‘I’ll take it with her, shall I?’ The younger nurse offered. The simple kindness robbed her of speech. She nodded quickly.
‘In your bag, is it?’ Another nod.
The nurse took the wool-and-silk shawl and the baby and left.
She felt a fresh contraction, leant her head back against the metal bars of the bed, eyes squeezed tight shut, lips compressed. A ring of grief swelling in her throat, choking her. Theresa, she thought, remembering the black pools of the baby’s eyes. That’s her name, Theresa…
… Outside the door, poised for flight. Her heart was bumping too fast in her chest, fingers clenched. She could just go. Turn and walk away. Cruel, yes, but not impossible. This side of the door there was still room for fantasies, for dreams of what she might be like, for scenes of happy ever after, of coming home, of finding peace. But in there, once across the threshold, there would only ever be reality: stark, unrelenting, unchangeable. No going back. No escape. Her ears were buzzing and her skull and back felt tight with tension. She couldn’t breathe properly.
She closed her eyes momentarily, fighting the rising panic. Don’t think. Just open the door.
She put her hand out and grasped the handle. Turned and pushed. Stepped into the room. Saw the woman on the couch rise unsteadily to her feet. Smiling. Moving towards her, mouth working with emotion. Little exclamations popping softly, hello, oh, hello. Arms opening, eyes drinking her in.
The two women embrace.
The younger started to cry, noisy sobs and sucking sounds.
‘Twenty eight years,’ the other said, her voice muffled with emotion. ‘I never thought I’d see you again. Come on.’
She led her daughter to the couch and sat with one arm around her, listening to her weep. She smelled her hair and felt the smooth skin of her fingers and waited for the crying to gentle and cease. There was no hurry after all. Years lost; but now they had all the time in the world. Forever.
And the daughter in her hot, damp sea of tears, felt them emptying out of her, on and on like when they change the lock gates on the canals. Made no effort to control them. Holding the hand, strong and bony like her own, hearing the drumbeat in her ears. Till she is all cried out. Feeling the wheel turn. Finding herself in a new place. Tender and bewildered and brave.
Part One: Birth
Caroline Joan
Megan
‘It’s not just morning sickness,’ Megan complained, ‘it’s morning, noon and night sickness.’
‘You look like you’re wasting away,’ Joan remarked drily.
‘G’wan.’ Megan was pleased with their new room-mate: older, more sophisticated, shorthand-typist no less. She had more about her than Caroline, who was kind but really shy and desperately unhappy.
‘And you should put your legs up,’ Joan instructed Caroline.
Caroline kicked off her shoes and carefully swung her legs round and on to the bed. There was little definition of the ankles left, the flesh was puffy and mottled red from calf to toe.
‘Does it hurt?’ Joan asked.
Caroline nodded. She looked tired, dark circles under her rich brown eyes. She had a wide face, a sallow complexion and wore her shiny dark-brown hair pulled back and tied in a ponytail.
Megan was brushing her hair. It had grown and she liked it long and bushy, springy red curls like Rita Hayworth. The brush wasn’t much good though, the soft bristles created more static electricity than anything else. Joan wore her black hair in a beehive, but hers was straight to begin with. She back-combed it and used sugar and water to set it. Joan was tall anyway, but with her hair up like that she looked even leggier, like some film star.
‘You should tell Matron,’ Megan said to Caroline.
‘I did.’
‘But it looks worse today.’ Megan told her. ‘They shouldn’t still have you doing the laundry, with feet fit to burst.’
‘Megan!’ Joan’s inky blue eyes narrowed in warning.
Megan shrugged and put her brush down. ‘Suppose it’s better than the kitchen though,’ she added. She foraged in her cupboard and came out with a knitting pattern and a pair of needles stuck into a ball of soft white wool. She rubbed the wool against her cheek. It was so soft. They’d lots of new stuff like this coming in, a million miles away from the scratchy wire that Mammy had used to knit all their stuff.
‘At least you can sit down to peel the vegetables,’ said Caroline. ‘I’m standing all the time in the laundry.’
Megan waved her needle at her. ‘If you’ve morning, noon and night sickness, the odour of cheese pie and liver stew tips the balance. And that’s not all that tips.’
The girls smiled.
‘What are you knitting?’ Joan asked.
‘The layette.’ Megan passed her the pattern. Black and white photographs of babies wearing the various outfits adorned the front cover. ‘White, of course, to suit a boy or girl and I’m doing the longer coat.’
‘I can’t knit,’ said Joan.
‘G’wan,’ said Megan, ‘everyone can knit. You can knit, can’t you, Caroline?’
‘A bit.’
‘It’s easy,’ said Megan. ‘How come your mammy never showed you?’
‘Oh, she did. I was always dropping stitches or getting the wool so tight I couldn’t budge it.’
‘Tell us about being a secretary. Was it hard at secretarial school?’
‘The shorthand’s the worst. And the teachers.’
‘Does it cost a lot?’
When Joan told her, Megan thought she was kidding her for a moment. ‘Flippin’ ’eck,’ she said, ‘you can count me out.’ Then she had a thought. ‘Tell you what, I’ll teach you to knit and you teach me shorthand.’
‘What about the typing?’ Joan laughed. ‘I don’t want to learn knitting anyway.’
‘Suit yourself!’ Megan tossed back her hair, pretended to be offended. She began to knit, the needles clicking in a steady rhythm. ‘I’ll just have to go back to the factory.’
‘But you said you were getting married,’ Caroline said.
‘I am, as soon as I’m old enough. Daddy won’t give his permission. Anyway, Brendan’s got to do his apprenticeship and he’s not meant to get wed till he's done. We wanted to,’ she said to Joan, ‘we wanted to get married and keep the baby.’ Her hands stopped moving. She gripped the needles.
‘That’s not fair,’ said Joan.
Megan could feel Joan’s eyes on her but didn’t want to catch them. There were tears stinging in her head but she would not cry. ‘No,’ she said abruptly. ‘Who said life was fair? They had that wrong. Still -’ she forced practicality back into her voice, carefully wound the wool round the needle – ‘there’s no budging them and I can’t run off to Gretna Green the state I’m in, so it’s the best of a bad job.’ She slid the stitch over, drew the wool around for the next.
‘Lights out in ten minutes,’ a voice called, knuckles rapped on the door.
‘Are you going to see Matron?’ Joan asked Caroline.
‘I’ll see how it is in the morning, it’s usually better after a lie down.’
She was so young, Joan thought, just sixteen. A dark horse. Not like Megan, who chattered day and night. The two girls were the same age but Megan’s bright personality and her bubbly confidence made her seem older than Caroline.
It was Caroline who had first shown her round, leading her upstairs and into the bedroom. ‘That’s yours.’ Caroline had pointed to the bed at the end of the row. There were three in the room and a small cupboard at the side of each. In the furthest corner, in an alcove to the side of the window, there was a wardrobe.
‘How long have you been here?’ Joan had asked her.
‘A month.’
‘What’s it like?’
The girl shrugged. ‘Bit strict. It’s all right if you remember the rules.’
‘Who else shares?’
‘Megan, she’s at the end. She came last week.’