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PROLOGUE
I just don’t want a baby this much,Paul had said to her.I want you, Liz. But I can’t do this anymore.
What?She hadn’t believed it, at first. But, as she looked in his eyes, she could see he was speaking from the heart.
But I thought you wanted a baby,she’d said, not believing what was happening.
I did. I do. But not like this. The arguments. The silences. I constantly feel like I’ve… failed. Because I can’t give you what you want,he’d answered, dully.
She had tried to wrap his arms around her, the way she used to. But he’d pulled away.Don’t. I can’t.
It’s the hormones,she’d said, starting to cry.I’m not myself. I know I’ve put on weight, and…The tears started rolling down her face.Please. Please don’t leave me. And, it’s not you. It’s me. I’m the infertile one.
Yeah, but it’s both of us that are in this. And it’s nothing to do with your weight, Paul had said with a sigh.I love you whatever size you are. And I love you when you’re moody and snappy and when you cry. But I can’t live with seeing what this is doing to you anymore. You’re suffering too much, and I just don’t think it’s worth it.And… and I can’t take it anymore. If we knew for sure it would work this time…He trailed off.
But we can’t know that,Liz finished his sentence, and he nodded.
Yeah.
She and Paul had been about to start a fourth round of IVF, and Liz’s doctor had put the decision in their hands. Many people conceived in the first two or three rounds, she had said, but there was still a good chance that you could have a baby on your sixth or seventh round.
That had been the day before. She and Paul had signed the paperwork in the doctor’s office: as far as Liz knew, Paul was as committed as she was to another round.
Until today.
The doctor said IVF could still be effective between six to nine rounds, Liz had reminded him, knowing from Paul’s face that he had already made his mind up.
I can’t do this another six times,Paul had replied, tiredly.I can’t do another one. And we can’t afford another three or four times, Liz. The money is ridiculous. It’s too much.
Money doesn’t mean anything to me,she’d argued, stubbornly.This is a child we’re talking about. You can’t put a price on life.
Paul had said,Why don’t we use that money for a really great holiday instead? We could both do with a break: let’s relax, get away, and see what happens.
Liz had got up and paced around the room.I’m so far beyond‘let’s relax and see what happens’. Can’t you see that?she’d argued. You’re a man. You can be relaxed about being a father. I can’t.
We have a few years left. You’re only thirty-seven,he’d argued back.
You just don’t get it,she’d shouted.
No, I guess I don’t.
There were things that Liz felt that she knew Paul wouldn’t understand if she told him. She had felt, for the past few years, that she was on some kind of baby countdown game show, where the top prize was a child: previous winners would be paraded in front of the players in every episode, complete with their buggies and prams and chubby babies. This was what it was like, going about her life in the world every day: at the supermarket, on the street, on buses and trains, Liz saw women with children everywhere, and her heart sank every time. Not because she begrudged those women their children. Because she wanted her own baby, so very much.
Those women had played the game, and won.
She could see, in her mind’s eye, her own particular prize at the top of a brightly lit board: a photograph of herself being a mother. She had visualised it so hard that she knew every detail: a stray wisp of her own hair on her cheek, the flush on her face, a background of trees in the evening light, and her daughter in the foreground: a little girl with her brown hair in wonky pigtails, wearing red corduroy overalls.
But that photo, of Liz cuddling her daughter-to-be, seemed to get more out of reach every day. Every time she began a new cycle of IVF, she imagined herself on the game show, answering questions, passing ridiculous tasks, being injected and poked and prodded, all in the name of motherhood. All to reach that glowing photograph, ringed with flashing pink lights.
Watch as Liz Parsons from Glasgow competes to win her perfect life. Will she win the jackpot?She imagined the smooth voice of a gameshow host narrating her life.
Was she good enough to play the game? Would she win, this time?
She couldn’t explain any of that to Paul. She couldn’t explain how important it was to rig the game in your favour, any way that you could. Because the torture of thinking that she might never have her own child was more than she could cope with.
Paul moved out the next day. Liz had sat on the sofa, watching Paul pack his clothes into suitcases.
Please don’t go,she’d begged him.I love you. Don’t you love me anymore?
