Page 72 of Always Alchemy

‘Sounds about right,’ Dex says, his voice sounding as shaky as mine did. ‘God, he’s so perfect.’

‘He has your eyes,’ Max tells Dex over me.

Dex instantly starts demurring. ‘No, no—it’s impossible to tell at this stage. He?—’

‘I dreamed of that,’ Max insists. ‘If I was a praying man, I’d have prayed for it. All I’ve ever wanted was a child who had Darcy’s smile and your eyes.’

MAX

In the nine months that we had to prepare for Charlie’s arrival, we settled on the following plan, or mission statement, most accurately.

It was this:

That the three of us would embrace this life-changing gift wholeheartedly.

That we’d deprioritise the daily bullshit that life andjobs throw at us and focus on immersing ourselves in the miracle of our son’s early days.

That we’d use our cunning advantage of having one extra adult in the relationship to establish an equilibrium that meant no one person, including Darcy—especiallyDarcy—would be too overwhelmed and exhausted to enjoy this most special, fleeting time.

That we’d get help, as much as possible, so that our only duties were to revel in our baby and rest (probably in that order, to be realistic).

I wasn’t up for any sort of night nanny or maternity nurse for a good while. There are three of us, for fuck’s sake! I was confident that between us we could manage, until I had an eye-opening conversation with Rafe at a Berry Bros champagne tasting one night.

‘Your child is the most important investment you’ll ever make,’ he told me. ‘You wouldn’t buy a new Porsche and get behind the wheel if you’d never had a driving lesson, would you? You wouldn’t dream of trying to “work it out as you go along”. So why the fuck would you leave it to chance with your baby? Honestly, you should book up Josie, our maternity nurse.’

I grimaced. ‘It just seems—I don’t know—like an obnoxious thing to do.’

‘Since when have you not been obnoxious? But seriously, okay, imagine you’re at home that first night, and the baby’s been feeding off Darcy for like, an hour, but you have no idea whether they’ve had enough milk. Or you’ve burped them for ten minutes but nothing’s come up. Should you put them down? Or do you keep trying to burp them?

‘What if they’re throwing up too much, or you don’t understand why they won’t stop crying, or—and this is a common one—you guys have fed them and burped themand changed them and it feels like you’ve just got them down and then the whole fucking cycle just starts all over again. It’s bloody relentless. I’m telling you. Having the right expert on hand can mean the difference between days and nights of pulling your hair out versus an experience where you all get to fully participate in the good bits but you spare yourself the heartache.

‘Rosalie used to scream every time we put her down after a feed. Like agonised screaming. It was awful. Belle cried every time. Josie diagnosed silent reflux and we took her to the paediatrician—bingo. She was spot-on. God knows how long we would have all soldiered on in total fucking bewilderment. I dread to think.’

I held up a hand. ‘Okay, okay. You’ve made your point. I’ll give her a call tomorrow.’

We all loved Josie when we interviewed her. She was competent and organised enough to please me, and caring and effusive enough for Darce and Dex.

With her due to start this evening, our schedule looks like this:

Dex and I alternate nights while we’re both on paternity leave. This gives us equal time with Darcy and Charlie, and equal exposure to what Josie can teach us.

Whoever’s not on duty sleeps alone in our room—depressing, but necessary for a sound night’s sleep.

Darcy and the husband on duty sleep in the spare room with Charlie, next to the nursery, where Josie is sleeping now and where Charlie will eventually sleep.

We’ve all agreed that Darcy’s only job right now is to feed him. She needs as much sleep as possible. From what Rafe said, I realise the feed-burp-change cycle can be both time-consuming and far too regular. We need to eliminate as much of that as possible so our wife can get the rest sheneeds between feeds. With three other adults on hand and the terrifying but efficient technology of breast pumps available, we’re determined that Darce will not shoulder this burden alone.

I feel quietly confident that we have a decent structure in place. Inevitably, parts of it will go to shit now that the little man is here, but that’s okay. The funny thing is that it all looked great on paper, but now that he’s arrived safely, and we’ve brought him home, and I’m sitting here with my wife and my husband and our child in what I suspect is a rare moment of calm, all the planning feels immaterial.

Because what I said was true. I’ve known for an impossibly long time now that to have Darcy and Dex immortalised in a child would be a gift more precious than anything else. However much I fill Dex up with my cum, I’ll never impregnate him. So to have been blessed with Charlie, the genetic product of the two most incandescent souls my own soul has ever encountered, has my cup positively overflowing.

He really does have Dex’s eyes. When he looked up at me the first time I held him in my arms, I had the most astonishing sense of recognition. I’d seen those eyes before, on one of the two loves of my life. That had to be a better surprise than seeing my own eyes.

Time will tell if our son has my wife’s smile.

I lay my hand gently over Darcy’s, and Dex puts his over mine, his touch warm and sure. Skin on skin on skin.

‘Can you feel it?’ she whispers. We’re still for a moment, and yes, I can feel it. I can feel the way her hand rises beneath mine with each fleeting breath our son takes into his impossibly tiny lungs and falls as he releases it.

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