Go to Sleep (17 page)

It’s the sound of traffic that wakes me, and then the harsh sunlight filtering through the slats. It feels like I’ve hardly slept. My skin grips my skull tight like a helmet, dots of light dancing about my eyes if I look up too quickly. I’m so used to the single prolonged white-noise whirr in my head that it barely registers. Zzzzzz. It’s the soundtrack to my days and nights.

Joe is lying dead still in his crib. I look out for the rise and fall of his lungs, impossible to make out beneath the baggy folds of his too-big babygro. I don’t want to wake him, but still the thought nags and nags. I go to the bathroom, dig out my little compact mirror and hold it an inch above his mouth. I wait. I hold my breath. A near-invisible wisp of steam mists the glass, disappears in an instant then mists up again, and I exhale, slowly. Joe is fine. But my mind – or whatever now powers whatever
I am or have become – lets in a fragment of a notion. What if he
had
? . . . No! I will not think it out any further. I drive the idea deep back down. But what if . . . what if?

Then I could sleep.

Frightened, frightened by everything, I run downstairs and haul open the curtains.

Daylight floods the room and the threat retreats. I confront the day. Joe is asleep. He may not stay that way for more than a few minutes, but who knows? For now Joe
is
sleeping. And through my foggy delay in processing this, a little frisson of glee takes hold, a surge of realisation that I can, perhaps, indulge myself in some of the basic functions of life that for ever get postponed as I leap to the needs of my Bean; taking a bath, reading the paper, cooking myself a meal with fresh ingredients. All these things need strategising, now; none can be done on a whim, or at all with a babe in arms. If I should desire a cup of coffee, I have to put Joe down while I boil the kettle. His cot is upstairs, and he’ll cry when I lie him down – and I dare not risk simply laying him on the couch. What if he were to suffocate himself? I could strap him into his buggy, but that seems cruel – intimating to him that we’re off out on an adventure, when selfish Mummy merely wants him out of the way while she makes herself a cuppa. I could attempt to make the coffee with Joe tucked neatly under one arm – but the idea of boiling water coming anywhere near him puts paid to that. Out of a narrow list of possibilities, the one
that always makes most sense is to put it off until later. It’ll keep. And it will taste so much better then, too. The yearned-for cup of coffee seldom materialises. But I can have one now – oh yes! And, while I’m at it, I shall fry myself some eggs and, with the radio on and my knees tucked under my chin on the sofa, I’ll settle down to an egg butty, oozing molten butter and brown sauce. Heaven.

To my surprise and joy there are eggs in the fridge, and the date on them is fine. I pour some oil into a pan and while I’m waiting for it to heat through, I boot up my laptop. There’s a clutch of emails from Faye, telling me in increasingly curt terms that she’s tried phoning, she’s called round three times without finding me in, and if she doesn’t see Joseph while he’s newborn she will be gravely offended. It’s hard to know with Faye whether she’s teasing or not and, over the years, I’ve come to realise there’s often a little nugget of resentment lurking behind the wisecracks and twinkling eyes. At The Gordon, I always – or almost always – defer to her greater experience and find myself conceding when we have a dispute. This time her martyred tone has made me angry though, and just as I was about to immerse myself in some me-time, too. I find myself firing off a heated response, telling her I’ve barely had time to wash my hair let alone indulge in the luxury of entertaining visitors. Purged of my angst though, I delete the email and re-write it with
a forceful gaiety, apologising to Faye for my scatterbrain and imploring her to come round after work today. I hit send and remember my eggs.

The oil is bubbling so furiously now that it blisters the eggs on impact. I slap the frazzled brown patties on to the waiting bread, slice the sandwich diagonally and bite right into it, yolk dripping out from both sides. I’m on a roll, now. I make another pot of coffee, loading stacked spoonfuls of Nicaraguan roast into the cafetière and standing back to inhale the first few blasts. I’m alive again. I’m functioning. Functional. I try to pay a few bills online but the procedure requires more patience, more mental exertion than my brain will allow. I abandon the operation and go back to my unread emails.

More junk mail from Praxal, the pharmaceutical company that’s been hounding me ever since I brought Joe home. They boast a panacea, seemingly, for every baby-related ill: nappy rash, colic, teething pains, Praxal has it all figured out. They’ve been spamming me madly, and I usually just hit delete as soon as I see their name but today’s tag line makes me sit up.
Dozinite
–
Aids Peaceful Sleep for Mother and Child
.

Mother
and child? Why shouldn’t the fathers be driven insane with sleeplessness, too? I click to read more about Dozinite. It’s a paracetamol-based suspension for colds and temperatures, and a side effect is that it
may
cause drowsiness. Clever. I scroll down, read the small print. Not to be given to children under the age of six. The
briefest hesitation, then I hit delete. As though on cue, Joe starts to cry. The hand of freedom is snatched away, but it was wonderful while it lasted. I feel better. Not
good
, but less bad. I’m fortified, for the time being.

I master the impulse to go to Joe, and decide to let him wait a bit. I try to breathe through the churning in my chest that’s become my default setting now, even when I hear a baby cry on TV. The more I dance to Joe’s tune, the more he seems to take advantage. That visiting lecturer had it right. What was her name? Caused a bit of a stir on the post-feminist scene then went off to marry a toy boy . . . anyway, her message was that the patriarchy begins in the womb; once the sex of the child is determined, lifelong hierarchies are set in place. Joe agrees with gusto.

He cranks up his pleas.

He is deliberately driving himself into a tantrum. I scream up from the bottom of the stairs. ‘What do you
want?
Hey? WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?’

Breathless, guilt-ridden, I slump back down on the sofa and hold a cushion across my midriff, determined to let Joe cry himself out. Then I rouse myself, switch the radio on and turn the volume up loud, some nasty drilling dance anthem, and I put on my gloves and blitz the surfaces that may have been contaminated with uncooked egg yolk. Even above the music his cries vibrate through the flat, heartbreaking, beseeching. I can’t stand it. I don’t know whether to just walk out, or go to him,
or throw myself out of the window, and my head is thumping with conflict when suddenly he stops. I hold my breath. Nothing. I feel awful. I did that to my little boy. I ignored his cries. I tiptoe to the bottom of the stairs and listen, to be sure. Every now and then there’s a little gasp followed by a pitiful shuddering. But he’s quiet, now. He’s going back to sleep. What a wretch I am – doing that. I stand at the window staring blankly down at the street below, smitten with self-loathing. Well done, Rachel. You mastered the Patriarch. Joe is eight days old.

I go to him. I just want to sit with him – to be there, with him. In repose, he lets out a little sob. The dead-weight of shame slams through me. I start to sing to him, surprised by how easily it comes, and how pleasingly melodic my voice is; yet it’s underpinned by sadness, too. This whole tableau – the lonely mother, the unhappy child – is etched with sorrow. Gently, as softly as possible, I slide my fingers under Joe and lift him to my bosom. I’m shocked by the delicate curve of his spine beneath my hand. I hold him to my face and kiss his cheeks, his lips.

‘I do love you, Joe,’ I whisper. ‘I do.’ I begin humming a lullaby. The buzzer sounds from below but I ignore it and continue singing and soothing him. ‘Don’t worry, my little man. We’ll get there, you and me. We will, you know.’

The buzzer sounds again, angry, insistent. Whoever it
is, they’re not giving up without a fight. I peer down from behind the curtains. Dad. He’s balancing a couple of boxes between his arms. Mousetraps. I’d forgotten all about that. I let him in.

I find myself staring at Dad as he crouches to set the traps. He’s still catching his breath from hauling these two boxes up the stairs. Dad’s not an old man by any means, but there’s no doubt he’s starting to show his age. There’s none of the sprightly agility I’ve grown so used to; he used to drive me mad with his nervous energy. Close up in front of me now, I can see the signs of wear and tear. Even his buttocks are beginning to slip. He cranes his head around. His scalp is studded with sweat beads.

‘These were the most humane ones I could find. They’re not as effective as the spring traps, but once you do nab the perishers, at least you’ll be able to release them back into the wild.’ He hauls himself back to his feet, gestures to the picture on the box – a cartoon mouse nibbling contentedly in the tubular house-like trap. ‘You put the cheese or whatever in there, see, the little mite goes to get it and hey presto, down comes the trap door.’

‘But hopefully not on its tail,’ I wink.

I’m trying to keep it in check, but there’s an anger rising in me – again. I should step over and hug my father; thank him for carrying out this little ritual for me. I could, at least, make the man a cup of tea. But he irritates me. He irks me so much, just by being here, by
being himself. What do I want from him? What is it that so niggles me, whenever he blunders into my life? It’s not just his mawkish devotion to Jan or his insistence upon levering her name into every single topic we discuss. No, but I’m getting close to something now. Whenever Dad is here, I realise all over again that Mum is not. I must be staring at him. He looks awkward, but walks to me with his arms held out.

‘Now then, how’s my little grandson?’

‘I . . . careful, Dad. He’s only just nodded off.’

He’s dying to say something. There’s a hard-boiled glint in his eye. He holds it in with a dimple smile and, in doing so, gives off an air of superiority.

‘What?’ I snap.

He shakes his head, checks himself but then, seeing my face scowl over, thinks better and spits it out.

‘Darling . . . It’s just, I think . . . Babies need to get used to noise. Start creeping around and you’ll be creating a rod for your own back.’ He smiles softly, takes Joe from me, pulls his puffy dozing face close to his own. ‘Oh, I’m going to miss you so much. Couldn’t I just sneak you into my suitcase?’

The reminder that he’s really going sends my blood pressure surging again. Joe senses something, too. He snaps his eyes wide open, screws up his face, his cheeks darkening with blood, and starts to shriek.

Dad blanches and goes to hand him back. ‘Oh. I think someone is ready for brunch.’

I keep my hands firmly behind my back.

‘I’d just finished feeding him when you came.’ There’s nastiness in my voice. I try to rein it in but I can’t help myself. ‘All I do is feed him. It’s not normal for a baby to be this hungry. This bloody
needy
! He won’t give me a moment to myself.’

‘Why don’t you try him with a dummy, then?’

‘A dummy?’

‘Yeah,’ he chuckles, making like he’s amused by Joe’s fury. ‘Little fraud is obviously using you for comfort. Call his bluff!’ And that is as much as I can take from my exasperatingly upbeat father. I stride to the coat hooks and struggle into my raincoat. Dad follows, with Joe.

‘Where are you going?’ he laughs. But he’s worried.

‘To buy him a dummy.’

Dad’s smile vanishes, and a tremor creeps into his voice.

‘Is he . . . Are you
sure
he’s not hungry, pet lamb?’

‘You’re the bloody expert, Dad,’ I say and shut the door behind me, taking the stairs four at a time before he has the chance to shout me back.

It’s a gorgeous, crisp morning. Autumn leaves crunch underfoot, stiffened by an early winter’s frost. The sky is full of movement, clouds blown chewing-gum-thin across the city and out to the Irish Sea, and I drift aimlessly for a while, enjoying the unexpected boon of liberation. Having got the taste, I’m desperate for more coffee, and the best place in town is right ahead of me, already lurching into view as I kick my way through the Boulevard’s fall. The cathedral was one of our favourite places when Mum got ill. Perhaps it was too special, that cherished ritual of coffee on the vast terrace, the sunshine on her puffed, jaundiced face. Even in her situation, facing up to the inevitable, she loved to traipse through the graveyard. Many’s the time we’d sit outside with our coffees and swoon at the gorgeous swell of the city below us.

‘It all makes sense from up here,’ she’d say. ‘It all fits together just perfectly.’

And I would ache to tell her that I was sorry; for all the things I did, the things I said. I wanted her to know that, looking back, I wished I’d never traded those precious times with her for cheap thrills with Ruben. More than anything, I wanted her to know how much I loved her. She wasn’t trendy. She didn’t love cool, eclectic things. She was difficult and narrow-minded; and she was my Mum. I wanted, once and for all, to say that out loud, yet the moment was never quite right. We were too happy or too peaceful with each other to spoil the moment with confessions. But she got worse, quickly, and the chance was gone for ever.

I get to the end of the Boulevard and dip down into Parly and there it is, within throwing distance, the monstrous gothic majesty of the cathedral. I stop in awe to look at the tower; I follow it way, way up and I think myself right up there, right to the very top, so high above, looking down on all this space below. I’m suddenly scared of what I might do with it. I turn tail, gasping for breath, and make my way down to the river.

I stumble past the Arena, not really sure where I’m going any more, or where I want to go. Cyclists, skaters and the occasional jogger pound the river pathway. I slump back on a bench and watch the sky drain of colour and lower itself down on to the water. I crane my neck back
downriver towards St Michael’s promenade. This time three weeks ago, I was full of it; tanked up on mad, blind excitement. It’s impossible to fathom, that my little mate who lurched and kicked inside me that morning, the Bean I felt such a potent love for, who I couldn’t wait to meet, is the baby I walked out on an hour ago. The baby my poor dad is trying to placate back home. But I can’t go back, not yet. I touch my flabby, empty stomach that once held him and swoon with nostalgia. How I wish he was still in there.