Title: After Coleridge
Author: CGB (luberluber@yahoo.com.au)
Rating: G
Summary: "Admit it Laura, you habitually over-react."
*
She could feel his hand at the back of her neck, holding her hair off her face while her stomach threatened to move beyond the confines of her body, and escape through her mouth. She closed her eyes and thought; calm blue ocean, calm blue ocean...
Only with the storms lately, the ocean was like a front loading washing machine with the clothes and the soap going round and round.... She heaved into the bowl.
"You know, this reminds me of the time..."
"Shut up!" Her voice croaked and her throat hurt. She held up a hand and he placed a glass of water in it.
He stroked the back of her neck with his fingers. It was cold and a little sweaty. Her face glowed with a light sheen of perspiration and she really did look beautiful when she was angry.
"Come on, Laura. If you're a good girl I'll give you a back rub."
She lifted her head. "I can't believe I'm doing this again."
"Neither can I. That's the third time since lunch. Why do they call it 'morning sickness' anyway?"
She scowled. "I mean pregnancy. Children. The whole thing."
"Right. Now about that...I still like Rex, but I could be persuaded to accept 'Rowan.'"
She stood up and wiped her face with her hands. "You know, I think it's passed - and I can't tell you how much I prefer 'Rowan' to 'Rex'."
"How about 'Leopold'?"
"Max?"
"Laura?"
"Do you think I'm being punished?"
He threw up his hands and walked out of the bathroom. She could hear the fridge door open and close and the sound of a bottle being uncapped.
She flipped the lid down on the toilet seat and sat on it, hands cradling her chin.
Somewhere between "Daring, you've made me the happiest man alive" and "God woman, what were you thinking?" there had to be a suitable response to an unexpected pregnancy.
Max was infuriating with his jokes and his general levity, but slightly more tolerable than Jack who sobbed on the phone and bought booties on his way home. God knows where he got them from but he came through the door proudly exhibiting a little bundle of purple wool that looked impossibly small.
They were unmarried and she hadn't told her parents yet.
And then just yesterday Miranda was telling her she couldn't borrow her jeans anymore because they were too short in the leg.
And where were those booties now? Why hadn't she saved them? Why hadn't she collected every second of her children's lives and pasted them into scrapbooks or hoarded them in storage boxes where she could find them whenever she needed reassurance that her children really were once little things that depended entirely on her.
She felt a tear roll down her cheek. Bloody hormones.
*
Max sat resting a foot on top of one knee. He drummed his fingers against his foot, and waited, watching the curtain across the bathroom entrance shift lightly, caught in a draft. Eventually she emerged from the bathroom, wiping her face with toilet paper.
"Well I realise we're both unemployed but are things so bad that we can't afford tissues?"
"Oh god..." she looked at the paper before throwing it over her shoulder and sinking down on the couch next to him. "I'm a walking disaster."
"That's the spirit." He raised his drink in the air. "To the proud parents-to-be."
"How can you drink at a time like this."
"It's the perfect occasion."
"Yes, but how can you drink when I can't? God, I have to go through nine months of this. I've lost my head. Really. It was around about the time I moved here. Nothing has gone according to plan since the day we arrived. It's chaos. Complete and utter chaos!"
"You know what I think your problem is, Laura?"
"Water retention?"
"Besides that."
"Enlighten me."
"Patterned behaviour."
"What?"
"Patterned behaviour. You respond to a crisis by putting on this little drama where you question your every move and moan about how you're stuffing up your life, and the lives of everyone around you."
"'Patterned behaviour! Where is this coming from? Have you been talking to Miranda?"
"Admit it Laura, you habitually over-react."
She crossed her arms and bit her lip. "Hmmmm... You think I'm over-reacting, do you? You know, when I went into labour with Miranda, Jack was on the phone and I was trying to attract his attention so I threw the teapot at him."
"The teapot!"
"Well, it was empty..."
"Did you hit him?"
She nodded. "Eight stitches."
Max's posture stiffened, slightly. "You know, patterns can be broken..."
"So can bones."
They sat in silence listening to the sea. On windy nights the cottage would shake and Laura was reminded that they never intended to stay here as long as they did. And maybe it was a learned response, but shifts in the weather in Pearl Bay felt ominous, a precursor to change. But expecting certain outcomes from certain situations was just a result of experience, right? Post hoc ergo propter hoc. It must be the lawyer in her.
The wind picked up suddenly, and the front door slammed.
Laura jumped. "God! Every time there's a bloody storm something else in this house falls apart."
"We'll fix it tomorrow."
"The streets will probably be a mess in the morning, and I told Jack I'd pick up Rupert and Miranda."
"They'll clear by the afternoon."
"You know with all these natural disasters, the storms, the water spouts, the earthquakes... it's a miracle this town's still here."
"It is, isn't it?"
Max put a hand on her shoulder and pulled her against him. She reluctantly shifted position to lean against his shoulder. She kept her arms crossed in defiance.
"Or maybe it isn't?" Max said. "Maybe they just don't like letting a little rain spoil their fun."
"You're not funny."
"I know you don't believe that, Laura."
And then she was up on her feet again. "I think I'm going to be sick..."
Fin