LITMIR.BIZ

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umbilical cord was so thin and weak that it tore as Darcie tried to loop it over the baby’s head but already the tiny baby was slipping out.

      When Isla saw him delivered she was holding her breath, even as she clamped the severed cord. She never made comparisons—in fact Isla did everything she could not to think of that awful night with Isabel whenever a baby was born.

      She couldn’t help but compare this morning, though.

      He was so tiny and his arms and legs were spindly and his little eyes were fused closed. The difference was that this little one started to put up a fight. Even as Darcie lifted him and handed him straight to a neonatal nurse his arms were flailing and he let out a tiny mewing cry as the nurse took him over to Alessi.

      ‘Let me hold him,’ Donna called out. ‘Alessi, I want to hold him.’

      Alessi didn’t say anything at that point, at least not to Donna. Instead, he spoke to the little boy.

      ‘Hello, beautiful baby,’ he said, and Isla felt tears prick at the backs of her eyes as Alessi did his best to shut out Donna’s pleas to hold her baby and instead did everything he could to give this little life a chance. ‘Do you have a name for your son?’ Alessi asked.

      ‘Archie,’ Donna said, and then lay back on the pillow, exhausted and defeated, aching to hold her son but knowing he needed the skill of the medical team now.

      Isla did her best to comfort Donna as the team worked on. There was no way to see what was happening. Alessi, the anaesthetist and two neonatal nurses were around the resuscitation cot. They could hear the baby’s fast heart rate on the monitor and Alessi issuing instructions. The mood was markedly more urgent than it had been for Elijah, and Donna started to cry.

      ‘I just want to hold him,’ Donna said to Isla.

      ‘I know you do,’ Isla said. ‘But right now he needs to be with the medical team—they’re doing everything they can for him.’

      It was an interminable wait, made all the more difficult because Donna’s husband called to say that he had landed. When Donna couldn’t speak Isla took over the call and Alessi glanced up at the calmness in her voice as she introduced herself to the distraught husband.

      ‘Tom, Donna is exhausted and upset but we’re taking care of her. Elijah was born first and has been taken up to the neonatal intensive care unit, and Archie …’ she glanced over and met Alessi’s sombre gaze ‘… is being worked on by the team now. We hope to get him up to the intensive care unit soon.’ She took a breath. ‘Have you cleared customs? Good, go over to the information desk and explain what’s happening and hopefully they can see you to the front of the taxi queue.’ There was another pause. ‘They’re very premature, Tom. Right now the team are doing their best for your sons.’

      It wasn’t an easy call but somehow she did her best not to scare Tom while still conveying the need for him to get there urgently because it was clear that Archie especially was struggling. That was confirmed when Alessi came over and spoke to Donna, his expression grim. ‘Donna, I am very concerned for Archie. I want to move him up to NICU where we can do some more tests on him and where there is more equipment …’

      ‘I want to hold him.’

      ‘I know you do,’ Alessi said, ‘but we are not at that stage—Archie is fighting and I will do everything I can to assist him in that. For now we’ll bring him over so you can have a little look at him. He’s very beautiful …’

      The incubator was wheeled over. Archie looked like a little washed-up frog, but Alessi was right—he was a very beautiful baby. ‘Put your hand in,’ Alessi said, and Donna did, stroking his little cheek and then holding his fingers. ‘I’m going to take him up. I also want to see how his brother is doing. As soon as I can I’ll come and speak with you or I’ll send someone else if I am busy with them.’

      ‘Thank you. If something happens …’ Donna couldn’t say it but Alessi did.

      ‘If either of the twins takes a turn for the worse you will be told, Donna, and the staff here will do everything they can to get you to your babies. Right now, though, I need to get him to NICU.’

      ‘Mummy loves you,’ Donna said, and Isla felt her heart twist, and for once she was struggling to keep up her cool mask. She wanted to go over to Alessi, to tell him to just give Donna her baby, to accept the inevitable and give them this precious time.

      It wasn’t her place to, though. Donna had made it clear before the twins’ birth that she wanted everything possible done for her sons. It was for Isla to support that decision now.

      It was a long and difficult day. Isla went through the birth with Flick and all that had happened. Donna’s husband arrived and he went up to NICU. Though Donna ached to go and see her twins she had a small bleed after delivery and wasn’t well enough to go up till much later in the day.

      Isla went with her.

      First they saw Elijah, the tiny, though relatively bigger, twin. ‘It seems impossible …’ Donna said, and Isla just stood back and let her have the time with her son. She looked over to the next cot and Alessi was there and caught her eyes, his expression still grim.

      When Isla took Donna over she knew why.

      Donna completely broke down when she saw her little man hooked up to so many machines.

      ‘He’s not well enough to be held,’ Alessi said. ‘Just talk to him, he’ll know your voice.’

      Alessi, Isla noted, looked exhausted. He was also incredibly patient and kind. For close to a year she had dismissed him as some sort of killer flirt and had avoided him at all costs.

      Now there was no avoiding him.

      On Friday, at the end of a long shift, at the end of a very long week, she walked into her office to find Alessi sitting there with Jessica, the twins’ older sister.

      ‘Excuse me.’ Alessi glanced up as she came in. ‘I was just speaking with Donna, and Jessica asked if she could have a word. I just came to the nearest room.’

      ‘That’s fine.’ Isla smiled. ‘I’ll leave you to it.’

      ‘No, don’t go,’ Alessi said. ‘Jessica was just telling me that she’s too nervous to see the twins but that her mother thinks that she should.’

      ‘Do you want to see them?’ Isla asked.

      ‘I don’t know,’ Jessica admitted. ‘I’ve seen their photos and there are so many machines.’

      ‘NICU can be a scary place,’ Isla said. ‘Alessi is actually coming to speak to my Teenage Mums-To-Be group, in a few weeks’ time, to prepare them in case their babies have to go there. It can be a bit overwhelming but once you get past the machines you’ll see your brothers.’

      ‘That is what I was just telling Jessica,’ Alessi agreed. ‘They are very cute. Elijah is very much the big brother. Stoic and very strong, he doesn’t like to cry or make a fuss …’

      ‘And Archie?’ Jessica asked, and Isla heard the twist in the young girl’s voice.

      ‘He’s way too cute,’ Alessi said, and Isla smiled at the genuine warmth in his voice as he went on to tell Jessica about her youngest brother. ‘His eyes have just opened and he loves the sound of voices, he really does calm down when he hears someone say his name.’

      ‘I used to talk to him when Mum was pregnant,’ Jessica said.

      ‘Then he would know your voice.’ Alessi smiled but then looked over when Isla’s cool voice broke in.

      ‘Are you scared to love them, Jessica?’ she asked, and Alessi could only blink in surprise. Isla asked the tough questions and had clearly got straight to the difficult point because Jessica nodded and started crying. ‘I’m guessing you already do love them,’ Isla said.

      ‘They might die, though.’

      ‘I

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