The Impossible Truths of Love, page 23
Annie nods, blindsided by the sudden mention of Danny. She has been trying so hard not to think about him, not to dwell on the past, when she knows she has so much to be grateful for.
The matron shuffles forward on the edge of her chair, clasps her hands in her lap. ‘It’s understandable that having another child might bring up some painful memories. And I can see from your notes that you experienced some difficulties – emotionally – after Danny died. I completely understand that there may be some conflicted feelings today.’
Annie does not know whether she is supposed to respond, but before she has a chance, the matron continues.
‘Childbirth can be incredibly disruptive to a woman’s hormones. It can happen to anyone, but given all you’ve been through, it’s really not surprising that you might feel a bit out of sorts. I understand that it must have been traumatic for you, handing Nell over to the midwives so soon after she was born, and then heading into surgery yourself. But I can assure you that we’ve taken exemplary care of her.’
A renewed sense of panic grips Annie’s throat. She can hear in this matron’s tone where the conversation is heading. This one doesn’t believe her either. None of them believe her.
The matron carries on speaking as though there is no need to leave any space for Annie’s thoughts, Annie’s feelings, Annie’s knowledge. ‘Every baby is given a tag around their ankle the moment they’re born. Nell was no different. There was probably so much going on that you didn’t notice. And Eileen showed you the tag around Nell’s ankle, didn’t she? That’s how we know who each baby belongs to. That’s how we know that the baby Eileen brought you is Nell.’
This matron is speaking in such a calm, measured way that Annie wants to scream into her face just to try to jolt some urgency into her. ‘The tag must have come off. It must have got swapped with another baby.’
The matron shakes her head with determined authority. ‘That simply doesn’t happen. The tags are very secure. They have to be to avoid exactly the kind of mixup you’re describing.’
A tornado of frustration rages inside Annie. ‘They’re not secure. I unpopped the one on that baby with one hand. It could easily have fallen off.’ She hears the desperation in her voice, wishes the matron would hear it too, would start to act rather than sitting here, doing nothing.
Matron pauses, sucking in a slow stream of air. ‘They are secure, Mrs Hardy. They’re very secure. Now, as you can see for yourself, the babies are lying in cots a good foot apart, so even if their tags did fall off – which they wouldn’t – their own tag would be easily reattached without it ever going near another child. What you’re suggesting is that two babies’ tags fell off, and somehow those tags got taken out of the cots and reattached to the wrong child. I do understand that you’re feeling agitated but you must be able to see that it’s impossible?’
A thin shaft of doubt begins to creep around the closed door of Annie’s certainty. From the nurses’ station further along the corridor she can sense the other midwives watching her, whispering, exchanging glances. She knows that the matron is waiting for her to respond, waiting for her to agree, but there are too many thoughts whipping around her head to be able to grasp any of them properly.
She sees the matron gesture behind her and then suddenly there is the first midwife, holding out the baby they are insisting is hers, and before she has a chance to object, the midwife has placed the child back in her arms.
Annie looks down at the baby, studies its fragile features, tries to see in its face the child she held for five minutes in the early hours of yesterday morning. Matron’s incredulity rings in her ears – ‘you must be able to see that it’s impossible?’ – and uncertainty weaves between her ribs. She closes her eyes, pictures the baby she had held in her arms the day before, and it is as if somewhere in her mind she had taken a series of snapshots that she can see as clearly now as if someone was presenting her with an album of photographs: her baby gazing up at her, eyes wide open, drinking in the sight of this strange new world; her baby blinking up at the fluorescent strip lighting overhead; her baby yawning – mouth stretched wide open – as though the effort of her birth had exhausted her.
Annie opens her eyes, looks down at the child in her arms, and a wave of nausea rises into her throat. She thrusts the baby back towards the matron, shakes her head so violently, the air whistles in her ears. ‘It’s not mine. I don’t care what you say. I know that baby isn’t mine. She hasn’t even got the right colour eyes. She looks nothing like my baby.’ She sits, holding out the baby like an offering to the gods, and it seems that minutes pass, and then hours, before the matron and the midwife share a look of consternation and the midwife takes the baby from her.
‘Mrs Hardy, please. You must see that what you’re suggesting is preposterous. This is your baby. I think if we can just get you back to bed, perhaps we can give you something to help calm you down, and everything will seem a lot clearer.’
Annie knows what they’re doing, what they’re implying. They think she’s mad. They think she’s delusional, that she’s making it all up. They are using the fact of her depression after Danny died to suggest she’s not in her right mind now. But they’re wrong. They’re completely wrong. This has nothing to do with Danny. Nothing whatsoever. This is about Nell, her baby, the baby who is no longer here in her arms where she should be. She is not mad. She has lost her mind before and it is not like this. This is not depression, or madness. This is fear.
‘Please, I’m not making it up. I know my baby. I’m her mother. This baby isn’t mine.’ Her voice cracks and she blinks hard against the tears; she will not play into their scepticism.
‘If you’re so sure this baby isn’t yours, then where is she? All the other mothers have their babies, and you yourself have said that none of the babies in the special care unit are yours. Your baby can’t just have vanished into thin air.’ The expression in Matron’s eyes is not unkind but her eyebrows have inched fractionally up her forehead.
Annie does not have an answer and yet she knows – instinctively, primevally – that the baby the midwife is holding is not hers. The pounding of her heart is so strong, so loud, that she thinks they must surely be able to hear it, cannot understand why they are not responding with the requisite urgency.
She feels a hand take hold of her elbow, feels herself being helped up from the chair and led back down the corridor, in the direction of the ward where she spent the night, but it is as if her head is no longer attached to her body, as if she is watching herself from above. All her mental energy is focussed on trying to find an answer to the matron’s assertion: ‘Your baby can’t just have vanished into thin air.’
As she is led back towards her bed, sandwiched between Matron holding her elbow on one side and the midwife holding the baby on the other, four pairs of eyes look up at her. Annie wants to howl into the unforgiving air, wants to scream until her throat is hoarse and her lungs are empty, until someone believes that she is not mad. She just needs one person to believe that she is telling the truth.
She does not look at the other new mothers – does not want to see the pity or embarrassment in their eyes – but as she allows herself to be led across the room, one slippered foot shuffling in front of the other, something looms into the periphery of her vision, as though determined to make itself seen.
Annie’s head swings around and there it is: the empty bed opposite hers.
She stops in her tracks, turns to the matron. ‘That empty bed. Who was in it? There was someone there yesterday. Where have they gone?’
Matron and the midwife exchange a glance of professional forbearance. ‘They’ve gone home.’
Images begin to take shape in Annie’s head, forming a picture she almost dare not view. ‘She must have my baby. That woman’s gone home with the wrong baby. You have to get her back.’
Matron’s grip strengthens on Annie’s elbow as she tries to turn her away from the vacated bed and towards her own. ‘Nobody’s gone home with the wrong child. Now, let’s get you back to bed before you upset the other babies, shall we?’ As if on cue, there is a burst of wailing from the bed beside the window, but Annie does not move.
‘Stop trying to put me back in bed. You asked where my baby’s gone. There’s your answer. You have to get that woman to bring my baby back.’ Tears sting her eyes but she blinks them away, cannot afford to give the midwives any more cause to think she is being hysterical.
‘Mrs Hardy, no one’s calling anyone back. I can assure you that babies do not get sent home with the wrong mothers. Now, really, you need to calm down. We can’t have the whole ward being upset like this.’
Matron’s words are glutinous in Annie’s ears, explanations jostling for position in her head. ‘That woman’s baby. Was it in the special care baby unit too?’
Matron hesitates, her eyes darting towards the midwife and back again, and in that sliver of time, Annie sees the answer to her question.
‘I can’t answer that. It’s confidential information.’
The hesitation emboldens Annie, her certainty growing with every passing second. ‘Was it a boy or a girl? It was a girl, wasn’t it?’
‘You know I’m not going to answer that. Now, please, will you get back into bed. You must be in pain. Let’s give you something to take that away, shall we?’
Annie shakes her head. She is no longer aware of any pain in her wound. All she can feel is the panic flooding her veins and a burning sensation in her chest, though she does not know whether it is fear or anger, grief or horror. ‘I don’t need anything. I just want my baby.’ She will not allow them to pour more liquid morphine into her mouth, will not allow them to sedate her, silence her for a second time.
Next to her bed, she spies the black holdall containing all the things she had been advised to pack for the hospital: nappies, baby clothes, spare pyjamas, sanitary towels. Pulling herself free of Matron’s clutches, she walks over to the bed. With one hand she leans on the mattress, stretches towards the floor, reaches for the holdall.
‘What are you doing?’
‘I’m discharging myself.’ She can hear the mania in her voice, knows they think she is deranged, but she doesn’t care. She has to find that woman and get her baby back.
‘Don’t be silly. You can’t leave. You’ve had surgery, you’ve had significant blood loss, and you need to stay here, where we can look after you.’
Annie shakes her head, fire in her throat. ‘I’m not staying here. You can’t expect me to sit here and do nothing. My baby’s missing. Why won’t anyone listen to me?’
Matron steps towards her, so close Annie can feel her breath on her cheek, can smell the residue of garlic in it. ‘Mrs Hardy, we can’t let you leave. I’m going to get someone to come and have a chat with you, someone who can help with how you’re feeling.’
Matron’s voice is quiet but firm, and she does not need to be any more specific. They are sending for a psychiatrist. The veiled threat is loud and clear: if you try to leave, we will make sure you cannot.
Annie leans her weight on the bed, clenched hands pressed against the rough canvas of her overnight bag, unsure where her fear ends and her panic begins.
Behind her comes the sound of squeaking wheels, and out of the corner of her eye she sees the midwife wheeling a transparent plastic baby cot towards her, complete with a child Annie knows is not hers. The midwife parks the crib next to the bed so that Annie has no choice but to look at the child lying awake inside. For a split second she allows herself to hope that perhaps she has been mistaken, perhaps the nurses are right, perhaps this whole episode has been nothing more than postpartum confusion. But as her eyes rest on the delicate features of the baby in the cot – on the dark hair and bright blue eyes, on the wrong lips, the wrong cheeks, the wrong nose, the wrong chin – she knows without a doubt that she is not mistaken.
Matron takes hold of her arm. ‘Only half an hour until visiting time. Is your husband coming this morning? I expect you’ll feel much better once he’s here.’
Bill. It is the first time Annie has thought of him, and now that she does she cannot believe she has been so foolish. ‘You have to get Bill here now. He saw Nell yesterday, he’ll know there’s been a mistake. He’ll be able to tell you this is all wrong.’ Hope surges in Annie’s mind. Bill will know she is telling the truth. He will be able to see that this baby isn’t theirs. They will not be able to accuse Bill of postpartum mania, will not be able to confine him to the ward, threaten him with a psychiatrist. He will be able to speak to someone higher up in the hospital, someone more senior, someone with authority who will have to take him seriously. And if the hospital won’t listen, he can go to the police. The police will have to do something. Her baby cannot have gone far. Bill will know what to do. He will know how to get Nell back.
‘Visiting hours begin in thirty minutes. Your husband is welcome to come then, with all the other fathers. Now, please get back into bed.’
Annie cannot believe these women are being so obstructive, so intransigent. ‘But Bill will know I’m right. You have to get him here now.’
Matron whispers something into the midwife’s ear, and Annie wants to scream at them for their stupidity, their deafness, their refusal to take her seriously.
‘Let’s get you something to eat, and hopefully that will make you feel better. If not, we can give you a little injection of something to help calm you down.’
This time the threat is not even veiled. They want to sedate her and she cannot allow that to happen. Every minute lost is another moment without her child. She tries to pull her expression into something resembling compliance, lowers herself onto the bed. She allows the midwife to lift her legs onto the mattress, plump the pillows behind her head, pull the heavy sheets back over her body, all under the watchful eye of the matron.
‘There, that’s better, isn’t it? Now, something to eat? You slept through breakfast but I’m sure we can rustle you up some toast.’ Matron’s voice is firm, redoubtable, as though she is speaking to a small child returning from a lengthy punishment.
Annie does not say anything. She cannot think of eating. Her mouth is dry, she knows she would not be able to swallow, but she daren’t contradict the matron, daren’t do anything to risk having medication pumped into her, disabling her from thinking straight.
‘Good. Anything you need, you know where we are. Meanwhile, I suggest you spend some time with your lovely little girl. I expect she’s ready for a cuddle with Mum.’
Matron glances one last time at the baby in the plastic crib before both she and the midwife turn and leave, Matron looking back over her shoulder at Annie as though checking she is not trying to escape.
From beside the bed, Annie hears the baby gurgling, and she turns her back to it, tries to shut out the sound. Her breasts ache with yearning for her newborn child and there is fear inside her, like a rock lodged in her stomach.
Scrunching shut her eyes, she tries to remember what the woman in the bed opposite looked like, but there is nothing more than a vague impression, like a face seen through mottled glass: dark brown hair in a mass of curls, pale skin, younger than Annie by a decade or so. Annie squints, trying to pull the image into focus, but it is as though the harder she concentrates, the more oblique it becomes.
In place of recall comes an imagined picture that burns behind her eyes and sears itself onto her heart: an image of that anonymous woman, right now, at home with Annie’s baby, cradling her in her arms, offering Annie’s child her breast, watching with unconditional love as a child she mistakenly believes to be hers suckles at her nipple. She imagines that unknown woman leaning forward and kissing the top of Nell’s head, breathing in the smell of her, believing it is a smell they share even though it is as foreign as if she were holding a newborn baby from the other side of the world. She imagines this woman kissing each of Nell’s toes, holding Nell naked against her bare skin, singing gently into Nell’s ear, holding out her finger to let Nell wrap her wrinkled fist around it.
The imagined scenes blaze inside her mind. She reminds herself that Bill will be here soon, he will know what to do. She just has to get through the next thirty minutes. She will have her baby back soon. It is a belief she has to cling to because if she doesn’t she fears the panic will engulf her.
The long hand clicks to a vertical position and Annie’s eyes gaze hungrily at the door, waiting for Bill to walk through it.
For the past thirty minutes she has sat motionless on the bed, watching the clock, interested only in the progression of time until Bill arrives. She has ignored the tea and toast the midwife put on the bedside cabinet, ignored the snuffling of the baby in the cot beside her. She has shut her ears against suggestions that she feed the baby, paid no attention as the midwife fetched a bottle of formula and fed the child herself. All she has wanted is for time to speed up, so that Bill will arrive and help find their baby.
Men begin to stride through the door, simultaneously eager and hesitant, as though they know this hallowed space is not really their domain. Two hold enormous bouquets of flowers in pinks, whites, yellows. One is clutching an oversized blue teddy bear under his arm. Another holds the hand of a little boy halfhiding behind his father’s leg.
Annie looks beyond them, over their shoulders, in search of Bill. But only four men have entered and Bill is not among them. Behind the four fathers, the doorway is empty.
Panic needles her skin, her mind racing with thoughts as to where he might be. She wonders if there has been an emergency in the workshop, though Annie cannot imagine what could be so urgent that he cannot leave it for an hour to visit her, cannot allow Elsa to hold the fort. Her mind speeds on, to Clare and Laura, to whether anything might have happened to either of them to prevent Bill from visiting. But they will be at school and she trusts that if anything untoward had occurred, he would have telephoned the hospital to let her know.
In the cubicle next to hers, a father sits down on a blue plastic chair, his baby clad in a pink babygrow asleep on his chest while he studies each of her fingers in turn. Behind her she can hear the toddler asking his mummy how long it will be before the baby learns to talk. Diagonally opposite, a man has taken off his shoes and is lying on the bed next to his wife, their baby in his arms, both of them staring down at the child as though unable to unpeel their eyes. Annie lies alone, watching, listening, waiting, trying to visualise the circumstances that could have kept Bill from coming.
