I don’t think I’d realised until now how upset I was about Daniel. At first, he tried to blame work. He’d been left holding the fort with a project that was at risk of falling apart – Rory having announced that he and Serena were going on an impromptu holiday, a ‘babymoon’， they called it. He was struggling to get out at eight at the moment, let alone in time for the classes at six.
‘I’ll read the books,’ Daniel had said. He was avoiding eye contact. ‘I promise, I’ll learn it all. Do we really need the classes?’
That’s when it had dawned on me. He didn’t want to come to the classes at all.
‘Is this really about work?’
I’d looked at Daniel, still not meeting my eye, fiddling with his watch. And I’d thought then about what the counsellor had told us, about us grieving at different rates. How she had made me understand that his grief was not less, but different. I couldn’t understand this, for a long time. My grief is raw and bloody, tearful and surfacing often. It is kinetic, feverish, greedy. It makes me impatient, makes me clutch at hope, at progress, at the anticipation of the new baby, the expectation of healing. Daniel’s is the opposite. A sort of paralysis of the heart. It makes him withdraw. Makes him terrified to hope, to plan, to believe in the future.
And then I’d thought about how he’d spent all weekend putting flat-pack nursery furniture together, crawling around the house on his hands and knees covering all the plug sockets, getting the baby monitor we’d bought working. How he’d gone, without complaint, to the post office to collect the huge breastfeeding pillow I’d ordered, and arrived home with a packet of prawn cocktail crisps after I told him I’d been craving them.
But for me, this is all part of it. Sitting in a circle and talking about the opening of the pelvis, like all first-time parents do. I want to be able to tell funny stories about it, like other mums. And Daniel just doesn’t seem to understand the impact it has, having to do everything connected with the baby on my own because he can’t face it.
Rachel has been an enthusiastic listener, her eyes wide open, her head nodding like a toy dog.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say, shaking my head, searching for a tissue in my bag. ‘I feel ridiculous getting so upset.’
‘Not at all,’ Rachel says. ‘I’d be annoyed too.’ She passes me a napkin from underneath the glass of juice. It’s rough and papery and sticky from the juice, but I take it gratefully.
As I blow my nose, two of the other mothers arrive with their partners, heading for the stairs. When they see my tear-stained face, they avert their gaze, quicken their step. I feel the colour rising to my cheeks. Rachel places a hand on my arm. ‘You sure you don’t want me to spike that drink?’ I laugh, wiping my eyes. It’s been a while since I really laughed.
Rachel smiles. ‘Come on,’ she says, gesturing to the stairs at the back of the pub. ‘We’ll miss all the fun.’
The class starts. Sonia tells us to prepare for a ‘breathing exercise’ with our partner, and I am surprised to find myself intensely relieved that Rachel is here. The exercise involves me kneeling on all fours on the wooden floor, one of Sonia’s grubby tie-dye cushions under my knees. Meanwhile Rachel has to rub my back and encourage me to inhale and exhale through the ‘surges’ – the word Sonia uses when she is talking about the agonising pains for which we all know we are destined.
Sonia is weaving between us, hands splayed, wrists rotating, spinning some tale about waves on a shore, something about a ribbon around our uterus unravelling. The other women on all fours crane their necks to hear. Her voice is mostly drowned out by Rachel’s commentary.
‘You are smashing it, Helen!’ Rachel cries. She slaps her hands down on her thighs. ‘You’ve got this. You’re all over it. Push, Helen! Push! Oh God, I can see the head!’ She roars with laughter. One of the other women actually tuts.
By the time the class concludes – with a surreal Playmobil demonstration of a Caesarean section – it occurs to me how grateful I have been for Rachel’s companionship. I find myself admiring her. She is so upbeat about it all. Would I be so cheerful, in her situation? Although she hasn’t said so explicitly, it’s clear there is no father in the picture. And she is so young. I wouldn’t have the strength to do all this on my own. I mean, he might have been a bit useless lately, but I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t have Daniel.
Rachel is standing up, pulling a jacket on over her bump. ‘Pub?’ she says brightly. ‘I mean, I know we’re already at the pub so … drink downstairs?’ She giggles. ‘We can go crazy and have another juice. Our vitamin levels will be through the roof!’