People LIke Her(60)
“From Miscarriage to Mamabare: A Personal Look at Baby Loss. Coming soon to BBC Three.”
Chapter Fourteen
Dan
Something it takes me a long time to get my head around is the idea of Emmy taking photos of our daughter in the hospital, our pale, injured, sleeping daughter. I do try to put myself in Emmy’s shoes, to see things through her eyes, to piece together what the hell was going through her mind.
I can’t do it.
There are moments when I am not even sure I want to.
The thought of leaving Emmy, the thought of walking out on my marriage, is genuinely not something that has ever occurred to me. Not seriously. Not even before we had children. Not for more than a furious few minutes, at any rate. What would I do with myself? Where would I end up? In some bedsit somewhere probably. Eating biscuits in bed and spending too much time on the internet. That’s what I always say, jokingly, when the subject comes up, as it does occasionally. The truth is I can’t really imagine it.
There have been times in the past twenty-four hours when I have seriously, and with a cold, settled fury, considered the practicalities and the logistics of such a move. There have been times when I have considered the implications of taking my daughter with me, tried to imagine the logistics of taking my son. There have been times when the only thing that has prevented me storming into the kitchen and telling Emmy I am leaving is not wanting her in sole charge of Bear and Coco. Free to use my children as props, as accessories, as sympathy grabbers whenever the fancy takes her.
Am I overreacting? I don’t think so.
We are supposed to be going out for dinner tonight to celebrate Emmy’s new TV show.
It is hard to think of anything I want to do less.
She does an Instastory in our hallway mirror of us ready to leave, another of the menu, takes a picture of her cocktail, takes a picture of her starter, a picture of me scowling across the table at her. Over the years I have got so used to this sort of thing that most of the time I barely even register it, but tonight, suddenly, it all seems monstrous. God knows which ones she actually posts. I’ve barely been able to look at her these past few days, let alone her Instagram feed.
Emmy tells me all about recording the Heavy Flow podcast and plays me a clip of Hero Blythe performing her period poem, and I don’t even crack a smile.
I finish my first beer about the same time they are clearing our starters away and order myself another.
The line that keeps running through my head is that I used to think it was only our online life that was a lie.
“They’ll be all right with Doreen babysitting, won’t they?” Emmy accompanies this with a hesitant smile.
It is clear how I ought to respond to this. Everyone knows, when you are out on a date with someone and they ask you a question like that, how you are supposed to respond.
I shrug and take a swig from my bottle of beer. It was not my idea to go out, I feel like telling her.
The waitress asks if I want another and I say yes and Emmy points out I haven’t even finished that one yet. I chug the last third of it and ask for the same again.
When Emmy texts Doreen to check that all is fine, she gets an answer back almost immediately. There was a bit of sleep-whimpering from Bear’s room about half an hour ago, but now all’s quiet on the Western Front.
We exchange platitudes about how lucky we are to have found Doreen and then fall silent again. It occurs to me that this is the first time we’ve been out to dinner together, have been out anywhere together, since Bear was born. I must admit, she looks beautiful. She has done her makeup carefully and has her hair up and is wearing a dress and looks like the Emmy I remember from the old days, the magazine days. They’re allowed to glam up occasionally, the Instamums, if they accompany any pictures with self-flagellating captions about how rarely they get to do this, how the shoes gave them blisters and it’s a special occasion because there’s #bignews coming, but the baby was still up crying when they got home and they regretted it all the next morning because of the #adultheadache.
Now that we know all’s well at home, Emmy is back to telling me about the TV show. I am nodding, half listening. Don’t get me wrong, I’m pleased for my wife. This is big news, huge news. What I don’t understand is why they’ve chosen her to present a program on this particular topic. I mean, it’s not like this is something we have experienced ourselves. Are there going to be talking heads on it? I ask her. Is she going to be talking to doctors, or mums who have been through all that stuff, or what? She tells me they haven’t really ironed out those details yet.
By the time we’re looking at the dessert menu, I’ve remembered why it is that Emmy and I so rarely go out. We are both about ready to fall asleep in our shoes. By the time the bill arrives, I am genuinely having trouble keeping my eyes open. The lights in the room seem to get dimmer and then brighter again. The conversation trails off. Emmy starts scrolling through her messages. As I am paying, Emmy and I both yawn simultaneously and then apologize to the guy with the card machine.
I check my phone, and it is 8:47.
“That was nice,” she says as we’re standing outside waiting for the Uber.
I put my arm around her shoulders and give her a squeeze, but say nothing.
“Now, what route is this guy taking?” she asks, observing our driver’s progress on her mobile.
I take my phone out and check the RP account.