| Squeezing
benefit from misfortune
by Lynne Worwood
There is nothing any good on television tonight.
Not that there ever is these days, just soaps and repeats and the
odd ‘reality’ show which it always seems, to me, is
about as far removed from reality as it is possible to be.
‘Do you fancy going down to the pub then?’ my husband
asks, trying to take my mind off things.
‘Not really,’ I reply.
I don’t fancy it, I’m not being antisocial, but the
village pub is the last place I want to go.
They would all be talking about it and I just don’t feel up
to that.
The people in the village are a pleasant enough lot, they mean well
but they will either avoid speaking to me about it altogether, as
though it had all never taken place, or else they will be full of
sympathy, and either way I will probably end up in tears.
No, I would prefer to stay in, just as I have been ever since it
happened.
Perhaps if there is nothing on television tonight there will be
something I can listen to on the radio.
‘You know you can’t stay in for ever,’ Peter says,
more in the nature of a statement than as a question.
I knew it. He is beginning to lose patience with me.
Well it was bound to happen; I couldn’t expect him to feel
the same way that I do, to understand my sense of loss.
When we first discovered that it was unlikely that I would ever
be able to conceive, Peter was brilliant about it. He said that
he had never been entirely sure that he had wanted children anyway.
A kind, generous thing to say – but nevertheless I knew it
to be totally untrue.
I have seen him with children. When they are tiny, cradling them
tenderly in his arms; when they are toddlers, on his hands and knees
with them, assembling toys and games.
We didn’t give up on having children easily, of course we
didn’t. No, we tried all the usual things that couples having
trouble conceiving try. We monitored ovulation times by body temperature,
Peter gave up on hot showers, and took to wearing boxer shorts,
I consumed folic acid and every other advised supplement under the
sun, and of course in the circumstances we sought and took medical
advice. Not to mention constantly being ‘at it like rabbits’.
Unfortunately, eventually we had had to come to terms with the fact
that we were likely to remain a childless couple.
We compensated by throwing ourselves into other things. We became
the ‘life and soul’ of the local social scene, always
there for village events, on all the committees for this, that and
the other.
Something was always missing between us though.
Peter had tried to fill the gap by getting me a puppy. At first
I had hated the idea; it made me feel like some sort of saddo, as
if I needed a child substitute.
I didn’t. I needed a child.
However when you find yourself presented with a little bundle of
joy, even if it has fur and four legs, it brings out all your maternal
instincts and I guess that was precisely what he became, in the
event, my child substitute.
I did everything for him that you would do for a child. Christened
him, with a name that any human first-born would have been proud
of – Adam; toilet trained him; had him vaccinated against
all known ‘childhood’ ailments; trotted backwards and
forwards to the medical centre with him for weighing, measuring
and monitoring his development; taught him how to behave well in
company – well the rudiments anyway.
He became my constant companion, followed me everywhere. People
in the village greeted him when we walked out together, just as
I spoke to their children; and he was so handsome, so well behaved
…
Which of course is what made it all the more difficult when we lost
him.
I haven’t seemed able to pull myself together emotionally
since.
Of course it was all very traumatic, the tree coming down on the
cottage like that, in the storm. I was frightened to death; heaven
knows how he felt, poor thing.
To me it’s like bereavement. It’s over two months now,
and I still find myself crying every time I think of him.
Peter was very sympathetic at first.
I remember that first night we spent in the cottage once they had
repaired the roof and sawn up the fallen tree. Peter had tried to
make everything as perfect as he could for me.
But he failed. Adam was missing. I felt as though nothing could
ever be quite the same again.
The damaged rooms had been redecorated and refurbished – they
even looked better than before. Peter had taken me in his arms,
hugged and squeezed, comforted and cajoled, wiped away my tears
and promised me a replacement.
I didn’t want a replacement, though, I wanted my baby.
Sobbing and inconsolable he eventually led me to bed, to the new
refurbished bedroom, beneath the newly repaired roof.
I needed my husband that night like I had never needed him before.
Now, well now, he thinks I should be over it and be pulling myself
together, getting on with life. I can see it in his eyes.
‘You know you should get out. You’re going to get agoraphobic
the way its going. Everyone down at the pub is asking after you.’
‘I don’t feel up to it,’ I plead.
‘We have to dust ourselves off and get on with life. He’s
never coming back…’
He never finishes because I just burst into tears.
‘OK, OK. I’ll do it. Don’t go on.’ I eventually
give in.
Perhaps he is right. I reluctantly pull on a jacket and we walk
up the road to where the village pub stands, set back slightly from
the road.
As we walk hand in hand into the pub the warm air hits my face while
the smell of warm beer, and food from the restaurant hit my stomach.
I feel weirdly nauseous, as though the people in here, my friends,
are all staring at me.
The walls seem to be coming towards me, the ground swaying.
Perhaps Peter is right, perhaps I am agoraphobic, and perhaps I’m
having a panic attack.
I have to pull myself together, friends are coming over, greeting
me, sympathising. I feel the tears well up.
‘Come and sit down over here, love,’ Angela, the chairwoman
of the village Women’s Institute, takes charge, pulling me
over into a quiet alcove by an open window.
I feel grateful.
‘You two go and get the drinks in,’ she instructs Peter
and her husband. ‘We’ll be over here.’
Then to me: ‘You look all in.’
‘I am,’ I admit. ‘Silly, I know, but I just keep
reliving the night of the storm, that loud splintering noise, the
huge crash, the tree nearly killing us in our bed, and poor Adam…’
‘It can’t be easy,’ she said, ‘but the repairs
are all seen to?’
Yes, and it was all insured. In truth it is better than it was before.
But…’
She shakes her head knowingly, ‘No, it can’t have been
easy, especially in your condition.’
‘My condition?’
‘Well being pregnant.’
‘I’m not.’
‘You’re sure?’
I am about to say ‘of course I’m sure’ and that
‘I can’t have children’, and then I feel uncertain…
just for a moment.
As I pause Angela suggests that perhaps I make an appointment to
see her husband, the village doctor, on the following day.
‘Get a check-up,’ she suggests, ‘if you’re
not… well then you look pretty washed out to me. Just as well
to get a check with all you’ve been through.’
The two men come over with the tray of drinks.
I slowly sip my wine. It’s possible. Two months since ….
Peter is silent as we walk home, I think he is annoyed that I was
so quiet in the pub, and that I didn’t even finish my drink.
I go to see Dr Smith the next day.
When Peter arrives back from work that night I say, ‘how about
popping up to the pub again?’
He seems pleased, very pleased. I can tell he thinks I’m making
an effort.
‘Yes, yes that would be good. I’ve got a surprise for
you; I’ll give it to you there.’
Walking into the pub I feel just as I did the night before, but
I fight back the weird sensations and make my way over to see Angela.
‘Hello Pet,’ she says, ‘can I get you a drink?
It’s a white wine isn’t it?’
‘Better make that a freshly squeezed orange juice,’
I say.
She beams and gives me a hug: “Knew it! I just knew it! At
least some good came out of the aftermath of the storm then. What
does Peter say?’
‘I haven’t told him.’
‘Haven’t told him?’
‘No. Not yet.’
‘Not told him? And he hasn’t guessed, him being the
obstetrics consultant at the hospital - can you believe it?’
‘No and No again,’ I laugh.
When Peter comes over he looks down at the orange juice, ‘You
feeling OK?’ he asks, concerned.
I nod nonchalantly.
‘Look,’ he says. ‘I was wondering about us getting
a dog.’
‘It’ll need to be good with children,’ I say.
‘Oh it is, it is,’ he says grinning from ear to ear
excitedly and missing my carefully veiled response.
The barman walks in.
‘People up at Manor Farm had him,’ he says. ‘They’ve
been trying to find out who he belonged to, I told them that he
was yours, ran off when the tree came down on the house.’
I throw my arms round Adam’s neck, ‘It’s so good
to have you back. I’ve got news for you. You’re going
to have a little brother or sister,’ I tell him as he wags
his tail madly.
I think he’s pleased.
For a moment Peter just stares disbelievingly, first at the glass
of freshly squeezed orange juice, then at Adam and me …
… I think he’s pleased too.
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