For Better for Worse

Zoe laughed at the disappointed expression on her mother’s face as she looked round the small sunny sitting-room.

‘She’s out with Ben. He’s taken her to the park. It’s the new chef’s first solo attempt at lunches today, and I suspect he was glad to get Ben out of the way.’

‘Yes. I saw how busy the restaurant was as I came past.’

‘We’ve been lucky,’ Zoe told her. ‘Ben’s found just the right niche in the market. It’s the restaurants which are catering for the expensive business account lunchers whic

h are really suffering. Out here, out of the city centre where most of our customers are local, we’re still managing to keep pretty busy.

‘We’ve had to prune our costs, of course, and take into account the fact that people are much more concerned about value for money these days. Clive’s backing has been a tremendous help. Without him we’d never have been able to afford to buy either this house or the restaurant; not having to pay any rent saves a fortune on overheads. I just feel a bit guilty that I’m not contributing more to things…’

‘You designed the décor and did all the costings…’

‘Mmm… and I’m managing to go back to work at least part-time, even if it is only to work on the reception desk and do the cashiering. I didn’t want Ben to feel that now we’d had Katie he wasn’t important to me any more.’ Zoe laughed ruefully. ‘Now if anyone has had their nose put out of joint I suppose it’s me.’

‘I warned you what would happen,’ her mother told her, smiling at her. ‘Men are notorious for becoming doting, adoring, possessive daddies when they have daughters. I’ve never gone along with this thing they’re supposed to have about wanting sons. Some do, of course, but if they’re honest most men will admit that there’s something very special about having a daughter. I can still remember how thrilled your father was when you were born.’

Zoe was bending down to retrieve a soft felt rabbit half sticking out beneath the sofa.

* * *

‘A flat over the restaurant?’ she had suggested cautiously when they had first talked about moving.

He had shaken his head.

‘You can’t bring a baby up properly in a flat,’ he had told her. ‘No, I’ve got a better idea. There’s a small house up for sale a few houses down from here. It’s got a good-sized back garden, and we’re just across the road from the park.’

‘Can we afford it?’ she had protested. Deep down inside she still felt guilty about the baby; worried that, although on the surface Ben had adapted surprisingly well to her pregnancy, inwardly his feelings were very different.

She wouldn’t have blamed him if he had felt resentful, if, despite all he had said to her, he had perhaps really wished that she had simply gone ahead with the termination without burdening him with the knowledge of how she felt or what was happening. She had been, she acknowledged, still disturbed and disquieted by her own awareness that when she had really needed to be strong and independent, when it had really mattered, she had been no such thing.

All through the last months of pregnancy, while Ben busied himself with preparations for opening the restaurant and chivvied the workmen to complete their work on the house and the restaurant conversion, she had worried that despite what he had said, despite the love and concern he showed her, despite the protective way he behaved towards her, it was all really a sham and that he was hiding his real feelings.

Sometimes, overwhelmed by guilt and misery when Ben was out, she had curled up alone on their bed, her eyes blurring with tears as she whispered to the growing bulge that was the new life inside her that it wasn’t to worry… that she loved it…

And yet as the birth drew nearer she had become more and more afraid, worrying about how Ben would react to the reality of the baby.

To accept her pregnancy was one thing; to say he loved her, to make plans for their future together… But what if, in reality, when the baby arrived, he found that he could not love it, that he did resent it? How could she let him go, knowing how much she loved and needed him, and yet how could she let him stay, let herself stay, knowing that he could not love their child?

Children needed love in the same way that they needed air to breathe and food to nourish them, and, if Ben could not love their child, by staying with him she would be forcing him or her to grow up under the burden of knowing of that lack of love.

She knew that her quietness during the last months of her pregnancy had concerned Ben, but she had not been able to explain to him how she felt. She had placed enough burdens on him already.

She had felt it would be disloyal to confide in anyone else, even her parents, and so she had kept her anxiety to herself, brooding on it. As the baby inside her grew, so too did her fear of what its birth might bring. And so too did her guilt for what she had done—to Ben and to her child…

‘I’ll never forget the night you were born,’ her mother was saying reminiscently now. ‘Nor the night Katie was born either. What on earth prompted you to go off to Manchester like that?’

‘I don’t really know,’ Zoe admitted. ‘I didn’t really think there was any possibility of Katie arriving early. Ben was busy down here sorting things out and I just…’

She shook her head, unable to explain the need that had overwhelmed her that morning, the feeling that the only way she could resolve the guilt and anxiety inside her would be for her to talk to Ben’s mother.

Now she was forced to admit that it had been a foolishly impulsive thing to do. At eight and a half months pregnant, she had tired easily and been very large. The train had been delayed by repairs to the lines and it had been over four hours before she had eventually arrived in Manchester. She hadn’t wanted to trust herself or her aged Mini to such a long journey on the road, so the train was her best option.

She had put the beginnings of pain in her back down to the discomfort of travelling.

The taxi driver had grimaced slightly when she gave Ben’s mother’s address, and she understood why, because the utilitarian block of flats was in a rundown part of the city.

Ben’s mother had been astonished to see her, but had welcomed her warmly, hugging her, exclaiming over her tired face and then taking charge with a speed and efficiency which Ben later admitted had surprised him when Zoe had dropped her mug of tea with a sharp cry of pain.