‘It is – much,’ says Lou. ‘Though you’d still have to shell out for the flights, and take extra time off work.’ Oh dear, yet more research she’s done on
the quiet. She explains, ‘Women abroad getting paid to donate their eggs isn’t something I’m happy about. You don’t know why they’re doing it – to get out of
poverty, fund degrees – who knows? And it’s a massive thing to put your body through, the hormone injections, and the removal of eggs is invasive in itself. At least with me, I’d
be having all that treatment anyway.’
‘Who would father the baby?’ asks Sofia. ‘Are you going to pay for a sperm donor through that clinic, too?’
Lou can’t help noticing she says
you
, not
we
. ‘I don’t know for sure. From what they said at the stand, I can see there are advantages to using one, yes, but I
was only going to find out the options today, not make any definite decisions.’
‘Then that will mean more money, too.’
‘It’s not much,’ says Lou. ‘Weren’t you listening to what that guy told me?’
‘Not really, no.’
Lou flinches, bruised. ‘The men don’t get paid to donate sperm – they can’t, here. We’re not like America. I’d just be paying a few hundred pounds to cover
vetting the donor.’
‘So more profit for the doctor in the nice suit.’
They’ve hit the dual carriageway: finally Anna can accelerate. Giant advertisements line the Cromwell Road, campaign showpieces that are bigger and brasher than any they might see in
Brighton.
Sofia continues, ‘You’re not allowed to sell other parts of your body, like your kidneys or blood, here in England though, are you?’
‘But a donor wouldn’t be selling his sperm, and I wouldn’t be
selling
my eggs. That’s the whole point.’
‘You’d be exchanging them. Like in a market. Treating a potential child as a thing that can be bought.’
‘I think you’re being a bit harsh,’ Anna chips in. ‘For sperm donors it’s easier – physically at least. But it’s a lot to ask a woman to give up her
eggs. It’s practical, that’s what. Two women need something – they swap it. Both benefit. Where’s the harm?’
‘You would say that,’ says Sofia.
‘Excuse me?’
‘You work in marketing.’
‘Meaning?’
‘So clearly you think it is OK to sell almost anything.’
They’re brought to a halt by yet another set of lights. Since Lou was last here, a purpose-built supermarket appears to have landed right by the junction like a giant spaceship. Anna takes
the opportunity to turn to face Sofia.
‘Do you want to walk home?’ She grips the steering wheel, knuckles white.
‘No . . . ’
‘Then I suggest you watch what you say.’
Lou winces. Sofia is clearly usingAnna’s presence to express beliefs too loaded to air one to one.
‘Sorry. It’s my English . . . ’
‘But you can’t
get
eggs on the NHS,’ interrupts Lou. Doesn’t Sofia understand? ‘Not easily, anyway. There are hardly any available.’
‘And it’s not like you’d be helping just any woman to have a baby,’ says Sofia. ‘You would be helping a
rich
woman.’
‘How do you work that out?’
‘If someone can afford to pay for you and for themselves, they must have a lot of money.’
‘You can’t be so certain,’ says Lou. ‘But doesn’t a rich woman deserve help too?’
The car moves forward again. ‘I’ve heard of people sacrificing a great deal to pay for IVF,’ says Anna. ‘They could be going into debt, remortgaging their home,
forfeiting holidays – you have no idea what another person’s circumstances might be. You’re being a bit unsympathetic.’
Sofia shrugs. ‘As I said before, it depends if you believe having children is the most important thing.’
‘Sofia’s not being unsympathetic.’ Lou is so upset she can’t address her girlfriend directly. ‘She’s defensive because she doesn’t want children
herself. Can’t you tell? She just thinks I should accept my lot, like some Victorian spinster.’
‘Plenty of people cannot have children, and they have to learn to live with this. Until recently that was true for us all if we were lesbians unless we want to . . . well, fuck a
man.’
Anna almost swerves the car.
‘And still it is only in the rich world a woman can afford to have a baby like this. In Africa—’
‘Don’t pull the poor-women-of-the-third-world card on me,’ snaps Lou. ‘Since when did you get so PC? You’ve a nerve lecturing me on global issues when you
couldn’t even call your so-called nearest and dearest to let me know you were alive.’
‘I said I was sorry.’
‘Like hell you are.’
By now the car feels extremely small and uncomfortable. It’s impossible to force such resentments back inside Pandora’s box, undo what’s been said. They spend the rest of the
journey in silence.
* * *
‘I wonder what sort of woman would give up her eggs?’ asks Cath.
She and Rich are facing each other on the train home to Leeds. There is no one nearby – just a table of lads at the far end of the carriage on their way home from a football match, and an
elderly couple a few seats in front.
Rich looks up from a brochure. ‘According to this, they might have some sort of fertility problem themselves.’
‘But not necessarily.’
‘I reckon they’re likely to be gay. Judging from today.’
‘Though not definitely that either. I suppose the only certainty is they’ll be younger than me.’
‘Under thirty-six, didn’t that doctor say?’
‘And not that wealthy. If you were wealthy, you wouldn’t need to share your eggs. You’d say never mind the money, and pay for the IVF.’
‘Don’t you think some women might do it anyway?’ says Rich.
‘Out of the goodness of their hearts? Unlikely. That’s why there’s such a shortage – people aren’t that generous.’
‘I guess.’
‘So, we’ve got poor
ish
, possibly gay, and under thirty-six.’ Cath allocates a finger to each point. ‘And healthy, I presume. How would you feel, having a baby with
someone like that?’
‘I’m not sure . . . ’ Rich pauses, evidently doing his utmost to keep up. ‘I wouldn’t really be having a child
with
them, would I? I’d be having a
child with you.’
‘Except it would be their genes.’
‘It’s only an egg you’d be having. The cells would be so small. It’s not like we’d be getting a fully grown newborn baby.’
‘I feel that as I’d be the one carrying it, it would be mine too. The egg would grow inside me. It’d be my blood supply. The baby wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for
me. So it’d be a sort of three-way baby. Hmm . . . I wonder what it would look like?’ She appraises her husband across the table: his blue-green eyes, his slightly lopsided mouth, his
broad fingers with their distinctive square-shaped nails, his purportedly too-thick neck . . . She’s so fond of him, it’s impossible to be objective. ‘I hope it’d be like
you.’
Rich leans over towards her and gently takes her hand. ‘Love, I think you’re racing ahead a little. We’ve got a long, long way to go before then. We haven’t worked out
how we’d begin to pay for all this – and it doesn’t sound as if it would leave much change from ten thousand pounds. That’s a lot of money, and we’ve only just come
back from holiday.’
Cath is crushed. ‘I didn’t think it was
that
much.’
‘I think you’ll find it is. By the time we’ve paid for their treatment, and ours.’
She bites her lip. It seems so unfair that at forty-two she’s too old for treatment on the NHS. She would have qualified before her cancer diagnosis – it’s as if she’s
being penalized for being ill. And Rich is only in his mid thirties – they’re hardly OAPs. Not for the first time Cath wishes she’d been more successful professionally. Her job at
Leeds Art Gallery is poorly paid and she’ll have to rely on Rich to contribute the greater share. It was one thing his treating her to the ski trip; it’s quite another expecting him to
fund IVF almost single-handed.
She says, ‘Surely we’re talking about something money can’t buy? It’s impossible to put a price on a baby. We’ll find it somehow, won’t we?’
‘I hope we can work something out. Perhaps we can apply for a loan. Besides, you haven’t even had a chat with the specialists at the clinic yet.’
‘I suppose, but we have to talk this through together, don’t we?’ She glances down at the brochure Rich has pushed aside. The image of two flowers bent towards each other calls
out to her. ‘I like the idea of egg sharing. I imagine it means just as much to someone else to have a child as it does to me, and it would be lovely to help another woman become a
mother.’
‘They made it sound relatively easy this morning, but you know, and I know, that a lot of the time, for, er . . . older women, IVF doesn’t work.’
‘Mm.’
‘And . . . well . . . with all your, um, history . . . ’
She holds up a palm. She doesn’t want to talk about her illness right now. She appreciates that the odds are stacked against them, that even without her medical history it would be likely
to take several attempts for IVF to succeed. But she can’t forget Angeline and the train of skiing children . . . She’s had her fill of pragmatism.
Cath tucks her jacket against the windowpane so she can rest her head more comfortably and look at the flat green fields flashing by. It’s strange to think that somewhere out there is
someone else, possibly carrying the eggs of their baby.
I wonder where she is? Cath asks herself. What she is thinking, what she is doing?
‘I am going to have a beer,’ says Sofia. They’ve just arrived home, not yet removed their coats.
Great, thinks Lou, but she doesn’t try to stop her.
Sofia opens the fridge. Lou sees carrots, lettuce, half a tin of sweetcorn, juice, last night’s uneaten curry. No beer, no wine. Lou is off alcohol, Sofia’s been at work all week;
neither has stocked up.
‘I’m going to get some.’
‘I thought you were hungover?’
Sofia picks up her purse and keys again. ‘Do you want anything?’
Lou shakes her head. Sofia heads out, slamming the door.
Lou sits down on the sofa. Her limbs are heavy, her head aches, the stitches across her abdomen are throbbing. She hasn’t even the energy to take off her parka. And now she has to brace
herself for another set-to. Worse, it looks destined to be clouded by alcohol. Lou has worked with alcoholics in her role as a counsellor; she also helped Anna when things came to a head with her
ex-boyfriend, Steve, who was a heavy drinker. Sofia’s nowhere near that bad, but this time Lou is not one removed.
I’ve not even had the chance to work out what I feel myself about trying to have a baby in the near future, she thinks, bending to remove her boots. I’d hoped the exhibition would
enlighten me about the options. Instead the drama with Sofia has taken over.
She rotates slowly on her bottom – ouch, her tummy really does hurt – and carefully hoists her legs up so she’s able to lie down. She dangles her feet over the arm of the sofa
and pulls a cushion under her head.
* * *
Sofia sits on the armchair at right angles to Lou, beer bottle in hand, watching her girlfriend slumber. It’s hard to be angry with her when she’s so vulnerable. She
watches Lou’s eyelids flicker, dark lashes against pale cheeks, and wonders what she’s dreaming of. Sofia’s own mind is full to bursting of all sorts: guilt and rage and upset and
resentment and jealousy and . . . oh, yes, love.
Looking at Lou there, with her parka half unzipped and her boots hanging off the end of the sofa, with her lips slightly open so she can breathe more easily and her brow furrowed as if
she’s concentrating hard on something, Sofia remembers that she loves her. There’s something so innocent about her, childlike.
What would a little Lou be like? she wonders. A smaller version crawling around this flat?
She imagines a baby – it’s difficult, she’s not used to thinking about babies. At first she just hears it crying, needing milk, winding, its nappy changing, being put to sleep.
But eventually she has a different sense of it: the scent of its skin, its soft downy hair, the folds of plump flesh . . . Its gaze as it learns to focus for the first time, its smile as it looks
up at its mother . . .
She can’t deny Lou that.
Nor, when Sofia pauses to think about it, does she want to. It’s just she can’t do it alongside her. Not right now, at least, and it seems that it’s now, for Lou, or not at
all.
* * *
Lou is hopping from foot to foot on the sand, eager to play in the sea.
‘Hurry up, Daddy,’ she is saying.
Her father is blowing up a lilo, cheeks puffed out; he looks funny. Finally, he pinches the valve shut with two fingers, pops the tiny plug in. ‘Right then, Louloubelle, we’re
ready!’
‘You coming, Mummy?’ she asks.
‘No, I’ll stay here,’ says her mother. She’s busy laying out the picnic on the rug. Irene never comes in the sea; the water’s freezing, she claims. Just for once
Lou would like her to.
‘I’ll stay with you,’ says Lou’s sister, Georgia.
‘Race you, then!’ says Lou’s dad, and before she can get to her feet, he’s off across the sand, airbed bouncing in the wind behind him. ‘First one in!’ he
yells, his voice diminished by the breeze.
He’s got a good head start, and he’s a decent sprinter, but Lou is good at running. Faster, faster, faster she goes, and, though her legs are much shorter, and she can feel her lungs
pressing against her chest, soon she’s closing in on him, then she’s abreast of him, and – hurray! – just before they reach the shallows, she overtakes. With a triumphant
sploosh! sploosh! sploosh!
she keeps on going into the sea. Before she realizes it, she’s up to her thighs, in over her waist – cold, excited.
She turns back to face her dad; he’s wading in more slowly, pushing the lilo into the waves ahead of him, grinning broadly.
‘Me on the front and you on the back?’ he says, patting the tubing.
‘Me on the front!’ says Lou, and with a squeak of plastic, hoists herself aboard.
*
Lou wakes, disoriented. It takes a moment to work out where she is. The lights are dimmed and the TV is on. The volume is down low; a woman in a skimpy outfit beckons viewers to
gamble online. Sofia is asleep in the armchair opposite, head back, snoring faintly. In her hand is a half-drunk bottle of beer, tilting precariously.