Chapter 6: The Floor

Poppy rang me at eleven that night, and for the first time since Tuesday she said my name as if she wanted me there.

"Mari, he's gone yellow."

I was in my coat before she finished.

By midnight we were back on the same ward under the same strip light.

A nurse I didn't know told us it was only jaundice.

"Very common," she said. "He's a bit sleepy and he's not feeding well. We'll put him under the lamp for a day or two."

The baby lay in a clear cot with a mask over his eyes, glowing blue.

He looked so small.

Poppy sat on the edge of the bed with her fists in her lap, grey in the face.

"I can't keep doing this," she said. "Every time he breathes wrong, I think."

She stopped.

"Think what?"

"Nothing. That I've broken him."

I put my arm round her.

It was automatic.

It was the arm I'd had round her since she was four and fell off the garage roof.

For a second I forgot that I'd walked out of a room because of her.

Then I looked at the floor by the cot.

Joss was lying on it.

He'd got there before I did.

He was on his side on the hard lino with his rolled-up vest under his head and his boots still on.

His long body was folded to fit between the cot and the wall.

One bandaged hand hung up through the bars of the cot, and the baby's fist had closed round his taped finger.

He was fast asleep.

I stood in the doorway and couldn't move.

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