What Alice Forgot Read online

  "How many children do you have?" asked the doctor. She had pulled up Alice's T-shirt and pushed down her shorts to feel her abdomen.

  Alice blinked to make the tears go away. "None. This is my first pregnancy."

  The doctor stopped and looked at her. "That looks very much like a cesarean scar to me."

  Alice lifted her head awkwardly and saw that the doctor was pointing a nicely shaped fingernail low down on Alice's stomach. She squinted and saw what looked like a very pale, purple line just above the top of her pubic hair.

  "I don't know what that is," said Alice, mortified. She thought of the solemn expression on her mother's face when she used to tell Elisabeth and Alice, "You must never show your private lady's parts to anyone." Nick fell about laughing the first time he heard that. Why hadn't he noticed that funny scar? He'd spent enough time examining her private lady's parts.

  "Your uterus doesn't seem to be enlarged for fourteen weeks," commented the doctor.

  Alice looked again at her stomach and saw that it was actually looking pretty flat. Skinny-person flat, which would normally be an unexpected bonus, except that she was having a baby. Nick had started to chuckle gleefully whenever she wore something that showed the round bulge of her stomach.

  "Are you sure you're that far along?" said the doctor.

  Alice stared at her flat stomach--very flat!--and didn't say anything. She was filled with confusion and fear and excruciating embarrassment. It occurred to her that her breasts--which had become so heavy and tingly and overtly breasty--felt like they had gone back to their normal humble, unobtrusive state. She didn't feel pregnant. She certainly didn't feel like herself, but she didn't feel pregnant.

  (What was that scar? She thought of those stories of people drugging you and removing your organs to sell. Had she gone to the gym, got deliriously drunk, and someone had taken the opportunity to help themselves to her organs?)

  "Maybe I'm not fourteen weeks," she said to the doctor. "Maybe I've got that wrong. I can't seem to get anything straight in my head. My husband will be here soon. He'll explain everything."

  "Well, you just relax and try not to worry for now." The doctor readjusted Alice's clothes with gentle pats. "First we're going to get you a CT scan and see if you've done anything serious to yourself, but I think you'll find things will start to fall into place soon. Do you remember your obstetrician's name? I could give him or her a call and check how far along you are. I don't want to upset you if we can't find the heartbeat because you're not far enough along to hear it."

  I'm sorry, but there is no heartbeat.

  It was such a clear memory. It felt like it really happened.

  Alice said, "Dr. Sam Chapple. He's at Chatswood."

  "Okay, good. Don't worry. It's perfectly normal to feel confused after a serious head injury."

  The doctor smiled sympathetically and left the room. Alice watched her go and then lifted up her shirt again to look at her stomach. In addition to being flatter, her stomach had feathery silver lines up and down the sides. Stretch marks. Awestruck, she ran her fingertips over them. Was this really her stomach?

  A cesarean scar, the doctor had said (unless she'd got it wrong, of course. Maybe it wasn't a cesarean scar at all, just a perfectly normal ... scar. Of some sort).

  But if she was right, that would mean some doctor (her own Dr. Chapple?) had sliced through her skin with a scalpel and lifted a bloody squawling baby straight out of her stomach and she didn't remember any of it.

  Could a bump on the head really knock out such a significant event from her memory? Wasn't that a bit excessive?

  She thought of times when she'd been watching a movie with Nick and had fallen asleep halfway through with her head on his lap. She hated it because she would wake up sticky-mouthed to see the lives of the movie characters had moved on and the couple who hated each other were now sharing an umbrella under the Eiffel Tower.

  "You had your baby," she said tentatively to herself. "Remember?"

  This was absurd. Surely she wasn't about to slap herself on the side of the head and say, "Oh, the baby, of course I had the baby! Fancy that slipping my mind."

  How could she have forgotten her baby growing and kicking and rolling inside her? If she'd already had the baby, that meant she'd already been to the prenatal classes with Nick. It meant she'd bought her first maternity clothes. It meant they'd painted the nursery. It meant they'd been shopping for a crib and a pram and nappies and a stroller and a changing table.

  It meant there was a baby.

  She sat up, her hands pressed to her stomach.

  So where was it? Who was looking after it? Who was feeding it?

  This was far bigger than a normal "Oh, Alice" mix-up. This was huge. This was terrifying.

  For God's sake, where was Nick? Actually, she was going to be just a bit snappy with him when he finally turned up, even if he did have a good excuse.

  The nurse with the green eyes came back into the room and said, "How are you feeling?"

  "Fine, thank you," said Alice automatically.

  "Do you remember why you're here and what happened to you?"

  This constant re-asking of questions was presumably to check her mental state. Alice thought about yelling, ACTUALLY, I'M GOING OUT OF MY MIND! but she didn't want to make the nurse feel uncomfortable. Crazy behavior made people feel awkward.

  Instead, she said to the nurse, "Can you tell me what year it is?" She spoke quickly in case the doctor with the glasses came back in and caught her checking up on her facts behind her back.

  "It's 2008."

  "It's definitely 2008?"

  "It's definitely second of May, 2008. Mother's Day next weekend!"

  Mother's Day! It would be Alice's first-ever Mother's Day.

  Except, if it was 2008, it wasn't her first Mother's Day at all.

  If it was 2008, the Sultana was ten years old. He wasn't a sultana at all. He would have progressed from sultana to raisin to peach to tennis ball to basketball to ... baby.

  Alice felt an inappropriate gale of laughter catch in her throat.

  Her baby was ten years old.

  Elisabeth's Homework for Dr. Hodges Much to Layla's horror, I stopped halfway through "Visualizing the Prospect" and switched over to the "Idea Olympics." I'm sure you'll be fascinated to hear, Dr. Hodges, that this is the part where I get them to look under their tables and find their "Mystery Product." Everybody gets pretty excited about this and they dive under the tables. It's amazing how so many different people can come out with EXACTLY the same jokes. It reinforces this feeling I have that the years are rolling by but nothing is changing. I am the perfect example of the phrase: Going nowhere fast.

  While all my students were writing down ideas on butcher paper for how to market their Mystery Products, I tried to call Jane back. Only of course now Jane had switched her phone off, so I loudly said "Fuck it" and saw Layla give a tiny, tight smile. I had offended her by changing the agenda, as if the agenda didn't matter, when the agenda is her life.

  I explained to her that my sister had been in an accident and I didn't know what hospital she was at and I needed somebody to pick up her kids from school. Layla said, "Okay, but when are you going to finish the rest of the 'Visualizing the Prospect' segment?" (I guess that sort of dedication is good in an employee, but isn't it a bit pathological, Dr. Hodges? What's your expert opinion?)

  I called Mum next and got her voice mail, too. Oh for the days before Mum got a life. It seems only a short time ago that I would have called Frannie first. She was always so calm in a crisis. But Frannie decided to stop driving when she moved into the retirement village. (I still find that weirdly upsetting. She was such a good driver.)

  I called the school and got put on hold listening to a recorded message about family values. I called Alice's gym to find out if they knew which hospital she'd been taken to and got put on hold listening to a message about sensible nutrition.

  Finally, I called my husband, Ben.

&nbs
p; He answered on the first ring, listened to me babble, and said, "I'll take care of it."

  Look, Grey's Anatomy starts in ten minutes. This journal writing must not impact on my nightly TV gorge. I don't care what Ben says, without the narcotic effects of TV, I might have gone truly insane a long time ago.

  Chapter 4

  Apparently Alice's CT scan was "unremarkable," which had made her feel ashamed of her mediocrity. It reminded her of her school reports with every single box ticked "Satisfactory" and comments like "A quiet student. Needs to contribute more in class." They may as well have just come right out and written across the front: "So boring, we don't actually know who she is." Elisabeth's reports had some boxes ticked "Outstanding" and others ticked "Below Standard" and comments like "Can be a little disruptive." Alice had yearned to be a little disruptive, but she couldn't work out how you got started.

  "We're concerned about your memory loss, so we're going to keep you overnight for observation," said the doctor with the red plastic glasses.

  "Oh, okay, thank you." Alice self-consciously smoothed her hair back, imagining a row of doctors and nurses with clipboards sitting next to her bed, watching her sleep. (She sometimes snored.)

  The doctor hugged her own clipboard to her chest and looked at her brightly, as if she felt like a chat.

  Oh. Gosh. Alice searched around for interesting topics of conversation and finally said, "So, did you ring my obstetrician? Dr. Chapple? Of course, you might not have had a chance ..." She didn't want the doctor to snarl, "Sorry, I was busy saving somebody's life."

  The doctor looked thoughtful. "I did, actually. It seems Sam Chapple retired three years ago." Alice couldn't believe that Dr. Chapple was no longer sitting in his big leather chair, carefully noting down answers to his courteous questions in beautiful copperplate writing on white index cards. She really needed to get this ... this problem sorted out once and for all. Pronto! Quick sticks! As Frannie would say. Was Frannie still alive in 2008? Grandmothers died. It was to be expected. You weren't even allowed to be that upset about it. Please don't let Frannie have died. Please don't let anyone have died. "Nobody else in our family will die," Elisabeth had promised when she was ten and Alice was nine. "Because it wouldn't be fair." Alice had believed every single word Elisabeth had said when they were little.

  Maybe Elisabeth had died? Or Nick? Or Mum? Or the baby? (I'm sorry, but there is no heartbeat.)

  For the first time in years, Alice had that feeling she used to get when she was little, after their dad died, that someone else she loved was about to die. She longed to gather everybody she loved and stow them safely under her bed with her favorite dolls. Sometimes the stress would become so overwhelming she would forget how to breathe and Elisabeth would have to bring her a brown paper bag to breathe into.

  "I might need a bag," Alice said to the doctor.

  "A bag?"

  Ridiculous. She wasn't a child who hyperventilated at the thought of people dying.

  "I had a bag," she said to the doctor. "A red backpack with stickers on it. Do you know what happened to it?"

  The doctor looked vaguely irritated by this administrative question but then she said, "Oh, yes. Over here. Would you like it?" She picked up the strange backpack from a shelf at the side of the room and Alice looked at it apprehensively.

  The doctor handed it to her and said, "Well, you just rest up and someone will be along to take you up to a ward soon. I'm sorry there is so much waiting. That's hospitals for you." She gave her a motherly pat on the shoulder and quickly left the room, suddenly in a hurry, as if she'd remembered another patient who was waiting.

  Alice ran her fingers over the three shiny dinosaur stickers on the flap of the backpack. They each had speech bubbles saying either "DINOSAURS RULE!" or "DINOSAURS ROCK!" She looked down at the sticker on her shirt and peeled it off. It was a definite match. She stuck it back on her shirt (she felt that she should for some reason) and waited for a feeling or a memory.

  Did these belong to the Sultana? Her mind skittered away from the idea, like a frightened animal. She didn't want to know. She didn't want a readygrown baby. She wanted her own little future baby back.

  This could not be happening to her. But it is, so get a grip, Alice. She began to open the bag and her fingernails caught her attention. She held up her hands in front of her. Her nails were beautifully shaped and long and painted a very pale, beige color. Normally they were ragged and broken and rimmed with dirt from gardening or painting or whatever other renovation job they were doing at the time. The only other time they'd looked like that was for her wedding when she'd got her manicure. She'd spent the whole honeymoon flapping her hands at Nick, saying, "Look, I'm a lady."

  Apart from that, her hands still looked like her hands. Actually, they looked quite nice.

  They were bare, she noticed. No jewelry. It was a little unusual that she wasn't at least wearing her wedding ring, but perhaps she'd been in a rush when she was getting ready for her "spin class."

  She held up her left hand and saw that there was a thin white indentation from her wedding ring that hadn't been there before. It gave her a disconnected feeling, like when she'd seen the feathery marks on her stomach. Her mind thought everything was still the same, but her body was telling her that time had marched on without her.

  Time. She put her hands to her face. If she was supposedly sending out "invitations to her fortieth-birthday party," if she was ... thirty-nine--she mentally choked and gasped for air at the thought--then her face must be different. Older. There was a mirror over a basin in the front corner of the room. She could see the reflection of her feet, in their short white socks; one of the flurry of nurses had taken off the strange sneakers (chunky, rubbery things) and put them on the floor next to the bed. Alice could just hop out of the bed and walk over and look at herself.

  Presumably it was against strict hospital regulations to get out of bed. She had a head injury. She might faint and hit her head again. Nobody had told her not to get out of bed, but they probably thought it was obvious.

  She should look in the mirror. But she didn't want to see. She didn't want to know. She didn't want this to be real. Besides, she was busy at the moment. She had to look through the bag. Quickly, she undid the buckles of the backpack and shoved her hand in. She pulled out ... a towel.

  A plain, innocuous, clean blue bath towel. Alice looked at it and felt nothing but embarrassment. She was fossicking through somebody else's private stuff. Jane Turner had obviously picked up someone else's bag and insisted it was hers without really looking at it. It was just like Jane. So bossy and impatient.

  Well.

  Alice examined her beautifully manicured fingernails again. She put her hand in the bag again and pulled out a plastic bag, folded flat. She opened it and emptied it onto her lap.

  A woman's clothes. Underwear. A red dress. A cream-colored cardigan with a single large wooden button. Knee-high beige boots. Small jewelry case.

  The underwear was creamy lace-edged satin. Alice's underwear tended to be flippant and faded; jolly seahorses on her pants and purple cotton bras that clipped at the front.

  She held the dress up in front of her and saw that it was beautiful. A simple design of silky fabric with tiny cream flowers. The cream of the cardigan matched the cream of the flowers on the dress exactly.

  She checked the label on the dress. An S for small. It wouldn't fit her. She was a medium at best. It couldn't be hers. She folded the clothes back up and opened the jewelry case, lifting out a fine gold necklace with a big topaz stone. The stone was too big for her taste, but she dangled it over the dress and agreed that it was an excellent match. Well done, whoever you are.

  The other piece of jewelry was Alice's gold Tiffany charm bracelet.

  Alice said, "Fancy meeting you here." She picked up the bracelet and laid it across her wrist and felt comforted, as if Nick had finally arrived.

  Nick had bought this bracelet for her the day after they found out she was p
regnant with the Sultana. He shouldn't have spent that much because they were experiencing what Nick called "severe fiscal stress," due to the fact that every single thing they did to the house ended up costing more than planned, but Nick said it could go on the balance sheet under "extraordinary items" (whatever that meant) because it was extraordinary that they were having a baby.

  The Sultana had been conceived on a Wednesday night, which just didn't seem exciting enough a night for such a momentous event, and the sex hadn't even been that passionate or romantic. It was just that there had been nothing much on TV and Nick had yawned and said, "We should paint the hallway," and Alice had said, "Oh, let's just have sex," and Nick had yawned again and said, "Mmmm. Okay." And then they'd discovered there weren't any condoms in the chest of drawers next to the bed, but by then the action was under way and neither of them could be bothered to get up and find one in the bathroom, and besides which it was a Wednesday and it was only once and, well, they were married. They were allowed to get pregnant, so therefore it wasn't really likely. The next day Alice discovered there actually had been a condom in the back of the drawer if she'd bothered to stretch her fingers just a bit further but by then it was too late. The Sultana had already started doing what it needed to do to become a person.

  The day after they did the eight positive pregnancy tests (just in case the first seven were wrong) Nick had come home from work and handed her a small gift-wrapped box with a card that said "For the mother of my child," and inside was the bracelet.

  To be honest, she loved that bracelet even more than she loved her engagement ring.

  Of course, to be really honest, she didn't actually love her engagement ring at all. She sort of hated it.

  Not a single person in the world knew this. It was her only real secret, so it was a pity it wasn't juicier. The ring was an Edwardian antique that had belonged to Nick's grandmother. Alice had never met Granny Love, but she had apparently been formidable but adorable (she sounded dreadful). Nick's four sisters, whom Nick called "the Flakes" because of their undeniably flaky tendencies, were crazy about that ring and there had been a lot of bitter remarks when Granny Love left the ring to Nick in her will. One or another of the Flakes was always grabbing Alice's left hand and sniffing, "You just can't get jewelry like that anymore!"