The Baby Trail Read online

  ‘The swelling can take twelve hours to show up. It may not look bad but it feels bad.’

  ‘How about if you lie back and think of England and I gently lie on top, being very careful not to lean on your sore side?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Let’s just try it out.’

  ‘Emma.’

  I lay on top of him carefully, putting all my weight on my hands, but then I lost my balance and fell, kneeing him in the groin. He howled like a banshee. ‘Get off me, you lunatic. Jesus Christ, are you insane?’

  ‘I’m sorry, I lost my balance. There’s no need to raise the dead.’

  ‘Emma,’ James ground out, ‘I would greatly appreciate it if you left me in peace before I really lose my temper.’

  ‘Drama queen,’ I shouted, and slammed the bathroom door, then locked myself in to have a long, hot soak in the bath to calm down. Tomorrow was day fourteen. I prayed that the swelling would not be bad and that he’d be feeling better – because even if I had to tie him to the bed and gag him, we were having sex.

  11

  The next morning James’s groin was only very slightly swollen. Needless to say, he believed the dig I had accidentally given him with my knee hadn’t helped matters. But I knew he was feeling better because whenever he thought I wasn’t looking, he walked normally – without the exaggerated limp.

  We had an intimate breakfast – just the two of us and the thirty squad members – and then they all headed off for strategy meetings and training sessions.

  ‘What time will I see you later?’ I asked.

  ‘Same as yesterday, I guess,’ answered the grumpy gaffer.

  ‘Are you feeling better?’

  ‘Marginally.’

  ‘Look, James, I didn’t mean to—’

  ‘Well, well, if it isn’t the screamers,’ said Donal, interrupting us. ‘Declan said you were very noisy last night, howling like werewolves, he couldn’t get a wink of sleep. Fair play to you, James, with the groin strain and everything. You’re all man, I’ll say that for you. Anyway, can you keep it down tonight? Poor old Declan needs his kip.’ Donal slapped James on the back and roaring laughing as he walked away.

  I looked at James, who was smiling for the first time in eighteen hours. He leaned in and whispered in my ear, ‘We’ll have to give them something to really talk about tonight. I’ll see you later and, yes, I promise to stay on the sidelines today. Sorry for being such a grump. I’m a bit tense about the match.’

  Will you be able to?’

  ‘Oh, I think I’ll manage. See you later.’

  I was delighted. Now I wouldn’t have to jump him when he came in and tie him to the bed, or give him a sleeping pill and hop on him that way – the other alternative I had come up with the night before. I wondered if I could go to prison for that. Surely not. An all-female jury would totally understand, wouldn’t they? Anyway, it wasn’t an issue now. I decided to go into town and get some hot underwear to help raise the sail as it were.

  I bought some sexy red lingerie and went back to the hotel to pee on my ovulation stick to double-check. It was definitely day fourteen in my cycle, but I wanted to check the ovulation status. I peed and waited. One line was thin and a bit blurry and the other was thick and strong. I suddenly realized I didn’t know which was the reference line and which the test line. Damn, I hadn’t brought the instructions with me. Which was which? I couldn’t remember. I began to panic. I needed to know – after all, I had travelled over for this. I had to make sure.

  I decided to go to the pharmacy I had seen near the hotel and get some new sticks. My French wasn’t great but reference was ‘référence’ in French and test was probably ‘test’ so it would be easy to figure out from the diagrams on the instructions.

  I walked into the pharmacie and looked around. The shelves were packed with médicaments. I wandered down the aisles looking for anything resembling an ovulation test but couldn’t see any. The woman in the white coat was clocking my every move. When I approached the counter she sighed and said, ‘Oui, Madame?’ in that dismissive way French people have when they know they’re dealing with a tourist.

  ‘Bonjour, parlez-vous anglais?’

  ‘Non.’

  Shit. OK, now I’d have to play the pidgin-French-plus-sign-language game. I took a deep breath and launched.

  ‘Je chercher le sticks pour le bébé,’ I said, pointing to my stomach.

  ‘Pardon?’ said the unimpressed pharmacist, looking at me as if I was some kind of retard.

  ‘Je chercher le test pour le bébé?’ I tried again, raising my voice this time in some lame hope that shouting would make it clearer.

  By this stage, there was another woman in the pharmacie who was waiting behind me and decided to join in. ‘You have the sick baby?’ she said, in strongly accented English. Isn’t it amazing how wonderful it sounds when a French person speaks English and how utterly wretched it sounds when I try to speak French?

  I turned to face her. ‘No, not a sick baby. I’m needing the test so I can make the baby,’ I said, resorting to pidgin English and doing so with a French accent. I sounded like Peter Sellers’s Inspector Clouseau.

  She looked puzzled and spoke in French to the pharmacist who shook her head. They turned back to me and shrugged. I was trying desperately to think of another way to explain. I took a nail file from the counter, straddled it, crouched down and pretended to pee on it, making sssss noises so they’d understand, and then said, ‘To check for le bébé,’ and rubbed my stomach again.

  ‘Mon Dieu!’ said the pharmacist, staring at me in shock. I could picture her telling her friends over dinner about the mad foreigner who had come into her pharmacie and performed doggie impressions.

  ‘Ah, oui, j’ai compris,’ said the customer, smiling at me, and laughing as she explained it to the pharmacist.

  ‘Ah, d’accord,’ said the pharmacist, looking relieved that there was a sane explanation for my behaviour.

  I smiled gratefully at the customer; she nodded and smiled at me. The pharmacist handed me a pregnancy test – I could tell by the drawing.

  ‘Oh, no. Non,’ I said. ‘Pas le bébé, uhm, it’s for before le bébé.’ I was desperately trying to think of the word for ‘before’ in French.

  The two ladies, meanwhile, were looking peeved. They thought they had cracked my code.

  I took a deep breath and pointed to the test. ‘Non,’ I said, ‘le bébé is not possible, I need to make the bébé.’ I looked around for inspiration and I saw a calendar. I pointed to it and the pharmacist handed it to me.

  ‘Regardez,’ I ordered the two women. I pointed to day fourteen. ‘Très important pour le bébé,’ I said. ‘Le test pour le bébé – ici,’ and I tapped on day fourteen. They still looked puzzled.

  Damn. I was getting really hot and bothered now. My face was purple with effort and embarrassment. Half of me just wanted to leg it out the door, but I decided to give it one last go. So I pointed to day fourteen and, making a hole with my thumb and index finger, poked my other index finger in and out, miming sex, and said, ‘Le sexe, ici pour le bébé. Je need le test pour checking the eggs. Ah, yes, les oeufs.’ Hurrah, I had remembered the word for ‘eggs’; I was in the home stretch.

  ‘Je need to faire le test pour checking les oeufs pour le sexe pour le bébé.’

  The two women looked at each other and then the penny dropped. ‘Ah, oui, Madame, vous cherchez le test d’ovulation,’ said the pharmacist.

  And there it was – ‘ovulation’ was the same in French. We all nodded and laughed. I paid the formerly stern-faced pharmacist, who patted my arm and wished me ‘bonne chance.’ We were all women. We understood. It was tough out there.

  I skipped back to the hotel, put on my new red underwear and waited for James. He hobbled into the room and collapsed on the bed. I took a deep breath and asked him what was wrong. He said the groin strain had got much worse during the day and he was in agony. I tried not to cry with frustration.

 
‘Could you help me with my shoes, please?’ asked Hopalong Cassidy, in a particularly whiny voice.

  ‘Fine,’ I said grumpily.

  As I reached down to untie his laces, James grabbed me, swung me back on to the bed and kissed me. ‘Just kidding, darling, I’m feeling fit, healthy and raring to go. Now, let’s get these sexy red lacy bits off.’

  The next day was final training and motivation-building day. James was up at the crack of dawn and didn’t get back to the hotel till late that night. When he did arrive, he looked very grim. The prop forward Dave McCarthy’s shoulder injury had not cleared up. He was out of the game and, as a key player, would be sorely missed. I could see James was really worried, but he was putting on a brave face for the team.

  For the next three hours his phone rang constantly as everyone we knew called to wish him luck and journalists hounded him for last-minute pre-match comments. I felt really nervous for him. After dinner that night, everyone was very subdued – jitters were setting in so they all went to bed early to get a good night’s sleep before the big game.

  I woke up in the middle of the night to find the bed empty. James was sitting in the corner of the room staring at a piece of paper, pen in hand.

  ‘Can you not sleep?’

  ‘Not a wink,’ he said, looking up.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Trying to write a speech to give the boys tomorrow in the locker room. I want it to be really motivational but I can’t get it quite right. I’m nearly there – I just need to tweak it a bit.’

  He looked like a little boy sitting there with his hair all ruffled and the pen in his mouth, frowning down at the paper. On the floor beside him was a book of Churchill’s greatest speeches.

  ‘Just speak from your heart, James. They trust you and look up to you. Whatever you say will motivate them,’ I said, in supportive-wife mode.

  ‘It has to be good, Emma. With Dave out of the game Perpignan have the advantage. I want them to go out there tomorrow and win. I need to give them a really rousing speech.’

  ‘Let’s see what you’ve written,’ I said, picking up the pad. James’s speech was largely made up of quotes from Churchill’s broadcasts during the Second World War. It was totally over the top – he might just about have got away with it if he was speaking to fighter pilots on a mission to bomb enemy territory or something, but this was a Leinster rugby team … Come on – know your audience.

  We have before us an ordeal of the most grievous kind … You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word: ‘Victory – victory – at all costs, victory, in spite of all terror, victory, however long and hard the road may be …’ But I take up my task with buoyancy and hope. I feel sure that our cause will not be suffered to fail among men. At this time I feel entitled to claim the aid of all, and I say, ‘Come, then, let us go forward together with our united strength.’

  I tried to tread carefully so as not to hurt his feelings. ‘James, I really don’t think you need to quote Churchill. Just use your own words.’

  ‘Darling, Churchill is considered by many to be the most motivational speaker of all time. Mayor Giuliani quoted Churchill when he spoke after the September eleventh attacks to great effect. I’m sure these quotes will get the boys going.’

  ‘James, Giuliani was speaking to a city under terrorist attack. This is a rugby team you’re talking to. The match tomorrow is hardly an “ordeal of the most grievous kind” — it’s a rugby match, for goodness’ sake. They’re looking for a slap on the back and a few whoops.’

  James looked down at his notes. ‘Well, what about this bit? “In the bitter and increasingly exacting conflict which lies before us we are resolved to keep nothing back, and not to be outstripped by any in service to the common cause.”’

  ‘James, I just don’t think it’s hitting the right mark. It’s a bit stuffy for a bunch of Irish rugby players.’ I had to make him see this was madness. There was a time and a place for Churchill’s war speeches and it most certainly was not a smelly dressing room.

  ‘You mean to say that you don’t think Donal and the lads would appreciate “Victory – victory – at all costs, victory, in spite of all terror, victory, however long and hard the road may be …”?’ he said, smiling despite himself.

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘What about JFK’s “Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country”?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘You think I should just say something more straight-forward?’

  ‘Yes, use your own words. It’ll be much more effective. Now, come back to bed and try to get some sleep. I want you looking your best for the front-page pictures of the Irish papers when you whip Perpignan’s ass tomorrow.’

  ‘Quick, give me my pen. I must take that eloquent motivational line down.’

  The next morning I kissed James good luck and he headed off with the team to the ground for some warm-up training. Meanwhile the wives, girlfriends and families were arriving into the hotel. I had been charged with helping them check in and giving them directions to the stadium. Paddy O’Toole’s wife was first in. She complained about the heat, the flight, the rude taxi drivers … I plastered a smile on my face, handed her a pile of photocopies with directions to the stadium and legged it out the door. I wanted to be there early to get a good seat and I had no intention of listening to her moaning in my ear throughout the game.

  By kick-off the stadium was jammed. About a third of the stands were filled with die-hard Leinster supporters who had travelled over for the game. They were all singing ‘Molly Malone’ and waving banners. The atmosphere was fantastic.

  I don’t know what James said to the team in the locker room that day, but they came out with all guns blazing. From kick-off, Leinster was hungrier, more aggressive in attack and more solid in defence. There was no contest, Perpignan was beaten 23—6 and all hell broke loose. When the final whistle blew the stadium erupted. I sobbed and hugged the two big supporters beside me. The fans rushed the pitch and Donal and James were carried shoulder high to the clubhouse where the celebrations kicked in.

  Later that day after copious drinks, toasts and cheers, James and I finally got a moment to ourselves and I spent a good ten minutes telling him how proud I was of him. He hugged me and said, ‘I’m proud of you, too, darling.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘For being so dedicated to having a family. I think you’ll be a wonderful mother and I know it’s frustrating but I also know that you’ll be pregnant soon. It’ll happen, Emma, I promise it will.’

  ‘Thanks. You’ll be a wonderful father too,’ I said, sniffling into his shoulder. ‘I know I’m a bit hyper about it, I don’t mean to be a pain. I’m just finding it all very frustrating.’

  You’re fine.’

  ‘Thanks, but let’s be honest here – I stalked you to France, forced you to have sex with me while injured and two days ago I squatted in a French chemist pretending to pee like a dog. I am definitely losing the plot.’

  We both laughed.

  ‘Well, OK, maybe you are a little insane, but I like that you’re passionate about things, it’s who you are.’

  ‘Yeah, well, believe me, passion and obsession are an exhausting combination. I feel about a hundred and forty.’

  ‘Maybe we should forget it for a while and just let nature take its course?’

  ‘I’ve tried to, James, but I can’t – I’m obsessed.’

  ‘Well, can we at least cut out the après-sex gymnastics? I’m worried you’re going to break something and I don’t fancy having to explain it to the doctor in Casualty. “And how did this happen, Mr Hamilton?” “Well, you see, my wife was cartwheeling around the bed after sex, as she does, to stimulate my sperm …”’

  ‘Ha-ha, well, OK, I’ll keep it to sticking my legs up in the air and shaking them about.’

  12

  Lucy thought long and hard about where to take Donal on their second date. She wanted it to be something memorable for
him and when she saw an ad for The Vagina Monologues she knew she had found the perfect solution.

  She called Donal, told him they were going to the theatre and he was to pick her up on Friday night – sober, uninjured, wearing normal clothes and on time.

  Donal wasn’t too keen on the theatre: at six foot four he always ended up sitting with his legs wrapped round his neck staring at his watch and praying for it to be over. Movies, he liked – plenty of leg room, popcorn, nachos covered with melted cheese, and usually a skimpily clad starlet to look at. Theatre, he found dull. The last girl he had gone out with, Cathy, had dragged him to Waiting for Godot. It was the longest, most ridiculous load of old rubbish he had ever seen and he fell asleep half-way through.

  When Cathy had poked him in the ribs to wake him up and glared at him he had whispered loudly, ‘That fecker Godot isn’t going to turn up, so can we please just go home?’ much to her embarrassment. The relationship ended shortly after.

  Still, he owed Lucy a decent date after the last fiasco, so he said it sounded like a great idea and made sure he was on time, and looking smart.

  Lucy stared at him. ‘No iron, then?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘The state of your clothes, you look like you slept in them.’

  ‘These are my good clothes, I’ll have you know. I dressed up for tonight – it’s the first time I’ve been out of a tracksuit in weeks. I like your skirt, nice and short. Come on, let’s go before I pull it off you. You shouldn’t look so sexy – I’ll never be able to concentrate on the play now.’

  Lucy smiled. ‘Oh, I think you’ll manage.’

  ‘So what are we going to see?’ Donal asked, praying that it wasn’t another Beckett play or, God forbid, a musical. Who in their right mind wanted to go and watch a bunch of people – old enough to know better – prancing about, swinging their arms in the air and singing about love and death? Maybe he’d be lucky and it’d be a comedy, something nice and light, not some heavy meaning-of-life crap: he liked to be entertained, not depressed.