Page 25 of The Soulmate

THEN

‘I‘m pregnant.’

We’d been married two years when I became pregnant with Freya. It was a good time for us, in a lot of ways.

After two years in the job, Gabe had gone from promotion to promotion, pay rise to pay rise. We could finally afford those suits he’d been buying. We had saved a good deposit for a home. I was even starting to buy nice things for myself. Now, he was running the investor relations team and apparently he’d single-handedly brought in more than fifty per cent of the company’s investors that year. If they’d used a broker to find those new investors, he told me, it would have cost the company hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees.

Still, I was nervous about revealing the pregnancy to Gabe. Not because I thought he’d be unhappy. After all, when I’d suggested we try, he was the one to ceremoniously empty my birth control pills into the toilet. My anxiety stemmed from another issue I wanted to talk to him about, something I’d been increasingly worried about over recent months.

‘Now that we’re having a baby,’ I said, ‘I’ve been thinking about these late nights. I don’t see you a lot.’

‘You’re right,’ Gabe said. ‘I’ll dial it back. Time to focus on family.’

‘The other thing is,’ I said, gaining courage, ‘your drinking.’

I wasn’t sure when alcohol had become a fixture in Gabe’s life. It wasn’t necessarily a huge cause for concern. He didn’t drink every day; he didn’t hide bottles around the house. But when he did drink, he drank to excess – usually when he was out with work colleagues. Several times, he’d come home so drunk after a night ‘working’ he couldn’t get his key in the front door.

Gabe was quiet as he contemplated my comment. One thing I’d learned in our marriage was that some topics had to be broached delicately. During the year that he kept leaving jobs, for example, we talked about it – even just between the two of us – in terms of ‘opportunities’. It wasn’t that he couldn’t hold down a job; rather, he was lucky to have these new opportunities. Gabe took the same care with me, though he really didn’t need to. In that way, I was far less fragile than he.

After a moment, he nodded.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘You’re right. With the baby coming, it could be better to stop the drinking.’

Gabe stopped drinking the same day, just like that. Overnight he developed a new interest – and it was preparing to become a father. The late nights ceased, too. Thus began the evolution of Gabe from young partying executive to family man.

Freya’s arrival, on her due date, was the conclusion of the metamorphosis for Gabe.

For him, it was love at first sight. He was besotted with Freya. His patience was endless. He paced the hallway with her at night, patting her and cradling her little head and marvelling at her existence. He came to her paediatric appointments and listened intently to the nurse’s suggestions. Whenever he saw another baby – in the street, on TV, in a commercial – he said he felt bad for the parents that their baby wasn’t as beautiful as Freya.

Admittedly, Freya was a pretty baby, petite and delicate with a heart-shaped face and piercing blue eyes. She was also a placid baby: content if she was being held, happy to observe. From day one I felt like she was watching me. Often, I wondered if I was meeting her expectations.

I was certainly prepared for motherhood. I’d read the books about the first three months, the ‘wonder weeks’, the eat–play–sleep routine. Gabe and I took a class in Baby First Aid. I’d set up a nursery with everything I might need. I’d purchased bottles and formula in case breastfeeding didn’t work out. I was ready for anything. I assumed I’d excel at it. Maybe that was the problem? Motherhood wasn’t really something youcouldexcel at. You did the same thing, day in and day out: feed, sleep, change. Hold her while she cries. Visitors came and went, and I acted the part of loving mother for all of them. I even performed it for Gabe.Yes, I feel so much love. It’s mind-blowing. What did I ever do without her?But the truth was, I found it hard to feel much of anything. To me, Freya was a prop in a pointless show I had to perform in, over and over, to no audience.

We lived in a tiny inner-city townhouse at the time, near a strip of coffee shops and restaurants. Before long, Gabe and Freya were known by everyone. He was the sexy dad in the puffer vest, proudly striding the pavement with the adorable rosy-cheeked baby in her pram. He was the dad who chatted to other parents about sleep times and feeding schedules and came home to me with suggestions, like: ‘We should stop letting her sleep so much during the day.’ He was the dad who laughed out loud when she yawned or smiled or farted, because his daughter delighted him that much. It was almost enough to compensate for the fact that I felt nothing for her.

I tried to force a connection. I held her skin to skin and stared into her eyes. I breastfed. I recited affirmations. I sniffed her head. I tried to recall all the reasons I wanted her, but I came up blank. If I’d had any – and I was sure I must have – they were gone now.

Once, while Gabe was at work, I dressed her in one of her most adorable outfits and just stared at her for hours, willing myself to feel something. When nothing happened, I put her into her crib in the nursery and left her there for the afternoon. If looking at her didn’t work, maybe absence would.

Gabe’s new zeal for fatherhood only made me feel worse about my lack of attachment. He was always thinking up something to do with her, to get us out and about.

‘It’s beautiful outside!’ he said one day, when the weather was average at best. ‘Let’s go have an adventure.’

Freya was only a couple of months old, and I was about to take a nap. By that point, I’d developed an unhealthy attachment to my bed. I sat around the house in sweatpants, living from feed to feed.

I glanced out the window. ‘It looks like rain.’

‘A drive then,’ he said, unperturbed. ‘Down the coast.’

If I’d said I was too tired, or I just wasn’t up for it, Gabe wouldn’t have minded. He would have taken Freya alone and told me to stay home and rest. But I wouldn’t have been able to rest. I’d have spent the day chastising myself for not going, for not taking part in my life, fornot being grateful. After all, what more could I ask for than a day at the beach with a good-looking man and a cute baby?

What was wrong with me?

I started to cry. And once I started, it was impossible to stop.

Gabe dropped to his knees in front of me and I told him everything I was feeling. Every little wretched thought. I told him how I hated him for being so happy. How I hated myself for being so sad. I even admitted to the most shameful thought: that sometimes I even hated Freya for what she’d done to me. I told him I was dead inside.

Gabe listened to me the way he always did, with undivided attention. He didn’t interrupt, or tell me I was just tired, or suggest something to cheer me up. When I finished talking, he put his arms around me and said, ‘I didn’t know. I’m so sorry I didn’t know.’