Chapter 3 #2
I smile into his shirt. “I do. Ellis cuddles are exactly what I need right now.”
Vinny leaves and I finish cleaning up the kitchen.
Somehow, I manage to hold it together, trying my hardest to not let thoughts of Mason in. I’m halfway down the hallway when my legs begin to sway, my shoulders falling as I lift my hand, trying to quieten the sob that escapes me.
My back hits the door and I slide down it, knowing I will wake Ellis if I go inside.
My heart seems to break all over again as the memories flood in.
Ellis Anthony Lowell
Tuesday 5th March 2019
Boy
6lb12oz
20:32pm
Pain radiates across my abdomen, crippling me until I find a breath of air. In through my nose and out through my mouth. My nostrils burn as I inhale deeply. It’s been seven hours of active labour. Unexplainable pain.
“You’re doing incredible, darling.”
I don’t speak. I can’t.
Maggie’s hand finds my back and I drop my head to the bed as the contraction begins to subside. My shoulders drop as I relax.
“Nina, I need you to get up onto the bed so I can examine you,” Kelly, my midwife, tells me.
“I can’t.” I shake my head, panicking. I don’t want to move, this position works.
“Come on, love, you can do it,” Maggie whispers, kissing the side of my head.
I look at her and nod, letting her take my hand as I step up and lie myself down on the bed.
“This will be uncomfortable, Nina. I’m sorry, my lovely,” Kelly tells me from the end of the hospital bed.
“Not long now,” Maggie says, stroking my hair back from my face.
My stomach starts to ache and I know another contraction is only moments away. “Oh god! I have a contraction.”
“Don’t panic, you’ve done so well, Nina. Deep breath in… Out.”
I manage the breath in but lose it mid-exhale. “I can’t!” I shout. “Ahhhhhh! Fuck, no!”
“Would you prefer to be on your knees, Nina?”
“I don’t know!”
“Just keep breathing and I will get you checked as soon as this one passes.”
“I need to push. Please, Maggie, I can’t.” I turn into her, searching for comfort.
“I know, darling,” she cries.
“Is that one subsiding, Nina?”
I breathe deeply as the last of the contraction racks through me, and my body slowly sinks into the bed as I relax. I can’t take much more; this is killing me.
Kelly begins examining me and I wince as she stretches me. “Nina, you are seven centimetres we aren’t quite there—”
“No!” I panic, throwing myself forward and standing from the bed in a rush. “I need to push.” My stomach starts to contract instantly, and I bear down, my body telling me I need to push. “Uggghhhhh!” A rush of warm liquid rushes down my legs. “Uh uh uh—”
“Don’t panic, it’s just your waters. Do you feel like you need to push, Nina?”
“Yes! Ugghhhhh!” I scream as the pain intensifies.
“Nina, I need to get Mason.” Maggie panics.
“Ugghhhhhhhhh. No! Not yet.” I’m not ready. It’s been five months, but I still can’t bear to face him.
I start to pant as I lean back down on the bed on my forearms—the most comfortable position I’ve found in the seven hours we’ve been here. The contraction starts to subside again, and I stand, my body wet with sweat.
“I need you on the bed, Nina. You aren’t steady enough on your feet.”
“I’m fine,” I pant. “I’m fine.”
“Try and get on the bed, darling, please,” Maggie pleads, her voice thick with emotion.
“I’m… Oh, no! No, no!”
“Nina, you’re panicking, you need to breathe.”
I shake my head as my body tenses all over and the pain takes me completely, taking control of my ability to do anything but focus on it. “Ugggggghhhhhhhhh!” I make a feral sound that ripples from deep in my throat.
“I need her on the bed now!” Kelly calls out.
Maggie strokes my hair and uses a damp flannel to blot my forehead. “Nina, we need you on the bed now. Please, try for me,” her worried voice coos.
I shake my head, my throat catching as I try to hold back the tears.
I can’t do this.
I can’t do this.
Strong hands slip around me, one under my breasts, and the other resting on my hip. “You can do this,” he rasps into my ear.
I shake my head, pinching my eyes shut. His voice is like a sweet melody to my soul.
“Look at me.”
“I have another…” I shake my head. “Oh god. No, no, no!”
“Look. At. Me!”
My eyes snap open as my head drops back to his shoulder.
“Mase, I can’t.” I shake my head, my tears slipping free.
He is just as beautiful as the day I met him.
“Yes, you can. If anyone can do this, it’s you. Breathe, Nina.” His hand smooths over my full, round belly. “Breathe.”
I inhale him as my nose brushes his neck, breathing through the contraction until it eases.
I feel weightless as I’m lifted and placed on the bed, Mason slipping in behind me.
“Okay, with the next contraction, I want you to push, Nina. I can feel the head.”
“See,” he whispers against my ear. “You’re nearly there. You going to give up now?”
“Shut up,” I reply hoarsely.
I can feel his smile against my neck and I watch as Kelly’s lip twitches. I wish I could smile but the ache starts to spread, and I tense up again.
“Relax, relax,” Kelly tells me, rubbing my leg. “I need you to push for me, Nina.”
“Uggghhhhhh!”
“Shhhh, no, that’s not it. Push then pant, remember.”
“It burns.”
“Burns?” Mason repeats.
“Pant,” Kelly tells me, panting with me.
Never in my life have I felt such pain.
“Okay, now push. Push! Push!”
I bear down with everything I have inside me. “Yes, baby,” Mason rasps against my jaw.
“Good girl, stop there. I have the head, and so much hair,” Kelly informs us.
I smile. Finally, something.
“You are incredible.”
“When you feel that contraction, I want you to—”
I feel it and waste no time grasping the arms that hold me as I push, not stopping until the pain stops, and my chest is enveloped in warmth.
“A gorgeous little boy.” Kelly beams at us. “Congratulations, Mummy and Daddy.”
Looking down, I take him in. His small little nose, pursed lips and flailing hands. “Hello, you,” I tell him as he looks up at me.
Mason’s hand reaches around me and smooths down his cheek. I look back at him over my shoulder and catch his tear-lined face, mere inches from my own.
“Thank you, Angel,” he tells me, closing the distance and kissing me.
My chest constricts as I will myself to pull away, but I can’t. Not when it feels so right, not when I’ve been starved of him for so long, and not until I taste the saltiness of our tears between us.
I rip myself away.
“Is Dad cutting the cord?”
“Can I?” He turns to me, and I nod, my heart physically hurting in my chest.
“Does he have a name?” Kelly asks.
I look at Mason as he leans in with the scissors, his eyes lifting to mine. We haven’t discussed it, but I’ve known since the day I found out I was pregnant what he would be called.
“Ellis. If that’s okay? Ellis Anthony Lowell.”
Mason only nods, as if that’s all he can manage.
The hours that followed my labour are a blur. I remember Elliot, Lance, Charlie, Vinny, and the girls all sneaking in and causing a commotion late in the evening—just to get a look at him. Not that Mason allowed the fuss.
It wasn’t until one o’clock in the morning, when the nurse told Mason to go home to get some sleep that reality sunk back in, obliterating the post-birth haze. I knew I couldn’t let him back in. Not even an inch. He would be Ellis’s father but that was all I could allow.
Swiping the tears from my face, I stand, roll my shoulders, and walk into my bedroom. I always knew today would come around, and now that it has, I feel him, his presence, and his aura. That pull we have—it never left.
But I’ll never let it drag me under again.
Mase
“Who’s Nina?” Jasmine asks as I walk to the edge of the balcony. “Charlie mentioned her earlier. I heard the two of you in the kitchen. Why would she need to know that I’m here? And why don’t you want her to know?”
Who is Nina? There’s definitely not an easy answer to that question. How do I explain something unexplainable to a woman I can barely stand to look at?
“You ask a lot of questions, you know that?”
She dips her head, her face growing red.
“Nina is your sister,” I tell her with little ease, turning to face the skyline as my brow creases. I wait.
“What?” she finally stutters.
“Your sister. Nina Anderson. She’s twenty-nine years old—a dancer. Your father had her and then you eighteen months later.”
“You know my father?”
I scoff. “I know enough to judge his lousy ass.”
I stand with my hands in my pockets not looking back at the girl on my terrace. She’s quiet behind me, and I know I’ve shocked her. I’ve shocked myself. When Nina didn’t believe me, I swore I’d never forgive her for it—and I won’t. Which is why me having Jasmine here makes no sense.
“And Nina, you know her?”
I shake my head on a laugh and something inside of me snaps. This is stupid. “You need to pack up your things, I can’t have you here. I’m sorry.”
Regardless of who Jasmine is and her situation, I can’t have her here. I should’ve known that last night.
“Where will I go? I have no money.”
I turn and look at her. She’s too skinny, her bones visible around her cheeks and jaw, and not in a healthy way. Her skin is spotty and pale, and she hides behind a baggy jumper.
“I’ll find you a hotel. And Charlie phoned the social worker today. They’ll be coming in the morning; we will put you up somewhere until you’re back on your feet. Okay?” I nod at her even though I can sense she’s struggling. I can’t get in too deep.
“Are you helping me because of Nina?” Her eyes pinch in at the corners—accusing, knowing—and I turn, hating that they have the same eyes.
“The why doesn’t matter. What matters is how you behave between now and getting your children back.”
“Behave? I’m not a child,” she says, her voice rising in annoyance.
“Maybe so, but Betty deserves more than the life you’ve given her this far.” I point in the direction of the terrace door. “And if you can’t see that, then you should leave now.”
“Not everyone is born with a silver spoon in their mouth, you know. I did what I had to do in life to get by.”
She has no idea. I walk to her with my hands in my pockets, my teeth clenched so tight they ache.
I’m an asshole for judging her—for taking my frustration out on her, but I also know that in life there’s always a choice, and Jasmine has made some shitty ones.
“I know someone just like you, someone who could have let their fate ruin them.” I shake my head.
“She didn’t. She never let it. She soared so damn high.
” I look down my nose at her. “Be better. For you. For your kids.” I walk past her and roll open the door.
“So, she doesn’t know about me?” she calls, halting me in my steps. “Nina. She doesn’t know I’m her sister?”
“No.”
“This is a fucking terrible idea,” Elliot tells me, staring wide-eyed at me from the other side of my desk.
“She was in Stratford?” Lance asks, surprised. “I thought Vinny said she wasn’t in the country?”
We’re in my office. Lance and Charlie sit on the sofas, while Elliot stands, still staring at me.
“She doesn’t have much in the way of identification. It’s why she wasn’t easily traced,” Charlie tells them, looking up from his laptop.
“She has a kid?” Elliot asks.
I nod.
“Why the fuck are you helping her, Lowell?” Lance questions, rolling his lips and smoothing his hand over his moustache.
“I don’t know.” I drag my hand down my face. “She needs it. She doesn’t know who set me up. She said she was told what to do that night, and my bets are on it having something to do with her boyfriend.”
“I’d have fucking left her.” Lance shakes his head, sitting back onto the sofa.
“Maybe I should have left her but it’s Nina’s sister, Sullivan.”
“You think her bloke is dodgy?” Elliot asks.
“Yeah, the place was a fucking tip, drugs, the lot.”
“So, what now? You chuck her in The Earl Marks and expect her to sort her shit out?” Lance chuckles.
Elliot frowns instantly. “Wait a second—”
“You put her up in The Earl Marks?” Charlie’s voice booms as he stands, letting his laptop fall to the sofa.
“Yeah.”
“What are the chances.” Elliot grimaces as he looks at Charlie.
“What?” I question, frowning between them when none of them speak.