The rain poured down outside, running in rivulets down the windows, washing away the dust and grime of the steamy summer months.

She looked out and thought, And so it doesn’t matter after all that I forgot to wash the windows.

Inside it was warm and stuffy – suffocatingly so. Her husband had insisted on setting the thermostat on an unseasonable 27 degrees before he left for work, so that the baby didn’t catch a chill. She was sweating now in her fleece pyjama bottoms. Perhaps I’ll change, she thought to herself as she sat on the chair, watching the heavens open.

What was the point, really? Who was there to care that she was still in her pyjamas – still, at 2 PM, unshowered, unwashed, her hair unbrushed? Her husband wouldn’t be home until 5:30, and she could always lie and tell him she had showered, and changed, and changed again into her pyjamas, and he would know with a sniff the truth of it, but he would not challenge her. The baby was the only other person who would see her that day. He was indifferent; as long as she tended to his needs, he didn’t care that she hadn’t washed her hair in four days, that the underarm of her black t-shirt was white with crusted-on deodorant.

And so she sat in the chair and watched as the rain poured down, washing the windows that had needed to be washed when she was eight months pregnant and too slow and ungainly to wash them herself.

The baby was sleeping. He’d sleep for at least another half-hour. There was time still for her to move, to walk to her closet and find an outfit (stretchy elastic maternity pants, to fit her still-flabby belly) and take a shower, perform all the rituals of womanhood. Nothing was stopping her; nothing was holding her back except for her own ennui, her own sense of the futility of all of it.

And yet she was not depressed. She knew this. Or at least she felt it. She had wanted this. Longed for it. Worked towards it with a feverous passion. Years of tests. Months of hormones injected into her belly. All of them building towards this, this tiny helpless boy asleep in his crib, oblivious to the heartache, the expense, of his creation.

She had wanted this. She had willed her son into being. And now that he was here, she wondered if it was worth it.

It wasn’t that she didn’t love him; but she hadn’t realised how heavily that love would be tinged with resentment. How was it possible that this little bundle, only two months old and weighing less than the barbells she had once lifted routinely at the gym, could command her life? He was an endless well of need, taking and taking and giving nothing in return, apart from a handful of slobbery, milk-drunk smiles.

And yet he was perfect. Beautiful. His eyes, when they were open, had deepened to the colour of a winter morning. His cupid’s lips, so rosy-pink, were a source of constant delight. His fine silky hair, so wonderfully dark, was the softest thing she’d ever felt. It was as if he’d gotten the best of both his parents’ DNA, and transformed it again into something better still.

She knew she should feel grateful, after the years of treatments, the hormones, the false starts. But it was precisely this expectation that she bristled against. As her friends gathered around to stare in wonder at her son, they all expressed it to her: Oh, you must be so happy. So proud. This must be blissful. Must, must, must. As if she wasn’t entitled to define her feelings for herself!

She was happy. She was proud. She was blissful. But she was also exhausted. The endless monotony of her daily routine, defined entirely by the baby’s sleeping cycles – a feed, a burp, a bit of a play, a nappy change, another feed, and down again for a nap –unrelenting, despite the hour, despite the weather. The endless lack of sleep, a body still healing from birth, the sink-or-swim nature of motherhood . . . and every day, choosing to swim seemed a little bit harder.

The baby cried – she sensed it almost before she heard it, as her chapped nipples released a fine trickle of milk - and she went to him, like an automaton, like a serf to her lord in the manor. She cooed softly as she kissed the delicate top of his head. She brought him to her chair, and arranged him in her arms as the lactation consultant had taught her in the maternity ward in the hospital after his birth, and helped him latch on to her proffered breast.

And still the rain poured down.

What would she be doing today, if she wasn’t home with this baby?

Working. She’d loved her job, truly enjoyed being an auditor on the twelve floor of the tax office in the CBD. She’d loved making sense out of the numbers, teasing out their story, setting them to rights. She’d loved her lunch breaks with her colleagues, a hurried sandwich from the deli downstairs, a cup of coffee, and a few words of gossip.

Maybe she’d go back, after all.

Shopping. All of her life she’d loved fashion. As a teenager she would devote most of her pocket money to the latest magazine, and the rest to beauty products. She could go out now, she knew; wrap the baby tightly against the cold, throw up the cover on his pram, walk to her favourite boutique, just three blocks away, and buy something new. But why bother? Her breasts would leak against the expensive cloth as soon as she heard her baby’s cry. Her stomach, once flat, now had rolls of excess fat. Her hips were still too wide. Buying clothes, once such a treat, now seemed a chore, an exercise in self-loathing.

Maybe she should go back to the gym.

Eating. On her occasional day off, she used to love taking in a new restaurant, treating herself to a special meal. The quiet hush of an elegant restaurant in the early afternoon – the gentle tink of silver on bone china – the heavy white tablecloth – the sommelier – there was something magical about the experience, and she would imagine she was writing a review for an upscale magazine as she tucked into her lobster bisque or her tiramisu.

But not with a baby.

All of the things denied to her now, all of the simple pleasures she could no longer share. She had given them up for this, she thought, as she reached down to let him grasp her finger in his hand. His long fingers wrapped around her own, and she looked at the tiny nails, incredulous in their perfection.

And was it worth it?

She knew what she was supposed to say.

A couple of nights ago, as she and her husband sat down to another meal of rather ordinary Thai take-away, she had tried to give voice to her doubts. She remembered her husband’s eyes – the repulsion, the discomfort – and she remembered her own betrayal – the way she had quickly changed directions, taken back the few words of unhappiness, covered them up with rapid assurances of her blissful contentment.

Nobody wanted to hear her, she decided as she lifted the baby to her shoulder and patted his back.

The world seemed to belong to a single religion, she reflected, and that religion revolved around the worshipping of mothers. Women could be anything, do anything, until they had a baby, and then they were expected to play their role as high priestess, and happily devote their life to being consumed, subsumed, by a bundle of cells that could not even express its gratitude. And if they dared deviate from this path – if they dared question the worthiness of sacrificing all else to this endeavour – they were stripped of their priestesshood, made to feel a traitor to their own kind. Their love for their child was put on trial, and they were found wanting.

But surely she could not be the only one who felt this way? Surely she could not be the only one who struggled with the sameness of the long days, who battled the unending fatigue of a baby who would not sleep through the night, who wanted to scream every time a stranger told her, You must be so happy?

No, not a question. A statement. No room for doubt. You must be happy, or you have failed, you have let us down.

And so she would play her part. She would smile and give assurance that, oh yes, she was thrilled. Blissful. Happy beyond every expectation. But inside she would know the words were hollow. She would understand it was more complicated than that. And as the stranger would walk away, content in the happy assurance of her lie, she would crumble inside. She would fight the urge to run after and to say, No, excuse me, that isn’t the truth. Or at least it isn’t the whole truth. I used to be more than this. I used to be a person. I used to have a job, I used to matter, I used to count. And now I am just this, just a mother; but really I am so much more.

She laid the baby on his tummy, and he fussed and squawked, as he always did during tummy time. Outside the rain continued unabated. Inside she felt her stomach twist with the anxiety of forcing her baby to do something she knew was good for him, something he did not want to do. She imagined it would be like this for years, this battle between wanting to give into his own way and knowing she had to mould him into a functioning member of society. She resisted the urge to pick him up again and let him struggle against the sheepskin at her feet.

The gathering loam of late afternoon made her think about dinner. She had not even had lunch. It seemed too much of a hassle, to make something for herself, and besides, she had to do something to erase these tummy rolls. But she knew her husband would want to eat. She had promised him a proper meal today, no more take-away or cheese toasties. There was some chicken in the freezer, and she knew she should stretch and rise and bring it out. But how useless it seemed, to cook merely to eat, to dirty dishes that would have to be washed, to create more work for her, when she was stumbling through each day already, half-awake and not really sure she even wanted to be that.

Her husband was frustrated with her, she knew. She could sense it, could feel the weight of his lack of understanding, even without him giving it a voice. He thought she should do it all – watch the baby, take care of the housework, cook. He thought it should be easy. The dust on the bookshelf sat undisturbed, the dishes from his breakfast were still in the sink, and the baby was still wearing himself out on the sheepskin. And still she sat in her pyjamas, with yesterday’s socks crammed into her smelly slippers. She was a wreck, and she knew it; but she didn’t know how to unwreck herself. How to take the first steps of rousing, of re-entering that other world. Was it even compatible, that wider world, with this world of the mummy-cult?

Perhaps she would be like this forever, stuck in a chair looking out at the rain with a baby at her feet as her unwashed hair progressed from oily to gross to dreadlocks. Her baby would grow at her feet into a man, the world would go on without her, and she would be trapped here in this rocking chair, sacrificing herself on the altar of motherhood.

Or perhaps she would pretend, along with everyone else, that she truly could do it all. Perhaps she would rise from her chair and walk to the freezer and pull out the chicken. Perhaps she would put her baby down for his nap and take a shower and change her socks and wash her hair. Perhaps she would dust the bookshelf. Perhaps she would put on some music, something soothing, and greet her husband at the door with a smile, and in another month, or perhaps two, broach with him the subject of day-care and returning to work. Perhaps she would still find time for a sandwich with a colleague. Perhaps she would lose her baby fat and wear fashionable clothes again.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, she thought, And what road will I take?