Their Special-Care Baby

Panic fluttered with larger and larger wings until she thought her throat would close.

Desiree fought the emotion as she clutched the bag tightly between her fingers. She breathed in and out grimly until she’d fought down the panic.

You’ll be fine. You’ll be fine, she told herself. Everything would work out—and whether it was the white coat or the kind eyes, she did trust Stewart, her new brother-in-law.

She trusted the sweetness in the face of the obviously forgetful Leanore.

Most importantly, she and both her daughters had survived.

Four hours later, Desiree’s new mother-in-law, pushed in her wheelchair by Stewart, returned with a nurse who steered a portable cot into the room.

A little girl stood clutching the rails with her tiny feet planted determinedly into the mattress as she swayed with the movement. Enormous blue eyes stared tremulously at the grown-ups.

Desiree’s eldest daughter looked chubby and alert but decidedly lost. Why wouldn’t she feel lost? Her own mother couldn’t remember her!

When the nurse lifted Sophie and placed her on the bed beside her, Desiree had to admit she felt better with the weight and feel of the little body against her. She gathered Sophie into her arms and hugged her.

Sophie had eyes like her uncle’s and grandmother’s. She stared up at Desiree, and then her little face dimpled and she grinned toothily. Unconsciously, Desiree hugged her close again.

‘Well, that’s the first smile we’ve seen the wee thing give since she came in.’ The nurse nodded complacently at the picture in front of her.

Leanore smiled mistily and Stewart lifted one sardonic eyebrow. ‘Well, Sophie remembers you.’

‘I wish I remembered her.’ Desiree spoke softly and brushed the baby’s cheek with wondering fingers. Her daughter’s skin was downy soft and far too pale.

The children’s ward nurse bustled forward. ‘She won’t drink for us. I’ve brought a bottle up with me. Maybe she’ll take some milk from you.’

Desiree stared down into the bright little eyes. Sophie? She tried the name out. No bells rang, nothing about the little face or her name was familiar, but Desiree couldn’t doubt that she was at ease with the toddler.

Sophie latched onto the teat immediately and Desiree smiled as she looked down into the trusting face below her as the level of milk in the bottle rapidly receded towards the teat. At least she could do something right for her daughter. ‘I’m sorry, Sophie. I have forgotten you for the moment, but I’ll look after you.’

‘And we’ll look after you.’ Leanore rubbed her hands with delight at the picture in front of her. She turned to her son. ‘They will come home to us? Won’t they, Stewart?’

‘Of course.’ There were unexpected misgivings in his tone and Desiree shot him a glance.

Something was bothering him and Desiree didn’t welcome the added stress of wondering what his problem was. The last thing she needed was another undercurrent she didn’t understand.

‘I’m sure I will be able to look after my daughters and myself quite well without your help.’ She hoped the pure bravado didn’t show.

He shook his head decisively. ‘You’ll have enough on your plate, travelling to Neonatal each day. You’ll need help and we’ll give it to you.’

His voice was flat. ‘You moved here to live with us. I’m sure even Sean would agree to you accepting our help especially now.’ He included his mother in a glance. ‘We’re glad to finally have the opportunity to meet you and Sophie.’

‘We live quite close to the hospital and have plenty of room. Stay at least until we’re sure you won’t suffer any other health setbacks. You could stay longer, of course.’

He produced a final inducement. ‘It would be easier for Sophie if she didn’t have to come to the NICU all the time with you.’

She couldn’t dispute any of his rationales, or an identity she couldn’t remember. It just didn’t feel right to lean on them so heavily.

Stewart went on. ‘Remember that Leanore is Sophie’s grandmother and she has been denied access since her granddaughter’s birth.’

‘What do you mean, denied?’ Desiree frowned at the censure in his voice. Had she prevented Leanore seeing her granddaughter? Had her husband—and she had let him? She didn’t like Stewart’s tone or the inference she had hurt his mother.

He avoided a direct answer and softened his tone. ‘My mother wants to get to know her grandchild.’ Suddenly it was Leanore who wanted to look after them, which was at odds with his caring eyes. Desiree wondered if he had reservations for another reason.

Why had he changed?

She removed the empty bottle from her daughter’s mouth and sat her up to burp her again. Sophie blew a bubble at her and Desiree kissed her cheek. Thank goodness her daughter was too young to know she had been forgotten by her own mother.

Desiree’s eyes narrowed with the effort of pinpointing her greatest concern, but she was interrupted by Sophie’s wind.

They all smiled at the third loud burp but despite the surface amusement something wasn’t right. Not just in this room but with her whole world.

So many things were out of kilter she had no way of diagnosing the most worrying feature.

It was too exhausting to worry about things she couldn’t change for the moment, so she rested back and just savoured the weight of Sophie in her arms. Her head ached.

Later that evening Stewart pushed Desiree’s wheelchair into the neonatal intensive care unit, and strangely Desiree felt less adrift than she had since she’d woken up.

She was so terrified for her baby but not overwhelmed by Neonatal Intensive Care, which was strange.

The beep and hum of the equipment, the bustle of medical and nursing staff, the parents beside most cribs and the tiny patients in their plastic cocoons and open cots all seemed to make sense. Maybe she’d been in one of these places before.

Then again it could have been because Stewart was there. He was so solid and concerned, uncomfortably attractive, but she was trying to ignore that with all she had on her plate, but most of all he seemed so patiently kind.

‘It’s a pretty daunting place,’ said Stewart as he nodded to a nurse, ‘but, believe me, you will get used to it.’

Desiree allowed his words to wash over her as she glanced around. She wasn’t daunted by the place, just that her daughter was here, and she wondered about that. Was it because she’d just been in a train crash? Had her senses been so overloaded by new situations that she was immune for the moment?

At least in this unit there was ordered chaos and Stewart was the boss. She had some control with her access to him.

She obeyed the sign and washed her hands. Almost as if she knew where her daughter was, she looked ahead to the furthermost cribs, home to the most critical patients. Stewart pushed the wheelchair forward.

‘She’s up this way,’ Stewart said, as they passed alcoves of four cribs at a time, each bay seeming to utilise more equipment than the last. Some babies were tiny, some less so, and some were in ordinary Perspex cots.

Desiree’s daughter lay tiny and exposed, her red shiny skin translucent, her miniature hands smaller than the top of her mother’s finger and her bald head smaller than Desiree’s palm.

The reality of her daughter’s struggle hit her. Her baby should be safe within her uterus, not exposed to pain and fear in the bright lights, fluctuating temperatures and noise of a neonatal nursery.

Desiree felt tears well into her eyes and she swallowed to clear the lump from her throat. ‘She’s so fragile. So beautiful,’ she said in a whisper.

Stewart smiled warmly at the crib and then at Desiree. ‘She is very beautiful. I’m glad you think that. A lot of people can’t see the beauty in a premature baby. They look so different to the image most people have of newborn babies.’ He shook his head at the unenlightened. ‘She is a miracle of creation.’

Stewart crouched down and slipped his arm around Desiree’s shoulder and hugged her gently as they peered into the crib.

Somehow Desiree knew he would do that for any new mother confronted by a tiny skinned rabbit of a baby, but she was glad of even that small comfort. More than glad—she was in desperate need of strong arms around her.

‘She’s gorgeous,’ he went on. ‘Her skin is only a few cells thick and very delicate. Her tiny veins are so clear under her skin the vessels look like lace. At the moment we’re using the umbilical vein for intravenous access, which is what the contraption stuck to her tummy is about.’