DAISY CHAINED

Charlotte Crammond

When they were small, Kieran gave Elaine a daisy chain. Each daisy was crumpled, a haggard joining of annual weeds. But Elaine grinned, an unabashed gummy smile. In that moment, she associated the radiant feeling with love.
        But he and his family went back home, their holiday finished for the summer.
        At sixteen, she held her first baby. Its little face looking up at her was the most precious thing in the world. It was her second experience of love, a feeling akin to motherhood.
        At thirty-nine, she decided to have a child. Elaine had moved to Stratford and found one of the best facilities for gynaecological clinics. At the sperm bank, she was handed various leaflets. A baby was on the front, the infant swaddled in a soft lemon blanket. In another, a family of three stood in front of a house and a picket fence behind them.
        At the estate agents, Elaine ran a manicured finger down the pane of two-to-three-bedroom houses in the area. The house she chose was described as ‘a well-presented semi-detached house that offers a fantastic family home with great potential for further expansion’.
        A year later, and six rounds of IUI later, she left the hospital, her baby swaddled in a neon yellow blanket. She got in the taxi and was driven to the block of flats. She waited for someone to come out of the entrance, thanking the man who saw the new baby in her arms, and kept the door open for her.
        She knocked on the apartment door, the daisy chain tight around her wrist.
        ‘Kieran, it’s me. Elaine.’
        ‘Who?’
        She lifted her hand, showing him her wrist. ‘Elaine Mayfair. I know I might look different; we are older after all! But I wanted you to meet your daughter. This is Kiera.’
        ‘How? I’ve never met you in my life! Did you immaculately conceive her?!’
        No. You donate at the sperm bank. But I think this was all fate because now we don’t have to be apart anymore, I have always loved you and now we can finally be the family we were always meant to be.’