“Hey,” says Eli, putting his arm round her. “I shouldn’t have
said anything. I didn’t mean anything by it. I think it can take
a while. And if it doesn’t happen, then it doesn’t. No big deal.”
But it is a big deal. Clem can feel the weight of it, it sits inside
her. Ghost child watches her.
“Besides,” says Eli, “the problem could be with me.”
But Clem doesn’t think so.
Clem goes for an HSG scan. She has given blood, she’s
peed in a cup, all based on where in her cycle she is even though
she doesn’t know what her cycle is anymore. And now this.
Naked from the waist down in a hospital gown, she lies on
her back with three people around her. The radiologist, a nurse
and a nursing student. The latter just there to observe. Next to her,
on a screen, she can see an X-ray image of her pelvis. Bones.
Clem is a skeleton woman. A skeleton woman with a ghost
child. The radiologist tells her that it’s a bit like apap smear, but
that she’ll insert a catheter and through the
catheter flood the uterine area with dye.
“You might cramp up a bit when the dye
goes in, like a period,” she tells Clem, “but we’ll
be able to see if everything’s in order. The dye
will fill the uterus and then the fallopian tubes.”
On the screen, Clem watches the catheter
enter her, long and white and thin. It pushes up
into the cavity amid her bones. She thinks of the
game Snake she used to play on her old
Nokia and wonders if the line will just keep on
moving and growing and moving and
growing. Then, out of the end of the white line,
darkness blooms. Fills her uterus.
But it doesn’t fill the fallopian tubes. Not everything’s in order.
Clem doesn’t have to show Eli the scan. By the time she gets
home, she is less solid, less real, than the X-ray itself.
“Look,” she says. “My fallopian tubes have gone AWOL.”
Eli tells her it will be okay. Clem drinks a bottle of red wine onan empty stomach while googling fallopian-tube blockages.
And then she drinks another bottle. And then she throws up on the
bathroom floor and in her hair, missing the toilet.
Ghost child lets out a long squeal and clenches its fists,
dropping to the floor. Stunned, Clem watches. Ghost child’s legs
are running nowhere; face screwed up, mouth wide.
“I’m the one that should be having a tantrum,” says Clem,
and notices peas in the vomit.
When Clem sees her GP, he tells her the scan is ambiguous.
“There could be a blockage or perhaps your tubes just
spasmed. It is an uncomfortable procedure, after all.”
Clem could see her tubes doing this – freaking out and closing up.
Maybe even just to embarrass her. Or from performance anxiety.
“But,” says the doctor, “further testing will need to be done.
Just to be sure. I’ll have to refer you and your partner to a fertility
clinic and they’ll probably recommend an ultrasound. And then,
if there is a blockage, probably laparoscopic surgery.
Otherwise, IVF might be the other way to go.”
Clem doesn’t like the idea of further poking and prodding,
insertions and harvesting. She hates being made aware of her
corporeality. She hates having to make a decision like this.
The doctor says, “We’ll also need a sperm sample from your
partner as it can be a combination of issues with both parties.”
Clem feels a little better. She’s solid enough to take a hold of the
X-rays and test results without them slipping through her fingers.
Clem tells Eli he has to see the doctor about his sperm. He looks
put out. Clem wants Eli to be a little put out after all her smiley faces
and vitamins and catheters and blood tests and peeing on things.
She wonders if any fertility procedures for men involves the insertion
of a catheter. Just to check everything’s in order. Or just for kicks.
Clem sits on the floor with the ghost child.
“I don’t know what I want to do,” she tells it.
Ghost child looks at her with interest.
“I’m scared,” says Clem. “I’m scared we’ll do
this and nothing will happen, and I’m scared that
we’ll do it and something will happen.”
Ghost child nods. Clem can see it understands.
“It’s just I don’t know what I’m getting if it does.”
And then adds: “I’m teachingRosemary’s Baby
this week so I guess that’s weighing on my mind.”
Ghost child laughs. And this makes Clem smile.
It is a nice laugh.
“It also scares me there might be something
really wrong. Perhaps I don’t want to know.”
Ghost child nods.
“But then I think I’ve gone too far. I can’t not
know. I can’t not try,” she says. And then, “I just feel lost.”
And ghost child takes her hand and it’s an odd feeling, barely
there, cool like water, but comforting. Ghost child smiles. It’s
a lovely smile. Clem likes it. It is, she thinks, a bit like her smile.E
Michelle Jager is the winner of the ELLE writing competition,
in association with Hachette Australia.“She
WONDERS
if any fertility
procedures
for M E N
involve
a catheter”FICTION
Photography: Stocksy