CHAPTER 74
There was nothing either of us could do for him, of course, being so far away, apart from simply doing our best to be there, wherever and whatever ‘there’ might be, if he needed us. Maz, as ever, spent so much of her energy worrying about others that she had let herself fade, just a bit, and I was slowly beginning to realise what a gamble she had taken in almost literally throwing herself at me.

There was no way I could or would ever object to the outcome, but for a moment, just a flash, I saw Neil in her, as he tried to make things right, by proxy. She was different, though, and I could hear Auds and Pen in my head, doing their own version of making things right by beating to death my own sense of worthlessness.

Caro, Maz, myself, and most probably Alan, cut from the same miserable bit of cloth. I excavated a smile, dropped my arm onto her shoulders, and set off once again for the bus stop.

We didn’t hear much from the U.K. for quite a while, but then we were getting rather busy, in an utterly traditional way. Maz was keeping a list of potential names, I was building a flatpack cot and Ronnie ‘knew a friend, who knew a friend’, and “She says the little bloke’s too big for it now, ey?” and simply gave us a convertible pushchair, one of those where a carry cot can be clipped in instead of a seat.

Maz was showing well rather quickly, which meant a relentless barrage of dreadful jokes from Kul, mostly about Maz having found alternative partners to trigger her getting into a ‘delicate way’. They should have been excruciatingly unfunny, but the man always had a way of delivering them that rendered them harmless, and even, just occasionally, funny.

I still found myself getting increasingly anxious as she approached term, because I kept remembering that test kit.

In the end, it was all an absolute cliché. I was at work, Maz was sitting in the back garden with Geeta, her waters broke and I was on my way to the maternity unit while Dal searched for the simple digital video camera he had borrowed from college months before.

He eventually found it inside what he called his Mock Turban.

It was long, complicated and distressingly bloody, and I nearly ducked out, but each time I looked at Maz, her sweat-soaked hair stuck to her face, I realised I couldn’t leave. Besides which, she had hold of my hand.in a grip that almost made my inner climber jealous.

The nurses were incredibly calm, despite Maz instructing one of them to “Get it out or leave me fucking alone!”

“Crowning now, Maryam. Remember your breathing”

“Fuck! Off!”

“That’s great. Keep that rhythm, ey? Head’s just…”

Suddenly, the baby just shot out into the waiting hands. One moment, the shoulders were just about through, and then it was out.

It. Our child. Our…

I found myself crying.

“We have a son, Maz, love!”

They sorted all the odd little bits, wiping the child down after clearing his airways, and no bloody slap, for he was wailing almost as soon as he was free. As soon as the cord was sorted, he was laid on his mother’s breast, and my vision was so blurred I had to be helped into a hair next to them.

The lead medic was a woman, and as Maz and I sobbed, she simply waited, eyes crinkling above her mask, before waving one of her nurses forward.

“Just going to take him for a few, Maryam. Get him wrapped up after a proper clean. What’s his name?”

Maz found her voice first: “Ishmael Michael”

“Call me Ishmael, ey?”

I nodded.

“Exactly. Is he, you know: any problems?”

“None that we can see Mike. Ten tiny fingers, ten tiny toes. Good weight and colour, and you heard his lungs are fine, and—right. That’s the placenta. Anyone would think you’ve done this before”

They cleaned Maz up as well, which wasn’t pleasant for either of us, and eventually she was in a bay on the neonatal ward, fast asleep along with our son. I was given the order of the boot, of course, and it was Kul, as always, who was there to drive me home, where we were joined by a raft of friends, who all brought something, and we proceeded to wet the baby’s head to a stupid extent, which left me fast asleep by eight in the evening, and badly hungover, and awake, by four in the morning.

Kul had stayed overnight, along with Chad and Vern, and as my hangover eased, and the ambush memories bit one by one, I realised Vern had actually stayed mostly sober that night.

“Mike, we like a good drink here, but this place in particular, we know what can happen. What with Bon Scott, for starters”

“Sorry?”

“AC/DC front man, came from Freo. Liked to get really pissed. Was over in London, got wrecked, was left to sleep in a car. He was only bloody 33. I drew the short straw last night: designated lifeguard”

Chad poked him hard.

“No you bloody didn’t! You bloody volunteered”

“Ah, just a technicality. My story’s better. What you got in for brekky, mate?”

All I wanted was a brew, but they had that in mind, and as I sipped, I opened my laptop to send the round of e-mails that---

I reined myself in before I started typing, and opened my sent mail instead, and there they were, the drunkmails I had fired out before falling asleep. The inbox held a multitude of replies, and as the tea slowly irrigated the mudfield of my hangover mouth, I read through them before forwarding them to my wife, preceded by a covering note.

‘Yes I was led into sinful ways last night. You were otherwise engaged. Just going to send you a pile of mails I got back. See you in a few hours. Love you both’

I will admit to getting more than a little weepy over those last three words, but I felt I was more than a little entitled to do so. U had a wife and son to look after now, and---

Kul was watching me, as if tag-teaming Vern.

“Your face clenched, Mike. Worries?”

“Oh, mate, not really. It’s just, well, here I am, dreaming about having a son, bloody ecstatic about it, and then, well, bang”

He passed me a fresh mug of tea.

“You’re thinking about Steph, aren’t you?”

I nodded.

“Alys as well, Kul. With Steph, well, you’ve seen both sides of that bloody Rubicon”

“She’s bloody happy now, mate”

“Yeah, but all of that shit she had to go through before she crossed over. What if our boy is on that same bus?”

He looked at me silently for a few seconds, then smiled.

“Then if she, they or whatever is, what do we do about it?”

Before I could reply, he answered his own question.

“We, all of us, WE show whoever me meet the same love, acceptance and support I know you have in you, and we let them know they are loved. How does that one sound?”

I smiled back.

“Despite all your shit jokes and piss taking, Kul, sometimes you slip up, and I can see why Sangeeta married you”

“Damn. And there was me thinking it was just the size of my turban, Now, none of us except Vern is fit to drive, and we won’t be for several hours, so Geeta is coming over to collect me, you and the boy for a trip to see the new boy. Smell brekky?”

“Yeah”

“Making you hungry, or getting ready to hurl?”

I visualised a Full English, and my gut’s reaction was a rumble rather than a clench.

“Full English will do me”

“Full Aussie, mate. No black pud, but savoury mince instead. Just as much lard, though. I’ll let him know”

The visit to see my new family was a little surreal, because we were barred from going in as part of the anti-infection protocols, but she was behind a glass screen, and my boy was with her, wearing a tiny little cap and wrapped in a blue blanket.

‘Our’ boy, of course. Ours. I wondered how young a child they made harnesses for, how small a shoe-size for rock boots…

I simply wanted to sit at that big glass window, stare at my people and weep with happiness, but in the end I had to go, Geeta dropping me back at MY family home rather than theirs, and I set to work on that flatpack cot.

What would I do if Ishmael Michael Rhodes turned out to be a different person, someone like Stephanie Woodruff, or little Alys? Or poor, lost Maddy?

Let them know that while it mattered, it simultaneously didn’t matter, and just let them know that they were loved, from the moment they could grasp what that meant, and from then on forever. My promise to my child was a simple one, that there would be no subject they would feel frightened to share with their parents.

If Neil felt he needed to atone for Maddy, then the least we could offer in support of that man was the openness of our hearts and our arms.

I almost found myself pitying ‘Nigel’ in his hollowness. What true joy could someone like him ever be graced with?

Almost, though. Never more than that.