‘Well guess what,’ I shout. ‘I’m not ready either. And,’ I am, I bloody well am, ‘I am going out tonight.’
I regret shouting when I hang up.
I know that I’m making a mess of things; I know that I’m being too harsh. I drive towards home and pass a take-away. I think about stopping there and getting lunch.
‘Do you really want that piece of chicken, Gloria?’ That’s what Beryl tells us to stop and do. Yes, I really want that piece of chicken. Some lovely deep-fried chicken and they do mashed potato and gravy too. I’m sick of my diet, it’s not working, I didn’t even lose a pound last week. I don’t want to go and get weighed tonight; I know I’ll have put on.
So I might as well have enjoyed putting on.
I park in the car park and I go to unclip Daisy, except she’s asleep.
She’s sound asleep and she doesn’t deserve to be disturbed.
I could leave her for two minutes, surely?
But it’s hot for May and I can’t.
I blink as it passes.
It just stops.
The urge just goes back from wherever it came.
I’ve never felt it leave before really – I mean a severe one.
I’ve always fed it.
So, instead of coming to in the front seat, face and hands greasy from chicken, with empty containers surrounding me that I need to hide in the bin, instead of hating myself further, I’m coming to in the back seat and feeling stronger.
I gaze at a sleeping Daisy.
Then I ring Paul.
He’s at work, but he can talk.
I tell him what I’ve done, what I said to Eleanor, how it’s not fair on us, that we never get a chance to go out.
‘There will be time for all that later,’ he tells me. ‘Right now, you need to sort out Eleanor.’ He tells me what I know I need to do, what I was probably coming around to myself but it sort of speeds up the process when you’ve got someone you can talk to.
It feels nice that, for the first time, I do speak to another person about what’s on my mind.
I can’t tell him everything.
Paul goes a bit funny when I mention him.
I’ve tried to explain that I don’t usually talk or think about him this much – it’s just what with him being dead and now that bloody Lucy is stalling on the kids’ payout…
Well, we don’t do very well when we talk about that but we’re doing very well talking about this.
‘Go with Eleanor to see the GP,’ Paul says.
‘She won’t go.’
‘She might now,’ Paul pushes. ‘Go round there now.’
It’s almost as if Eleanor is waiting for me. She opens the door and she just sobs in my arms. Daisy just lies asleep in her car seat on the floor beside her. I don’t cry, I’m still feeling strong.
I was strong with the GP’s receptionist too when I rang.
I told them I was picking up my daughter and we were on our way and we were not to be kept waiting for long.
The receptionist told me that I didn’t have an appointment and that she couldn’t fit me in till Thursday.
I said I was on my way.
She said there would be a long wait.
Do you know what I said?
‘Added up, I have probably spent six months of my life politely waiting for Doctor Carmody to see me. I’ve never complained and I’ve never made a fuss, so tell him, between patients, that Gloria Jameson is on her way with her daughter and, if anything, I expect Doctor Carmody to be waiting for me!’
I still can’t believe that I said that, but honestly I did.
I pile Eleanor in a car that is free of chicken takeaway boxes and I clip Daisy in the back. The snooty receptionist is pissed off when we walk in but, instead of being told to take a seat, we are taken straight through to the treatment room!
‘Gloria!’ Dr Carmody comes in about ten minutes later. He’s a lovely man. He’s been my doctor since before Eleanor was born. He’s seen me at my worst – far worse than Eleanor is now, let me tell you, and he knows I don’t like to make a fuss.
He talks to Eleanor, who says little at first - just that she can’t stand to be near the baby. That she can’t stand how she can’t stand to be near the baby.
That she wishes it had never happened, how she wants it all to go away.