Afterwards by Charlotte Leonard

Author:Charlotte Leonard
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK
Published: 2022-04-14T00:00:00+00:00

Pivot

The nurse holds out the small white pill. It rolls around the bottom of the see-through plastic cup as she walks across the clinic room, her arm stretched out.

‘You’ll need to come back here tomorrow for the next stage of the process. After that things really start. Then you’ll have to stay here at the clinic until you’ve passed the pregnancy. That can take some time at fourteen weeks. It’s all written in this leaflet here.’ I take the leaflet that my mother would approve of with its bullet-pointed tips and pastel-coloured hints, a timeline and a help number. ‘If you’re positive you don’t want a surgical procedure then you’ll need to swallow this,’ she says and passes me another flimsy cup that threatens to collapse within her clutch, half filled with tepid water from the tap. I go to take the single pill, to lift the cup towards my mouth.

I think of Ben. I see him at the funeral, drunk and swaying, spilling beer and leaking tears from red-rimmed eyes. I can hear Ben telling me he cannot live without my man.

Jay loved someone else, I tell myself. Just get it over with. But my arm stays heavy by my side. I fixate on a plastic pot plant that’s sitting on the nurse’s desk. Its cheap green leaves are far too pert and vile in their brightness, a shade of green I’ve never seen before in nature. My throat is tight and there’s a dampness spreading out from underneath my arms, along the bottom of my back and a wet and sweating stickiness between the meat that is my thighs. I can smell the antiseptic, sterile bleach and the bovine scent that’s building in the hollows of my armpits.

‘If you wait, your options will be limited. The timing means that you’ll be looking at a surgical procedure, which you’ve told my colleagues you don’t want.’

There’s an awkward pause and I wonder if I could somehow make myself pass out, just faint, unconscious on the floor. I want to have my brain switched off. I’m jealous of the plastic plant and the ease of its existence.

‘I’ve changed my mind,’ I finally say.

‘You want to keep the baby?’

‘No,’ I say. ‘I don’t want to be awake for it.’

I’m not exactly sure if I’m referring to the operation or to all of life. The nurse pauses and takes the cup, removes the pill from out of sight.

‘I understand,’ she says kindly. ‘But we can’t do that for you today. You’ll need to book. You can do that at reception now or on the phone if you prefer.’

She says goodbye and as I leave without stopping to speak to anyone, the heavy fire-door slams hard. A sonic exclamation mark.

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