Blocks of Couverture

Mid-morning sun flowed through the office window, casting a warm yellow line across the surface of Dr Barker’s desk. It caught the back of his head and shoulders, making the tips of his curly grey hair glow. He was hunched forward, holding the phone receiver to his ear—in his other hand an uncapped pen bounced between two fingers.

He sighed, ‘Still holding,’ he said, covering the mouthpiece with his hand. His elbow bumped one of the several loose clusters of papers and manila folders on his desk. His computer was switched off. Post-it notes were stuck to the monitor. My eyes felt like fiberglass. I tried to focus by looking around the room—blue carpet, cream colored walls, the examination couch on my left. Behind us, near the door, stood a large bookshelf crammed with textbooks and journals, in the corner, a sink and a metal bin.

‘Yes. This is Dr Geoff Barker.’

I turned back.

‘I’m after a first trimester screening result.’ He leaned back in his leather chair. There’s a pause. ‘Dani Jackson.’ He gave them my date of birth and address. There was a much longer pause. I looked at Mark for reassurance. His lips are thin. His jaws were clenched at a boxy angle and the collar of his red polo top was bent. Dr Barker jotted down some numbers on a pad of paper. ‘Thank you.’ He said, hanging up. ‘Sorry about that.’ I attempt a smile.

He leaned forward and clasped his hands, looking at me. ‘Unfortunately your baby’s nuchal fold translucency was a little thicker than average,’ he said. My left hand started to tremble. I steadied it with my right. I sat, looking at Dr Barker, feeling them twitch in my lap.

‘Do you understand what I mean by that?’

‘It ...’ I cleared my throat. ‘It means the skin at the back of the baby’s neck is too thick.’ ‘That’s correct.’ He glanced at the numbers on the pad of paper. ‘Often it can occur in babies that turn out to be perfectly healthy and normal. But there is also a known association with fetal chromosomal anomalies.’

‘So what’s the risk?’ Mark asked.

Dr Barker hesitated. He glanced at Mark but addressed me.

‘As you may remember me explaining to you at your first antenatal visit, the results of the nuchal fold thickness are combined with the placental hormone levels blood test that you had done last week.’

I nodded, my tongue so dry it felt swollen.

‘This enables an odds ratio to be calculated of the chances of your baby having Trisomy 21, more commonly known as Down syndrome, or Trisomy 13 or 18.’

He looked back down at the pad. I tried to read the numbers but it was too messy a scrawl. ‘The risk of your baby having Trisomy 13 came back as one in 2400 and Trisomy 18 as one in 1150. That’s slightly higher than average for your age but still very low.’ I didn’t want to hear what was right, I needed to know what was wrong. ‘What about Down syndrome?’ I said. He blinked, ‘One in forty.’ The shoulder line of his thin striped blue suit sagged slightly, as if somehow it was his fault. The trembling in my lap became stronger. Mark reached over and covered my hands with his own. The line of yellow sunshine on the table seemed to dull, creeping closer towards me—I felt a weird combination of relief and fear.

One in forty.

It could have been worse. It could have been worse.

It was still pretty bad.

‘So what now?’ I said.

Every action has its consequences. Every journey has its end.

I don’t really remember much about our drive back home. I think I cried a bit. But mostly I just sat there feeling numb. My fantasy world had collapsed. This morning I was Dani Jackson, thirty-six, in good health and have-to-work-at-it-but-still-reasonable shape—contentedly married to Mark, my dependable, handsome, hardworking husband. We lived in a large, quirky stone and timber house in the midst of a mountainous forest. And I loved my job, running a small but expanding artisan chocolate-making business. But, most important of all, after years of pain and chaos, I was finally pregnant, and we were going to become a family. I told you it was a fantasy world.

So here I am, Tuesday, Eight PM, about to have a shower—standing in the bathroom, staring in the mirror, at Dani Jackson, thirty-six. I am plain, bordering on ugly—creases deepening, cellulite spreading, crooked nose and blotchy skin—in a difficult-at-times eight-years-and-counting marriage to Mark Jackson, a thirty-eight year old short-tempered workaholic who’s still studying and training because of unresolved issues and a tendency towards indecision. The house we live in is cold and dark, and expensive to run. And as for my business, no-one takes it seriously and I barely break even, and my dreams of becoming an in-demand maker of award-winning chocolate delights will almost certainly remain just a dream.

I look away from the pallid woman in the mirror who’s standing there dressed only in her underwear. Turning on the tap, I splash water on my face and neck. A trickle runs down my cleavage, around my belly button, and stops at the bulge above the elastic of my briefs. I look down. I rub my hand over my skin. At least one dream came true. I can still see it clearly—our baby’s tiny hands, as clear as the ultrasound image, little lines of light for fingers. I feel it, its legs kicking, and phantom sensations of its heart beating. In my mind the gentle sloping outline of its face begins to take shape.

Why did we wait so long? The woman in the mirror who won’t meet my eye knows many reasons, some mentionable, some not. We got together when I was twenty-five, got married when I was twenty-eight—and having kids straight away wasn’t on either of our horizons. But when I turned thirty, I started thinking. And the thinkings became maybes, and the maybes became like the face of a clock striking 12 with alarm bells. I told Mark and he said, “No, let’s wait a little longer,” and so we waited. Travel? “Let’s wait a little longer.” Career? “Let’s wait a little longer.” House deposit? “Let’s wait a little longer”—until Mark’s “a little longers” turned into one-big-stagnant-longer.

I peel off my underwear, turn on the shower and get in, feeling the pinpricks of hot water on my face. I think about how easy it is to ignore time. How easy it is to be in self-denial. How easy to fool yourself into believing that there’s plenty of it left—until that one day when you finally wake up to yourself, and you’re thirty-five, and you realize that your life to this point really hasn’t added up to all that much. And then you start to panic. Perhaps there was a part of me that didn’t mind. In a way, I’d enjoyed the solace of being the mundane childless thirty-something couple. Eventually, though, I had to move on. I set things in motion—hurtling our lives towards an unknown destination. Unfortunately we were on separate tracks.

I enter my office and gently draw the door shut behind me. In the dark space ahead, I feel my way to the desk and boot up the computer, waiting for the electronic wheezes and grunts to settle down. By the time I’ve finished googling Chorionic Villus Sampling, Amniocentesis, Chromosome Analysis and Down Syndrome, my headache is settling in, my shoulder’s burn and the little clock on the corner of the screen says 2:13 a.m. I listen to the faint high-pitched hum of the monitor. Eventually the screensaver starts and the room darkens in fractions of blackness. Straightening up, I grip the mouse and google again. I find a website called YourPregnancyDotCom, ‘We cover everything’ the homepage boasts—above a photo of a cute dimply baby. I go to the forum section, registering under ‘Confused36,’ I click on the new topic button and type in ‘Unhelpful Husband’. Underneath, in the dialogue box, I type,

: My husband’s trying to bully me into having a CVS. What do I do?

I press Send and sit there, staring at the screen. It starts going hazy. I scrunch my eyes, rub them, roll them, and open them widely. I look at the mug of tea from the morning of the ultrasound, the four-day-old tea bag stiffly clinging to its side. I think about shutting down, when suddenly, ping,

: Re: Unhelpful Husband

I lean forward and squint. Who else would be up and on this website at this time of night? Someone tagged ‘PixieBump’ apparently. She hasn’t minced words:

: Leave him :)

: I was being serious.

: So was I!

: Sounds like you’re having a shitty time.

: Yes I am. Very shitty.

: Want to tell?

: We’ve been trying since the beginning of last year and it’s been a long, long slog of ovulation calendars, healthy living, disappointing one-lined pregnancy tests and so many timed sperm deposits that I think even my husband was starting to lose interest. I had almost resigned myself to going down the IVF road when I finally found out I was pregnant. Got some bad news yesterday though – my first trimester test has come back as high risk for Down syndrome and my husband’s pressuring me to have a CVS.

Several minutes pass. I look at my Koko Black wall calendar. I get up and flip it over to February. When I get back she’s replied:

: Congratulations on being pregnant!! Sorry your husband’s being an arsehole though. Ignore him. It’s your choice not his. Men can’t understand. They don’t have the same bond with pregnancy that we do. Is this your first baby? How many weeks pregnant are you?

For a moment I’m tempted to crawl under the desk and unplug the computer. Instead I count backwards from thirty then type:

: Twelve weeks and five days. That’s part of the problem. Mark wants me to have a CVS ASAP so we can have time to “think about our options” before I start to show.

: Men can be so tactful. Sounds like he knows what he wants. But what about you?

I pause.

: I don’t know. To be honest I’m not sure if Mark definitely knows either. Unfortunately he’s the sort of guy who can’t tolerate uncertainty and it hurts me that he wants me to have a procedure that’s a risk to our baby just so he can find out.

: It’s hard when you’re being pressured. BTW I know someone who had a CVS. It’s kind of like an amnio isn’t it?

: Yes. But the CVS can be done earlier (10 weeks instead of 15) and it carries twice the risk of causing a miscarriage. Probably because when the needle is stuck in, instead of sampling fluid from around the baby it actually takes a biopsy of the placenta.

It suddenly strikes me that I have no idea who I’m chatting to. I add another line before pressing Send.

: What about yourself? How many weeks are you? Do you have any kids?

: Just the one – Andrew. He’s three. Plus current bump of course (24 weeks). Judging by the jumping it feels like she’ll take after her hyperactive older brother. Speaking of which I’d better go and check on him. The playroom’s gone quiet which usually = trouble.

: Playroom? Andrew must be hyperactive if he’s up and playing this early in the morning!

The minutes tick by. I sit with only the whine of a mosquito at the window for company. Great. I’ve just met an online stranger who sounds friendly and now I’ve gone and insulted her by implying that her son should be on Ritalin. My momentary lift from the unexpected chat is ebbing away when her reply flashes onto the screen:

: Early in the morning! LOL. It’s 3:45 in the afternoon sweetie. Where in the world (literally) are you? Found out why the playroom was so quiet – miracle of miracles the little man was asleep!

I choose my words more carefully this time:

: Glad to hear he’s napping. I live on the outskirts of Melbourne, Australia. What about you?

: St Albans, aka outer northern outskirts of London, England. Sounds like you should go and have a lie down. I can only imagine what horrible time of night it is down there.

I’ve been dismissed. With good intentions to be fair but dismissed nonetheless. I can’t blame her. She must have better things to do. I’m wondering how to say goodbye in a casual yet grateful kind of way when she posts me a final message:

: BTW my email address is [email protected] in case you ever want to chat or debrief about anything. It was great to meet you Confused36. Best of luck. And remember, the choice is up to you.

Two days later I pulled into the car park overlooking the dam. Apart from a white Ford parked sideways near the entrance, no-one else was there. I drove past a set of splintery picnic benches and eventually parked behind a green metallic pump shed. I saw faded yellow lines, crumpled beer cans on the verge of grass growing through bitumen cracks—below, a crescent of still waters, beyond, a ragged horizon of trees, a distant plume of smoke.

When I got into the car this morning I sat there for ages. Windows wound down a few centimeters, keys in the ignition, garage door closed. Eventually I let go of the keys, opened the garage door and backed out of the driveway. As I shifted into first I was shaking so much I found it hard to steer.

Now, I sit here, engine off, ticking the gearstick and steering wheel. My hands start to cramp. I stretch them, looking at my indented palms—tracing the lifelines with my eyes.

I think of Darryl, Nicky’s older ‘little’ brother,” and how fascinated he was with other people’s hands—how he’d try and trick me by saying ‘High Five.’ He’d grab your hands and measure his stubby fingers against yours. How he always wanted to thumb-wrestle. How he was sometimes too rough.

I remember back to that summer between grades four and five, when Nicky and I were best friends. I remember the times we’d push her bed across the door to stop Darryl from coming in. I remember the way we’d keep quiet until the knocks and mushy-mouthed cries finally went away. Later we’d sneak out. Sometimes a Barbie was missing when we came back. She’d track him down. I’d follow. He’d always be in his same hiding spot, behind the stack of old pallets next to the packing shed. When he’d see us he’d grin and point at Barbie’s chest and say ‘Boobies,’ while twisting open the plastic legs, saying ‘Bum!’ How loud he’d laugh, rivulets of snot followed by the dull-lidded hurt look on his face when she’d snatch it from his hands, hissing, ‘Retard.’ I sift through other memories, some vivid, some hazy.

I stare out at the glinting blue waters, watch the shadow of a cloud as it slowly passes over. The back of my throat tastes like rancid coleslaw. I power all the windows all the way down. Lean out. Spit. ‘At first you don’t realize how lucky you really are,’ a blogger on a Down syndrome support group forum had said. ‘You can’t imagine how much joy and love they’ll bring to your life. We thank God for trusting us with His wonderful gift’—I always heard an unspoken desperation in their words, something hidden in the background, like so many bedridden children quietly thinking, ‘there’s nothing under the bed, there’s nothing under the bed, there nothing….’

I close my eyes and lean back against the headrest. If there is a God, and Down syndrome is so wonderful then how come we’re not all born with it?

One in forty.

How convenient. How simple—the statistical chance of your life changing forever, all boiled down to a simple fraction. Last night, after Mark went to bed, I took the ultrasound photo – the one Kate seemed so reluctant to print out – off the fridge and went into my office. I kept holding the photo up to the monitor, comparing it to internet pictures of first trimester fetuses with Down syndrome. I don’t remember falling asleep, but I do remember dreaming. When I woke up my face was in the keyboard, my legs were stiffly uncomfortable. I couldn’t find the photo.

I wake up, T-shirt stuck to my skin, the room slowly forms in the fragments of moonlight coming through the trees—chest of drawers, bookcase, cherry-wood chair in the corner, Mark’s sleeping hump next to me. I pinch the skin at the base of my throat. I check the clock, it’s three fifty-three. It was time to get on with the day. I started cleaning and cooking, and then Mark appears in the kitchen, with lopsided hair and scrumpled boxer shorts.

‘Morning.’

‘Morning.’

I see him raise an eyebrow at the bottle of corn syrup on the counter.

‘I better go have my shower,’ he says.

‘OK Mark, I’m having mine when you leave for work.’

I spend the day working with chocolate confections. When he returns from work I’m in the middle of dipping truffles. I dunk one into the melted chocolate. Hold it under till it drowns.

‘Hi.’

‘Hi.’

His dark hair’s flattened, the top button of his Baurbridge & Kay shirt undone, tie missing in action, smile a little forced. ‘Someone’s been busy,’ he says, looking around the kitchen. Almost every square inch of the benches and island top are covered with tray after tray of chocolates—shiny half globes of pralines, miniature gourmet cups, neat lines of logs in a variety of flavors, crispy clusters of brittle, decorated hand-dipped squares, and a plague of chocolate mice both brown and white. There’s also the inevitable mess – a sink overflowing with moulds, spatulas, mixing blades and whisks and a pile of dirty bowls balancing precariously next to it.

‘Should we get take out tonight?’

‘It’s Wednesday,’ I say, ‘We don’t eat take out on Wednesdays.’

He stands there watching me while I dip ganache into melted chocolate. I drop the truffle into the topping pan and roll it back and forth in the cocoa. He keeps watching. I keep rolling, more and more aware of his eyes on me.

‘What!’ I glare at him.

The lines under his eyes are deep, the room behind him dim.

‘We need to talk about Friday.’

The cocoa powdering my hands starts to muddy.

‘Can’t you see I’m busy?’

Another one of his pauses. He glances sideways, exhales slowly through his nose.

‘So you’ve made up your mind then.’

I pick up the tray of lemon mint squares, open the cupboard door beneath the island and slide the tray into the drying rack. I stay squatting for a second, admiring the neatly lined squares of chocolate, the thin slivers of sugared peel set diagonally across each one.

‘It’s a one in forty chance for goodness sakes,’ he says behind me. ‘Don’t I get a say in this too?’

My knees pop as I stand. I look my husband in the eyes. ‘You’ve already had your say.’

His words harden. ‘We haven’t talked properly and you know it.’

I stare at him. He stares back. He turns and gestures to the couch. ‘Can we at least sit down?’

I hesitate.

‘Please?’

We go sit down, becoming two odd figures reflected in the darkness of the TV screen. I bring my feet up and twist around to face him cross-legged.

‘You brought me here, so speak.’

‘Okay then.’

‘If the baby has Down syndrome I think we should try again.’

‘Which means?’

‘You know what it means.’

My eyes start pulsing. ‘Say it then!’ I yell, slapping his face so hard that it hurts my hand. ‘Say it you coward!’

He recoils for a moment, as I turn to leave he catches the back of my smock. I claw at his fingers.

‘Abortion.’

I stop twisting his thumb.

‘There,’ he says. ‘I’ve said it. Now sit back down.’

‘Not until you let go of me.’

He does, slowly. I balance on the armrest of the couch, looking down at him. He’s sitting in my shade, shoulders slumped, head tilted down a fraction.

‘If the baby has Down syndrome, then yes, I would prefer if you had a termination.’

‘Abortion.’

‘Abortion. But I wouldn’t pressure you into having one.’

‘I don’t believe you.’

He looks up at me, eyes surprisingly white. ‘Have you really thought about it.? Have you thought about how hard it would be? I mean do you really think you could handle it?’

I hop off the couch. Fists clenched.

‘Of course I know it would be fucking hard. That doesn’t change the fact that it’s still our baby.’ I point at my belly. ‘It’s already in there, Mark. Don’t you feel anything for it, for God’s sake? It’s as much a part of you as it is of me!’

He leans forward and smothers his face in his hands. ‘I know.’ Voice muffled. ‘It’s just ...’ He looks up, bleary eyed. ‘A child with Down syndrome. I’m not sure if I could do it.’

I feel numb. This isn’t my husband.

‘Yes you can,’ I say. ‘If you have to you will.’

I stare at him defiantly. Out of my shade he’s different. It’s night now, and the glow from the kitchen lights illuminates the right side of his face Phantom of the Opera-like. The left side of his face is in darkness.

‘I think I know why you won’t have the CVS,’ he says softly. ‘It’s not the small risk of miscarrying that’s stopping you. I think you’d prefer not to know because if you did find out that the baby has Down syndrome, you’d want to terminate as well.’

It’s easier to get angry again than try and deny it. I go to the TV cabinet, pick up a DVD and throw it at him. It misses.

‘Fuck off!’ I scream. ‘That’s not the issue is it? The issue is you’ve never really wanted to be a father and you’re looking for an excuse to get out of it, again! Fine then. Fuck off. If you’re not going to be part of all this you can fuck off and leave.’

I stride into the kitchen and snatch the handset from its wall-mounted base.

‘What are you doing?’

My fingers are shaking so much I have to hang up and redial twice. She picks up on the fourth ring.

‘Hi Mum,’ I say. ‘Guess what. I’m pregnant!’

Thursday February 10th

13 weeks and six days

183 days to go

For Bub. Sorry I’ve taken so long.