Cleo

“Getting restless, are you?” said Mum the next morning. “It’s a sign the baby can’t be far away. You’d better get rid of that cat.”

I gave up trying to fix things. Mum announced her departure, early as usual. Good-byes were always clumsy. Our family wasn’t big on displays of affection. As she stowed her bag into her hatchback, she looked suddenly frail again, a lonely old woman in a brown coat. We hugged briefly while Rata looked on, her tail at half-mast.

“Take care,” I whispered.

“You too,” Mum said, her vein-roped hand on the driver’s door.

The drive ahead would take her five solitary hours, after which there’d be toast and scrambled eggs in front of the television and more knitting. Around eleven p.m. she’d have a mug of tea and a biscuit or two before heading off to bed—all of which added up to twelve hours of not talking to anyone. For someone who needed to talk, the prospect must’ve been torture. But Mum never complained.

“Would you like Rata to stay with you for a while?” I asked. “I’ve talked with Rob and Steve, and they’re okay with it.”

Mum suddenly straightened her back and shed ten years.

“I think we’d get on very well together, wouldn’t we, girl?” she said without hesitation.

Rata looked adoringly up at her with an expression of absolute devotion and barked happily. It’d been a long time since Mum had been the focus of such adulation.

“Just a minute,” she said, looking young and pretty again. She reached into the backseat and produced one of her green knitted rugs, which she smoothed over the front seat. Tail flying, Rata leapt gleefully onto the seat and waited for the engine to start.

If animals are healers, Mum needed one as much as anyone else. The silver-haired woman and the golden-haired dog looked a perfect match as they drove off up the street.

Raising my arm to wave good-bye, I felt a pang—strange, yet familiar. Exciting and frightening at the same time. A new person was about to arrive on planet Earth.

Rebirth

Love, for cats and people, can be painful.

A mother cat is rightfully called a Queen. Personally, I think it would be great if pregnant women were also called Queens. If the gay community protested too much we might possibly accept Baroness, Duchess or Fairy Princess. Anything instead of those glamour-sapping medical terms Gravida, Multigravida and the dreaded Geriatric Multigravida.

Cats arrange to have four or five babies in one hit. If humans did the same the number of months a woman spends gazing into a toilet bowl would be dramatically reduced. She’d have to buy only one set of hideous maternity clothes in her entire life. Children’s clothes would be bought in bulk. Deals could be made with baby gear manufacturers and schools. (Five educations for the price of four?)

Restlessness is a surefire sign that a female cat is going into labor. It’s the same with humans. I’d been wrong to assume the Battle of the Bassinet was responsible for my moonlight escapade with the hand mower. I should have realized it was primal instinct telling my body to rev up for a big one.

“Hello? Is that the hospital? Look, I think I might be going into labor. Contractions? Well, they’re not all that strong—maybe five minutes apart…What do you mean try and get some sleep? How can I go to sleep when I’m having a baby?…You want me to calm down and take a pill? Are you joking? So what if your beds are all full? I’ll give birth in the broom closet.”

“Who does that stupid nurse think she is, turning me away from the hospital like that?”

“Here’s the pill,” Steve said. “Try and get a good night’s sleep.”

“I think we should call Ginny. She’ll know what to do.”

“I did. The babysitter answered. They’re at some rock music awards.”

“Rock music awards?”

“It’s okay. They’ll finish around midnight. Ginny will meet us at the hospital, if we end up going there. Try and get some sleep.”

“What time is it?”

“Haven’t you gone to sleep yet? It’s ten-thirty.”

“These contractions started seven hours ago. I think we should go to the hospital.”

“They don’t want you.”

“They’re hardly going to turn us away if we arrive on their doorstep, are they?”

As we pulled into the hospital parking lot I immediately wanted to go home again. Hospitals creep me out, especially when you’re not entirely welcome. Even this one, with its “homely” new birthing unit, could’ve doubled as a set for a Frankenstein movie. As if I didn’t notice the gleam of the machinery, the holes in the wall expecting tubes and wires to be plugged into them, the nasty implements lurking under green surgical cloth. Frankly, I’d have preferred a cardboard box.