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He didn’t answer.
‘I don’t have to be told.’
He turned and looked at her rigid profile.
‘Yes, Doctor, you do.’ He turned off the tap and pulled out a wad of paper towels. ‘Doctors are the worst culprits.’
She rolled her eyes and he just laughed.
‘By the way,’ Diego said. ‘I’m not.’
It was Izzy who didn’t answer now, just pursed her lips a touch as she dried her own hands, refusing to give him the satisfaction of asking what the hell he was talking about. Instead she followed him through NICU, past the endless incubators, most with their own staff member working
quietly on the occupant.
It was incredibly noisy—Izzy remembered that from her paediatric rotation, but she’d been such a confident young thing then, curious more than nervous. Now it seemed that every bleep, every noise made her jump.
‘Here he is. Toby is his name.’ Diego looked down into the incubator then spoke with the nurse who was looking after the infant Izzy had, just that afternoon, delivered. Yet when he glanced over at the rather brittle doctor he found himself momentarily distracted, watching Izzy frown down at the tiny infant, then watching as her huge eyes darted around the large ward, then back to the baby.
‘He’s doing well,’ Diego explained, ‘though it is minute by minute at the moment—he’s extremely premature, but Megan has done a thorough maturation assessment and thinks he’s more like twenty-four weeks.’
‘That’s good news,’ Izzy said, only Diego
didn’t look particularly convinced. ‘Well, it’s good that she delivered in hospital,’ Izzy said, ‘even if she was in the wrong department.’ She stared at the baby and as she felt her own kicking she willed herself, begged herself to feel something, this surge of connection to her own babe that she knew she should feel.
‘Do you get attached?’ Izzy asked, and Diego shook his head.
‘Too dangerous here. It’s the parents who get to me if anything.’
She’d seen enough. The baby was tiny and fragile and she hoped and prayed he would be okay, but the bells weren’t ringing for her, the clouds weren’t parting. There was no sudden flood of emotion, other than she suddenly felt like crying, but only because of her lack of feeling for her own baby she carried. ‘Well, thank you very much.’ She gave a tight smile. ‘As I said, I just thought I’d pop in on my way home.’
‘I’ll walk with you,’ Diego offered.
‘There no need.’ Izzy said, but he ignored her and fell into step beside her. She really wished he wouldn’t, she just wanted out of the stifling place, away from the machines and equipment, away from babies, away from the endless guilt...
‘How far along are you?’
‘Sorry?’
‘How many weeks pregnant?’
She was momentarily sideswiped by his boldness and also glad for the normality of his question. It was the question everyone hadn’t asked today—the bump that everyone, bar Jess, seemed to studiously avoid mentioning.
‘Twenty-eight weeks,’ Izzy said. ‘Well, almost,’ she continued, but she had lost her audience. Diego had stopped walking and she turned her head to where he stood.
‘Here.’
Izzy frowned.
‘Over here.’ Diego beckoned her over and after a slight hesitation she followed him, coming to a stop at an incubator where a tiny baby lay. Tiny, but comparatively much larger than the little boy she had delivered that afternoon. ‘This little one is almost twenty-nine weeks, aren’t you, bebé?’ Diego crooned, then pumped some alcohol rub into his hands. ‘You’re awake...’
‘I thought you said you didn’t get attached!’ Izzy grinned and so too did the nurse looking after the little girl.
‘If that’s Diego detached,’ joked the nurse, as Diego stroked her little cheek and chatted on in Spanish, ‘then we’re all dying to see him in love.’
‘She’s exceptionally cute,’ Diego said. ‘She was a twenty-four-weeker too, though girls are tougher than boys. She’s a real fighter...’ His voice seemed to fade out then, though Izzy was sort of aware that he was still talking, except she didn’t really have room in her head to process anything else other than the baby she was looking at.
This was what was inside her now.
This was what had bought her up to the NICU tonight—a need for some sort of connection to the baby growing inside her. And Diego had led her to it.
Her little eyes were open, her hands stretching, her face scrunching up, her legs kicking, and Izzy watched, transfixed, as the nurse fed her, holding up a syringe of milk and letting gravity work as the syringe emptied through the tube into the infant’s stomach as Diego gave her a teat to suck on so she would equate the full feeling with suckling.
‘She’s perfect,’ Izzy said.
‘She’s doing well,’ Diego said. ‘We’re all really pleased with her.’ He glanced at Izzy. ‘I imagine it’s hard to take in.’
‘Very,’ Izzy admitted.
‘Come on,’ he said, when she had stood and looked for a moment or two longer. ‘You should be home and resting after they day you’ve had.’ They walked together more easily now, Izzy stopping at the vending machine and trying to choose between chocolate and chocolate.
‘You’ll spoil your dinner.’
‘This is dinner!’ Izzy said, and then grimaced, remembering who she was talking to. ‘I mean, I’ll have something sensible when I get home...’
He just laughed.
‘Don’t beat yourself up over a bar of chocolate!’ Diego said. ‘You need lots of calories
now, to fatten that baby up.’ He could see the effort it took for her just to sustain that smile. ‘And you need to relax; they pick up on things.’
‘I do relax.’
‘Good.’
He fished in his satchel and pulled out a brown bag. ‘Here, Brianna forgot to take them.’
‘What are they?’ For a moment she thought they were sweets. ‘Tomatoes?’
‘Cherry tomatoes.’
‘Miniature cherry tomatoes,’ Izzy said peering into the bag. ‘Mini-miniature cherry
tomatoes.’
‘Keep them in the bag and the green ones will redden. I grow them,’ Diego said, then corrected himself. ‘I grew them.’ He frowned. ‘Grow or grew? Sometimes I choose the wrong word.’
They were outside now, heading for the car park.
Izzy thought for a moment and it was so nice to think about something so mundane. ‘Grow or grew. You grow them and you grew these.’
‘Thank you, teacher!’
He was rewarded by her first genuine smile and she looked at him again. ‘So what’s this about your job title?’ Izzy remembered a conversation from Resus.
‘The powers that be are revising our
titles and job descriptions. Two meetings, eight memos and guess what they came up with?’ He nudged her as they walked. ‘Guess.’
‘I can’t.’
‘Modern Matron!’ She could hear someone laughing and realised with a jolt it was her. Not a false laugh but a real laugh, and then he made her laugh some more. ‘I said, “Not without a dress!” And I promise I will wear one; if that is the title they give me. Can you imagine when my family rings me at work.’ He glanced at her. ‘Surgeons, all of them. I’m the oveja negra, the black sheep.’
‘I like black sheep,’ Izzy said, and then wished she hadn’t, except it had honestly just slipped out.
They were at her car now and instead of saying goodnight, Izzy lingered. He was sexy and gorgeous but he was also wise and kind and, despite herself, somehow she trusted him, trusted him with more than she had trusted anyone in a very long time.
‘You said that babies can pick up on things...’ Izzy swallowed. ‘Do you believe that?’
‘It’s proven,’ Diego said.
‘So if you’re stressed or not happy...’
‘They know.’
‘And if you’re not sure...’ She wanted him to jump in, but he didn’t, he just continued to lean on her car. She should just get in it. Surely she should just drive off rather than admit what she didn’t dare to. ‘I mean, do you think they could know if you don’t...?’ She couldn’t say it, but Diego did.
‘If you don’t want them?’
‘Shh!’ Izzy scolded, appalled at his choice of words.
‘Why?’ There was a lazy smile on his face that was absolutely out of place with the seriousness of her admission. ‘It can’t understand your words—they’re not that clever.’
‘Even so!’ She was annoyed now, but he just carried on smiling. ‘You don’t say things like that.’
‘Not to an over-protective mum!’
Oh!
She’d never thought of it like that, never thought that her refusal to voice her thoughts, her refusal to even let herself properly think them might, in fact, show that she did have feelings for the life inside.
It was her darkest fear.
Of the many things that kept her brain racing through sleepless nights, this was the one that she dreaded exploring most—that her feelings for her baby’s father might somehow translate to her baby.
That love might not grow.
‘You’re not the only woman to be unsure she’s ready,’ Diego said. ‘And lots of mothers-to-be are stressed and unhappy, but I’m sure you’re not stressed and unhappy all the time.’ His smile faded when she didn’t agree and they stood for a quiet moment.
‘What if I am?’
He was silent for a while, unsure why a woman so beautiful, so vibrant, so competent would be so unhappy, but it wasn’t his business and for a dangerous moment Diego wished it was. So instead he smiled. ‘You can fake it.’
‘Fake it?’
‘Fake it!’ Diego nodded, that gorgeous smile in full flood now. ‘As I said, they’re not that clever. Twice a day, fake happiness, say all the things you think you should be saying, dance around the house, go for a walk on the beach, swim. I do each morning, whether I feel like it or not.’
He so didn’t get it, but, then, how could he?
‘Thanks for the suggestions.’ She gave him her best bright smile and pulled out her keys.
‘Goodnight, then.’
‘Where are you parked?’
‘I’m not. I live over there.’ He pointed in the direction of the beach. ‘I walk to work.’
‘You didn’t have to escort me.’
‘I enjoyed it,’ he said. ‘Anyway, you shouldn’t be walking through car parks on your own at night.’
He really didn’t get it, Izzy realised.
He was possibly the only person in the hospital who didn’t know her past, or he’d never have said what he just had.
She turned on the engine and as she slid into reverse he knocked on her car window and, irritated now, she wound it down.
‘Sing in the shower!’ He said. ‘Twice a day.’
‘Sure’ Izzy rolled her eyes. Like that was going to help.
‘And by the way ,’ he said as she was about to close her window, ‘I’m not!’
Izzy pulled on her handbrake and let the engine idle and she looked at those lips and those eyes and that smile and she realised exactly why she was annoyed—was she flirting?
Did twenty-eight weeks pregnant, struggling mentally to just survive, recently widowed women ever even begin to think about flirting?
No.
Because had she thought about it she would never have wound down that window some more.
‘Not what?’ Izzy asked the question she had refused to ask earlier, her cheeks just a little pink.
‘I’m not a frustrated doctor,’ Diego said, ‘as many of your peers seem to think every male nurse is.’
‘Glad to hear it,’ Izzy said, and took off the handbrake, the car moving slowly beside him.
‘And I’m not the other cliché either!’ he called, and her cheeks were on fire, yet for the first time in the longest time she was grinning. Not forcing a smile, no, she was, from ear to ear, grinning.
