Читать книгу An Unexpected Bonus - Caroline Anderson - Страница 5

‘MUM?’

A door crashed in the distance, and Jo met her mother’s eyes with a rueful grin. ‘So much for our peaceful teabreak.’

‘Mum?’ Footsteps retreated, then returned, attached to a bright smile in a pretty heart-shaped face the image of Jo’s. Long dark hair, again like her mother’s, was scooped up into a band, and now at the end of the day strands escaped, drifting round her soft hazel eyes and giving her a dreamy look.

‘Here you are. Hi, Grannie. Wow, a cake! Yum—can I have a bit?’ She cut a chunk, hitched herself up onto a stool by the breakfast bar and sank her teeth into the cake, without waiting for a reply—or a plate.

Her grandmother slid a plate under the hovering hand and smiled. ‘Good day, darling?’

‘OK, I s’pose. Bit pointless at homework club because the staff hadn’t got round to giving us any homework yet, but that was cool. We talked about Cara’s new boyfriend.’ Her eyes swivelled to her mother. ‘Talking of which, I hear your new doctor’s rather gorgeous.’

Jo nearly choked on her tea. ‘I wouldn’t have gone that far. He’s all right, I suppose.’

‘Cara’s mum said he was really yummy. So’s this cake—can I have another bit?’

‘Will you eat your supper?’

Laura rolled her eyes. ‘Mother, when do I ever not?’

It was true. She ate like a horse, thank God, in these days of eating disorders and unhappy children with appalling self-images and huge expectations hanging over them. ‘OK,’ she agreed, and cut a rather more moderate slice. No point in going to the other extreme. ‘So, let’s hear about Love’s Young Dream, then.’

‘Cara’s boyfriend?’ Laura giggled. ‘Oh, he’s in year nine—the third-year seniors, a year above me, Grannie,’ she explained patiently to her far-from-senile grandmother, ‘and he’s tall and his hair’s streaked blond and he’s got an earring and a tattoo on his bum.’

‘Bottom,’ Jo corrected automatically. ‘And how does Cara know that?’ she added, dreading the answer.

Laura laughed. ‘He had to do a moonie for a forfeit at a party she went to—she says it’s a dragon and it’s really cute.’

‘Let’s hope no one gets the urge to stick a sword in it,’ Jo’s mother said pragmatically, and cleared the breakfast bar while Jo tried not to choke.

‘Can’t I have any more?’ Laura said in her best feel-sorry-for-me voice, watching the cake vanish into a tin, but her grandmother was unmoved.

‘You’ll just be sick. Go and wash your hands and come down for supper in half an hour.’

She disappeared, leaving her coat dropped over a chair and her shoes scattered on the kitchen floor where she’d kicked them off.

‘A tattoo, eh?’ Rebecca Halliday said with a murmur as the pounding footsteps faded up the stairs.

Jo rolled her eyes and picked up the shoes and the coat, tidying them away. ‘Whatever next. I wish I could influence her choice of friends a bit more—she worries me.’

‘She’s fine. She’s a sensible girl. She won’t get into trouble.’

‘You thought I was sensible,’ Jo reminded her pointedly. ‘So did I, come to that, and we were both wrong.’

‘You were sensible. You were lied to. We all were.’

‘You’re very loyal, Mum.’

Her mother hugged her briefly. ‘You’ve come through.’ She dropped her arms and moved away, not given to overt displays of affection, and started scrubbing carrots like a woman possessed.

Jo helped her, and after a moment her mother looked up and met her eyes. ‘So, tell me about this doctor, then. Gorgeous, eh?’

Jo could feel the tell-tale colour creeping up her neck, and busied herself with the casserole. ‘Oh, he’s just a man, Mum. Nothing special.’

‘Married?’

Funny how one word could carry so very many little nuances. ‘No, he’s not married,’ Jo said patiently. ‘He’s thirty-two, single, he started working in hospital obstetrics and decided he wanted to be a GP so he retrained. He’s been doing locum for six months while he looked for a job.’

‘And now he’s ready to settle down.’

Jo put the lid back on the casserole with a little bang. ‘How should I know? He’s only been working since the first of January, we’ve had a weekend when he’s been off and it’s only the fifth now!’

Her mother slid the carrot pan onto the hob and flicked the switch. ‘Don’t get crabby, I was only asking. Anyway, you usually have them down pat in the first ten minutes.’

‘No, that’s Sue. I usually take fifteen.’

Rebecca laughed. ‘Sorry. I stand corrected.’ She deftly changed the subject. ‘I gather Julie Brown had her baby yesterday.’

‘Yes—another boy. Both well. I was so busy I didn’t have time to tell you. It was a lovely delivery—on the kitchen table.’

Her mother smiled. ‘So I gather. That’ll make mealtimes interesting for them. How about a glass of wine?’

‘What a good idea.’

Jo took the proffered glass and followed her mother into the sitting room, dropping into the comfy sofa and resting her head back against the high cushion. It was more comfortable than her own little annexe at the other end of the house where she usually spent her time after work, but tonight her mother had cooked for them and obviously felt a little lonely.

So did Jo so that was fine. Since her father had died they’d found companionship and support in each other, and without her, as she’d told Ed, she wouldn’t have been able to cope with bringing Laura up and keeping her career—

‘It would have been your father’s sixtieth birthday today,’ her mother said quietly into the silence.

Jo’s eyes flew open. ‘Oh, Mum, I’m sorry, I forgot,’ she said, filled with remorse.

‘He was going to retire—funny how you make all these plans and the decisions get taken away from you and changed. I can’t believe it’s nearly four years since he died.’

‘Or nearly thirteen since I had Laura. He really adored her.’

‘Yes. They were great friends.’

Jo swirled her wine round and peered through it at the lights. ‘You must miss him.’

‘I do—every day, but life goes on.’ She sat quietly for a moment, her teeth worrying the inside of her lip, then she met Jo’s eyes. ‘Maurice wants me to go to dinner at the weekend. I said I’d think about it.’

Jo thought of Maurice Parker, the senior partner who was due to retire soon and whose place Ed would fill, and wondered what her father would have thought. They’d been colleagues and friends for years—would he have minded? Would Maurice’s wife have minded, after all the suffering she’d gone through before she died? Would she even have known what was going on?

It was as if her mother read her mind. ‘He had such a difficult time with Betty—Alzheimer’s is such a cruel disease,’ she said. ‘She didn’t know him, you know, not for the last three years. Your father used to say she’d be the death of him.’

‘He aged, certainly. He looks much better now in the last couple of years without all the strain of her illness to weigh him down.’

‘Awful, what love and loyalty can do to you. Must check the carrots and put the broccoli on.’

Jo let her go, sipped her wine and thought about her father. He’d always seemed so fit until the heart attack that killed him. There’d been no warning, no time to prepare. One minute he’d been there, the next he’d gone. Her mother had been devastated, and Laura too. Jo had been so busy propping them both up she’d hardly had time to grieve, and by the time she’d lifted her head above water again it had seemed too late, a little contrived.

She had grieved, though, in the privacy of her own room, shedding huge, silent tears for the man who’d been so fair and so kind to her all her life.

He’d been her best friend, a rock when Laura had been born, and without his support she wouldn’t have been able to train. True, her mother had looked after the baby, but it had been her father who’d encouraged her and supported her financially, bought her a car and paid the running expenses and paid for everything Laura had needed.

They’d turned one end of the house into a separate annexe, giving Jo and her baby privacy but easy access for babysitting, and with their help she’d built herself a career of which she was proud.

Then suddenly, without warning, he’d gone, leaving Maurice, and James Kalbraier, to cope with the practice. Maurice had cut down his hours, taken on another doctor, Mary Brady, and concentrated on nursing Betty for the last few years of her life.

And now Jo’s mother was talking about going out to dinner with Maurice.

Jo considered the idea, and decided it was a good one. They’d both loved their spouses, but they were gone and Maurice and Rebecca were still alive.

Yes. It would do them both good to get out. Who knows, they might—

‘Supper!’

‘Coming!’

She took her wine glass through into the kitchen and put it down by the sink. ‘Mmm, smells good. Have you called Laura?’

‘Well, I did yell, but she’s got that music on so loud…’

‘I’ll get her,’ Jo said with a grin, and ran upstairs. She banged on the door which was vibrating gently with the music her daughter was listening to, and opened it a crack. ‘Supper, darling.’

‘OK.’ The noise vanished, and the silence was deafening.

‘You really shouldn’t have it on so loud,’ she began, but Laura laughed and skipped past her, flitting down the stairs and running through to her grandmother’s kitchen, ignoring the predictable lecture.

‘Hi, Grannie, what’s for supper—? Oh, yum! Can I help?’

Jo smiled and followed her through more slowly. She wasn’t a bad kid—just a little loud, with questionable taste in friends. She supposed she could send Laura to the independent school her mother kept offering to pay for, but that would mean travelling to school, no convenient buses and after-school homework clubs, and her friends would be scattered far and wide.

This way, questionable though some of them might be, they were nearby, and when Jo was working that was very important.

‘We’ve got a panto rehearsal tonight,’ Laura reminded her as she joined them at the table. ‘Will you test me on my lines?’

Jo laughed humourlessly. ‘Just so long as you don’t try and test me—I haven’t had time to look at them since before Christmas.’

‘Mother! Roz will skin you alive!’

‘Don’t I know it! I’ll try and have a quick scan through after supper—perhaps Grannie will test you.’

‘Of course I will, darling. How’s it going?’

Jo laughed. ‘It was awful before Christmas. We’ll see if anyone has spent the last couple of weeks learning their lines or if they’ve all switched off and forgotten what little they did know. I suspect the latter.’

‘Based on personal experience?’ her mother said sagely, and Jo gave a rueful chuckle.

‘You guessed. Oh, well, there’s time.’

‘Have they got anyone else for the chorus yet?’ Laura asked, tucking into her casserole with huge enthusiasm.

‘I don’t know.’

‘You ought to ask Dr What’s-his-name—what is his name? The new guy?’

‘Latimer—Ed Latimer. I doubt if he’d be interested.’

‘You could ask,’ she suggested round a forkful of carrots.

She could—but she didn’t want to. She didn’t want Ed Latimer any nearer her than he had to be, for any more time than was absolutely necessary. He was too disturbing, too masculine. Too male. Just—too much.

She finished her meal in silence, listening with half an ear to Laura and her mother chattering, then she loaded the dishwasher and excused herself for a quick shower before the rehearsal. The water was warm and silky and sensuous, sliding over her naked skin and making her aware of herself in a way she’d almost forgotten.

Her mind turned to Ed again, and she closed her eyes and moaned softly. Why? She’d spent years fending off flirts, and none of them had even so much as ruffled the surface of her peaceful existence.

And now Ed Latimer had come strolling into her life, his hands shoved casually into his pockets, all testosterone and laughing eyes, and her self-control was lying on the floor, belly-up and grinning like a submissive dog!

‘This is awful! What on earth’s the matter with all of you? Two weeks off and you’ve all keeled over and died!’

There was a chorus of feeble protest, and their hard-pressed producer threw down her script and stalked into the kitchen. Jo met Laura’s eyes and smiled encouragingly, then went into the kitchen after Roz, closing the door quietly.

‘Roz?’

‘It’s like this every year! I don’t know why I do it! They screech through by the skin of their teeth, just about pulling the thing together by the final dress rehearsal—sometimes not even then! This is the thirteenth year, you realise that? I knew we ought to give it a rest, but they wouldn’t listen. It’ll be fine, they all said, and now look at them! Corpsed, the lot of them, the second you take their scripts away! Well, that’s it. They’re not having their scripts again, any of them, and they can just manage with the prompt!’

Jo soothed Roz’s ruffled feathers and gave her time to settle down. ‘Perhaps we ought to have our break early and let everyone calm down a bit—the urn’s hot now. Why don’t I make a big pot of tea and open the biscuits and we’ll try again in a little while?’

Roz stabbed her hands through her hair and gave a stifled scream. ‘They drive me nuts,’ she confessed.

‘You love it.’

‘I know. I must be a masochist.’

They shared a smile, and Jo filled the teapot while Roz poured milk into the cups. ‘We still need another man for the chorus—I don’t suppose your new doctor wants to get involved?’ Roz asked her.

She slopped the tea into a saucer and splashed her hand. ‘Damn,’ she muttered, and put down the pot. ‘I don’t know—why don’t you ask him? I expect he’ll be too busy.’

‘Would you ask him for me, as you’ll see him?’

And, just like that, she was forced into a corner from which there was no escape.

‘Hi, there.’

Shivers ran up Jo’s spine and made her hair tingle against her scalp. She turned, groping for a smile that wasn’t completely idiotic, and forced herself to meet Ed’s eyes. ‘Hi, there, yourself,’ she said, and was very proud of the fact that her voice only croaked the tiniest bit.

‘How are things? Any imminent obstetrics for me?’

‘Sorry.’ She shook her head and smiled a more natural smile. ‘They’re all hanging on till their due dates.’

‘Even your lady the other night?’

‘Even her. Sorry. I’ve got an antenatal class at the hospital in a minute—I’ll ask them if they want to get a wriggle on for you, shall I?’

He chuckled and reached out to test the kettle, and the sun slanting through the window caught his hair, gleaming on the red lights in it and turning it a rich, deep chestnut. It was a lovely colour, much more interesting than plain dark brown, and she wanted to reach out and touch it…

There should be enough in there for you,’ she told him, dragging her attention back to the kettle. ‘It’s just boiled.’

Tea for you?’

‘I’m OK.’ She held up her full mug to show him, and he nodded and snagged a mug off the draining-board.

‘No doubt they’ll all produce in the fullness of time,’ he said, going back to their previous conversation. ‘We’ve had two in the past week—I suppose that’s my ration.’

‘Absolutely. I’ve got something to ask you, by the way, talking of producing. The thirteenth annual Yoxburgh panto is short of a male chorus member—Roz asked me to ask you, but I told her you’d be too busy.’

He turned and met her eyes. ‘Why?’

‘Why are they short?’

‘Why did you tell her I’d be too busy?’

She felt a little touch of colour brush her cheeks. ‘I don’t know—I just thought you would be,’ she faltered. ‘It’s quite a punishing rehearsal schedule. It’s up to you. Of course, if you want to do it you’d be more than welcome—I was just trying to give you a way out if you wanted one. It can be pretty tedious.’

She floundered to a halt and looked up at him again, to find him watching her with understanding.

‘If you don’t want me to do it, just say so, Jo,’ he murmured, and his voice was like raw silk, sliding over her nerve endings.

She laughed, a forced little hiccup of sound. ‘Don’t be daft. I just thought you wouldn’t be interested. It’s very amateur.’

‘Are you in it?’

She nodded. ‘Yes—for my sins, I’ve got the female lead. Heaven knows when I’ll get time to learn the lines.’

‘Is it fun?’ he asked, and with a sudden flash of insight she realised he was lonely and would actually like to join in. Good grief, a willing volunteer. That was a first!

It was beyond her to exclude him just for her own selfish reasons.

‘Yes, it is fun,’ she told him, relenting. ‘It would help your patients get to know you as a person as well. It could be good for your image—they’re a bit slow to let you in round here.’

He shot her a quizzical look. ‘I noticed.’

She coloured again, and looked down at her hands. ‘I’m sorry. I just felt that if we had to work together all the time and ended up at the panto rehearsals, well, it might be a bit…’

‘Much?’

She nodded.

‘Does it unsettle you?’ he asked softly. ‘My proximity?’

She looked up into his eyes—those stunningly magnetic storm-grey eyes that seemed to see right to the heart of her—and nodded again, just slightly. ‘A little,’ she confessed.

His mouth tipped in a crooked and endearing grin. ‘That makes two of us. I’m not exactly immune to you, either.’

She stood up, pushing her chair back and trying for a bit of authority. ‘That doesn’t mean we have to do anything about it. We have to work together, Ed. I don’t think we can do that if we’re…’ She ran out of words, unusually for her, but he was there again.

‘Involved?’ he offered. A lazy smile lurked in his eyes.

‘Exactly.’

He shrugged and grinned again. ‘OK. If I promise to keep my distance, can I join the pantomime?’

‘Of course you can.’ She returned his smile. ‘It is awful, though. Don’t say you haven’t been warned.’

He chuckled. ‘OK. When’s the next rehearsal?’

‘Tonight. Quarter to eight, at the community hall. Wear something warm—it can be a bit chilly.’

He nodded, drained his tea and left her. She sat again, as if she were a puppet whose strings had been cut, and buried her face in her hands. So he felt it too—and she’d thought it was just her, being silly. Oh, Lord, this was so much more complicated. If she was the only one—

‘You OK?’

Her head jerked up. ‘Yes, just a bit tired. Did you forget something?’

‘Where’s the community hall?’ Ed asked.

‘Ah. Um—on the main street, nearly opposite the chip shop.’

‘That black and white building?’

She nodded, avoiding those searching eyes. ‘That’s right.’

‘OK. I’ll see you then—unless you’re back in the surgery after your antenatal class?’

‘Antenatal class?’ She gasped and leapt to her feet. ‘I’d forgotten it!’ she muttered, and, scooping up her pager from the table, she headed for the door.

‘See you later,’ he called. Jo ran out to her car, wondering if she’d been totally insane to suggest he should join the pantomime crew. Her brains were scrambled enough as it was!

She arrived at the hospital just about on time, and a couple of the mums were late. She decided to give them a minute or two because they were new. While they waited she ticked the names of those who were there on her register and encouraged them to mix and get to know each other while she set up her equipment.

She had a doll and a plastic pelvis so that they could see the way the baby would emerge through the birth canal, charts and diagrams to show the development of the baby, and lots of information about nutrition, exercise and so on.

The classes didn’t have a beginning or an end, but ran on a continuous loop, with four sessions making up the whole set. In a way it made it harder, but it did mean that someone new to the area or only able to come intermittently didn’t miss out. Each session included a lecture, a discussion and work on relaxation and pain control, and today was about the second stage of labour, the expulsive stage.

The latecomers arrived together, apologising for getting lost on the way, and Jo called all the patients to order, settled them down and started the class, by going round and asking the new members in turn to say a little about themselves, whether it was their first or subsequent child and what sort of delivery they were hoping for.

There were five women out of the ten there who wanted a home birth or who wanted to deliver in the GP unit. Of these five, only three were on Jo’s mental list of possibles. One was a little too old, another had a previous history of stillbirth.

The other three couldn’t deliver in the GP unit on the grounds that only second and third babies were permitted by their scheme, and these were all first-timers. Still, they could, if she thought they were suitable, opt for a home birth with consultant back-up, if necessary, at Jo’s discretion. She still hadn’t decided.

The older mother, however, was aware that Jo didn’t want her to deliver at home, but it didn’t stop her planning a home delivery, and Jo knew full well that when it came to the crunch she’d leave it too late to go to hospital, regardless of what they might say to convince her otherwise.

‘I’d like to have the baby in the GP unit,’ one of the new mums was saying, ‘but I know I can’t because it’s my first, and my husband isn’t happy about me having it at home. I’d like to come back to the GP unit straight afterwards, though.’

Jo nodded. ‘That should be possible if everything goes well, or if you have support at home afterwards you wouldn’t need to come in here at all.’

She looked doubtful. ‘I don’t know if I could cope alone. It’s such a responsibility—what happens if you don’t know why it’s crying?’

Some of the others chorused their agreement, and Jo hastened to reassure them. ‘You struggle on and try everything until you hit on something that works. Babies are remarkably tough and very good at getting their own way—I really wouldn’t worry.’

‘But what if I’m really clueless?’ she persisted.

‘You’ll know what to do. I’ve only had one mum in all my years who genuinely didn’t, and she gradually relaxed and started listening to the baby. You’ll be fine—and, anyway, you wouldn’t be alone. For the first ten days I’ll come whenever you want, and once a day in any case, then the health visitor takes over so you won’t be abandoned.’

She looked round. ‘Right. A couple of you are second- or third-timers along for a refresher and the rest of you are having your first so I think we’ll have input and comments from the old hands after the talk. I want to go through labour and delivery with you, just to make sure you all know or remember what all the stages are and what’s happening at any point.’

They settled down and listened, and after Jo had done her demonstration with the elastic band and the plastic pelvis she invited questions and comments.

This was always a tricky one. Inevitably there would be at least one mother who would revel in going over the more traumatic and memorable moments of her labour, regardless of the dread she was inspiring in the first-time mums, so Jo was on the alert ready to cut off anyone who launched into a counter-productive monologue.

In fact, they were fine, and after a few minutes she got them all to lie down and relax.

‘Think of every part of your body in turn. As you think of it, tense it hard, then hold it, then let it flop. Think about how you make it go floppy, and after a while you’ll be able to home in on tight areas of your body and relax them. Right, start with your feet. Point your toes hard, but make sure you don’t get cramp. Good. Hold—and relax. Totally floppy. Good. Now pull your feet up so your toes are pointing at your head. Tense—hold—and flop. Well done.’

She watched them, looking for the ones who found it difficult and the ones who had probably done yoga or had been to her classes before.

One new girl, thin and dressed in what Jo could only describe as ‘hippy’ clothes, was wonderfully relaxed. Her name was Mel, and Jo flicked through her notes and noticed her address—the travellers’ site in the forest outside Yoxburgh, up on the heath by the edge of the trees.

It was a lovely spot, but Jo had a sneaky feeling, despite what she’d said, that Mel was going to go for a home delivery. The idea of delivering a baby in a converted coach or, worse still, a ‘bender’—a shelter made of tree branches—filled Jo with horror.

What if anything went wrong? It was Mel’s first—there was no reason why anything should go wrong, but what if it did? The baby was bound to be born at night—the more difficult the location the more likely it seemed to be, and there was no power out there, no light, no running water. How would she deliver her safely under those conditions? Jo vowed to have a word to make sure Mel understood the risks. Mel had a few weeks left to go so she’d use them to try and talk sense into her.

Jo led them through the relaxation, then the breathing, and finally she got them to grip each other’s forearms with both hands and twist firmly in opposite directions to pull the skin. Called ‘Chinese burns’, they were a thing schoolchildren did to each other to see who was bravest—harmless but painful, Jo found they were a useful tool to help women practise breathing through the ‘contractions’ and remaining relaxed. When they’d all had a rest for a moment and she’d done the question-and-answer session and they’d put the mats away, she sent them all off.

Still thinking about Mel, she packed up all her stuff, cleared away the cups and made sure the mats had all been stacked properly in the cupboard. They used the maternity day-room for their classes, and she didn’t want to leave the place untidy.

One of the staff midwives stuck her head round the door and grinned. ‘Got time for a cuppa?’

‘I’d love one. Did you see my traveller?’

‘Yes—is she going to be a problem?’

Jo laughed. ‘I hope not, but I suspect so. I think she’s just unconventional, not stupid, but I’ve got a suspicion I won’t be able to persuade her to go to the Audley. I just have a feeling.’

‘Birth in a bender, eh? That’ll be a first, won’t it?’

‘Don’t.’ Jo sipped her tea and sighed with relief. ‘Perhaps I’ll get Ed Latimer to talk to her—see what he’s made of.’

‘I don’t know, but if you can get the recipe, I’d like one the same, please!’

Jo laughed, but inside her stomach the butterflies were working themselves up to a frenzy. The remark had reminded her about Ed, and about the rehearsal. It was panto time in three hours, and she’d have no professional guise to hide behind, no protocol—just herself, and Laura.

That was it! She’d be Laura’s mother. It would make her seem middle-aged and boring—with any luck!