Contents
Chapter 45
Overview
Noelle narrates Ellie’s covert home birth and names the baby Poppy at Ellie’s suggestion. She lies to health services to register the infant while avoiding scrutiny. As Ellie deteriorates postpartum, Noelle takes over care of Poppy. Overwhelmed and resentful, Noelle isolates Ellie, abandoning her behind a closed door.
Summary
Noelle recounts orchestrating a clandestine home birth for Ellie, having prepared alibis to avoid hospital involvement. The baby is born alive, healthy, and named Poppy at Ellie’s request, despite Noelle’s preference for a more traditional name.
In the weeks after, Noelle leaves Poppy with Ellie but soon takes the infant to a clinic to get weighed, vaccinated, and placed on official records. She fabricates a story about an unexpected pregnancy and a rapid home delivery, endures reprimands, secures paperwork, then evades the follow-up midwife by ignoring calls and visits while maintaining minimal clinic appointments for Poppy.
Meanwhile, Ellie’s health declines. Noelle observes postpartum complications—first a genital infection, then likely mastitis—advising Ellie to keep feeding from the affected breast. Ellie becomes feverish, loses interest in Poppy, and stops eating, repeatedly calling for her mother. Noelle assumes feeding duties for Poppy as Ellie weakens.
When Poppy is about five months old, Noelle, unable to bear Ellie’s pleas, closes the room and ceases visiting for a long time, effectively isolating Ellie while continuing to raise Poppy under her fabricated narrative.
Who Appears
- Noelle DonnellyNarrator; clandestinely delivers Ellie’s baby, lies to authorities, evades midwife, and ultimately isolates the ailing Ellie.
- Ellie MackCaptive mother; gives birth to Poppy, suffers infections and decline, pleads for her mother, then is shut away.
- PoppyNewborn daughter; named by Ellie, registered by Noelle, receives clinic care while Noelle assumes primary caregiving.
- Clinic staff and midwifeQuestion Noelle’s story, provide paperwork and appointments; midwife’s follow-ups are dodged by Noelle.