Free Everything and Nothing by Araminta Hall

paperweight perilously close to the edge of the desk.
    ‘God, Betty, what are you doing?’ she shouted. Betty’s lip started to tremble. ‘Sorry,’ she said to the doctor. ‘Hal has never eaten anything solid. Ever. He lives on bottles of milk.’
    ‘How many does he have a day?’
    The truth seemed suddenly untenable in this pristine office and so Ruth pointlessly lied. ‘About ten.’
    ‘At least they’re sustaining.’
    ‘Yes, but he’s nearly three.’
    The silence was broken by the sound of Hal’s sucking. It could have been funny.
    ‘Do you offer him food?’
    ‘Every day. Every meal.’
    ‘Do you eat with him?’
    Ruth rubbed the side of her neck. ‘No, not often.’
    The doctor wrote something down. ‘Do you work?’
    ‘Yes, but my nanny is brilliant. She knows what to do. In fact, she’s recently planted a vegetable garden which Hal helped with because she read that if you get kids to see the whole process of growing food, they’re more likely to eat it.’
    ‘That’s not a theory I’m aware of.’
    ‘It’s not just Hal’s garden. I helped too,’ said Betty, slipping from her chair onto the floor and starting to cry. Ruth decided to ignore her.
    ‘And how’s the rest of his development?’
    Ruth estimated she had about ten minutes before Betty launched into a full-scale tantrum. ‘It’s not great. He’s well behind where Betty was at this age. His speech is still quite limited and he doesn’t have many friends.’ Ruth thought she might cry. Her stomach felt as though it had been clasped in a vice.
    ‘Were you aware that refusal to eat can sometimes be a symptom of more serious physiological disorders?’
    ‘No, I wasn’t. Do you think Hal’s got something like that?’ She heard the pitch of her voice rising.
    ‘I’ve no idea. I have no reason to suspect that at the moment, I’m just saying it might be something we should explore further down the line.’
    ‘I want to go home,’ said Betty, from under the chair.
    ‘But are there any tests we can run?’
    ‘Not yet, Mrs Donaldson. One step at a time.’
    You can’t do that, Ruth wanted to shout. You can’t dangle a piece of information like that and not follow it up. She wanted to stand up and shake the stupid man until he told her every possibility.
    ‘Have you tried not giving him bottles?’
    ‘No. My husband did suggest that, but it seemed too cruel.’
    Dr Hackett looked at her over his glasses and a look of pure contempt clouded his features. ‘Cruel to be kind, I’d say.’
    ‘Mummy, I want to go. You said I could get a new Brat.’
    Ruth looked down at her daughter sprawled on the floor, her face turning red as she worked her way up to a howl and momentarily hated her. ‘Not now, Betty, I’m talking. You won’t get a new Brat unless you behave.’
    ‘Do you work full time, Mrs Donaldson?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Have you heard of separation anxiety?’
    ‘Well, sort of.’ Of course, of course. How stupid of her not to realise that this too was going to turn out to be her fault.
    ‘When did you return to work after Hal was born?’
    ‘He was about five months.’ Ruth nearly apologised but managed to stop herself. She felt very hot.
    ‘Five months is a bad age to be separated from the mother,’ said Dr Hackett. ‘There are lots of key developmental stages that can get missed.’
    Ruth’s mouth was dry. ‘Really?’ Why didn’t he ask when Christian had gone back to work or how much he was at home? Or if he had fucked his secretary whilst she was pregnant?
    Betty was wailing. Ruth had a terrible urge to kick her. It reminded her of how she had lain in bed next to them when they were tiny newborn babies and wondered how she would stop herself smothering them with a pillow or throwing them across the room. It wasn’t that she had wanted to do it, in fact the opposite had been true. But it had seemed so unlikely that she was up to the responsibility it would take to sustain and nurture a whole life. Hal