Tonio by Jonathan Reeder Page B

years during delivery.
    The afterbirth still had to be removed, but the umbilical cord came, twisted and gaudy, into view. The doctor handed me a pair of episiotomy scissors. ‘It’s a tradition here that the father cuts the umbilical cord. Things didn’t go that smoothly today. We had to hurry.’ She fastened two clamps next to each other on the cord. ‘Can you do it like this?’ Just clip it between the clamps … yes, that’s right.’
    It made a creepy, crunching sound.
    â€˜We’ll give you a piece of the umbilical cord to take with you. Sealed in plastic. As a memento.’
    I watched as the baby was washed, dried off (more like patted dry) and weighed. He was three-and-a-half weeks premature, and underweight. The scale’s reading was given to the white-coated man, who was still writing everything down. Weight, length, the various times of the entire process. In the six months between high school and university, I had a job as ‘timekeeper’ at a machine factory in Eindhoven. Maybe that’s what this man’s job was called, too. He entered the time of birth as 10:16.
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    â€˜Have a name for him yet?’ asked the midwife.
    â€˜Ach, all those pretty girl’s names …’ I answered. ‘Yesterday we were sure it would be a girl. Tonio. That’s his name now. Not Esmée. Tonio. Hello, Tonio.’
    His cries, as he was trussed into a nappy, were high-pitched and yet hoarse. Miriam’s weakly beckoning voice nearly got drowned out. I went over to her.
    â€˜I’ve just unveiled the monument,’ I said. ‘Well done, babe … beautiful job.’
    I kissed her wet cheek. The women removed the afterbirth. As though identifying a flower, the midwife began picking through it in front our very eyes, offering icily sober commentary about how the foetus lived in the uterus. I had rather preferred to preserve the myth of the afterbirth. An aunt who had worked as a maternity ward nurse once told me how some of her colleagues smuggled placentas home with them to feed to the dog (like they also stirred breast milk into their tea). For a moment, I was afraid the doctor would suggest we all munch down the afterbirth for lunch — which would perhaps have meant a return to the myth.
    Miriam bravely endured being stitched up where she’d been torn during delivery. Later, she was taken by wheelchair, in which a sort of blotting paper had been laid, to the shower. The doctor took me aside.
    â€˜The baby’s underweight, so we’d like to keep him for the time being … in an incubator … for observation. You can go have a look in a moment.’
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    The blonde nurse came to ask if we needed anything. No, there was enough water in the carafe, and I avoided the coffee after Miriam reminded me how the stuff could stink at inopportune moments.
    â€˜A tranquiliser, maybe?’
    Yes, Miriam thought that was a good idea. A little while later the nurse returned, keyed up, with a handful of individually wrapped pills. ‘The head of the trauma team will be here any minute.’
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    â€˜As I understand it,’ said Dr G., the traumatologist, ‘the accident occurred on the Stadhouderskade just as it curves past the Vondelpark. It’s a nasty spot. Notorious, I’m afraid: we see a relatively high proportion of accidents at that intersection.’
    Dr G. was a tall, slender professor of surgery. He appeared self-assured by nature, but with us he had an slight air of diffidence. His expression betrayed sympathy for the parents: unlike us, he had seen Tonio’s injuries, both the external and internal ones. He was in a position to assess the boy’s chance of survival.
    â€˜I won’t give you false hope,’ he said without sitting down. ‘He’s still in a critical condition. I had to remove his spleen … it was badly damaged. Half of it at first, and then the rest. The impact caused a