the metal, heaving food out of the mouth heavy and ominous as a mud slide. Hump and roll and the food spewed over the slack lips and slithered down the chin. Elizabeth left the green muck clinging to the infant skin, even though the only person she punished was herself.
Time passed, dragging its minutes. Elizabeth glanced at the clock. After one and a half hours only half the vegetables were gone, and most of this was caught rubbery and wet in the weave of the nappy she used as a bib.
‘Damn this,’ she said, flat and quiet, ‘and damn you,’ she said to the child. The child looked back at its mother, the eyes large and dark and pretty above a face slick with green slime. In the long empty pause that followed, the baby’s head dropped back and the mouth gathered into a scream; an exquisite piercing scream. The noise continued, punctured only by deep breaths, mere splinters of silence when Elizabeth felt the child watching her. Elizabeth preferred to avoid those eyes, they saw too much. Elizabeth could stand before the world without shame, a patient, suffering, ill-fated mother, but before the eyes of the infant she was condemned.
She turned away. She knew what to do and immediately felt herself relax. She removed the teat from the baby’s bottle, tipped the vegetables in with the milk, replaced the teat and shook the bottle. The contents sloshed up and down in the glass, thud plop, thud plop, like a brain rattling in its skull. She watched the mixture turn a pale khaki and settle into the consistency of diluted mud. She smiled with satisfaction. She took a fork and wrenched at the teat until the hole was a gaping angry gutter. She tightened her jaw, clenching her lips as she tipped the child well back in herlap and poured the food in. The speech therapist, the woman in charge of all oral functions – eating, screaming, and if luck prevailed, talking – would be aghast at such apostasy; but mothers were not fools and Elizabeth would not be accused of starving her child.
Ginnie swallowed in strong irregular gulps and the level of food in the bottle decreased. The glugging sound, just on the verge of choking, was oddly comforting. It was all very well for the speech therapist to forbid liquid foods and reclining postures and gaping teat holes, all very well for her to mutter that Ginnie was not nearly as handicapped as other children she knew, she only saw the child once each week, mid-afternoon, cleaned and smelling of baby powder, no longer hungry and eager to sleep. ‘Such a gorgeous little poppet,’ the therapist said, taking the child on her lap, ‘such a pretty little girl.’ And there Ginnie would sit for the entire session silent, compliant, gurgling to the speech therapist and ignoring her mother. No, the speech therapist did not have to sit for hours every day nagged by aching muscles and taunted by a future clotted with the odour of regurgitated food. She did not sit spooning in time with the passing hours, her life dribbling down the baby’s chin. Neither the speech therapist, the physiotherapist, the social worker nor the paediatrician had to live with this child.
And neither, they were quick to remind her, did she.
The bottle was emptying quickly. Elizabeth stood it on the table and watched the khaki sludge sink to the bottom. She wiped the child’s mouth a little too roughly and saw the infant skin glow. Without the dribble and the green slime, she was a pretty baby; even Elizabeth could see that. Strangers would peer under the bonnet of the pram, ‘What a pretty little thing,’ they would say, ‘and how old?’ And Elizabeth always reduced the eighteen months to ten, so that all the mothers could nod sagely: they thought as much. But what would happen when the child outgrew her pram and burst through her pusher, how could Elizabeth conceal the truth then? It was not so much that she was embarrassed by the handicap, rather, any association with this child was a reminder of her own damaged
Time passed, dragging its minutes. Elizabeth glanced at the clock. After one and a half hours only half the vegetables were gone, and most of this was caught rubbery and wet in the weave of the nappy she used as a bib.
‘Damn this,’ she said, flat and quiet, ‘and damn you,’ she said to the child. The child looked back at its mother, the eyes large and dark and pretty above a face slick with green slime. In the long empty pause that followed, the baby’s head dropped back and the mouth gathered into a scream; an exquisite piercing scream. The noise continued, punctured only by deep breaths, mere splinters of silence when Elizabeth felt the child watching her. Elizabeth preferred to avoid those eyes, they saw too much. Elizabeth could stand before the world without shame, a patient, suffering, ill-fated mother, but before the eyes of the infant she was condemned.
She turned away. She knew what to do and immediately felt herself relax. She removed the teat from the baby’s bottle, tipped the vegetables in with the milk, replaced the teat and shook the bottle. The contents sloshed up and down in the glass, thud plop, thud plop, like a brain rattling in its skull. She watched the mixture turn a pale khaki and settle into the consistency of diluted mud. She smiled with satisfaction. She took a fork and wrenched at the teat until the hole was a gaping angry gutter. She tightened her jaw, clenching her lips as she tipped the child well back in herlap and poured the food in. The speech therapist, the woman in charge of all oral functions – eating, screaming, and if luck prevailed, talking – would be aghast at such apostasy; but mothers were not fools and Elizabeth would not be accused of starving her child.
Ginnie swallowed in strong irregular gulps and the level of food in the bottle decreased. The glugging sound, just on the verge of choking, was oddly comforting. It was all very well for the speech therapist to forbid liquid foods and reclining postures and gaping teat holes, all very well for her to mutter that Ginnie was not nearly as handicapped as other children she knew, she only saw the child once each week, mid-afternoon, cleaned and smelling of baby powder, no longer hungry and eager to sleep. ‘Such a gorgeous little poppet,’ the therapist said, taking the child on her lap, ‘such a pretty little girl.’ And there Ginnie would sit for the entire session silent, compliant, gurgling to the speech therapist and ignoring her mother. No, the speech therapist did not have to sit for hours every day nagged by aching muscles and taunted by a future clotted with the odour of regurgitated food. She did not sit spooning in time with the passing hours, her life dribbling down the baby’s chin. Neither the speech therapist, the physiotherapist, the social worker nor the paediatrician had to live with this child.
And neither, they were quick to remind her, did she.
The bottle was emptying quickly. Elizabeth stood it on the table and watched the khaki sludge sink to the bottom. She wiped the child’s mouth a little too roughly and saw the infant skin glow. Without the dribble and the green slime, she was a pretty baby; even Elizabeth could see that. Strangers would peer under the bonnet of the pram, ‘What a pretty little thing,’ they would say, ‘and how old?’ And Elizabeth always reduced the eighteen months to ten, so that all the mothers could nod sagely: they thought as much. But what would happen when the child outgrew her pram and burst through her pusher, how could Elizabeth conceal the truth then? It was not so much that she was embarrassed by the handicap, rather, any association with this child was a reminder of her own damaged
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