A PROMISED BABY

Gwennie is pregnant and has a mysterious visitor

Gwennie Davies was an angel. That’s what everyone said if they knew her and quite a lot who didn’t because the message had got around.

Life had not always been easy for her, though. She married young, too young some said, and her husband was widely known to be a bully or a big headed swine, choose your own definition. But he did one good thing and died as a consequence of having an undiagnosed heart condition before Gwennie was half way through her twenties, and pregnant with the fruit of his rather disgusting loins.

But she did have wonderful parents who leapt in to help her as the nine months progressed and her confinement was imminent. She was returned to her childhood bedroom in their house and her own home (rented) was returned to a surly landlord who took no notice when it was pointed out that he surely must owe Gwennie some money on account of the improvements she and the deceased swine had made to the place. He sneered at the idea, of course, and refused outfight.

So Gwennie was in her old bed (as comfortable as it had always been, soft and yielding and smelling sweetly of lavender mixed with wild herbs (picked from the countryside by a twelve year old Gwennie when she had been going through a phase of loving nature, encouraged by Mrs Jessop, an English teacher who quite often allowed herself to be diverted to more interesting things than verbs and pronouns.

And it was while she was in the luxury of this fragrant bed that Gunjy Gordon put in her first appearance

Gunjy Gordon was a doll, a lovely pink-cheeked bright-eyed doll and she (it was a girl doll wearing very feminine knickers) danced in front of Gwennie as she lay almost but not quite half asleep and wondering what on Earth was tapping at her window, when there was one almighty thump, and despite being half asleep she almost leapt out of bed, shaking whatever Junior was growing in her womb until it wondered if it had done something very wrong, which of course it hadn’t.

“Open the window sweetie,” begged the doll in a delightful young-doll voice, and because Gwennie was an angel of a girl she did as she was told and opened the window, and Gunjy jumped in.

“That’s better,” grinned the doll-like visitor, “it was getting cold out there, with rain forecasted on the Beeb.”

“Who…” began Gwennie. She wanted to ask what on Earth a doll was doing in her bedroom when she’d given up having dolls years ago, but thought direct questions might be too rude for a proper person like herself to ask. Her late lamented bullish husband might have launched into a whole series of unnecessarily rude questions, but that was him and she had learned that many of his ways had been positively crass.

“Me?” asked Gunjy? “I’m Gunjy Gordon, which may or may not be a name you’ve heard of, and I’ve come to ask you a really vital favour.”

“Er… yes?” queried Gwennie wondering what someone who looked very much like a doll could possibly need from her.

“It’s just that I lost mine…” began Gunjy tentatively, “It was heartbreaking, really, but she died. I wept for days. You’ll understand if you lose yours…”

“Lose my what?” asked Gwennie, totally confused.

“Baby, of course. You are expecting a baby, sren’t you? They reckon in the Noble Heights of Overland that of all the people on this God-forsaken planet that you are both in the family way and, gloriously, the nicest person who ever lived…”

“That’s nice of them to say and yes, I am expecting,” murmured Gwennie

“Well?” asked Gunjy.

“I don’t understand. Well what?” frowned Gwennie

“Oops, silly me!” exclaimed the doll, “I forgot the important bit didn’t I? The asking bit…”

“If there is such a thing, yes, you never mentioned it,” said a puzzled Gwennie

“I’d better get on with it, then,” smiled Gunjy, “it’s just, I lost my baby, a girl it was, such a pretty thing, but it was born without a breath in its body. So can I have yours?”

Had the question been a punch with the weight of a giant behind it Gwennie couldn’t have been more shocked. Was this really happening, this conversation with a living doll, or was she dreaming?

“If course not!” she replied after a micro-second of thinking, and then, “my baby will be human sized and you’re, well, you’re a lot smaller. My baby, when it’s bornt, will be bigger than you are already!”

“The lords of the Noble Heights of Overland mentioned that and said they could quite easily shrink it until it’s the right size for me. Oh, Gwennie, you’ve no idea how happy that would make me! I would love it and call it Quinky, which is a family name and means best beloved! I would feed her on the best honey and bathe her in the sweetest waters anywhere in the universe even if I had to travel to Betelgeuse to collect it!”

“But the baby will be my baby and is not for sale,” said Gwennie, her voice raised so that her mother downstairs heard and thought she must be dreaming.

“But I will love her…” Tears were forming in the doll’s painted eyes and the ever kindly Gwennie couldn’t help feeling sorry for her.

Then she had a thought.

“You said you will love her,” she smiled, “and I would if it was going to be a daughter, but I’ve had a scan and there’s no doubt about it, my baby is going to be a little boy.”

Gunjy stamped both feet irritably. “A boy?” she demanded, “you mean a perfect human like you are said to be is actually going to have a male baby? A snotty nosed burping boy child that enjoys playing with mud and frogs, and not a delightful and fragrant daughter with a honey-sweet smile and innocent eyes?”

“Exactly,” smiled Gwennie, “it’s what the scan showed. We could clearly make out its little thingy.”

Gunji scowled. Not a pleasant sight, a doll scowling, but Gwennie was unperturbed. “Then I must be off!” the doll said, “I’m sorry to have bothered you and I bid you farewell!”

Then she was gone.

Next day an ambulance called to take Gwennie to the maternity hospital in town and she was smiled at and cooed over by midwives and nurses who looked exactly like some from Call the Midwife on the telly.

“Have you thought what you’re going to call your baby?” asked one of them, smiling so sweetly she might have been made of sugar, and glancing down at her notes.

“I thought Peter,” replied Gwennie.

“Oh dear,” smiled the nurse, “then you may have to think again! The scanner was playing up and we’ve decided it looks more like a sweet little girl than a baby boy after a great deal of studying the image…”

Somewhere in the mysterious Noble Heights of Overland wherever they might be Gwennie quite clearly heard a doll-like cackle and a heart-rending sob.

© Peter Rogerson 18.09.24

xxx