Alison Roberts - Midwives On-Call

‘Hey, will you go with Uncle Ollie?’ Em was saying, moving on, prising Toby away from his neck-hugging. ‘I bet he knows how to tickle toes, too.’

‘I can tickle toes.’ He was a paediatric surgeon. He could keep a kid entertained.

But Toby caught him unawares. He twisted in Em’s arms and launched himself across, so fast Oliver almost didn’t catch him. Em grabbed, Oliver grabbed and suddenly they were in a sandwich hug, with Toby sandwiched in the middle.

Toby gave a muffled chortle, like things had gone exactly to plan. Which, maybe in Toby’s world, they had.

But he had so much wrong with him. His tiny spine was bent; he’d have operation after operation in front of him, years in a brace …

He’d have Em.

He should pull away, but Em wasn’t pulling away. For this moment she was holding, hugging, as if she needed it. As if his hug was giving her something …

Something that, as his wife, had once been her right?

‘Em …’

But the sound of his voice broke the moment. She tugged away, flipped an errant curl behind her ear, tried to smile.

‘Sorry. I should expect him to do that—he does it all the time with Mike. He has an absolute conviction that the grown-ups in his life are to be trusted never, ever to drop him, and so far it’s paid off. One day, though, Toby, lad, you’ll find out what the real world’s like.’

‘But you’ll shield him as long as you can.’

‘With every ounce of power I possess,’ she said simply. ‘But, meanwhile, Mum’s ready to go. She’s so excited she didn’t sleep last night. Gretta’s fed. Everything’s ready, all I need to do is put on clean jeans and comb my hair.’

‘Why don’t you put on a dress?’ he asked, feeling … weird. Out of kilter. This was none of his business, but he was starting to realise just how important this afternoon was to Em and her mum. And how rare. ‘Make it a special occasion.’

‘Goodness, Oliver, I don’t think I’ve worn a dress for five years,’ she flung at him over her shoulder as she headed into the house. ‘Why would the likes of me need a dress?’

And he thought of the social life they’d once had. Did she miss it? he wondered, but he tickled Toby’s toes, the little boy giggled and he knew that she didn’t.

They left fifteen minutes later, like a pair of jail escapees, except that they were escapees making sure all home bases were covered. Their ‘jail’ was precious.

‘Mike might come over later to collect Toby,’ Em told him. ‘Toby loves Mike, so if he does that’s fine by us. That’ll mean you only have Gretta so you should cope easily. You have both our cellphone numbers? You know where everything is? And Gretta needs Kanga … if she gets upset, Kanga can fix her. But don’t let her get tired. If she has trouble breathing you can raise her oxygen …’

‘Em, trust me, I’m a doctor,’ he said, almost pushing them out the door.

‘And you have how much experience with kids?’

‘I’m an obstetrician and a surgeon.’

‘My point exactly. Here they’re outside their mum, not inside, and you don’t have an anaesthetist to put them to sleep. There’s a stack of movies ready to play. You can use the sandpit, too. Gretta loves it, but you need to keep her equipment sand-free …’

‘Em, go,’ he said, exasperated. ‘Adrianna, take Em’s arm and pull. Em, trust me. You can, you know.’

‘I do know that,’ Em told him, and suddenly she darted back across the kitchen and gave him a swift kiss on the cheek. It was a thank-you kiss, a perfunctory kiss, and why it had the power to burn … ‘I always have,’ she said simply. ‘You’re a very nice man, Oliver Evans. I would have trusted you to be a great dad, even if you couldn’t trust yourself. That’s water under the bridge now, but I still trust you, even if it’s only for an afternoon.’

And she blinked a couple of times—surely they weren’t tears?—then ducked back and kissed Gretta once again—and she was gone.

And Oliver was left with two kids.

And silence.

The kids were watching him. Toby was in his arms, leaning back to gaze into his eyes. Cautiously assessing? Gretta was sitting in an oversized pushchair, surrounded by cushions.

To trust or not to trust?

Toby’s eyes were suddenly tear-filled. A couple of fat tears tracked down his face.

Gretta just stared at him, her face expressionless. Waiting to see what happened next?

Both were silent.

These were damaged kids, he thought. Rejects. They’d be used to a life where they were left. They’d come from parents who couldn’t or wouldn’t care for them and they had significant medical problems. They’d be used to a life where hospital stays were the norm. They weren’t kids who opened their mouths and screamed whenever they were left.

Could you be stoic at two and at four? That’s how they seemed. Stoic.

It was a bit … gut-wrenching.

Kanga—it must be Kanga: a chewed, bedraggled, once blue stuffed thing with long back paws and a huge tail—was lying on the table. He picked it—him?—up and handed him to Toby. Gretta watched with huge eyes. This wasn’t what was supposed to happen, her eyes said. This was her Kanga.

He lifted Gretta out of her chair with his spare arm and carried both kids out into the yard, under the spreading oak at the bottom of the garden where the lawn was a bit too long, lushly green.

He set both kids down on the grass. Fuzzy the dog flopped down beside them. He, too, seemed wary.

Toby was still holding Kanga. Warily.

He tugged Gretta’s shoes off so both kids had bare feet. Em had made the tickling thing work. Maybe it’d work for him.

He took Kanga from Toby, wriggled him slowly towards Gretta’s toes—and ticked Gretta’s toes with Kanga’s tail.

Then, as both kids looked astonished, he bounced Kanga across to Toby and tickled his.

Toby looked more astonished. He reached out to grab Kanga, but Oliver was too fast. The tickling tail went back to Gretta’s toes—and then, as Toby reached further, Kanga bounced sideways and tickled Fuzzy on the nose.

Fuzzy opened his mouth to grab but Kanga boinged back to Gretta, this time going from one foot to the other.

And then, as Gretta finally reacted, Kanga boinged up and touched her nose—and then bounced back to Toby.

Toby stared down in amazement at his toes being tickled and his eyes creased, the corners of his mouth twitched—and he chuckled.

It was a lovely sound but it wasn’t enough. Kanga bounced back to Gretta, kissed her nose again, then bounced right on top of Fuzzy’s head.

Fuzzy leaped to his feet and barked.

Kanga went back to Toby’s toes.

And finally, finally, and it was like a minor miracle all by itself, Gretta’s serious little face relaxed. She smiled and reached out her hand.

‘Kanga,’ she said, and Kanga flew to her hand. She grabbed him and held, gazing dotingly at her beloved blue thing.

‘Kanga,’ she said again, and she opened her fingers—and held Kanga back out to Oliver.

Her meaning was clear. He’s mine but it’s okay to play. In fact, she wanted to play.

But that one word had left her breathless. What the …? He’d seen the levels of oxygen she was receiving and she was still breathless? But she was still game.

She was trusting.

He wanted to hug her.

She was four years old. He’d met her twice. He was feeling … feeling …

‘Hey!’ It was Mike, and thank heaven for Mike. He was getting emotional and how was a man to keep tickling when he was thinking of what was in store for this little girl? He looked across at the gate and smiled at Mike with gratitude.

‘Hey, yourself.’

‘We’re going to the beach,’ Mike called. ‘You want to come?’