Becoming an Aunt

I became an aunt aged 5, November 1989, the same day as the Berlin wall fell.

The hospital tea run, the nurse with a pen sticking out of her pocket behind the desk, the clouds hovering in the sky, the white tiled floor, the carton of orange juice my mother got me when I grew restless and thirsty. Ordinary day.

When you're five, your world is the only world. I was the only person to become an Aunt ever, in the history of the Universe. The sky was just for me. There was a truth. Where was Berlin?

Three generations of my family gathered in the hospital from early until late, waiting, waiting, until eventually my nephew was finally A Person, a real little person, and he lay there all small and squashed, and I thought he was so strange. Someone brought a cake, cut me a slice, two slices, and I ate and ate.

Later, I felt sick from eating so much. I lay in my bed with the covers over my mouth to stop me being sick, it worked, eventually I fell asleep.

Dreamed about babies, their strange little hands, their lack of teeth, their crying, their jars of weird food, awoke and vowed to myself I'd never have one, didn't want one, too weird, too small, too scary, especially boys.

Asked my Mum what love was as she made my breakfast. Will I be in love when I'm grown up, Mummy?

She laughed and said you just wait 'til you're grown up honey, don't worry about things like that now.

I said, what are babies for?

A week later we went to the park with everyone, for a walk. I saw an old man. I found it difficult to imagine him as a baby. He had a cigar hanging from his lips, he had creases in his forehead, he was wearing smart clothes, he smelled of a strange smell, not of soap or the same perfume my mother wore.

Don't stare, she said.

My nephew lay in his pram, making noises but not words. He was called Matthew. I stared at him instead.

I said, Hello Matthew and he wound his tiny hand around three of my fingers as it started to rain.