amazing how the atmosphere of a room can change in a heartbeat. How a room warmed by the glow of the fire and a loving chat between mother and son can so quickly become icy cold. As if sensing the shift, and the immediate thudding of my heart, Daniel lifts his head and lays it on my lap, staring up at me, before pawing at my arm as if to comfort me.
‘Adam, love. What is it?’
‘Mum, it’s Jodie. She’s started bleeding.’
My son. My big man of six foot tall, with the makings of a beard and a solid jawline, crumples in front of my eyes.
33
A WHITE COTTON HANKIE
Niamh
Niamh is holding onto Jodie’s hand in the back seat of Paul’s car as they drive to the hospital. She’s not sure whether it is her, or her daughter, who is squeezing most tightly. Jodie is remarkably stoic – more stoic than Niamh managed to be that time she was the one being rushed to hospital only to find there was nothing to be done.
She had sobbed and gulped while Laura drove and Becca held her hand. She’d been desperately trying to get hold of Paul but, given that he’d been on a flight from London to Belfast, she’d been unable to speak to him.
‘He’s going to be so disappointed,’ she’d sobbed into Becca’s shoulder.
‘We don’t know what’s happening yet,’ Becca had told her. ‘It might be nothing. Try to keep calm.’
Niamh had failed, spectacularly, at keeping calm. Afterwards she’d look back on it and come to realise it was because she knew. Deep in her heart, she knew. She didn’t have all the same symptoms she’d had when she had been pregnant with Jodie. Her boobs didn’t hurt. She didn’t wake up each morning and immediately throw up. Yes, she was maybe a little more tired than normal but she was a mother to a two-year-old and was also working full time. Her husband had been away on business for the past week. She was bound to be more tired – but she was nowhere near the bone-crushingly exhausted horror of her first trimester with Jodie when she struggled to stay awake even in front of a class of rowdy teenagers.
Still, even though she had suspected that something was not right, she still felt shocked to see the streak of red in her knickers when she went to the loo. How strange, she’d thought, to suddenly find it so alarming when it had been a monthly occurrence ever since she turned twelve. Annoying, yes. Inconvenient? Abso-bloody-lutely (no pun intended). But not alarming.
Suddenly, though, it was a signal that something had gone wrong inside her body. That her body had let her down. Was it something she had done? Had she not been excited enough? This had been a surprise pregnancy, unlike that with Jodie, which they had planned for. She had already been struggling with Jodie in the terrible twos and Paul’s work requiring long spells away. She’d cried when the test had turned positive. So was that her fault? Had she wished the baby away?
Sitting now, beside her daughter who is staring, face expressionless, out of the car window, she wonders what thoughts are running through her mind. Looking at the back of Paul’s head as he drives, she wonders what he’s thinking. Is he relieved? Worried? Scared?
She wonders if he feels the way she does right now – that she hates that there is nothing she can do to influence the outcome of the next few hours. There is no way she can take whatever pain – physical or emotional – her child will be experiencing and carry it on her own shoulders. Yes, she’ll feel it because, God knows, a mother feels the pain of their child on some instinctual, deeply rooted biological level – but it won’t be as sharp. It won’t ease what Jodie is going to go through.
If the worst happens. She tries to remind herself that it’s not always bad news. It might all work out.
