Felicity arrives first. She takes in Rose and me and the state of the flat and sighs.
‘Come on, sit down. Do you have any tea?’
‘No.’
‘That’s all right. I brought some. And some milk and sugar.’
We sit and drink. I let Felicity put sugar in mine and it gives me the energy to repeat what I said on the phone.
‘I can’t do this. I can’t look after Rose. I need … I need help.’
‘That takes a lot of courage to admit, Hedda.’
I cuddle Rose tighter, as though I can take back the words, what I’ve set in motion. But I can’t. I love her too much to keep pretending. She needs more than this, more than I can give. All down my side a huge bruise is forming. I’m stiff with it, wincing whenever I move. My heart still feels strange and wrong, like parts of it might have died off. I can’t trust it, can’t trust myself.
‘You need to be checked out. And we’ll need to contact the police about the assault,’ she says.
‘I’m not going back to hospital,’ I say. ‘Not now. Not ever.’ I know this suddenly, and there’s grief in it, long and howling. Molly’s gone, and so is the unit. I can’t go back. Because if I do, I don’t think I’ll be coming out again.
‘Then we need to work out a plan, to keep you out.’
‘Like what? I’ve got nothing left.’ I sort of mean that I’m exhausted, but maybe more than that. I try and get it straight in my mind through the Nia fog. ‘It’s too late, isn’t it?’
Felicity’s voice is very gentle. ‘I think, for now, you need extra support, yes.’
I put my hands over my face and speak through them. ‘It’s like this war in my head. If I don’t have Nia … I don’t even know what I’m like without her … it. I don’t know who I am. I’ve never done anything worthwhile. Except for Rose. But I can’t make her my everything, can I? Like Mum? I can’t ask Rose to carry all that.’
‘No, you can’t.’
‘So Nia wins then.’
Felicity leans forward and touches my hand. ‘Only if you let it. Nia’s not a person, Hedda, and your eating disorder is not you, no matter how comforting you might have found it in the past. And I think you know it too.’
I give a tiny nod.
She sighs. ‘Maybe I’ve been in this job too long … I think you’ve worked very hard, and you’ve done a very brave thing, to call me. I don’t think you realise just how strong you are.’
I look at her in disbelief, but she’s not finished.
‘All this power you have, all this destruction – you can turn it into something positive.’
I shake my head.
‘You can. You are,’ Felicity says. ‘You just need some help. You have to let people help you.’
I think about Robin, and Laurel, and Molly. How they always asked about me, and never once admitted they needed help too.
I start to cry. ‘I have to let her go, don’t I?’
I mean Rose.
But also, Nia.
Felicity sighs. ‘I think right now you need to work on your recovery, and I don’t think you have the resources at the moment to look after Rose too. I know how much you love her, but you have to love yourself as well. When you’re ready, I think you will be a beautiful parent.’
‘Just not now.’
‘No, not now. You need to be healthy first. And I believe you will be. I see you, and I believe that.’
When Molly died, I never thought anyone else would see me – properly see me and love me anyway. And now Felicity, of all people, the woman who’s taken everything I’ve thrown at her – my lies, my insults and my silence – has. Then in a flash, I see her too. The apology in her eyes. How hard she’s tried. And I want to tell her how much it means that she did. That she didn’t fail me. I can’t find the words, but I grab hold of her hand and she blinks really fast and I realise she’s holding my hand back just as hard. We sit in silence with our fingers linked for a long time, until Rose stirs and begins to cry.
A while later, Joanna arrives. Felicity talks to her in a low voice, and then I do. Joanna makes notes and asks questions and I try my hardest to answer, but I want to sleep and sleep.
I tell her about Mum, and about Dad going AWOL.
‘I think that rules out your mother as a placement for the time being,’ Joanna says. She goes out for a bit to make calls and to buy nappies and formula.
Felicity stays with me the whole time.
I hold tight to Rose, my girl, my beautiful girl, my life raft I have to let go.
Because no baby should be someone’s life raft.
All that need.
All my need.
It’s too big for one tiny person.
Another while later, the police arrive. They take a statement and go next door. There’s shouting and banging and then he’s being done for assault and possession and carted off. But I know he’ll be back. They say someone will come to fix the door later on.
I can’t stop holding on to Rose.
Eventually, Joanna is back. ‘I’ve found a foster placement. It’s a wonderful couple, very experienced. I’ve spoken to Violet and they can take Rose today.’
‘Today?’ Everything is falling away. I hold Rose tighter, like Joanna is going to snatch her from my arms right now. ‘What then? What will happen?’
‘Well, you’ll have contact, be able to visit Rose. And you will work on your recovery. This should be short term, until you’re back on your feet. We’ll need to sort out your accommodation. Perhaps college, or a job. If you weren’t turning eighteen next month I might have been able to arrange a placement for you both together, but as it is …’
‘I’ll be on my own,’ I say dully.
‘No. I’ll be here to support you,’ Joanna says. ‘This isn’t the end, Hedda. I can’t make any promises, and Rose’s welfare will come first, but this isn’t the end.’
Felicity squeezes my fingers.
Violet arrives as it’s getting dark with her husband Rod, a big, carefully shambling man, with thinning hair and broad hairy arms. Through my haze I recognise Violet. It’s Vi, the woman from the food bank.
She smiles at me. ‘We’ll take good care of her, I promise.’
She leans down to take Rose and I can’t believe this is it: this is happening, she’s going. I can’t make my arms let go. But Felicity is there and she puts her arm roundmy shoulder, and I breathe in Rose’s smell, and feel her warm against me, and I take what courage I have left and kiss her.
Then I let her go.
Vi holds her and says, ‘She’s a lovely wee thing. I can tell how loved she is.’
I want to scream and howl, but I don’t because I can’t frighten Rose.
Violet straps her into her car seat.
I start to gabble. ‘She likes “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star”. And this bear – she laughed at him. If she’s tired, she likes you to stroke here between her eyebrows and that makes her sleepy. She likes going for walks. And books – she likes books.’ Panic rises in me. How do I sum her up? If only I’d made a list … Why didn’t I make a list?
But Rose is the one thing I could never turn into a list.
I take a deep breath. ‘She likes the bath quite warm, and if she has wind, rub this way.’ I hold a hand up to demonstrate. ‘Not this way.’
I take a breath, and Joanna says, ‘Let’s give her a couple of days to settle in and then we’ll arrange a visit.’
The space where Rose was on my lap is cold.
I lean into the car seat and give her a kiss on her forehead. She’s fast asleep, but I whisper to her anyway. ‘Time to go, Rose. I love you. I’m sorry. I’ll see you soon.’
And then they’re gone.
Felicity says she’ll stay but I just want to be by myself.
‘I’ll be back tomorrow. Early,’ she says, and then she leaves too.
I run to the window and lean out to watch the car edge away slowly, like it’s carrying the most precious object in the entire universe. I stare until the car gets to the end of the road. It waits a huge amount of time at the junction, and I imagine Rod dithering, his thinning head spinning from left to right and back again, Vi telling him to get on with it. Then the car turns the corner and its lights fade away.
I don’t know how long I spend at the window as dusk turns into darkness. It seems the flat is smaller when I turn back around. Rose’s spare blanket is still on top of the sofa and I take it with me and curl up, smelling it, trying to etch every line of her in my mind. And I want to run and not stop running until I find her and bring her home with me where she belongs, but then I remember not only her smile but the other times, when she cried and I thought I would do something terrible, the money running out and the man next door breaking in while she screamed. The Nia voice calling from the ceiling and my heart fading into nothingness.
I let the grief wash over me and as it deepens, Nia comes, like I knew she would, like she always has. She wants me with her, and right now in this bleak flat, with the one good thing that’s ever happened to me gone, I can’t think of any reason why not.
It gets darker still. Night is arriving. Words form, gathering strength and speed, like a train: Fat, disgusting bitch. Hate you … And there’s a part of me that wants to sink into them, back to where everything hurts, and maybe it would hurt less than it does now, because all of a sudden I don’t think I can breathe for one more second without my girl. Felicity was wrong. I’m like Molly after all; I’ve never been good for anything but destroying myself.
I stand up and go back to the window. Lean way out in the night air. It wouldn’t take much to let go.
I think about Molly underneath that stone slab, how I told myself she had cast a spell, to keep me out of hospital. But she’s not here. She never was.
The ground below is dark, wind rushing around my ears. If it wasn’t Molly watching over me, keeping me out, then maybe that means something else.
Maybe some part of it was me.
And then, I think of Rose.
Rose who is still here. I might not be able to look after her right now, but I have contact. I’ll get her back. If I can. I think about all the things I’ve counted over the years and realise I can’t put a number on the love I have for Rose. It’s bigger than infinity. Countless. Perhaps if I have that much love for her inside me, I can find a way to love myself too.
The saying comes back to me then, the one Robin’s grammy said about life being a precious gift, and making it flower. I weigh it, try and find its size in the darkness. I don’t know whether my life counts too.
The Nia train is near. I can feel her in the room behind me. I look down, at the ground that seems so close.
And slowly, I pull myself back.
I go to the kitchen. In the back of the cupboard is a packet of noodles. I leave them there. Instead, I take out the chicken Robin left me and heat it on the stove, watch it bubble.
I sit down at the table with the plate in front of me.
Nia chatters, but I know now. It’s my choice to hold on to her or not. But if I let her go, it has to be for me, not Rose.
I look up at the ceiling, where Nia’s watched for so long, and then at the darkness beyond the open window. I think about my daughter, my beautiful girl, who picked a mother like me, one she could trust to choose right. Then I gather Nia to me, and whisper in her ear.
‘It’s time for you to go now.’
I watch my hands release thin air.
And I begin to eat.