Auður Ólafsdóttir - The Greenhouse

— All the best with your exams, I said as we were saying good-bye. All I could do now was wait for Anna to call me one night to ask me to come and see the baby.

— The only thing I could do was wait for the baby to be born, I say to my traveling companion, and just leave it at that.

I wondered how long I could wait before I told Dad about the child who would probably be coming into the world on Mom’s birthday in August and how I should announce it to him. I was twenty-one years old and living at home; Dad was fifty-five when he had his first and only children, his twins, Jósef and me. The strangest thing was that my greatest worry was having to tell Dad the expected date of birth. Which bits should I divulge and which bits should I keep to myself about the conception and birth of the child? Should I just spill it out over dinner, out of the blue, casually even, like it was no big deal to have a child with a woman you didn’t know, or should I take a more formal approach and tell him that I needed to have a little chat with him in private, as if there were anyone else in the house, and sit down on the sofa and turn off the radio news to underline the importance of this inevitable event? I felt like I was about to reveal material to the electrician from a novel that I hadn’t read yet, and therefore I honestly couldn’t think of any way of making it interesting. I was also afraid of disappointing him, that he might think I was finally going to tell him of my decision to study botany.

When I finally thought I’d found the right moment to tell Dad the news, my friend phoned to tell me that she was on her way to the maternity ward because she was about to give birth. She said she would wait for me, and I thought I sensed a certain vulnerability in her voice, as if she were about to cry.

It was ten thirty on a Friday night, the sixth of August.

— She called me when the baby was coming, I say to the actress.

It’s been three hours since we left and we’re still in the forest. I see my traveling companion digging into her drama student bag again, looking for her red lunch box.

I must admit I was totally surprised that my friend called me before the baby was born; up until that moment I hadn’t even expected the baby to necessarily be born at all. I dove under the shower and then ironed the only white shirt I had; that was my contribution to the birth, to be in a white, ironed shirt like at Christmas. Apart from that I didn’t know what role Anna expected me to play in the birth. I felt I was on my way to an exam I hadn’t studied for. Suddenly Dad appeared beside the ironing board, and I quickly told him that I was expecting a child with the friend of a friend of mine.

— D’you remember Thorlákur? I ask.

His reaction took me somewhat by surprise; he almost looked happy, then he took the iron and wanted to finish ironing the shirt for me.

— I never really expected to experience the joy of becoming a grandfather, he said, your mother and I weren’t even sure you were that way inclined.

I didn’t ask him what he meant by “that way inclined,” but allowed him to help me put on my shirt, as if I were a little boy on his way to his first Christmas ball. He asked me if wanted to borrow a tie from him.

— No thanks.

The moment triggered a memory in him.

— Your mother practically filled up the whole orange kitchen unit in the last weeks she was pregnant with you two brothers, so I avoided going into the kitchen when she was there. The apartment wasn’t big and we were always bumping into each other; there was no way of getting past her. I felt as if I were one too many, as if the apartment just wasn’t big enough for the two of you and me.

A short moment later I feel the need to place more cards on the table.

— I assisted at her birth, I say to the actress, knowing full well that my linguistic skills won’t allow me to elaborate any further. It’s as if someone else is talking through me about my private affairs to the girl.

My traveling companion clearly approves.

— Really? She looks at me with a mixture of puzzlement and admiration. Admiration, though, seems to be the dominant expression.

Even though I was no substitute for the midwife or anything like that, I was certainly present at my daughter’s birth. And I wasn’t left unmoved either.

The corridor was flooded in milky light. I didn’t feel unwelcome, but at the same time I wasn’t needed; my role in the child’s conception had already been completed nine months earlier. Anna was in a white hospital gown that stretched over her taut belly, and she was wearing white socks. She seemed distant and anxious, as if she couldn’t quite handle the situation.

The midwife gave me a warm welcome and I smiled at Anna. I knew how difficult this was for her and pitied her terribly; now I felt I was all to blame. I wanted to apologize, to tell her how sorry I was and that I’d never intended for this to happen to her. Instead, though, I just did what I was told and sat still on the chair that was placed by her bedside and patted the back of the hand of the future mother of my child. Two black ravens were perched on the ledge on the other side of the window, and the women spoke to each other in hushed tones, while Anna lay in silence on her side, clutching a white pillow in her arms.

I couldn’t fathom how it had ever occurred to the mother of my child to have me present; we barely knew each other. I felt totally superfluous, but fortunately it all happened quite fast; I didn’t have to watch my friend agonizing for days on end. The birth went smoothly and swiftly, and the baby was born shortly after midnight on Friday the seventh of August, two hours after I arrived at the hospital. It was a girl, and she was gluey red and cried briefly, just while she filled her lungs with air and wriggled her limbs in all directions. Then she quieted down, grew calm, and looked around, tranquil pearly eyes emerging from the bowels of the earth. There was a faint glow in her deep blue eyes, as if they still belonged to the other world.

— What was it like to be at the birth of the child? my companion in the car asks.

— It was surprising.

— What was surprising?

— You think about death. Having a child gives you the certainty that you’re going to die one day.

— Weird guy, she says.

What makes her say that? Unless I misheard her. My brain is having problems dealing with so many things at once — translating, stringing together unfamiliar words, and trying to work out what extra meanings they might have. My traveling companion, on the other hand, expresses herself effortlessly. I don’t have the guts to ask her what she meant by weird . So instead I say:

— Weird girl yourself.

I didn’t know what was going through Anna’s head, but personally I was a little bit surprised that it was a girl. The midwife showed me how to hold the slippery baby and weave a little cocoon around its minuscule body. She gave off a slightly sweet smell, like vanilla caramel. My daughter also seemed to treat my amateurish attempts with understanding and looked at me with her big, alert eyes veiled in a mist, totally calm. At first sight, she seemed hairless, but when her head was wiped, a film of light yellow down appeared.

— My daughter had little hair when she was born, I say to my traveling companion, like some lawyer reopening an old case because some new evidence has been produced.

If it hadn’t been for the smell and the feel of the baby’s soft body, it might have all seemed very unreal to me, like watching a film. I tried to show my child’s mother some moral support and patted her shoulder. Her eyes were burning as if she’d just been through a life experience that I could never understand. The baby — I tried out the words my daughter —was incredibly tiny and beautiful, like a porcelain doll. The midwife who had wrapped the baby in a towel had also said she was beautiful. Her words were mainly directed at the mother, and then she gave me this slightly bewildered look, as if she were trying to figure out where I fit in with the child. Anna held the baby in her arms, but it was as if her mind were elsewhere, as if she’d done her duty now and wanted to go to sleep. Then she turned to me and said: