Chapter 21
‘Noah’s out like a light,’ Maureen said, venturing into the living room, where she found Rosi stretched lengthways on the sofa.
Her rounded stomach rose like a small hillock beneath her maternity top.
A cup of tea was within reach on the coffee table while Shay, seated at the far end of the sofa with her sock-clad feet in his lap, massaged them.
Rosi was busy tossing peanuts into her mouth.
Dangling grapes would have suited the scene more, Maureen thought, casting about for somewhere to sit.
The piles of washing she’d spied earlier had been moved to the armchair, one half of the coffee table and the floor.
She refrained from tutting, not wanting to get the conversation off on the wrong foot.
‘Your tea’s there, Maureen. It should still be hot,’ Shay said, pointing to the table in front of him. Then, lifting Rosi’s feet off his lap, he stood up and stretched. ‘Have my seat. I’ve some phone calls to make.’
‘Thanks, Shay.’ Maureen smiled fondly, aware he was leaving them alone to chat. She cocked a brow in her daughter’s direction, and Rosi pulled her feet up, making room for her to sit down.
Her brown eyes were on Shay as he strode from the room, like she was watching the lifeboat she’d planned to clamber aboard sail away, and as the door clicked behind him, she shovelled in a handful of nuts.
‘I’d go easy on those if I were you, Rosi, or you’ll wind up constipated.
Peanuts are notorious for it. Don’t you remember when your brother ate a big bag of them one Christmas and didn’t go for days?
We heard about nothing else from him the whole time.
Status updates, like a Radio 1 news bulletin, were coming from the toilet every hour on the hour. ’
Rosi pulled a face. ‘I remember.’ She set the peanuts aside, reaching for her tea.
Maureen did the same, and they supped in silence until Maureen spoke up. ‘I think that boy of yours upstairs is destined for politics. He has an answer for everything, and he’s not frightened to speak his mind.’
‘He takes after his nana.’ Rosi side-eyed her mammy.
‘And you might as well get to the point of why you’ve called around, Mammy.
I already know Donal’s shave his beard off and Moira and Aisling told me you’re dead set against me having a home birth.
I’m not surprised, you know. Why do you think I didn’t tell you myself? ’
‘You’ve got the wrong idea, Rosi. I’m not against it.’ She was, but Maureen was going to relay her concerns in a manner that didn’t get her eldest daughter’s back up. ‘I’m just not sure it’s a good idea, given your age, that’s all.’
Challenge flashed in Rosi’s eyes. ‘I’m hardly over the hill, Mammy.’
‘No, but you’re forty, and the risks are higher after thirty-five.’
Rosi glugged her tea and set the mug down on the coffee table, folding her arms across her chest. ‘You’re not going to change my mind, Mammy, no matter what you say. So don’t bother trying.’
‘Janey Mack, it’s like looking at your sister in years to come,’ Maureen muttered.
There was no need to clarify which sister she was referring to.
Rosi and Moira shared the same dark hair and eyes, but Moira was stubborn as a mule, not Rosi, and she wasn’t used to seeing her dig her heels in like this saying as much.
‘This isn’t like you, Rosi, and I’m worried, is all.
You can understand why, surely?’ Donal would be proud of her continued calm composure in the face of adversity.
‘I’m easy-going by nature, Mammy, unless something really matters to me, and this does.’
‘But why? The Rotunda’s a grand place. Why would you not choose to have your baby there with all the smiley nurses and doctors on hand?’
‘Because I want autonomy over my own body.’
Autonomy was one of those words Maureen thought she knew the meaning of but couldn’t be quite sure. She ran with being in charge as the definition. ‘But it’s not just your body, is it? It’s the baby’s too.’
‘And I believe the less stress I’m under delivering my baby, the happier he or she will be.’
Maureen’s calm composure slipped. ‘Rosi, did you not hear me? I’m worried.’
Her daughter’s face softened. ‘Well, don’t be.
There’s no need. We’ll be grand.’ She patted her tummy gently.
‘And you’ll be holding your new grandbaby in your arms before you know it.
You’re just going to have to trust me on this, Mammy.
It’s not a choice I’ve made lightly. I’ve done my research, and you’ve met my midwife, Kay.
You know yourself she’s a capable woman.
She has every confidence in my decision, so why haven’t you? ’
‘Because I’m your mammy. That’s why.’ Maureen frowned, unable to think of anything else.
Then she remembered what Shay had told her.
‘And a birthing pool, Rosi? I mean, where will you put it, for starters?’ Her disparaging gaze flicked over the cluttered floor space to the patches of cream carpet between.
‘Mark my words, you’ll ruin that lovely carpet there, splashing about like an otter.
’ Otter? She didn’t know where that had come from.
Still, Rosi would get the gist of what she was saying.
‘We’ve a waterproof drop sheet, Mammy, and the warm water can take the edge off the pain. It’s relaxing.’
‘Cop yourself on. We’re talking about giving birth, not having a soak in the bath, my girl.
There’s nothing relaxing about it, especially when you’ve pumpkin-headed genes running through the family.
’ Maureen, catching the stubborn set of her daughter’s jaw, grabbed wildly for reasons that would further cement her case.
‘And you know yourself you’ll not get waited on afterwards by the lovely nurses so you can have a good long rest. There’ll be no button to push for tea and sandwiches to be brought to your bed either.
’ It was a weak argument and she knew it.
‘Shay will look after me. And it’s not like in the sixties when you had us anymore, Mam.
There’s no lying about in a ward, giggling with other new mammies for weeks afterwards like you’re on a sleepover—only one where you get to go home all refreshed and confident about how to care for your baby.
You’re in and out these days. Wham, bam, thank you, Mam. ’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘You know what I mean.’
Maureen did, and it was true enough, but she wasn’t ready to concede yet. ‘But Rosi, they’ve specialists on hand at the hospital if anything should go wrong. If you have the baby here and things don’t go to plan — well, think of the time it will take to get you the help you need.’
‘Read my lips, Mammy. Nothing will go wrong. I’m grand, and the baby’s grand.
There is no reason for me not to have a straightforward delivery at home.
Sure, women have been having their babies at home for centuries.
It’s only since the fifties that hospital births have become the accepted norm in Ireland.
And how many women were still having babies all through their forties when birth control wasn’t readily available? ’
She had done her homework, Maureen thought, momentarily flummoxed.
She remembered one of her brothers, she couldn’t remember which one now, travelling to Northern Ireland and coming home on the train with his pockets stuffed full of condoms. It seemed like the dark ages now. Rosi was talking again, she realised.
‘Colin had his way over where I delivered Noah, Mammy, like he did most things in our marriage. I found his birth terrifying, mostly because I didn’t know what to expect, but also because I was in a clinical environment with strangers who talked over me.
I know what I’m in for this time, and I want to feel like I have some control over what’s happening. ’
‘Autonomy,’ Maureen piped up.
‘Exactly. I want to be surrounded by familiar things, not in a sterile hospital room.’
‘Rosi, I understand what you’re saying and, if you were younger, I might be more open to it, but—’
Rosi interrupted by throwing her hands in the air. ‘I give up. It’s like talking to a brick wall.’
‘Excuse me, madam, that’s my line.’
They glared at one another from opposite ends of the sofa until Rosi’s mouth began to twitch and a snigger escaped. Maureen joined in, then sobered, reaching for her daughter’s hand and giving it a squeeze.
‘I’ve said all I’m going to say on the matter.’
‘I don’t believe that for a second,’ Rosi snorted.
Shay tapped on the door, distracting them as he appeared with a plate of biscuits, which he set down in front of them.
If he told her he’d baked them himself, he’d get the gold sticker for son-in-law status, Maureen thought.
He didn’t, and raising his brows in Maureen’s direction, he asked, ‘Any luck?’
Rosi scowled at him.
‘Deserter.’
‘No,’ Maureen replied despondently.
‘Maureen, do you mind if I have a word with Rosi?’
‘Not at all. I’ll get going now and leave the pair of you to get on with your evening.’
‘No, don’t go just yet.’ Shay was insistent.
Rosi shot him a questioning look while Maureen, equally perplexed, got up and said, ‘Shall I make another round of teas then?’
‘That would be grand.’
Shay nodded.
‘Herbal for me, Mam.’
Maureen picked up the empty mugs, feeling like a contestant on The Weakest Link as she padded from the room.
What was Shay going to say to Rosi? she pondered, because he’d already said there was no changing her mind, and she was beginning to think he was right.
There was nothing for it but to make the tea and locate the biscuit tin.
She’d done both, helping herself to two chocolate digestive biscuits—wheat was healthy, at least—having convinced herself Donal would understand, given the stressful circumstances. Her hand was reaching for a third when Rosi called out, and it snapped back to pick up the tray instead.
It was time to find out what was going on.