Let Her Go Read online

  He sighed; as he exhaled, his chin dropped to his chest as if he was deflating. ‘Nadia … I don’t know where to start. It’s not that simple. My God, it would be so much more complicated … Think about the effect it’d have on you!’

  ‘I’d be fine.’

  ‘Being pregnant again? You hated being pregnant!’

  ‘No I didn’t! I loved it, I loved every moment of it.’

  ‘No, you were exhausted all the time, sick for months. We’ve got three other kids to look after now …’

  ‘Well, you can help, and I’m certain Zoe and Rosemary would babysit all the time if I did this! Is that what this is about? How it will affect you? That you’ll have to help out more, be here in the evenings and spend time with me and the kids?’ Nadia’s eyes filled with angry tears.

  ‘Of course it’s not, but we’re just starting to get our lives back to normal – you’ve been saying that too! The girls are at school, Harry’ll be at kindy next year, and then you’ll have some time back for yourself, to start working again, we can go on holidays …’

  ‘Don’t be so selfish! Who cares about going on holidays? Anyway, who says I want to go back to work?’ Nadia grasped his hands, pleading with him. ‘It just doesn’t seem … important to me any more. I’m better at this, Eddie, at being a mum – surely that’s more important than working! I can do this for Zoe, it’s an amazing thing! Yes, things are getting easier now with our kids getting older, but Zoe can never have that! Never. Not unless I do this. Think about our life, about the kids, and how gorgeous they are, how funny, how amazing. There’s plenty of time to go on holiday, but not for having children. This is her only chance.’

  ‘Nadia,’ he said patiently, still holding her hands. ‘I think you’re amazing for even thinking about it, I really do. But you’re almost forty, we’ve got three kids of our own, and I just don’t think it’s as easy as you make it sound. Aren’t there risks? Could you really give birth to a child, then hand it over? What about the children, how would we explain it to them?’ He swallowed, then spoke softly. ‘Nadia, this isn’t your responsibility. You don’t have to be the one to try and fix Zoe’s life. They can adopt, or foster, or use someone from India or wherever. You don’t have to do this.’

  ‘I do, Eddie.’

  Nadia thought back to what Rosemary had said, that she would do it for Zoe in a heartbeat if she could. Eddie was wrong: this was her responsibility.

  * * *

  ‘Don’t push Harry so high, Charlotte!’ Nadia shouted across the playground. Charlotte turned to look at her, laughing, her dark, defiant eyes flashing. The same eyes as her father. Nadia smiled and shook her head, then turned to Eddie, sitting next to her at the wooden picnic table. Charlotte went back to pushing the swing. Harry was laughing and holding his head back so the wind flew through his fair hair.

  ‘Who do you think she gets that from?’ Nadia asked.

  Eddie smiled. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. I was a good child.’ He put his arm around her shoulders and squeezed. ‘You OK? You didn’t sleep well.’

  She rubbed her eyes. ‘I’ve got a lot on my mind.’

  He nodded, but Nadia knew he wasn’t going to bring it up again if she didn’t. After their discussion last night, they had both retreated into their thoughts. Eddie had agreed to think about it; Nadia had thought she had made her decision, but hearing Eddie voice the fears she’d been pushing away had confused her. She could counter every argument he put up, but she knew his concerns were legitimate.

  Last night, while Eddie had slept deeply next to her, Nadia had lain awake. After about an hour, she had got up and tiptoed into the children’s rooms to watch them sleeping. She had thought again of Zoe, sleeping restlessly alone at home, with her husband away and no child to keep her company.

  Now Nadia sipped at her takeaway cup. ‘Where’s Violet?’

  Eddie pointed towards the climbing frame. ‘There.’

  Nadia nodded as she watched Violet clamber up a ladder in her bare feet. Always the quiet one, off by herself. Such a serious little thing. As Nadia herself had been. She must spend more time with her. It was so easy to leave Violet alone to read or draw or dress her dolls, so easy to forget to ask if she was OK. Nadia looked down at her sandy toes peeping out of her tan leather sandals. ‘Do you remember when Harry was born?’

  Eddie turned towards her on the bench. ‘Of course.’

  ‘Do you remember how relieved we were to have three kids, all healthy? I remember turning to you and smiling and just sort of knowing that we were done. Our family was complete.’

  ‘Yeah, of course. And not just them – my relief was about you too. You were healthy, safe. When each of the kids was born, I used to have this fear at seeing you there on the hospital bed, with all the monitors, in such pain. In case you didn’t make it.’

  Nadia thought about her mother. Hilary never got the chance to see her baby, Nadia, grow into a toddler, a teenager, an adult; to watch her sleep, to push her on the swing. She wished she could remember her. Sometimes she thought she did, but she was only an infant when Hilary had died, so she knew it was her mind trying to fulfil her wish, integrating photos she had seen with stories she’d heard. But though she knew it was impossible to remember her mother physically – her face, her voice, her touch – she also knew that memories weren’t always visceral. They could be implicit, formed from intense experiences – like the fierce love of a mother – and held in the cells of our deepest brain structures. Nadia knew that Hilary was merged with her, the good and the bad – and it must have been bad, near the end. No matter how much love there was in that hospital room, there must also have been terror, a wrenching sorrow and regret. Nadia glanced at Eddie. How would he have coped with a little baby if Nadia had died like her mother had? Her eyes filled with tears at the thought of her father as a young man, left alone with only grief and an infant daughter.

  Eddie put his hand on hers, drawing her back to him. ‘You’ve forgotten how hard it was on you.’

  ‘It wasn’t that hard.’

  ‘I just don’t think you’ve thought this through.’

  Nadia shook her head. ‘You’re wrong. I have thought it through. She’s my sister, Eddie. What if it was us?’ She raised her hand with the coffee cup towards the children. ‘Can you imagine life without them? Why shouldn’t Zoe get a chance to be a mum too?’

  ‘Of course I can’t imagine being without them.’

  ‘Where would we be without them?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, do you think we’d still be a couple?’ To her frustration, Nadia heard her voice waver, and her eyes began to water.

  ‘What?’ Eddie frowned. ‘Of course we would.’

  ‘What keeps people together, Eddie?’

  He cocked his head to the side. ‘What are you talking about? Are Zoe and Lachlan in trouble? If so, that’s even more reason not to go through with this —’

  Zoe grimaced. ‘No. Never mind. I just mean that kids are what makes a family, you know. And she’s my sister, I just want her to have the same thing I do.’

  Eddie stretched out his legs in the sun, splaying his toes. ‘But maybe the fact that you’re her sister makes it even harder. Wouldn’t it be easier if she used a stranger, someone from overseas? That’s what usually happens, isn’t it?’

  ‘She can’t afford it – it costs a fortune. Zoe isn’t some movie star who’s left it too late to have kids. It’s different. She deserves a child – not that those other people don’t, but … Anyway, even if she did have the money, how can that be better than using me? We’re not talking about a business transaction. This is a child. I hate the thought of her having to pay to rent someone’s body part. How can that be good for the baby, or her? If someone is only in it for the money, how desperate must they be? They wouldn’t have decent hygiene or nutrition if they have to resort to surrogacy to feed their own children!’

  ‘I don’t think it’s that bad, love.’


  ‘Well, who would carry a stranger’s child if they didn’t have to? What kind of motives would they have? It can only be about money. I don’t trust anyone who’d want to make a profit from this. I want to give her a child because I’m family, and because she’d do it for me.’

  ‘Would she?’

  ‘Of course she would.’ Nadia knew it was the truth.

  Eddie rubbed his face. ‘She hasn’t got eggs, what —’

  ‘We’d use my eggs, I’d go to the clinic and be inseminated. It’s easier, cheaper, less invasive than donor eggs and IVF.’

  ‘But then the child would be yours! It’d look like you, like our kids! What if when you saw the baby, you —’

  Nadia put up her hand to stop him. ‘I’ve told you, Eddie. I’m happy with three kids. I’m done, finished. It’d be her baby – and Lachlan’s, not mine. I would know that from the start. People donate eggs and sperm all the time and know that their genetic child is walking around out there, but they know it’s not theirs, not in an emotional way. I’d just carry it for her. I’d be the baby’s aunt, that’s all.’

  Eddie lifted his coffee cup to his mouth and tipped it up. ‘You’re just telling yourself what you want to hear. What about me, seeing you pregnant with someone else’s baby?’

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake. It’s not like I’d have to have sex with Lachlan!’

  ‘Jesus, Nadia! The kids then, what would you tell them?’

  ‘The truth! I’m proud of this. It’s a good thing to do.’

  Eddie gripped her hand and looked straight at her. ‘I know that. I don’t doubt that it’s a good thing to do. But I’m worried about you.’

  ‘Don’t you think I’m strong enough?’

  Eddie raked his fingers through his hair, then leaned closer to her. ‘Nadia, it’s not that I don’t think you’re strong, it’s just that I know how much you love being a mum, and I know how much you loved the kids from the minute you were pregnant. This will be too hard for you …’

  Nadia blinked back tears, and nodded. ‘It will be hard. I know that, Eddie. But it’s what I want to do. It’s just forty weeks of pregnancy, then it’s over. What’s a year out of our life? It’s nothing, it’ll go so quickly, but then Zoe will have a child forever.’

  ‘But it’s not just a year, is it?’

  Nadia finished her coffee to give herself time to think. How would it feel to have a baby inside her again, kicking and prodding her? She would be sick, she would be tired, and of course she knew it would be difficult emotionally. But Zoe had been sick, still was, and she hadn’t asked for that. Even if they weren’t biologically related, Zoe was her little sister. Family bonds weren’t forged from blood, they were welded by shared moments, from intimacy, from vulnerability. She sniffed and took a deep breath. ‘Let’s go.’

  Eddie sighed and picked up their empty cardboard cups. ‘Let me think about it, OK?’

  Nadia nodded as she collected her bag and three pairs of kids’ shoes, then walked towards the swings. They could talk about it some more, but she knew what the right thing to do was. Some siblings gave each other a kidney, or their bone marrow; how was this any different?

  Chapter Five

  Zoe gave the driver a ten-dollar tip then slammed the taxi door behind her and hurried towards her house, grinning. She had almost called Lachlan from the pub, but resisted; this was something she needed to tell him in person. It was almost like telling him she was pregnant: it should be special. She laughed to herself – this was like telling him she was pregnant. She unlatched the gate and ran up the path to the front door. Her hand shook as she held the key up to the lock. Could this really work?

  Zoe had been surprised when Nadia had called her and asked her to go for a drink tonight; they had been spending much more time together lately, and Zoe had enjoyed feeling close to her sister again, but Nadia rarely socialised in the evenings because of the kids and the long drive to the city. When Zoe had arrived, Nadia was already there, compulsively sipping her drink and drumming her fingers on the pockmarked wooden table.

  ‘Zoe,’ Nadia had begun in a hesitant voice. ‘There’s something I want to talk about.’

  Zoe sat down and waited, a stab of anxiety going through her. But then Nadia spoke the words that changed everything.

  ‘I’ll do it.’

  ‘Do what?’ Zoe said, frowning.

  ‘I’ve thought about it and done lots of research and considered all the risks and everything, and I’ve talked to Eddie about it. I’ll have a baby for you.’

  Zoe sat up straight and stared at Nadia. She shook her head quickly, and looked down, tears already springing to her eyes. ‘No, don’t be —’

  ‘I want to, Zoe.’

  Zoe fumbled in her bag for a tissue and dabbed at her eyes. ‘No. We’ve talked about it, it’s too hard. I’m just not meant to be a mother. I’ve accepted that now.’

  Nadia reached out and took Zoe’s hands. ‘It’s the perfect solution. I mean, we have to sort out all the medical and legal stuff, but I want to do this for you.’

  Zoe lifted her hands out of Nadia’s and covered her face, her whole body shaking. She couldn’t take it in. Was Nadia serious? She slowly took her hands away from her face and looked at her sister, who smiled, then jumped up, walked around to Zoe and hugged her hard.

  It had been one of the most amazing evenings of Zoe’s life, in the bar, surrounded by music and laughter, seeing the earnest look on Nadia’s face as they drank and talked about how, together, they would make this happen. But now, standing on the doorstep of her little house, in the dark, it almost felt as if it had been a dream. No, it had happened. Nadia really had offered to be a surrogate for them.

  Zoe took a deep breath, turned the key in the lock and pushed open the door. ‘Lachlan? Lachlan!’

  She had a sudden fear that he wasn’t home from soccer training yet and that she’d have to wait, but then she saw his kit bag in the bedroom doorway and heard the TV. She dropped her bag on the floor of the hallway and hurried to the back of the house.

  Lachlan was sitting on the couch with his bare feet propped up on the coffee table, a bottle of beer in his hand. He wore an old, soft grey t-shirt and blue tartan boxer shorts. His dark hair was damp, springing up into curls, and she could smell the fruity scent of her shampoo. She gazed at him for a moment, and felt a wave of pity. He looked worn out. She’d been so self-absorbed, demanding that he support her, when he was also dealing with the knowledge that he’d never be a father. She recalled her accusations that he would leave her, and blushed; she’d been terrified about the inevitable day when he’d decide that he wanted children more than he wanted her, and angry at him for having the option to find someone else and have a baby. In some ways she had been pushing him, giving him an excuse to leave her now while she felt so low that another blow almost wouldn’t matter. She had wanted him to voice the hatred she felt for herself. But she saw now that he was trying his best too, and she had pushed him away. He was kind, he was patient. He was her husband. He had told her again and again that he loved her long before they had thought of children, and that if it was a choice between her and a child, she won. But now, because of Nadia, he’d never have to make that choice.

  Zoe walked to the sofa and squeezed in next to him, snuggling into his chest and breathing in the scent of his clean skin. She wrapped an arm around him.

  Lachlan kissed the top of her head. ‘You look happy! How was it?’

  She pulled away a little, and grinned at him.

  He smiled back at her, looking curious. ‘Zoe? You’re shaking! What’s going on?’

  Zoe opened her mouth to explain, but instead of the carefully crafted speech she had practised on the way home, the words just tumbled out. ‘Nadia … she … she’s going to do it, Lach, she’ll have the baby!’ She grabbed his hands.

  ‘What?’

  ‘She said she’s been thinking about it, and she’s talked to Eddie, and obviously we’ll have to go to the doctor and do tests and see a
lawyer and all that, but she’ll be a surrogate for us! Can you believe it, babe, it’s going —’

  ‘Whoa!’ Lachlan took his feet off the table and sat up straight. ‘Hold on, hold on …’

  ‘I can’t believe it!’ Zoe grinned, clutching his hands tighter, willing him to share her excitement.

  But Lachlan was no longer smiling. ‘Zoe! Calm down! We’ve already talked about this. We decided it was too complicated, too risky.’

  ‘But that’s the best part, babe. I didn’t ask her – she just offered, out of the blue! She’s thought about all the pros and cons, and she knows that she wants to do this for us. It’s the perfect solution!’

  He stood up, then paced around the room. ‘Just wait! This has come out of nowhere! I just don’t know … It’s one thing for a stranger to do it, someone we’ll never see again, but your sister …’

  ‘It’s better this way!’ Zoe insisted. ‘We can be part of it all, we’re not paying someone, she’s doing it because she wants to help us have a child. Her family is complete, she’s healthy, and it means we don’t have to go through all the stress and expense of doing it overseas. She can use her own eggs too, so the baby won’t look like a stranger.’ Why didn’t he understand that this was the only way? She felt her excitement of the past few hours drain away, replaced by despair. Was this a ridiculous fantasy? She couldn’t bear to lose this – her last – hope.

  ‘But it’ll look like Nadia, Zoe, not you,’ Lachlan said softly. ‘How will that make you feel?’

  She shook her head. ‘Don’t, Lachlan – don’t spoil this. The baby will look like you. And looking like her aunt is better than looking like someone random. I’d always wonder if an egg donor was going to knock on our door one day, looking for her child. This way, everything’s kept in the family, everyone knows where they stand. Please, Lachie, please …’ Zoe made herself breathe deeply. She had to stay strong here, to prove to him that she could cope with this. She knew it wouldn’t be easy to watch Nadia carry a child for them. The image of a child with Nadia’s fair colouring instead of her own dark hair and eyes had already gone through her mind, but she had pushed it away. ‘Look, I know it will be hard. Our journey to being parents will be different from other people’s. I know that, but this is the only way. What choice do we have? Nothing is ideal. What would be ideal is if somehow I didn’t have this bloody illness and could have a baby myself.’