whined about having had to get up for his night feeds and how unlucky she was to have a baby that still needed them, as if she didn’t already have no luck at all.
She was still not dressed now, in fact, and Hannah would be arriving in half an hour. So, having delivered yet another lecture, about how all babies needed night feeds at this age – not to mention for some time to come – I suggested that now Roman was attired in his babygro she get on and make herself respectable too.
‘Humph!’ she huffed, tugging the belt of her dressing gown tighter round her. ‘She can just take me as she finds me. She isn’t my social worker, is she? I’m not doing anything till I’ve had something to eat.’
I went to make her breakfast almost on autopilot, really. After all, that was what I did – I looked after children. But even as I popped the slices of bread in the toaster, and reached for the hot chocolate, it occurred to me that, actually, I shouldn’t be doing this. Emma didn’t just have to prove to Hannah that she could look after Roman, she had to prove she could do so while still taking care of herself. After all, she was right – she wasn’t one of the lucky ones, was she? If she’d been my child, I’d be there for her, helping her through the hard bit. If this had been Riley, that would have been exactly what I’d have done. Thank God it hadn’t been, but saying it had, I’d be there for her, making her breakfast, supporting her, helping her through.
But that wasn’t the case. Emma had no such support to rely on when she left me. She’d be on her own and, as such, she had to learn to survive.
I sighed heavily, as the reality of what was to come started sinking in. It was such a dilemma; I wanted to help her, but there was a clock ticking, loudly. In order to keep Roman, she had to prove she could survive without help. She was being monitored and it was my job to collude with those doing that monitoring, which meant that if things went wrong – if the decision was reached that she couldn’t be trusted to look after Roman – I would be a part of that decision-making process; a decision to part him from his mother. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt so torn about a placement, or so emotionally on edge about what was the right thing to do.
I finished making the breakfast and took it in to her anyway. By now Roman had been relocated to his Moses basket – a surprise gift Mike had brought home a couple of evenings before. ‘Save him having to be up in his cot upstairs all the time for his naps,’ he’d explained. And I understood perfectly. Out of sight out of mind was the last thing that was required.
‘Come on, Emma,’ I said once she’d finished the first slice. ‘Come on, get a move on!’ She was flicking through the channels now, inertia kicking in. ‘Get upstairs, get yourself showered, and get dressed, quick smart. You might not care what Hannah thinks, but I do. You need to show her that you can set a good example to your child, and lounging about watching TV in your PJs isn’t one, in my book. Come on, take the rest of your toast up and get organised.’
She huffed again, and I was reminded that in the normal course of things she’d be in school, probably huffing about having to sit through double maths instead. ‘A good example?’ she spluttered. ‘He’s not even two months old! It’s not like he’s going to start copying me, is it? Christ!’
She stomped off then, slamming the door behind her for good measure, which made me flinch, expecting Roman to wake with a start and begin wailing, but he was obviously used to noise. He barely stirred.
Emma was still upstairs when Hannah arrived on the doorstep fifteen minutes later, looking a picture of smiling efficiency.
‘Morning, Casey,’ she said cheerfully as I ushered her over the threshold. ‘Goodness, it’s warm in here after the nip in the air out there. Had to ramp the heating up for our little man, I suppose?’
She shrugged her parka off as she went in, and cast around, looking for him.
‘Exactly,’ I said. ‘Not ideal for a woman at my time of life, it must be said, but needs must, eh? Cup of coffee?’
‘That would be lovely. Ah! There you are – look at you, all snug in your lovely basket!’ She plucked Roman from his bed and turned back to me in one smooth movement. ‘And where’s our little madam today?’ she asked.
It was nothing personal, but I didn’t really like the way she called Emma ‘our little madam’. It was the sort of term a mother might use affectionately for her own teenager, and, though it wasn’t for me to say, in this context it just felt slightly inappropriate – as if she was already encouraging her to play that kind of role, despite Emma being a mother herself. It also riled me that Hannah was only young too and, though she was possibly the best social worker since the invention of sliced bread, had no personal experience of being a mum herself. (I’d checked.) Which didn’t mean she couldn’t do a brilliant job for Roman – some of the best midwives out there were childless, after all – but did mean it sat uneasily with me that she should slightly patronise Emma in that way. So I lied. I just didn’t want to give her further fuel to think of Emma like that.
‘She’s upstairs sorting out the baby’s laundry, I think,’ I mumbled. ‘I’ll pop the kettle on then I’ll nip up and tell her you’re here.’
‘Excellent,’ said Hannah. ‘Now, little fellow,’ she said, turning back to Roman, ‘how are you?’
Once I’d chivvied Emma down (having first, of course, briefed her) I left her and Hannah to it, and got on with doing a bit of laundry myself. I was out in the conservatory – a welcome addition Mike had made to the house not long after we’d moved in – hanging it on my airer when I heard the door go, and by the time I returned to the living room Emma was back in position on the sofa, Roman in the crook of one arm, remote in the other hand, TV on.
She glanced up. ‘She said she’ll see you Thursday,’ she told me. ‘And maybe phone you. Prob’ly to bitch about something else I’m doing wrong.’
‘Wrong?’ I asked. ‘What did she say you were doing wrong?’
Emma pouted, seemingly lost for an answer. ‘Nothing,’ she admittedly finally. ‘But she doesn’t have to. I can just tell. She thinks I’m useless. “You should do this that way, you should do that this way. You should hold him like that, not like that –” She never stops.’
‘Emma, that’s not true.’ I went and perched on the edge of the sofa. ‘Sweetheart, honestly, that’s not true. She just wants to help you learn how to look after him the best you can. That’s what she’s there for …’
‘No she’s not. She just wants to see how bad I am. So I don’t know why she gets all uppity when I prove it to her – she should be pleased!’
‘Love, that’s not the case at all. Look, you really need to try and get along with Hannah. I know you don’t like it, this whole assessment thing, but you have to take it seriously. It’s not a game, you know. It is serious. So whatever you think about Hannah, you have to take it seriously.’
Emma’s eyes glittered. ‘Why?’ she said angrily. ‘What’s the point? What difference is it going to make to anything? It’s obvious they want him.’ Her eyes flicked down to Roman. ‘So you really think anything I do is going to make a difference?’ She looked disgusted. ‘They’re short of babies, aren’t they? You should know that. They’ve probably got some poor, sad, childless couple already lined up to have him. I know how it works. And if you don’t you don’t know anything!’ She’d swung her legs around now, and was rising from the sofa, Roman in her arms still. ‘Trust me, Casey, I know how it works. They’re just waiting for me
