Words by Michelle Fitzgerald // illustration by Yulia Shchelkunova
I still have my Mum’s number saved in my phone.
When my daughter took her first steps, I tapped your name in my contacts; it was reflexive and subconscious.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
I am frozen. Winded with a heartache I can’t put into words.
I still have my Mum’s number saved in my phone.
When I found out I was pregnant. I went to call you, only to remember I now have to go through the reception desk of the Dementia wing of your care home.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
I am listless. Heartsick and homesick in equal measure for a place I can never return.
I still have my Mum’s number saved in my phone.
When my miscarriage started. From the cubicle at school, between teaching classes. When the bloodied blob exited my insides, plopping into the toilet bowl. When I stared at it wildly; a caged animal. A grief so primal it swallowed me whole. I held my heart in my hands, wrapped in toilet paper, for what felt like an eternity, before flushing it down.
I fumble through my call list before it hits me. I can never go back. There will be no homecoming.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
I still have my Mum’s number saved in my phone.
When I fell pregnant again. Just months later. Cautiously ecstatic. A deep knowing in my bones that this time we would meet her.
I can’t wait to tell you. We’ve waited lifetimes to share this. I grab my phone, press your icon and again this fucking message. This stupid, fucking message.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
When my daughter spoke her first words.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
You can no longer talk.
Or walk.
Let alone operate a phone.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
When my first article was published. In the most beautiful printed magazine, I found myself through writing. Surfacing from the trenches of mothering.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
When my daughter started kindergarten.
When I was longlisted. Shortlisted. Won the playwriting fellowship.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
When I cried so hard, because I missed you so hard and I got a bloody nose.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
When I met you in my dreams; I woke up laughing and sobbing. A gut punch upon waking. Utterly incongruous with the chirping birds greeting the morning sunshine.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
When I see you in my daughter. Her fierceness. Her fire. Her stubbornness. Her beauty.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
When I catch myself in joyful abandon. A joy you never found and I know you would be so proud of me.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
The number you have dialled is not connected.
I still have my Mum’s number in my phone.
I know I can never call you.
Or return to being your daughter.
Or go back to where I came from.
But you will always, always be my first home.
