Olive

by Emma Gannon

‘Everybody with a womb doesn’t have to have a child any more than everybody with vocal cords has to be an opera singer.’ Gloria Steinem, Chelsea Lately, October 2011

The side-effects were so aggressive: major spots, mood swings, couldn’t fit into my clothes any more. I felt as if I’d had a personality transplant and I didn’t like the idea of not behaving like myself.

Why wouldn’t he understand that being on the pill and off the pill and in between the pill all means I have an excuse to act totally loopy?

‘You sound like you’re very anxious again at the moment.’ ‘Maybe I always am.’

I was swatting away my partner’s penis like an annoying fly.

Then, I suddenly couldn’t breathe. I climbed off him, feeling like I was having a panic attack. I rushed out, into the bathroom across the hall. I sat on the loo, grappling with my phone, trying to Google my feelings.

‘Just remember, when you get to my age, you never remember the little things that used to worry you or keep you up at night – you mostly look back fondly on the good times – they become clearer in your mind,’ she says, watering some poppies.

‘Well, you must remember that no decision is ever really the wrong decision. Because it’s the decision you made at the time. Respect your past self and her choices,’ she says, looking me directly in the eye.

‘You hate coffee,’ I say. ‘I know,’ he laughed. ‘I panicked.’

No choice is the wrong choice, because it’s the one you make at the time with the information you have.

We sit near a young hot dad and his toddler daughter who are reading a David Walliams book together.

Making an active choice about motherhood is one thing, but having that choice taken away is another. How do you do the whole ‘Where do you see yourself in five years’ time?’ when you don’t even have free rein to choose?

‘Off to see my therapist!’ was the new ‘Off to get a haircut!’ If anything, you were weird if you didn’t have one these days.

My first question when I meet her will be whether she feels any pressure to be seen to be ‘having it all’ in a different way: travelling, sex, friendships, hobbies. Having to ‘make up for’ not having kids, in some weird way. Ambition with a capital ‘A’.

My heart sinks. My achievements never seem good enough.

I hate it when people get stuck in career paths they don’t love because they want to impress their parents.

I guess this is the only upside of having an emotionally distant mother – she never gets involved with my life choices.

We hug and kiss each other on the cheek. And, just like that, she leaves. I’m left standing alone. A million things unsaid stretching between us. Once, Isla wouldn’t have just left – she’d have tried harder. She would have sat on my bed and chatted it through with me. But we have different things going on now.

I pull out my iPhone and open my ‘notes’. I write: ‘I’d rather freeze time than my eggs.’ Sounds poetic. But then again, I am very drunk.

Feels like a diseased pigeon has died in my mouth

(‘Just stop buying avocados and then you might be able to get on the housing ladder!’).

‘People my age be on baby no. 3, and I’m still on “Mambo no. 5”.’ Instagram meme

I guess that’s how we first bonded. Both knackered, young and broke. You get to know someone very quickly when you work with them in a tiny bookshop (or: you end up wanting to murder each other).

plus being around books all day seemed to have a good effect on my soul.

‘Did you know six minutes of reading can help reduce stress levels by up to sixty per cent?’ Jacob said, reading this information from a small book propped up on the till. ‘That’s sixty-eight per cent better than listening to music, one hundred per cent better than drinking tea, and three hundred per cent better than going for a walk.’

Her ability to actually listen to her friends whilst maintaining her mad life is a real skill. She is like a dolphin: they sleep with one side of their brain wide open as a defence mechanism as they drift through the deep sea. A rare breed: a successful multitasker. She can genuinely talk with you on any topic and still have one side of her brain on kid-watch.

She is also baking banana bread and the house is filled with a warm and toasty smell. It drifts down the corridor and under our noses just like a Tom and Jerry cartoon.

She looks like a walking, talking filtered photo.

I don’t even look after plants. I only have cacti and aloe vera, because you can ignore them and they don’t die.

‘How many kids do you have?’ I ask, sounding politely intrigued. ‘I have six,’ Belle says. ‘Fucking hell,’ I say, before I can get control over my mouth. Bea looks at me with widened eyes.

Here’s the thing: most people love to talk about themselves.

I feel like David Attenborough, eyeing up a rare new breed.

I forget my badge and have to stand like the other non-pregnant muggles, dammit.

‘As women, unfortunately, we cannot trust our own hormones.’ What?

‘You have nothing to complain about. You’re pursuing needless drama.’

‘Look, I understand. But you have to understand that your feelings of not wanting a child will never be as important as a woman who desperately wants one but can’t.’

Colin: That shit IS bananas b-a-n-a-n-a-s, as Gwen Stefani would say

Colin: RELAX – as Frankie Goes To Hollywood would say

It is aggravating having to hold your tongue in so many ways.

Sometimes we don’t ‘know’ for sure, and maybe we never will, but we just have to live each day in the way that feels most natural to us.

‘And while you’re at it, you can move for me too. I’m eighty fucking seven!’

I don’t think having a baby is a one-way ticket to having forever happiness or a new best friend.

Perhaps I’m scared of having that much love. Too much love, to potentially lose.

‘Olive, I need a plan. Life is about having a plan.’

‘I don’t know how I’ll feel about it when I’m eighty and I don’t have any children and grandchildren. I don’t know if that will make me happy, or sad.’ Donna, 49

‘It used to keep me up at night, but now I realize he’s someone who needed to go off and do his own thing. He never felt close to us, even though we felt close to him.’ Dorothy’s voice suddenly sounds hoarse and dry. ‘He never felt the need to keep in touch.’

‘You need to let go, you know, when you go the toilet, and in life.’ What a beautiful motivational quote that is!

‘The time will come / when, with elation / you will greet yourself arriving / at your own door, in your own mirror / and each will smile at the other’s welcome.’ I stare at her, a little baffled. ‘It’s “Love After Love” by Derek Walcott. Beautiful piece. A reminder to feast on one’s own life. Let go of your guilt, Ol. Women are made to feel guilty for everything. The food we eat, the bodies we have, the relationships that don’t work out. We must accept the challenge and refuse to take on this guilt.’

The loss will always be there, of course, but I’ve finally come out the other side.’ We both smile gently at each other. I do like a man who can open up unprompted. A rare breed.

We lock eyes and it feels awkward, intrusive, too deep almost.