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Polly was feedingSummer with a bottle of expressed breastmilk when a woman knocked at the door to her room. The woman was about Polly’s age and had shoulder-length, curly, auburn hair. She was vaguely familiar.
‘Hi, Polly.’ The woman smiled warmly. ‘Remember me? Elsa?’
Polly recalled a skinny, freckled redhead from Wirralong High. ‘Elsa O’Donoghue?’
‘That’s right, although I’m Elsa Hargreaves these days.’ With another bright smile, she asked, ‘Are you receiving visitors?’
Polly hadn’t been expecting any visitors besides Seth. So far, he’d visited her three times, which was quite a surprise, and yesterday evening he’d even brought her beautiful new nightgowns and little sleepsuits for Summer. Polly could only suppose he’d noticed that the nighties she’d brought with her were old and fraying and, of course, she hadn’t any baby clothes with her at all.
Given that her visitor was stylishly dressed in grey linen with matching sandals and immaculately painted silver toenails, Polly was glad she was wearing one of the new nighties now. It was the loveliest shade of blue and had pretty smocking across the front and it made her feel rather glamorous, which was no small achievement, given her flabby tummy and newly leaking breasts.
‘Sure,’ she said to Elsa. ‘Come on in.’
‘I hope you don’t mind,’ Elsa said. ‘When I heard you were here all alone, I just had to call in.’
This didn’t seem entirely logical to Polly. To begin with, she had no idea how Elsa knew she was here at the hospital, but the bigger question was why would she bother to make this visit? They’d never been particularly close friends at school and it was years and years since they’d seen each other.
Polly could only suppose Elsa had grown into one of those particularly sociable people. Like Seth, perhaps. She probably sent out loads of Christmas cards too.
‘Take a seat.’ Polly pointed to the chair beside her bed and Elsa was all smiles as she came closer and peered down at Summer, who had her eyes closed as she concentrated on the important task of sucking.
‘What a gorgeous little bub,’ Elsa said. ‘Congratulations.’
‘Thanks,’ Polly replied. ‘She’s doing really well, considering she was four weeks early.’
As Elsa sat, she reached into a yellow leather shoulder bag. ‘I brought you a little something. Well, it’s actually a little something for your baby.’
‘Really?’ Polly was still processing the fact that Elsa even knew about Summer, let alone that she’d bought her a gift—a gift, wrapped, no less, in pretty silver paper scattered with pink daisies and tied with a pink tulle bow.
‘Gosh.’ Polly gulped. She had her hands full with Summer and the bottle, so Elsa set the gift on the table beside her. ‘Thanks so much,’ Polly said. ‘I—I—’ She managed an awkward smile. ‘I’m a little gobsmacked to be honest. That’s very kind of you.’
‘Not at all.’ Elsa sat back in the chair, folding her arms and crossing her legs and looking totally relaxed and at home. ‘I belong to a local group of mums with bubs and pre-schoolers. That’s how I heard you were here, actually.’
Polly frowned. ‘You mean there were other mothers who were talking about me?’
Elsa dismissed this with a laughing wave of her hand. ‘Yes, but don’t look so shocked, Polly, you must remember what Wirralong’s like. Word still spreads through the place like wildfire. Our mothers’ group had one of our regular get-togethers yesterday. Ruth Lange knew all about you. I think she heard your story from Bridget Quinlan.’
‘Oh.’ Bridget’s name rang a vague bell for Polly. She wondered what her ‘story’ involved.
‘We always try to make hospital visits for new mums, and we drop casseroles around when they’re settling in at home with their newborns.’
‘How… thoughtful.’ Clearly, her guess about Elsa’s sociability had been correct. ‘So, you have kids?’ Polly remembered to ask.
‘Two boys.’ Elsa grinned. ‘Harry’s three and a half and Noah’s fifteen months.’
‘Nice.’
‘Nice most of the time, but they have their monster moments. I’m free today, because Harry’s having a play date and my mum’s minding Noah.’
Polly only had a vague idea of what a play date might entail. As for grandmothers who were available for babysitting…
She looked down to see that Summer had fallen asleep without quite finishing her bottle. A bubble of milk sat on her lip and her lashes lay like delicate, feathery fringes against her soft, pink cheeks.
‘The little sweetheart,’ Elsa murmured and she held out her arms. ‘May I?’
Polly hesitated. This friendly mumsy scenario was something she hadn’t anticipated. But then she saw the flash of hurt in Elsa’s eyes and she told herself that she hadn’t meant to reject Elsa and of course this woman wouldn’t harm her baby.
‘Sure,’ she said as she bravely handed Summer over.
