Postcards From Berlin by Margaret Leroy

a weight chart. A little frown pinches the skin between her eyes. I suddenly imagine
     how she’ll look when she is older, with stern lines round her mouth and glasses on a chain.
    “Daisy’s really rather underweight,” she says. “She’s on the lowest percentile.”
    “I don’t know what that means.”
    “I’ll show you.” She turns the chart toward me, points at it with her pen. “The average is here,” she says, “and Daisy’s right
     at the bottom.”
    “She must have lost lots of weight since she’s been ill,” I tell her. “She isn’t eating; she feels too sick to eat.”
    Dr. Carey leans toward me. Her immaculate hands are tightly clasped together.
    “What does she eat, exactly?”
    “Today, she had a piece of toast for breakfast and she didn’t have any lunch.” I know, I’ve looked in her lunch box. “Yesterday
     was better. She had a bit of rice and some gravy for tea.”
    I want to make it clear I’m not a worrier, that I know that children are tougher than we think, as the other GP told me, that
     rice and gravy really isn’t too terrible.
    Still the pinched little frown.
    “Just rice?” she says. “She should be eating meat. She needs her protein.”
    “Of course she does. But rice and gravy was better than before.”
    “We’re fortunate to have a nutritionist working in this practice,” she says. “I think I should refer you to her for advice
     about what Daisy should be eating.”
    “But I know what she should be eating. Of course I do.” I think of all the books I’ve bought on bringing up children, books
     with cheerful covers and energizing titles —
Bright Ideas for Moveable Feasts, Creating Kids Who Can
. “It’s just that she won’t, she can’t. She feels too sick to eat. She hasn’t eaten properly since Christmas.”
    She shakes her head a little. I feel this conversation slipping away from me.
    She turns to Daisy, looks at her: There’s something she’s working out. She fiddles with a wisp of hair that grows in front
     of her ear.
    “Daisy, I wonder if you could tell me a bit about school?” she says then. “Is it all right? D’you like it?”
    “It’s OK,” says Daisy.
    “Is anything worrying you?”
    Daisy shakes her head.
    “You’re sure?” says Dr. Carey. “Sometimes it’s hard to talk about these things.”
    Daisy frowns. I see how she’d like to help, to give the answer that Dr. Carey wants, but she can’t think of anything. She
     twists her fingers in Hannibal’s graying wool. He’s dirty; she’ll never let me wash him in case he loses his smell. Here in
     this blue sterile place, I find his grayness embarrassing: I worry that Dr. Carey will think that I never wash things properly,
     that I am messy, sluttish, not a proper mother. Daisy doesn’t say anything.
    Dr. Carey turns to me. “You know, Mrs. Lydgate, I’m wondering whether we should treat all this as psychological.” She says
     this with a kind of finality, as though it is an achievement.
    Panic seizes me.
    “But nothing traumatic has happened to Daisy. It started when she had flu.”
    “But, you see, she looks so miserable,” she says. “She looks all pale and hunched up.”
    “She’s unhappy because she’s ill,” I tell her.
    Dr. Carey ignores this, leans a little toward me. “Tell me, Mrs. Lydgate, is everything all right at home?” Her voice is hushed,
     confiding, as though she thinks that Daisy won’t be able to hear.
    “Everything’s fine,” I tell her.
    “You’re living with your husband?”
    “Yes.”
    “And how do you both get on?”
    “We get on fine,” I tell her.
    My coat is damp from the rain. I am chilled through.
    “You’re sure? You don’t have awful shouting matches in front of Daisy?”
    “No, we don’t. We don’t have awful shouting matches at all.”
    I’m trying not to get angry. I know that if I get angry she won’t believe what I say.
    “Because if you do,” she says, “Daisy’s sure to react.”
    “Really,” I