Page 95 of Special Delivery
Up at the bar, Mr Spice King himself had appeared and was rolling out a portable karaoke machine.
‘To signs!’ declared Kate, raising her glass rapturously.
‘To signs,’ April repeated.
Poppy lifted her glass and attempted to smile. There was only one way to avoid feeling these feelings, so she tipped the rest of her champagne down her throat.
CHAPTER 40
Poppy shone her phone torch into her mouth and inspected the damage. Her left tonsil was the colour of red cordial. Of course she would get sick. Thirty-one-year-olds could not drink like twenty-two-year-olds without getting sick. It was a law of physics.
Turned out conversation starter cards were for suckers. If you really wanted to get to know someone—or a whole restaurant—all you needed to do was sing a few bars of ‘Crazy in Love’ and pass the mic around. With April and Kate by her side, she’d rolled through passionate renditions of Aretha Franklin, Macy Gray and Gwen Stefani before realising their superpowers (which were heavily reliant on their second and third bottles of champagne) could be harnessed perfectly for Carly Rae Jepsen and Miley Cyrus. The whole-restaurant singalong to ‘Party in the U.S.A.’ had been a life highlight, the kind Poppy would probably still remember in her nineties.
Too bad she’d be dead long before then. There was no way she could survive this hangover. She chucked her phone onto her bed and kicked off her shoes. Maybe a warm shower would cleanse her liver? At the very least, the steam might soothe her throat. She stepped into her ensuite, undressed and turned on the shower. She was about to step under when her ears pricked. Was that Maeve?
Poppy wrapped a towel around herself and stepped out of the bathroom. Maeve had only gone down ten minutes ago; she wasn’t due to wake for at least another half an hour. Her temples pounded extra forcefully as she craned her ears. Bugger. Maeve was definitely crying. Poppy tiptoed down the hall, hoping Maeve might go back to sleep, but by the time she reached her room her daughter was screaming at full lung capacity.
Poppy eased the door open and saw her daughter lying next to a puddle of vomit. Oh god. She lifted Maeve from the cot and grabbed some wipes to scrub her face, which made Maeve cry harder. Her eyes were matted with a web of crusted mucus and two streams of green snot were running from her nostrils.Fuuuuck!This didn’t look good.
Shifting her daughter to her hip—no easy feat while wearing a towel—she went to find her phone and began to type. Google, ever so helpfully, offered a range of options:
Is my baby teething?
Is my baby constipated?
Is my baby getting enough milk?
Is my baby sick or teething?
Is my baby lactose intolerant?
Is my baby cross-eyed?
Is my baby too skinny?
Is my baby dehydrated?
Jesus Christ, she’d googled at least half of them. She rephrased:Can a baby have conjunctivitis and gastro at the same time, and is that bad?
The overwhelming response from Google was yes. Fuck. Again.
Maeve’s cry had settled to a snivel but she still looked miserable. Her eyes were bloodshot and gooey and the snot was now smeared across her cheeks. Poppy put her hand to her daughter’s forehead. It definitely felt warmer than usual.
Poppy’s left tonsil throbbed and she let out a whimper. Of course this would happen.
She took her daughter to the lounge room and lay her under her mobile. As soon as Poppy put her down, Maeve began to wail. Poppy picked her up and patted her back to calm her and then lay her down on the play mat again, more gently this time. Maeve immediately started to cry. Sighing, Poppy scooped her up and then called her mother.
‘She doesn’t want to lie down,’ she told her mother.
‘Of course not, darling,’ Chrissie replied. ‘She’s congested, so lying down will only make her more uncomfortable. She needs to be kept upright.’
Poppy wanted to wail. She’d heard tales at mothers’ group of babies who got sick and had to be held constantly, with the parents taking it in turns.But there isn’t another parent!Poppy fumed.At some point I will need to shower! And pee!
‘Which doctor will you go to?’ asked her mother.
Poppy grabbed a tissue to wipe Maeve’s nose. She was embarrassed to admit she didn’t have a regular GP yet. The hospital health clinic had sorted all her pre- and post-pregnancy needs and she hadn’t needed medical help since. As her mum nattered on about how her bunion issues had been promptly fixed by her lovely young doctor (who was twenty years older than Poppy), her mind drifted to James. His knowledge of medicine, of Orange, his matter-of-factness, his innate decency; his recommendation would be rock-solid. Less bunion-reliant than her mother’s, at least.
In one of those startling moments of maternal intuition, her mum asked, ‘Why don’t you call your midwife?’
