160. Husbands (2)

 It was the middle of the afternoon. I was in the kitchen making coffee and about to go and sit down in the lounge for a rest I felt I deserved. I was feeling relaxed and happy and was even reflecting on how good the kids were, all playing nicely together.

I poured the coffee and placed the mug on the kitchen counter and as I replaced the coffee pot I heard tiny footsteps coming into the kitchen. I smiled to myself as I marvelled at Maths-Head (who was about 8 at the time) play-chasing Baby. How nice of her to play with Baby! How gentle and calm she was! Baby was giggling excitedly and her big sister was making silly witches sounds. Family life at its best.

But suddenly Baby fell flat on her belly. As always in this situations time stops. For a spilt second all is quiet and you may even think nothing's the matter at all but then, screams fill the silence, cries all the more piercing after this still moment in time. The air vibrates and all hell gets loose. Not even a second has passed and the whole scene is chaos: screams and cries, blood and tears, everyone is rushing around, stopping whatever they were doing. 

Quickly I grabbed hold of Baby and lifted her up to settle her on the kitchen counter. Blood was gushing out of her forehead and was trickling down her front. This being child number 4 I had some experience and did not panic. I grabbed a tissue and pressed it to the wound. Soon the bleeding stopped and I peeked under the hankie to check the damage.  It was a neat cut but it seemed deep. I called for the others to get me the boîte-à-bobos. Maths-Head ran at break-neck speed making ambulance noises (a pang of worry) while Miss Organiser took on the drama queen role and their brother after a quick look went back to pushing his toy cars across the carpet (spitting profusely).  

The cut was definitely deep. Surgery and doctors would have to help here. We'd only been living here a few weeks but I'd noticed a medical centre round the corner from our house. A quick call to my husband and we would be right there. 

I instructed the other three to sit down and freeze, statue-like until their dad got them. The three of them looked cute, all sitting in a row, nodding their heads in obedience. I put a clean home-made dressing on baby's forehead. She was now perfectly happy and seemed excited to get to go in the car while her siblings had to stay behind. 

'Dad will be here in no time. DON"T - MOVE - OK?'

Three little heads nodded convincingly. Super cute.

Minutes later I was in the brand new empty surgery and the nurse had just started to clean the wound while we were waiting for the doctor when all of the sudden my husband came in. He had his motorbike helmet in hand and he looked a bit shaken. But I thought this was a case of mirror effect: I was the tense one. He must have thought I was tense about the other kids.

'It's ok. I've checked on them. They'd raided the biscuit cupboard. How's Baby?'

The nurse, probably single and definitely too young to know about the unexpected ways in which men sometimes behave, said cheerily:

'See, Sir, this is quite a deep cut.'

As she said this she lifted the dressing so my husband, father of 4, could see the wound. The nurse had cleaned it and it was all the more obvious that the cut was indeed very deep and as the bleeding had stopped there was nothing to hide the horrible spectacle. (Reader, relax, I shall stop the description here.)

My husband took a step and moved closer to Baby to inspect the wound. The colour immediately started draining from his face, just like in a cartoon, and he began to sway gently to and fro. The doctor walked in just in time to instruct my husband to go next door to lie down. She shouted at someone to deal with the father of the child. I felt a bit awkward. Should I say I did not know who this man was? Could I admit he was the dad and would be the one driving the cute baby with the bandage to the hospital? Baby was coping so much better than her dad was - and she was the one with the wound! By now she had a bright pink and yellow lollipop and thought this was the best day ever. 

After a sit down and some just-for-dads sweet drink, the whole family got in the car. I allowed the other thee to carry on eating the stolen cookies as they all wanted a lick of the giant pink lolly.

I made no comments and trusted mu husband to drive us to the hospital where the most amazing surgeon. He had been a war surgeon and was now a plastic surgeon and knew the art of blurring scars. He was truly amazing because he did this with only the tiniest amount of anaesthetics. When the removal of the stitches came, surprisingly quickly, as done in two layers (I can't remember how many but I just remember there were so many tiny stitches) he used no anaesthetics at all and told me to keep Baby on my lap because that was the best way to keep her calm and trusting. She did not cry, did not scream and got another - smaller this time - treat.

We drove back home and had take away pizzas to celebrate the happy ending.