Phaedra Patrick - Wishes Under The Willow Tree

‘Aw. That’s cute.’

‘We hiked up to Dinosaur Ridge, a local landmark up high on the moors. The rocks are supposed to look like the profile of a stegosaurus. I was lagging behind but I heard a woman’s voice say, “Quick. Shoulder.” And it was Cleopatra. Well, Estelle. She had a stone in her boot and wanted to lean on my shoulder to steady herself. She said that I looked solid .’

‘I suppose that’s one word to describe you,’ Gemma said.

‘I thought she was gorgeous but I didn’t know what to say.’ He was aware that his words were flowing more freely than usual, because he wanted to talk about his wife. He thought back to that day and tried not to groan when he remembered his riveting first words to Estelle.

‘My legs are killing me,’ he said.

‘You’ll be fine. If you’re not, I can always carry you over my shoulder.’

‘Perhaps if you have a small crane…’

‘I’m stronger than I look.’ She rolled up her sleeve and flexed her arm. They both stared at the slight bump that appeared above her elbow. ‘Pure muscle,’ she laughed.

‘I believe you now.’

‘By the way, I’m Estelle.’

‘And I’m Benedict.’

When they eventually climbed up and reached Dinosaur Ridge, the rest of the group sat on the stegosaurus scales, looking smug and eating their sandwiches. ‘I have a joke,’ Estelle said as she rubbed her knees. ‘It’s completely rubbish. Do you want to hear it?’

‘Go on.’

‘Why are there no tablets in the jungle?’

‘I have no idea.’

‘Because the parrots eat ’em all. Get it? Paracetamol.’

‘That’s funny,’ Benedict said, even though it wasn’t.

‘You tell me one.’

Benedict could only think of one that he’d overheard a couple of schoolboys sharing outside his shop. He regretted it as soon as he started to tell it. ‘How do you get a fat guy into bed?’ he asked.

Estelle frowned. ‘I have no idea.’

‘A piece of cake.’

She snorted and then laughed out loud. Her headband slipped off the top of her ears. ‘I may bear that in mind,’ she said.

Throughout the rest of walk, Benedict replayed his joke over and over in his head. It was so lame.

They agreed that a pint of cider in the Pig and Whistle would help to ease their aching thighs, and they talked so much that their cheese sandwich tea led into a pub quiz in the evening. They came second and, when Benedict walked Estelle home, they celebrated by kissing on the canal towpath in the moonlight.

Their dates from then on revolved around food – a new tearoom that Estelle had read about, over in York, or a new sandwich on the menu at Crags and Cakes. Except, whereas Estelle was sensible, choosing small dishes, salads, skipping a dessert, Benedict didn’t have the willpower. He liked large meals and full oval plates, finding the heavy feeling in his stomach comforting. He couldn’t resist a sticky toffee pudding, especially with custard.

They married almost two years later in the small church in Applethorpe, and began to try for a baby on their honeymoon in Santorini.

‘I’d love to have two kids, standing on my knee, under the gem tree,’ Benedict said, as the moon shone through the window, making the white bed sheets shine silver. ‘Like Charlie and I did with our mum and dad.’

Estelle smiled. ‘Who knows…in nine months’ time…’

‘We should stock up on nappies.’

However, the months rolled by and no double blue lines appeared on the pregnancy kits that Estelle bought each month, just in case.

For the first couple of years, it didn’t concern them; they were having fun trying. But slowly, increasingly, it mattered.

‘Never mind.’ They smiled at each other. ‘Next month, definitely.’

But still nothing happened.

They started to make love to a schedule, noting the days when Estelle was supposed to be most fertile.

Doctors’ appointments and hospital appointments began to fill up their calendar. Benedict felt grubby as he sat in a small cubicle with a porno mag in one hand and a plastic cup in the other. But this was nothing compared to the invasive tests that Estelle underwent. She had sample tests and scans and blood tests, a hysteroscopy and a laparoscopy. Benedict stood and watched her disappear into rooms and behind curtains, and coming around, groggily, from her operations.

And the results were always the same. Nothing. Unexplained infertility.

Estelle started to look at the pregnancy tests in private, with the bathroom door locked. When she came out she was quiet and her cheeks were streaked with tears.

They still went out for walks, their pub lunches together, on holiday, to gigs over in Applethorpe. Benedict worked in the jewellery shop and Estelle started to paint.

They went through three rounds of IVF, which failed. The process gave Estelle excruciating headaches and made her feel lethargic, but she was determined to try again. Benedict sold his Ford Focus to pay for another go, but that didn’t work either. There was nothing in the bank and the only thing left to sell was the house. They put it on the market for a year but prospective buyers deemed it old-fashioned, too much work to do.

Benedict and Estelle started to count the years, not celebrating the anniversary of when they met or married, but in terms of how long they’d been trying for children. ‘It’s been three years, since we first started’… ‘It’s been five years now’… ‘I can’t believe it’s coming up to eight.’

Until they both, sadly, agreed that it wasn’t ever likely to happen.

There were strangers missing in their relationship who had never been real. They had invented ghosts and pinned their hopes and futures to them. Benedict and Estelle had fallen in love with children who would never be.

Benedict had thought only of being a father and, without that dream, he felt lost, like he was only a husk of a man. What was his identity now? Being a jeweller or husband wasn’t enough. He needed to be a parent.

A silence settled in the Stone household, like a fine layer of dust, coating everything.

When she was made redundant from the accounts department at Meadow Interiors, Estelle set up their spare bedroom as a studio. As her confidence grew, she started to walk on the moors on her own, with her sketchbook and paints. She travelled to York to buy new brushes and only told Benedict when she got home. She retreated to her studio for hours at a time.

Last Christmas, Benedict looked out of the dining-room window at the gem tree. It was coated in snow and children were laughing in the street, building a snowman. He swallowed and held his back straight. A deep longing welled inside him. ‘I think it’s time that we thought about adoption,’ he said. ‘There’ll be a child who needs us, out there somewhere.’

Estelle stood beside him. She reached up and leaned on his shoulder, as she had done the first time they met. She didn’t speak for a long time. ‘I’ve thought about it,’ she said, in a quiet voice. ‘This isn’t about raising any child. It’s about us having our own.’

‘It would be ours. Not biologically, but we have so much love to give.’

Estelle shook her head. ‘I don’t want to adopt.’

‘Why not?’ Having a family was all they had talked and dreamed of. How could they even contemplate a future without it?

‘It would be a stranger’s child. Not really ours.’

‘I looked after Charlie when my parents died…’ He tried to wrap his arms around her but she squirmed away.

‘You had no choice. And your brother broke your heart…’ Her words trailed off.

Benedict stared out of the window. ‘That’s different.’ He’d never told his wife what happened between him and Charlie all those years ago. Or why his brother left. He wanted a family with Estelle, and he wouldn’t mess up this time. ‘This isn’t about Charlie. This is about us,’ he said, though he felt desperation tug inside him. ‘Please let’s consider adoption.’