ROSIE NIXON lives in London and is Editor-in-Chief of HELLO! magazine, where she has worked for over a decade, she is also an author and mother of two. Her debut novel, The Stylist, is in development as a major motion picture.

Rosie has worked in the magazine industry for over 20 years and previously held senior positions at glossy women’s titles including Grazia, Glamour and Red. Rosie was named Editor of the Year (entertainment and celebrity) by the British Society of Magazine Editors in 2017.

Also by Rosie Nixon

The Stylist

Amber Green Takes Manhattan

Copyright

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2020

Copyright © Rosie Nixon 2020

Rosie Nixon asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Ebook Edition © November 2020 ISBN: 9780008273422

Version 2020-10-22

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 Page numbers taken from the following print edition: ISBN 9780008273415

For Mum and Dad

She thought she had known love before, and she did.

But it was just a whisper of what love had to say.

Just a tea cup out of the ocean.

And so this time she sat down and closed

her eyes and listened, really listened,

to what love had to say.

JMSTORM

Contents

Cover

About the Author

Booklist

Title Page

Copyright

Note to Readers

Dedication

Epigraph

Chapter One: Aisha

Chapter Two: Aisha

Chapter Three: Lucy

Chapter Four: Aisha

Chapter Five: Lucy

Chapter Six: Aisha

Chapter Seven: Lucy

Chapter Eight: Aisha

Chapter Nine: Lucy

Chapter Ten: Aisha

Chapter Eleven: Lucy

Chapter Twelve: Aisha

Chapter Thirteen: Lucy

Chapter Fourteen: Aisha

Chapter Fifteen: Aisha

Chapter Sixteen: Lucy

Chapter Seventeen: Aisha

Chapter Eighteen: Lucy

Chapter Nineteen: Aisha

Chapter Twenty: Aisha

Chapter Twenty-One: Lucy

Chapter Twenty-Two: Aisha

Chapter Twenty-Three: Lucy

Chapter Twenty-Four: Aisha

Chapter Twenty-Five: Lucy

Chapter Twenty-Six: Lucy

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Aisha

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Aisha

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Lucy

Chapter Thirty: Aisha

Chapter Thirty-One: Aisha

Chapter Thirty-Two: Lucy

Chapter Thirty-Three: Aisha

Chapter Thirty-Four: Lucy

Chapter Thirty-Five: Lucy

Chapter Thirty-Six: Aisha

Chapter Thirty-Seven: Lucy

Chapter Thirty-Eight: Aisha

Chapter Thirty-Nine: Lucy

Chapter Forty: Aisha

Chapter Forty-One: Lucy

Chapter Forty-Two: Aisha

Chapter Forty-Three: Lucy

Chapter Forty-Four: Aisha

Chapter Forty-Five: Aisha

Chapter Forty-Six: Aisha

Chapter Forty-Seven: Lucy

Chapter Forty-Eight: Aisha

Chapter Forty-Nine: Lucy

Chapter Fifty: Aisha

Acknowledgements

About the Publisher

Chapter One
Aisha

Saturday 24th April

‘Oh no,’ I sighed, holding the paper between my fingers. It had been on the fridge door for a month. Four weeks in which I should have read it to the end.

Still in my slippers, baggy pyjama bottoms and a slightly tatty T-shirt – low on style, but one of the few outfits that was still relatively comfortable at this stage of my pregnancy – I padded from the kitchen to the bedroom and stood in the doorway.

I looked at him with faint hope. ‘I don’t suppose you read this, did you?’

Jason grunted in response; he was half asleep.

‘Jason?’ I said, more loudly than was strictly necessary. ‘It says I need to bring a sharing dish to contribute to the lunch.’ I paused, searching his features for a clue, before adding a loud, cursory, ‘Great. You didn’t. So I don’t have a sharing dish. Aargh!’

It wasn’t Jason’s fault. Joining The Baby Group had been my idea and I should have read the paperwork. ‘So now I’ll have to leave the house in the next five minutes so I can stop by the deli and pick up something overpriced.’

As I flung open the wardrobe doors and pulled out my maternity jeans and a stretchy mauve maternity top, my mind was already ticking over, wondering whether I should take a nice plate on which to put the shop-bought sandwiches, with some foil to cover them, and whether perhaps there were some cherry tomatoes in the bottom of the fridge, which I could add as a garnish so no one would know they were bought. I grabbed a silver pendant and slung it around my neck in an attempt to jazz myself up a bit.

Jason had propped himself up onto his elbows. ‘Is it really that bad?’ he said, fixing his green eyes on me, concern mixed with a mild amusement etched across his face. That gorgeous face. He even looked gorgeous first thing in the morning, damn him.

‘Yes it is. I’ve messed up. You’re meant to take food to share with the group at lunchtime. We have nothing in the fridge. The universe is clearly trying to tell me this Baby Group is a bad idea.’ I paused and looked at him. ‘Maybe I won’t go.’

‘Baby, come on. You’ve got to go. You’ve been thinking about this day for weeks,’ he said. He was correct, I had.

‘Hmm, weeks and weeks in which I could have been better prepared. I can’t face it now.’

He looked at me quizzically for a moment, probably trying to remember if we’d had a conversation about the letter; whether he was partially to blame here.

‘It’s not your fault, I’m just annoyed at myself,’ I said, more softly, swallowing my frustration. ‘Plus none of my clothes fit and I feel like a frump. I’m not up for it any more.’

‘For what it’s worth, I like you in that top,’ he offered, as I pulled it down a bit more, watching it stretch across my impressive chest and large, round bump.

I ignored his compliment. ‘You know that food preparation isn’t exactly my forte. What hope do I have with no ingredients and less than five minutes to make something?’

I was brought up by a ‘feeder’ mother who took great pride in cooking delicious dinners from scratch and was very particular about how they looked. Her signature dish, a version of Coronation Chicken, made with a blend of spices inherited from dad’s Indian mother and smothered in yogurt, was legendary in certain Leamington Spa circles. I’d inherited my love of spicy food from dad’s side of the family, but none of the domestic skills. Though I was artistic enough to make a plate look good, the taste of its contents was another matter. Hence Jason was the main chef in this household. But he wasn’t quite as good at ensuring the fridge was adequately stocked. Oh, why didn’t I check the bloody letter? I managed to stop myself from swearing out loud.

‘I’m sorry I’m not going with you today, Aish,’ Jason said, ‘I really am. But I promise you, if you pick up a few sandwiches and pastries from the deli the other ladies will be really happy. Not many pregnant women turn down deli goods, from what I’ve learnt.’ He winked – an obvious reference to my obsession with the almond croissants from our local deli. ‘Anyway, I doubt anyone else has had time to rustle up a MasterChef-quality homemade dish. And if they have,’ he qualified, ‘well, they need to get a life, if you ask me. You must go, you’ll regret it if you don’t – and you never know, you might meet some like-minded people. You said yourself you’re keen to make some “mum friends”.’

I smiled. He knew what to say to make me feel better. It would have been nice to have Jason by my side in this first session, but I understood. We’d had this conversation a million times – he needed to put in the overtime while he could, before the baby came. Being an IT manager often meant him working unsociable hours. I didn’t like it, but I was used to it.

‘Thank you, Jase.’ I smiled and gave him a peck on the lips. ‘I suppose you’re right.’

Fully dressed, I waddled back to the kitchen to look for a suitable plate for the sandwiches. To be honest, lunch wasn’t the only thing I was worrying about this morning. Walking into a room full of strangers with the intention of making friends was a weird and nerve-wracking prospect. All that judgement. It made me feel anxious. And if that wasn’t enough, the day was also likely to involve some awkward chat about the perineum and confronting childbirth head on. I hadn’t given much thought to the actual birth bit because it made me feel nauseous whenever I did. I was convinced I was going to need a caesarean, like Mum, and the thought of being butchered in a stark operating room had cost me a few sleepless nights already.

I diverted my attention to our barely used kitchen cupboards, stooping down to poke around, looking for a dish I wasn’t even sure we still had. We’d had to shed a lot of stuff when we moved back from Hong Kong two years ago.

‘Crockery doesn’t travel well,’ Jason had reminded me at every opportunity. He didn’t have the same sentimentality for belongings as me. That was another thing I had inherited from Mum, a self-confessed ‘hoarder’.

Jason came up behind me, spreading his hands over my bump from behind. He laced his fingers with mine, and I reciprocated, despite the fact I’d rarely felt less sexy than I did right now – all swollen breasts, water retention in my legs, rounder-than-usual face. At thirty-five weeks and three days, I was rapidly getting too big for even my biggest maternity clothes. I didn’t understand those women in Cosmopolitan who claimed they felt sexier up the duff.

‘You look sexy today,’ he whispered into my neck, between peppering it with little kisses. ‘I wish I didn’t have to work.’

‘You were late home again last night,’ I muttered.

‘You were still awake though.’

‘I wasn’t,’ I replied, remembering how he had pushed himself into my back, in an attempt to gauge whether I could be warmed up for sex. Of course I was having none of it. We both knew that I had pretended to be asleep or had blamed my bump when rebuffing his sexual advances countless times in the last few months. Much as I fancied my husband, I just couldn’t face sex at the moment. I wasn’t sure how much more rejection he could take.

‘You were just pretending to be asleep!’ he protested.

As any woman who has ever been eight months pregnant knows, it’s practically impossible to be sound asleep anyway. Especially when your husband comes to bed late, having slammed the front door, which is just beneath your bedroom, and then starts trying to unbutton your maternity pyjamas, pestering you for sex.

I shook my head.

‘Right, sure. Well the little snorts you were making weren’t very authentic.’ He was humouring me. Sometimes Jason didn’t seem to grasp that my feelings about my body were not the same as they once were. Just because I had porn-star worthy boobs right now, didn’t mean they made me feel sexy. In fact, the opposite was true: I missed my B cups.

I poked around in the cupboard for a few seconds longer before realizing this crouching position was ill-advised for a woman in my condition and I wasn’t quite sure how I was going to get back up again.

‘Need a hand?’ He slid his hands under my armpits. ‘Aren’t you supposed to stop doing things like this now?’

‘I can do it, thanks.’ I shook him off and rose to my feet in a graceless fashion, steadying myself on the kitchen table and feeling like an overweight elephant in women’s clothing. It was hard to imagine there was a time when we’d had sex on this very table.

‘Listen,’ he continued brightly. ‘Provided I’m done before seven, which I really hope I will be, how about I take you for a burger this evening, to make up for today?’

He was pushing the right button there – along with almond croissants and custard creams, the quarter pounder with cheese and bacon from Honest Burger was another pregnancy craving. And don’t get me started on the salty, skinny fries.

‘Now you’re talking,’ I said, softening. ‘I’ll head home after the class, so text me what time to meet.’

‘Will do. And make sure you take notes – you’ll need to tell me what I’ve missed, so I can prepare for the arrival of whoever is in there.’ Then he bent down and spoke to my belly. ‘Yes, we are talking about you, little bean. Your mummy is going to be brilliant today and I love her very much.’

‘We love you too.’

This wasn’t the first time Jason had told me he loved me via my belly recently. He hadn’t actually said it to my face – or rather the round moon that used to be my face, complete with cheekbones – very often since I got pregnant. He used to tell me all the time, back in the days when we were dating, and when we were newly married. He would kiss me like his life depended on it and constantly tell me he loved me to bits. He’d leave loving Post-it notes on the fridge and text me sweet compliments while I was at work, which had the ability to make me smile all day, and feel like I was the only woman in the world. But he didn’t tell me so often these days, I’d noticed, and to be honest, I needed to hear it now more than ever.

Twisting to check the time on the cooker clock, I realized I’d have to waddle as fast as I could to the deli. I picked up my bag and kissed Jason goodbye.

After begrudgingly putting almost thirty pounds onto my card for eight ciabattas hastily stuffed with tomato, mozzarella and basil – the quickest thing they could do – and awkwardly asking the guy not to wrap the sandwiches, but put them straight onto my plate and cover the whole thing in cling film, I made my way towards the door. There was a sinking feeling in my stomach and my chest became tight. For a brief moment I thought again about not going to the class. Although I’d always known Jason would have to miss this first session, going alone suddenly seemed impossible. Plus my nagging worry that the class might involve something hideously embarrassing like acting out labour or talking about discharge with a bunch of strangers would still not go away. Imagine if we were expected to get our boobs out to practise breastfeeding or something? Could that be a possibility? Please God, no.

But I knew I had to make myself go. Jason was right, I did need to meet like-minded people – I needed some friends with babies. My closest friend Tara had two toddler boys, but she was so busy running them to and from nursery while holding down her city job that we didn’t see each other as much as we used to. And I was yet to open any of the ‘baby manuals’ she had thoughtfully passed on to me, so I needed to learn; I had to do this for the bean.

I took a deep breath and strode towards the venue. ‘We’ll do this together, okay?’ I whispered to my bump. ‘Just you and me.’

Chapter Two
Aisha

The meeting was being held in the back room of our local church. When I finally found the door, I pushed it open and saw a room full of strangers sat in a circle staring at me.

‘Hi,’ I said, cringing inwardly as I realized I was interrupting the introduction. ‘Sorry I’m late. I’m Aisha. Aisha Moore.’

There was an intense silence as I made my way into the room. Luckily the jolly woman who had been talking didn’t seem fazed.

‘Hello Aisha!’ she said warmly. ‘Welcome. I’m Maggie, I’m a doula and your group leader! Take a seat here.’ She indicated a chair opposite hers. ‘I was just about to ask the mummies to tell us how far along they are and where they’re having their lovely babies. You can kick things off if you like? Feel free to tell us the sex, if you know – only if you want to. No one has to discuss anything they are uncomfortable with. This is a supportive space. No judgement here.’ Maggie was a short, podgy lady, probably in her late fifties, with frizzy brown hair, a wide smile and small, kind eyes. She was leaning so far forwards, smiling encouragingly with her whole body, that it looked like she might topple off her chair.

I hung my coat on the back of my seat and sat down, carefully pushing my bags underneath. I’d have to deal with the plate of sandwiches later.

‘Well,’ I began once I’d caught my breath, ‘I’m just over thirty-five weeks pregnant and I don’t know what I – we’re – having.’ I rubbed my bump and Maggie nodded eagerly.

‘Where are you planning to give birth?’ she asked.

‘Hopefully not on the Tube!’ I giggled nervously and noticed no one else seemed to find this funny. ‘Hospital obviously – College Square Hospital.’

I saw Maggie’s eyes flicker. ‘Not obviously, necessarily,’ she muttered. ‘It’s a very personal choice.’

I felt a bit stupid. It’s just that a home birth had never really been a consideration for me; I wanted to be in the safest possible environment – especially if I might end up delivering the world’s largest baby. Jason had recently mentioned both he and his sister were ‘huge’ newborns and, judging by the fact I’d put on over two stone in weight so far, there was a high likelihood that I was carrying a mega-baby too. That was my reality – and that, in my book, meant hospital. But I decided not to go into it, because I noticed Maggie’s gaze move to the empty bucket seat on my left. ‘My husband, Jason, he’s working today, but hopefully he’ll be at the next meeting,’ I explained. ‘Sorry again for being late.’

A woman with blonde highlights a few seats to my right in the circle caught my eye and gave me a friendly smile, which made me feel a little better.

‘Super! We look forward to meeting Jason next week,’ Maggie beamed, her eyes lingering on mine a little too long – possibly trying to scope out how I really felt about my absent baby daddy. Thankfully most of the group were now eagerly looking at the couple sat to my left. It was two women: a small brunette and an equally small woman with black hair. The pair looked almost identical aside from the fact that one was Asian and the other white.

‘I’m Lin, and this is Susie – both spelt with an i,’ the black-haired woman said, before announcing, ‘She’s the one having the baby – I’m just having a food baby!’ The room rippled with awkward laughter. She patted her midriff, which, it had to be said, wasn’t too far off the size of her partner’s bump.

‘We used my brother’s sperm to make the baby with Susie,’ she continued, turning to smile affectionately at her partner. ‘It’s a boy. And we’re going to call him Charlie. We’re planning a home birth as natural as Mother Nature will allow.’

Damn. She really stuck the knife in there with the natural home birth. Plus Charlie was on our list of possible names, if the bean turned out to be a boy. Although my instincts were currently leaning towards it being a girl, I wondered if there was any etiquette involved in choosing the same baby name as someone in the group. Should you stake your claim, so they wouldn’t think you copied their chosen name? I thought about interjecting: ‘How funny! We’re thinking Charlie too! Loved that name from the moment I got pregnant. Bagsy Charlie!’ But would that seem too intense? Weird? Passive aggressive even? Really everything about being here felt strange because I wasn’t sure where the boundaries lay. I stayed quiet and tried to focus on how maybe Charlie wasn’t such a great baby name anyway, given we once had a family cat called Charlie when I was very little, and he got run over. Surely a bad omen. That settled it – Charlie was off the list. I made a mental note to tell Jason later.

‘And how are you feeling about the birth, in general, Susie?’ Maggie asked, drawing the other woman into the conversation.

‘Well I’m not a fan of Western drugs,’ Susie said, her voice quieter than Lin’s – I had to strain to hear her. ‘I’m opting for a drug-free, home water-birth involving hypnosis. And we’ve been researching a Balinese ritual involving burying the placenta in a special cemetery as soon as possible following the birth.’

‘Or we’ll have it made into tablets,’ Lin chipped in, looking a little cross. ‘We haven’t made a final decision yet. And we’re both planning to breastfeed. I’m about to start a groundbreaking course of hormones to make that possible.’ She squeezed Susie’s hand.

They seemed so resolute in their wishes, it made me feel even more insecure about my fears and lack of concrete plans. I made a mental note to google placenta tablets.

Maggie nodded and clapped her hands together with glee; hearing a more unusual birth plan seemed akin to Christmas to her. ‘How wonderful!’ she exclaimed. ‘That’s fantastic. You’ve clearly spent a great deal of time thinking about this. We’d all love to hear more, I’m sure.’ I wasn’t sure I did, but Maggie looked desperate for further elaboration.

Susie launched into a detailed monologue on how ‘placenta parties’ were a big trend in areas of San Francisco, where they simply popped the ‘delicacy’ into a blender along with whatever fruit, veg, even alcohol, they fancied and whizzed it up into a nutritional ‘placenta smoothie’ to be shared with family and friends. It sounded quite bizarre.

Relieved the heat was off me while she spoke, my attention wandered and I took the opportunity to look around the room properly.

It was then that I spotted an array of pretty plates and ceramic dishes brimming with salads and cakes laid out on the table behind us. I thought again of the shop-bought ciabattas under my chair. If Jason had been here, I could have nudged him to take them up, but as it was I felt too self-conscious to stand up and make another fuss after my late arrival. Under my chair they would have to remain.

As Susie’s lengthy explanation of the nutritional merits of eating human placenta came to a close, we all turned to look at the couple to Maggie’s right, a pretty blonde woman with elfin features and her equally blond, small husband. They were holding hands and looked very young, probably mid-twenties. I could imagine the petite, blonde, blue-eyed little baby they were cooking up in that perfectly neat bump. They introduced themselves as Helen and Ian Edwards.

Ian spoke first; he had a timid voice and piercing blue eyes. He reminded me of a gerbil. ‘Hi everyone, we’re having our first baby. Well I guess that’s pretty obvious, this is a group for first-time parents!’ he said, before laughing nervously. ‘We are thirty-five weeks. Don’t know the sex and College Square Hospital for us, too.’ He turned to Helen: ‘Anything you want to add, babe?’

‘No, that’s it,’ Helen replied self-consciously, before shrugging and smiling at no one in particular and then fixing her eyes on the floor. I smiled back at her; she seemed sweet and strait-laced. But maybe I was being too quick to judge. She might have a naughty streak.

‘That’s fine, dears,’ Maggie said, trying to mask her disappointment that there wasn’t another juicy set-up or alternative birth plan to discuss. ‘Welcome to The Baby Group.’

Next was the woman who had given me a friendly smile earlier. She looked well put-together, with red lipstick, a neat flick to her eyeliner, fresh highlights in her tousled shoulder-length hair and a black Gucci handbag. She gave the impression of someone who had a successful career and a decent amount of savings in the bank. Of everyone, she was probably the closest in age to me (around her mid to late thirties), which made me instinctively gravitate towards her.

‘Hi all, I’m Lucy Raven, baby boy, due May 31st. Looking forward to starting maternity leave in a few weeks. Still got a ton of nursery prep to do at home though. My partner, Oscar, is also working today. He’ll join one of the other classes. That’s me, I guess.’ She folded her arms and sat back in her seat, signalling she’d said her bit and wasn’t opening the floor for questions. She seemed to have her shit together – it was a little intimidating.

Maggie nodded; she seemed impressed too. I noted Lucy wasn’t wearing any rings on her wedding finger.

Seeing Lucy here on her own made me feel better about Jason’s absence, but I wondered how she really felt about it. She certainly came across as perfectly happy and confident, so I decided to take a leaf from her book and sat up a little taller.

The last couple to be introduced were sat on my right: a tall black guy with a chiselled face called Will, who could easily have been a model, and his partner, a white woman called Carol, who was not unattractive but not nearly as head-turningly gorgeous. Were Will single, I’d have been tempted to trade Jason in for him; he had ‘swipe right’ written all over him. There seemed something mismatched about them. Will did most of the talking and while he spoke, Carol delved into a little blue bag hanging from her chair and retrieved her phone, which she cradled in her palm as if she might need to ‘phone a friend’ at any moment.

‘The baby is due on the 22nd of May and it will be a hospital birth for us, too,’ Will informed us in a matter-of-fact way. He had a deep, thespian voice.

‘My husband, Christian, will join one of the other sessions,’ he continued. He paused for a moment, gauging correctly that we had all naturally assumed Carol was his other half. Carol gave us a small shy smile, while Will seemed to enjoy the attention from his captive audience. His timing was brilliant; I wondered if he was an actor, as well as a model. ‘Carol is our surrogate,’ he continued. ‘She’s had a baby before, but fancied a refresh, so we enrolled in this class. You’ll get to meet Christian soon.’ He turned to her and they exchanged a warm look. ‘Christian and I are both planning to be there for the birth, and then we will be the legal parents – the two dads. Carol will be moving back to the Ukraine.’ He looked at Maggie with a neutral face, as if waiting for her to ask a question.

Maggie simply smiled and said, ‘How wonderful!’

Will had delivered his lines beautifully and he had made me stop and think. I had been so consumed by my own pregnancy journey, I hadn’t really appreciated how difficult it might have been for other couples to conceive. You kind of assume that for everyone else it’s easy. Having some more unusual family set-ups in the group was going to make it more interesting.

‘Right then,’ Maggie announced, when the introductions were complete. ‘What a great group! You’re all wonderful humans, in my eyes.’ She really was an eccentric character. ‘First up, we’re going to discuss birth choices. But, before we go on, I have to tell you that nothing is off limits here. In fact, let’s just get something out of the way before we get in too deep, shall we?’ She paused and I unscrewed the lid of my water bottle, feeling self-conscious about what ‘getting in too deep’ might entail. Then she flung up her arms as if she were a cabaret singer ready to make an encore and cried out: ‘VAGINA!’ at the top of her lungs.

This was an inopportune moment for me. At the exact same time that Maggie made this dramatic announcement, I took a swig of water from my bottle. Instead of swallowing, the whole mouthful came flying projectile out of my mouth. A tsunami of warm filtered water sprayed not only down my top but also all down my jeans and on to the area of floor directly in front of me. I wouldn’t be surprised if Lin caught a light mist too.

‘Oh my God. Sorry!’ I yelped, trying hard to stifle hysterical giggles – my default reaction when in shock or when something embarrassing has happened to me.

Maggie looked at me in horror. ‘Are you okay, Aisha?’ she asked.

A brief silence was followed by a nervous titter, this time from Will. I wanted the ground to open up and suck me under. This was excruciating. Plus I was really quite wet.

Once I’d composed myself a bit, I nodded. ‘Yes, I’m fine, sorry about that.’ I dabbed at my face and top with one of the deli napkins from under my seat. At least the close proximity of the bag had come in handy.

‘Good dear, try to keep calm, we don’t want any early labours do we? There we go – I’ve said it,’ Maggie continued, ‘the V word. You’d better get used to it, ladies and gents. Now, after three, let’s shout it together loud and proud! One, two, three—’ She paused to looked around the room, especially at me, her eyes wide with excitement, as we simultaneously tried to avoid her gaze and stifle our sniggers. ‘VAGINA!’

There was nothing loud or proud about our pathetic, quiet chorus. I prayed to God there wasn’t a service going on in the chapel next door, then quickly realized the irony of that thought. I looked around the room to see whether anyone else was finding this hilarious. Will caught my eye and put his hand over his face, his shoulders shaking. ‘This is bizarre,’ he mumbled, between guffaws. Carol seemed a bit annoyed or perhaps confused.

Helen and Ian were looking at each other with pink cheeks. Lin and Susie seemed nonplussed, and Lucy seemed to be trying not to laugh too. I thought how hilarious Tara would find this. Shouting ‘vagina’ with a group of strangers was nothing short of ridiculous and I wished I had someone to cringe about it with.

Maggie ignored Will’s comment. I managed to pull myself together.

‘There we go – well done. That woke us all up. And didn’t it feel great?’ No one replied. ‘One thing you should know about me is that I love vaginas,’ she continued, clearly revelling in our puce faces. ‘I love talking about them and I absolutely love marvelling at the magical and wondrous things they can do. No fannying around here. And I love nipples too. Basically, I’m vagina and nipple mad.’

Will suddenly exploded with laughter again. ‘Sorry!’ he murmured. ‘But this is… unexpected.’ Carol gave him a quizzical sideways look, and I couldn’t quite determine whether she agreed with him or if his announcements were embarrassing her.

Maggie glared, unimpressed. ‘Well, William, dear, with babies you need to expect the unexpected. You’ll see.’

That told him. Will rolled his eyes. I liked Will; he was showing more spark now.

Right now my vagina wasn’t feeling particularly magical or wondrous. I was also painfully aware of what my poor unsuspecting vag was going to go through in not-very-many weeks’ time: scrutiny by various members of hospital staff, some painful war-wounds delivering my gigantic baby… It all felt pretty terrifying.

‘Lovely,’ Maggie continued, undeterred and looking happy again. ‘Now that we’ve broken the ice, let’s get to the nitty-gritty. Hands up who’s made a birth plan already?’

Helen, Lucy and Susie raised their hands. I instantly felt insecure again, for not having done mine.

‘I have it here,’ Helen said, putting the rest of us to shame. She had taken a folded-up piece of paper from a pocket at the back of her pristine notepad and was waving it excitedly, as though it held the meaning of the Da Vinci code.

‘That’s great, ladies. You don’t have to tell us what’s in it – I’m always happy to have a natter one-on-one if you’d like to, it’s a very personal choice. But I would say that writing a simple and informed birth plan – or a “vaginal instruction plan”, a V.I.P. as I call it – is a useful exercise to help ensure your wishes are known by your partner and birth team, and, of course, your beloved vagina.’ She paused for dramatic effect, and presumably to check our cheeks had remained a shade not far off beetroot. I was starting to think Maggie wasn’t the kind of person I would want in close proximity if I was actually in labour. I imagined her doing something embarrassing like shouting about my ‘magical vagina’ instead of finding someone to give me an epidural in my moment of need.

‘So, for those who have not yet created their V.I.P., let’s look at the options,’ she continued, before adding to the three who had raised their hands: ‘You might want to change your plans at the last minute – so you should find this relevant and useful too.’

I reached into my bag again, this time for my notepad and pen. Like most of my notepads, it was filled with half-finished sketches and doodles. I turned to a blank page and scribbled down ‘Write Birth Plan’, underlining it twice. Then I doodled ‘V.I.P.’ next to it, noticing my hand was shaking slightly. I felt thoroughly out of my depth.

Chapter Three
Lucy

I hoped I hadn’t made too much of an effort with my appearance, wearing a new black maternity dress bought especially for this occasion, new 40-denier tights and my trusty Golden Goose trainers. I’d applied more make-up than I’d worn in previous weeks, including a neat cat-eye flick to my eyeliner and a slick of a new scarlet Urban Decay lipstick. There was nothing like red lippy to put a spring in my step, even if those steps were more of a waddle, and my stomach was full of fluttering butterflies, as well as a baby. I’d given myself an eight out of ten, and hoped that my smart appearance would help me to give a good impression. The day had come to go forth and see if I could make a friend, or two.

Once the introductions and discussions about birth plans were done, we broke for lunch.

I watched with pleasure and relief as everyone made appreciative noises as they tucked in to my salad. It was the only dish that was completely polished off and I couldn’t help feeling a little smug. I played down the fact it had taken me nearly all of yesterday to create and actually felt a bit silly for having put in so much effort, when clearly most of them had bought their offerings from a shop that morning. When Helen and Susie asked me about the ingredients, I told them it was a family recipe. Helen and Ian had brought a pasta salad with tuna, cherry tomatoes and sweetcorn. The tuna had started to turn brown, since it had been left out all morning. I felt sorry for them as it was barely touched, but there was no way I was going to risk eating it.

Aisha wasn’t much of a cook either, judging by the shop-bought ciabattas. She seemed to be a little embarrassed because she set them down on a pretty plate, blurted out that she hadn’t read the part of the letter about bringing a sharing dish until this morning, and then made an excuse to get some fresh air. She needn’t have worried though, because they were delicious and all gone within a matter of minutes. Will and Carol had supplied deli-counter offerings from the big Sainsbury’s, so my biggest rivals for ‘dish of the day’ were Susie and Lin, whose decision to bring dessert would have been a good one, only their box of ‘vegan superfood brownies’ tasted more like bird food than the glorious stodgy ‘proper’ brownies from Gail’s bakery down the road. What a wasted opportunity – with a room full of pregnant ladies, chocolate brownies would have been a much better idea.

I checked my phone while everyone else continued chatting and saw that Oscar had WhatsApped.

O: How did the salad go down?

Me: Really well, thank goodness.

O: Excellent. How is it then?

Me: Fine. Although the teacher is obsessed with vaginas.

O: A woman after my own heart.

Me: Haha.

O: Well I suppose it’s a legit thing for a midwife to be obsessed with.

Me: True

O: I’m thinking about your vagina now.

Me: Are you on the plane? Are you drunk already?

O: Yes and slightly. I wish you could join the mile-high club with me. I miss you.

Me: You’ve only just gone! But you’ll be back soon enough. Class is about to start again – me and my vagina had better go.

O: Call you when I land.

Me: OK, safe flight.

O: Still thinking about your vagina.

Oscar had left for New York early that morning.

‘I’ll miss you, but I’ll cope,’ I’d said as he stopped for a moment and asked whether I was really feeling okay about him going off and not coming to The Baby Group, especially when my due date was getting so close. He had reassured me that his phone would stay on all night and he’d drop everything and come home immediately, if anything started to happen.

As he’d walked away from me down the hallway to retrieve his shoes, I’d watched his slightly gangly walk, and marvelled at how I’d ended up with a man so kind and considerate, albeit lanky.

Then he came back into the kitchen, shoes on, and gave me a peck. ‘See you in a few days – I’ll go straight to the office probably, I’m on the red eye. Proper kiss?’ He lifted my head to his lips. He was a good kisser. But I couldn’t press my body into his like I used to do when kissing him. I ran my fingers over the front of his trousers and he ran his over my bump.

‘I really wish I didn’t have to rush off this morning,’ he whispered.

And then we kissed again. When our lips pulled away, he was still holding my head in his hands. He fixed me with a look; a look of lust mixed with wonderment.

‘You’re having a baby!’ he cooed.

I smiled and shrugged. It was wonderful to see him genuinely engage with this pregnancy – a scenario I once feared would never happen. I pulled my chin from his fingers, conscious that time was ticking and I needed to get ready.

He hesitated. ‘Good luck today. WhatsApp me when you get out, tell me how it goes, and if there’s anyone you’re considering being friends with. I’ll be able to reply from the plane.’

After the break, Maggie tried to make us believe that the delivery of a baby through a surgical incision in the abdomen and uterus was a barbaric torture involving a long recovery process and thus should be avoided at all costs. I closed my ears and kept quiet for most of it, having already decided on an elective C-section. It was surprising how judgemental people could be about childbirth, when surely the aim was just to have a healthy baby, however it might be born. Half of me wished Oscar was here now; he would have struggled to keep silent and would likely have challenged Maggie on that. I wondered if there were any other secret caesarean sisters in the room. Carol’s expression had failed to give anything away all day, although my guess would be her as the most likely candidate.

During the afternoon break, I nipped to the bathroom, took the red lippy out of my prized handbag and topped up my lips with three strokes in the mirror. Perhaps Gucci had been a bit too fancy for today.

‘You’re so glamorous,’ said a quiet voice at the sink next to me. Lost in thought, I had barely noticed Aisha come out of the cubicle. She turned on the tap beneath her and we smiled awkwardly at each other in the mirror.

‘Well I suppose I won’t be wearing it much once the baby arrives,’ I replied. ‘May as well make the most of it.’

‘Yes, the red lippy will have to go – your baby won’t appreciate it when you’re smothering him in kisses, believe me!’ came Maggie’s booming voice from behind a locked cubicle door. ‘Unless you both want to look like clowns, that is.’

Aisha and I looked at each other and smiled broadly. ‘Does she literally hear everything?’ I whispered, as Aisha silently giggled.

‘Noted, Maggie!’ I yelled back. ‘No more rouge for me.’ I slung the lipstick back into my bag for dramatic effect.

Aisha had put her hand over her mouth to stop her laughter.

Maybe I might make some friends here, after all.

Chapter Four
Aisha

As I was leaving the group, Dad texted to tell me he had transferred £500 into my account to buy us a cot. I had panic-texted him during the meeting, when almost everyone else mentioned they had prepared cribs for their babies, just in case they arrived early. Obviously, Jason and I didn’t yet own one. I was just trying to work out how to tell Jason about the payment, because I knew Dad’s hand-outs were a source of tension for him, when he phoned.

‘I feel like such an amateur,’ I told him as we chatted while I walked home. ‘The others seem so organized, whereas my only plan so far has been to survive the birth. As it turns out, not-dying isn’t a birth plan.’ I sighed loudly, for dramatic effect. ‘It’s made me realize that I – we – still have a lot to work out.’

‘Oh honey, we’ll get there,’ Jason replied. ‘People have babies every minute of every day and I bet loads of them are a hell of a lot less prepared than us. You attended a Baby Group for starters. Surely that counts for something? Isn’t the whole point of going to a Baby Group, to learn and plan?’

‘That and make some new friends. I’m not sure I’m going to succeed in that either,’ I said.

‘I can’t believe they were all psychos or boring, were they? Tell me about them.’

I took a deep breath. ‘Well, there was “Perfect” Helen and “Earth Mother” Susie who both had their birth plans all laid out. One of them is going to have her placenta made into tablets. I’m not even entirely sure where to find my placenta,’ I stroked my bump, ‘let alone how to make its funeral arrangements. I mean, is that bad?’

He chuckled in response. ‘Sounds quite mad to me.’

‘Then there was this “Deliciously Ella” one, who had prepared a salad that looked like it had walked off the set of its own cookery show. And she was wearing red lipstick. Jason, I don’t think I’ve worn any lipstick for the last three months, let alone a red one. I’ve never felt less cool. She turned up with a Gucci handbag too. She looked like an Instagram post.’

‘Aisha, it’s a Baby Group, not an influencers’ convention. I don’t think anyone cares what anyone else is wearing,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t give a toss. Excuse the salad pun.’

‘But I care,’ I sighed. ‘Anyway, how was your day?’

‘Philip offered to pay me double overtime when I mentioned I’d missed the meeting. I’ll get at least two hundred quid,’ he declared, sounding genuinely chuffed. ‘I’ll tell you more over dinner later.’

‘Every cloud.’ I sighed again. I didn’t dare tell him about the money from Dad, which we were going to badly need because Jason’s £200 wouldn’t cover kitting out the nursery, not judging by the baby list Maggie had said she was going to email us all this evening. ‘I’m just popping home for a quick change of clothes and a rest. I’ll see you in an hour.’

When I reached Honest Burger, Jason was standing outside holding a bunch of yellow tulips. He looked so sweetly apprehensive.

‘Tulips for my love,’ he said, bowing down dramatically. ‘I’m so sorry I wasn’t there with you today; it doesn’t sound like you had the easiest time.’

‘I suppose I can forgive you,’ I said, taking the flowers from him and lifting my head to give him a kiss.

He knew yellow tulips were my favourite. They had been hard to come by in Hong Kong (whereas red roses had been ten a penny) and they had reminded me of home. Now I bought a bunch almost anywhere I found them. I loved them so much that when illustrating my last children’s book – yet another incarnation of a story about learning how to share – I put yellow tulips in almost every scene. When my new editor questioned it, I had my answer at the ready (I hadn’t been in this game for eight years and learnt nothing): ‘It adds another dimension. Once the adult reading the book becomes aware of them, the child can begin to search for them on every spread. I’ve done so many bunnies, cats and bears. Yellow tulips symbolise cheerfulness and sunshine to me. Please?’

I got to keep the tulips.

When we sat down, Jason slid an arm around me, enveloping me into a tight hug. ‘You’re going to be an amazing mum, you know,’ he said earnestly, turning my face so my gaze met his.

My eyes filled with tears. ‘I hope so.’ I took a deep breath.

‘I was thinking, with my overtime money, we could shop for a cot.’ He fixed me with a look of pure love. ‘Perhaps we could go and find one tomorrow, a really great one.’

I smiled. There was a time when a bonus would have meant going straight to the pub, and blowing it all on margaritas and later a Thai meal at our favourite local restaurant, and now here he was getting excited about buying a cot. Even though I would give almost anything for a margarita right now, it felt good, after his initial wobble when I got pregnant, to see Jason enthusiastic about the baby. It meant he was finally getting his head around becoming a daddy and it made my heart swell with happiness. This was quite a moment, because it was the first time it had been his suggestion to go shopping for nursery items. The last time I mentioned getting a cot, he had suggested we use the time to go on a date instead. He had looked exasperated when I had explained that the baby was likely to be in a cot for up to two years so it was important to do the research. But really, it wasn’t even about the cot – it was about us coming together to plan. Jason seemed to think having a baby was a fleeting moment in time.

‘A cot – can I just check I heard you correctly?’ I asked sardonically.

‘You did,’ he said proudly, moving a stray piece of hair that had flopped across my face. ‘I know it probably sounds ridiculous, but it’s like I’m finally really excited about all this. I was genuinely gutted not to be able to come with you today. I felt like I’d let you down.’ He paused. ‘But more than that, I felt as though I’d let our baby down. It felt horrible – and I don’t want either of you to feel like that again. I promise I’m going to be a good dad, Aish, I’m going to give our baby everything he or she needs – nothing will be too much.’ He looked down at my swollen belly and whispered behind his hand. ‘You hear that, little bean and your little placenta, wherever it may be?’ He glanced at me comically. I beamed. Jason had always been able to make me laugh. ‘I’m going to give you everything you need. Including a gold-plated cot, if that’s what you want. Well, maybe not gold-plated, but a super-cosy one. I love your mummy very much, you know.’

Although still not addressed directly to me, they were, at least, the words I had been longing to hear, but there was still a nagging worry: that Jason was managing to give the conversation a financial slant. He was still not over the fact his salary since moving back to London was quite a way beneath what he once earned in Hong Kong. Jason had been obsessed with earning money when we lived abroad; I had hoped things might change when we moved back to London, but when he failed to find a role with a large basic salary he put in for all the overtime available. I tried not to dwell on it, telling myself that all our baby really needed was love and his presence. And we were planning now, at least.

The conversation moved on to kitting out the nursery, and I downloaded the overwhelming list from Maggie entitled, ‘What to buy for baby and you’. It contained buggies, bottle sterilisers, changing mats, something called a ‘jungle gym’ and a number of strange gadgets – I mean, do you really need a machine to get wax out of the baby’s ear? I tried to push to one side the strong doubt that £200 would come anywhere near covering the cost of all this. I decided not to tell Jason about the money from Dad – plus the fact I might need to ask him for more – because I didn’t want to spoil Jason’s happy mood.

Chapter Five
Lucy

I had missed Oscar loads this week and it wasn’t just because of a mild concern that I might go into early labour and would end up having to ask our creepy neighbour to take me to hospital if I couldn’t make it into an Uber on my own. I missed having him around the place. I missed him wrapping an arm around what used to be my waist and planting kisses on my forehead. I missed his conversation.

There were some plus sides to him being away though – having as many pillows as I liked in bed was one. Also especially satisfying was the fact that it took me all of five minutes, with a hammer and some tacks, to put up the pictures I had chosen for the nursery walls, rather than a convoluted whole afternoon involving a painful discussion about why it was best to do this properly – i.e. the time-consuming way, involving a spirit level, drill and proper picture hooks. DIY techniques were a constant battleground for us.

‘What’s cooking?’ he asked, nose in the air like a sniffer dog the moment he had set his suitcase down. I took his hand and led him towards the kitchen, where he guessed correctly that I’d been busy cooking my speciality boeuf bourguignon this afternoon.

I puckered my lips. ‘Supper, for my man.’

Oscar smiled and put his arms around me. Despite the fact he was six foot three with long arms, I’m pretty certain they didn’t meet at the back. ‘It smells beautiful – but not as beautiful as you look, darling Lucy.’ He paused to look at me. I enjoyed accepting his compliments and stopped for a moment to bask in his besotted gaze, before shuffling out of his hands and turning to retrieve the oven gloves from the side. I gave the pot a stir, releasing some more juices, to labour the point that I really was a bloody good cook.

‘Something tells me some nesting has been going on,’ he declared, with an air of sarcasm.

There was no point denying I had become a pregnancy cliché. ‘Wait until you see the nursery.’

He followed me upstairs.

I reached behind the nursery door and turned the light off for some added drama as we both stood on the landing outside the smaller of two spare rooms, which had been turned into the nursery. He planted a kiss on my lips. As I edged open the nursery door with my foot, he whispered, ‘Maybe we should leave the lights off…’ Then he pushed himself into my back and ran his fingers over my breasts and over the bump. It occurred to me that my body was not too dissimilar to a camel’s, with two humps, right now. ‘I just find you so sexy.’ As he pressed himself into me, I felt he was hard.

‘Sexy now – but will I be sexy to you when my breasts are lactating and I’ve not slept for weeks?’ I muttered.

He gently turned my face towards his. ‘What do you mean?’ he said. ‘Of course I’ll find you sexy. You’ve never looked more womanly – I love it.’

‘You’ll still want me, when I’m a mum?’

‘Even more so,’ he whispered, hungry for me. ‘You’ll be sexier than ever to me when you’re a mum. You are blooming, Lucy.’

I turned to face him and we kissed slowly and passionately.

‘The Baby Group woman was saying that sex can bring on labour at this stage,’ I whispered, my bump between us, stopping us from pressing into each other as closely as we wanted to.

‘I don’t care, I need you,’ he panted, before gently biting my lip with a passion I had felt many times before.

‘Even with boeuf bourguignon in the oven?’ I smiled into his lips as we went in for another long kiss, soft and warm. Swapping sex for food was the only thing guaranteed to work with Oscar.

‘You’ve got a point there, Miss Raven, but your curves make me feel horny,’ he said. ‘I’m going to be even crazier for you when this little one arrives, but I know I’ll have to fight for your attention, because I’ll have competition. I need to make the most of having you to myself.’

I pulled back to take in his face. His eyes were sparkling in the landing light. He looked handsome. I was aware that the dinner really was going to be spoiled if we carried on right now. I peppered his lips with shorter kisses until our mouths separated again. When I opened my eyes once more, Oscar was beaming at me.

‘Why are you laughing?’ I asked, thinking something about my appearance must be humouring him.

‘I’m so happy,’ he said. ‘I didn’t think it was possible.’ I knew it was his way of acknowledging not just the passion we shared, but our deepening bond. ‘Our future is so bright.’

I smiled into his lips once more. ‘I love you, Mr Bright.’

Chapter Six
Aisha

Saturday 1st May

A week later, Jason and I were on our way to the second Baby Group meeting when his phone rang. I knew instinctively it was bad news.

‘Seriously?’ he said loudly, stopping in the middle of the pavement. I watched him put his hand to his forehead and took an educated guess that it was his boss, Peter, on the other end. Then Jason said: ‘I’ll be there in thirty,’ and hung up. My heart rate quickened.

‘The system’s gone down again,’ he said. ‘It’s a nightmare, Aish, I thought we’d fixed the problems yesterday, but apparently not. Peter is going nuts because no one’s getting any emails.’ He blew air out of his mouth harshly. I wanted to feel sorry for him because he genuinely was having a work nightmare, but right now, I was more sorry for myself – and our baby.

I sometimes wished Jason worked for the ambulance service. At least then the unsociable hours and emergency calls would have the payoff that he was saving lives in the process. Instead, I have an IT manager who gets all the stress and upheaval, but with none of the genuine heroism.

‘At least you’re not actually in labour, hey?’ he said lightly, as if this was a sweetener.

‘Yeah, because if I was in labour, I’m assuming you wouldn’t be going in!’ I snapped.

‘If you were, I’m sure I could remote in, and keep working,’ he retorted.

I failed to see the joke and looked around self-consciously, hoping that no one else from The Baby Group was witnessing this. I was royally pissed off. Jason was going to miss another meeting. Not to mention he knew how anxious I was about going into labour.

‘Oh baby – Aisha – chill out, okay? Of course I wouldn’t leave you if you were actually in labour.’ He said it as though this was slightly funny. He reached for my hand.

My eyes burnt and my bottom lip trembled. I wondered if this was the kind of stress that could bring on contractions. ‘I just feel like you constantly put work ahead of me,’ I said, trying to stop my voice from wobbling.

‘Ahead of you and our baby, never,’ he said, sincerely enough to make me straighten a little. ‘Ahead of this group today, I’m afraid, yes. I’m as pissed off about it as you are, I promise, but this is my job – I’m doing this for you. We both knew what I was taking on and Peter wouldn’t be asking if he didn’t really need me.’ I said nothing. ‘Baby, we talked about this and how if I put the hours in now, I can be around for you in a few weeks’ time, when you’re really going to need me. You and our baby will need me. We discussed that, remember?’ He looked at me with those big green eyes. ‘Isn’t that what we agreed – I work my arse off now, so I can be around for as long as possible when it’s here?’

‘We still need you today,’ I replied, trying really hard not to cry. ‘I need you.’ I knew I was labouring the point, but I couldn’t help it, and stroked my bump for added effect. The thought of walking into the meeting alone again filled me with dread. It was just going to be so embarrassing having to explain why he wasn’t there for the second time.

‘I’m really sorry,’ he said, dropping my limp hand, because it clearly wasn’t going to show him any love right now, however hard he clasped it. ‘I’ll be back as soon as I can – with any luck, it will be quick to sort out and I’ll get an Uber and come and join you for the afternoon. I’ll be thinking of you, you’re amazing, you don’t need me, you can do this.’ He lowered his face to my belly. ‘I love you and this little bean so much. I do, you know.’ Then he kissed me on the forehead and dashed off in the opposite direction to the one we were meant to be going in.

Fortunately I was one of the first to arrive at the group – only Helen and Ian had taken their seats – so I had a quiet word with Maggie.

‘Jason got called away for work suddenly. He’s a manager for the IT department of a bank – in the city,’ I said. ‘There was an emergency situation with their systems going down, something to do with a software update.’ I was babbling. ‘He’s the manager.’ I immediately felt silly for going into so much detail and feeling the need to repeat the manager part, in case she hadn’t heard, as if this somehow validated his absence. Who was I trying to kid? I just hoped he would be there next time.

‘It sounds terribly techy, I don’t have a clue about all of that,’ Maggie said, her chirpy voice a comfort to me now. ‘We’ll miss him, but I suppose it can’t be helped.’ She paused to look me in the eye. ‘Are you okay, dear?’

‘Absolutely fine,’ I lied. ‘He’ll be here next week.’ And I took my seat.

When we had all settled into the same places as last time, Maggie began: ‘In today’s session, we’re going to act out a vaginal birth and also a caesarean section and then we’ll be talking about body awareness, breathing and massage.’

I watched Helen sip from an extra-large Caffè Nero cup and wished I’d thought of picking something up myself. How I missed my daily caffeine fix. If you gave me a pound for the number of times I’d hoped a barista would accidentally make it a proper coffee rather than decaf, I’d be handing over a piggy bank heavy enough to pay for a new deluxe iCandy stroller by now. Though I’d bet Helen was sipping something herbal.

‘Would anyone like to share if they are planning to go the caesarean route?’ Maggie asked. Her dark, piggyish eyes darted around the room expectantly.

I averted my eyes from hers and immediately thought of Mum. Lately I’d been thinking about her more than ever. As I saw my bump grow, resembling the colourful, inflatable beach ball I’d played with on childhood holidays in France, sometimes my whole body ached for her. There were so many questions I wanted to ask her, but would never get the chance.

Did she suffer the same debilitating morning sickness I had endured for the first sixteen weeks? Had she opted for the caesarean section birth, or was it an emergency? I remembered her showing me her faint scar, but I couldn’t recall the whole story and it bothered me that I hadn’t paid more attention. Perhaps the combination of the sickness and the C-section was why my mum had stopped at one child. After the sickness I had experienced, I didn’t blame her. Perhaps I would feel complete with one child too. Mum always led me to believe she couldn’t imagine loving any other child as much as she loved me, but I never knew if there was really another reason. All I knew was that I could be headed for a C-section too, but that at the end of the day did it really matter, because this baby inside me was so very wanted and so deeply loved.

Lucy was the only person who raised her hand. I clocked the empty seat next to her and it offered me a little comfort to see that she was also flying solo again today. ‘I’m electing for a caesarean,’ she said confidently. ‘It might seem controversial, but I have my reasons and I’m sure this is the right route for me.’ She folded her arms and sat back in her seat. I admired her ability to shut down a conversation.

‘Wonderful,’ Maggie said awkwardly. ‘Feel free to discuss your decision with me at any time, if you’d like to. I’ll be asking you to pair up to practise a few of the breathing and massage techniques first,’ she continued. ‘We’ll save the C-section until after lunch.’ Presumably so it didn’t put any of us off our food. I felt a little sorry for Lucy and the way Maggie had made it sound like something she frowned upon. Lucy clearly had her reasons – and it wasn’t as if I hadn’t considered one too, because of Mum. Pregnancy could make people so judgemental.

The idea of practical demonstrations made me shift uncomfortably. Don’t split up the couples. Please don’t split the couples. I didn’t want someone else’s husband’s hands on me. Although perhaps I could make an exception for Will…

‘Aisha and Lucy, you can work together please,’ Maggie said.

I successfully caught Lucy’s eye and we exchanged a shy smile in acknowledgement. Seeing as we were both partnerless, it made sense for us to work together, even though the idea of giving and receiving massages from another pregnant woman – and especially someone as well put-together as Lucy – wasn’t exactly making me feel relaxed.

‘Sorry, you seem to have drawn the short straw,’ Lucy said as Maggie indicated I should move to the chair next to Lucy.

‘Not at all, I’m just relieved she’s not using me to demonstrate,’ I replied.

Maggie turned to us: ‘Okay ladies, ready to give it a go?’

‘There’s still time,’ Lucy muttered, smiling sweetly, and I cringed in response.

A minute later, following a description of what we were to do from Maggie, all of the couples moved into position and Lucy slowly manoeuvred herself into a kneeling position behind me.

‘Well, this is embarrassing,’ she whispered. I could tell from her voice that she was trying not to giggle and the fact she was letting her guard down made me warm to her. ‘I’ve never felt less mobile.’

Meanwhile, I was on my knees, leaning over a chair, so I couldn’t see how mortifying it was for her because I was wrapped up in my own ridiculousness.

On the other side of the circle, I could hear Lin and Susie getting into the exercise. Susie was making loud, appreciative noises as Lin clearly hit the right spots.

‘Fabulous ladies! Great work over there,’ Maggie encouraged them. ‘Don’t hold back – remember that, everyone; it’s really important that you let out those moans and groans. And when you reach transition stage – that’s the bit right before the birth – if you want to moo like a big beautiful pregnant cow, just do it. Let it out! That’s right, Susie, “Moooo!”’

‘I don’t hear any mooing coming from you, Aisha,’ Lucy said sarcastically, as I felt her tentatively knead my shoulders. It was embarrassing doing this with a woman I barely knew. If it wasn’t so funny, I’d be livid with Maggie for putting us through it.

‘I don’t think I’m at the mooing stage yet,’ I replied, ‘I’m more in the “get me out of here” stage right now.’

‘I’m with you,’ Lucy giggled. ‘If it wasn’t so hard to move out of this position, I’d leg it out of here with you.’ We both snorted with laughter.

‘Whoa, Lucy dear! That position isn’t necessary for you!’ Maggie suddenly exclaimed, rushing over to us, her too-wide-for-her-body-shape navy trousers flapping and revealing the top of a white towelling sports sock. ‘That’s what the birth partner would do, yes, but it isn’t safe for you to do. I’ll come and assist the pair of you. I don’t want to be responsible for any injuries – let alone early labours!’ She held up her hands and gave me a worried look, like I was about to shoot a baby out of my vagina unannounced. ‘You okay down there, Aisha?’

‘I think so. Do I stay here?’ I asked, feeling vulnerable.

‘Yes please, just for a moment Aisha. I’ll demonstrate another gentle relaxation technique on you, if you don’t mind, and then it will be Lucy’s turn.’

I rolled my eyes at Lucy and mouthed: ‘Told you.’

She winced, and mouthed back, ‘Sorry!’

At least it felt as though I had a comrade here, because all of the others seemed to be taking this extremely seriously.

Maggie turned to the group. ‘Now, don’t be embarrassed if any of you ladies fart during this exercise – either from the rectum or vagina – it’s perfectly normal to be gassy.’

At that, Lucy let out a guffaw like a schoolgirl, shooting one hand up to cover her mouth as her shoulders shook and she struggled to contain herself. It took all my strength not to collapse into giggles too – or to fart.

Maybe she was okay after all.

Chapter Seven
Lucy

Fortunately, when the relaxation demos were over and Aisha and I had composed ourselves, Maggie granted us a comfort break. We joined the others in the tea-making area and I almost wanted to hug Aisha when she pulled a packet of custard creams out of her bag.

‘I’ve been craving these,’ she smiled, offering me the packet.

I had been trying to avoid refined sugar, as a general rule, but they were exactly what I needed right now. ‘Oh yes please!’ I said. ‘I thought I was going to lose it for a moment then. It was the most bizarre thing—’

Just then Helen joined us: ‘That was so interesting, I had no idea about the mooing,’ she commented. ‘Aren’t our bodies incredible?’ She looked deadly serious. I really did not understand how a person could not find the idea of mooing remotely amusing.

‘Well I’m going to moo that hospital down!’ Susie interjected, lightening things up. I liked her, she seemed a cheery personality.

‘You’ll definitely know when Susie’s arrived,’ Lin added fondly.

‘I just hope it doesn’t happen too soon,’ I said. ‘I’ve got a lot to pack into the coming weeks. I’m not ready to turn into a full-blown sow just yet.’

‘When are you finishing work?’ Aisha asked, offering the biscuits around again. I gladly accepted another.

‘I’ve still got a fortnight left at work. We’re down to the final two in a huge client pitch, plus I’ve got a campaign that’s about to go live, and my deputy is showing no signs of picking up the reins right now. I’ve got to supervise everything she does. It’s hard to focus on buying nursery equipment until I can get all of that tied up and delegated. Although I’m trying to multi-task… the nesting instinct is real and I’m desperate to get stuck into it. What about you?’

Aisha hesitated. I suddenly felt maybe I had said too much; been a little full-on about work. When you’re in the fast-paced world of consumer PR it’s easy to be swept up in the urgency of everything.

‘I’m still at it, but I don’t have to go into an office at least; I’m freelance,’ she answered quietly.

‘What do you do?’ Susie asked, joining the conversation.

‘Illustrator, of children’s books,’ Aisha said.

‘That’s so cool! Would we know any of your books?’ Susie continued.

‘Probably not. Well, I don’t know, maybe, I’ve done six over here,’ she smiled, her cheeks flushed as though she was embarrassed to have the attention on her. Aisha seemed to lack confidence, which was a shame because she was clearly talented, not to mention beautiful, modest, funny – she was easily the most interesting in this group, in my eyes.

‘What about you?’ Aisha asked.

‘Primary school teacher,’ Susie replied. ‘There’s barely a children’s book I don’t know, perhaps I’ll know some of yours. I’m just hoping this little one can hang on until half term and then I’m all good.’ She patted her swollen belly. ‘I can’t wait to stop now – you wouldn’t believe the probing questions I get on a daily basis from a class of six-year-olds. They seem even more obsessed with my placenta than Lin is!’ We all chuckled.

I had noticed a missed call from Katie during the session, so I took the opportunity to grab a brownie from the table – another Susie and Lin special, my sugar craving was strong this morning – and popped out into the street to phone her back. Katie had been my closest confidante since we bonded on day two of university and was the kind of friend who always saw the funny side of situations. I knew she’d love the massage demonstration story.

‘I need to show you something,’ she had said on that day we first met twenty years ago. Her expression was somber, as though she’d been telling me my cat had been run over. Then she’d ushered me down the corridor of our halls and into her bedroom, where her face had lit up into a wide smile and, giggling, she had pointed to a magnum of Cava. ‘From my parents. Want to help me find some hot guys to share it with?’

Katie had perfectly managed the delicate balancing act we faced at university – of attempting to be functional adults while having a strong desire to get drunk at every opportunity. I had loved her from the moment I met her and simultaneously discovered my love of bubbles. And, of course, we had managed to land ourselves the hot guys, for the short while we were together at uni anyway. Katie had always been there for me, even after our student days together had been cut short.

‘So?’ she asked. I could sense a mix of excitement and trepidation in her voice.

‘Nothing to report,’ I replied. ‘Not yet, anyway.’

‘I’ve been thinking about you all day,’ she sighed, disappointed.

‘But I am learning that doulas are vagina-mad, that I have a fear of farting from my front bottom, and that having a baby is totally insane. I can’t believe so many people do it. Tell me the details of your birth story again? It will make more sense to me now.’

She sighed. ‘Two words – car crash. Don’t you remember Daisy and I were in hospital for four days afterwards because I lost so much blood? I’m not sure it’s a good idea to remind you.’

‘Oh yes, of course, I’m sorry. Maybe don’t tell me then. Actually, I need to know. Knowledge is power.’ I felt bad that I couldn’t remember the details of Katie’s birth story, but the truth was that before falling pregnant myself, I had found it difficult to engage with other people’s pregnancies and births. I had kind of blotted out the fact that a number of my friends were getting pregnant and having babies around me and I had purposely distanced myself from them, because I was finding it so hard myself. I did it with Katie too, and I’m sure it must have hurt her. For a while it had stung too much – she seemed to have it all, and I felt resentful, even though I had hated myself for it.

I think my body had been waiting, waiting for The One – for the same feeling of true love I had been lucky enough to experience once before, a long time ago.

I had spent years basically on a treadmill of long periods of being single, trying out various dating apps, going on dates and having relationships lasting a few months at most; many of them enjoyable and some involving plenty of good sex, but none that I felt could go the distance.

Like Lennox, the builder who had come to do some work in my bathroom and ended up drinking a bottle of wine with me one Friday evening. We went on a few dates and he was good at foreplay, but the fact that he had never read a book and still holidayed with his parents, aged 39, had soon put a stop to things.

And Rich, the wealthy banker who, if I’d drunk a number of cocktails, we were sitting in the right light, and I squinted, looked passable for Ryan Gosling. He had taken me to some of London’s most expensive bars and restaurants – even a couple of swanky hotels in the New Forest – during our six-month courtship, but he had absolutely no sense of humour. He didn’t even find it amusing when I introduced him to the new Snapchat filters and sent him a video of myself singing ‘Do Ya Think I’m Sexy’ half naked while looking like a fluffy white bunny. It was never going to work. There’d also been Tom from Norway, and a couple of other one-night stands whose names I couldn’t remember.

I had taken a few risks along the way too, having unprotected sex in the middle of my cycle, then watching and waiting for the slightest sign of a pregnancy or a period symptom, wondering whether, if I was expecting a baby, I could give it a go with the father; if maybe there was a chance for us. But no pregnancy had come.

Curious to know about my fertility, I undertook tests which revealed, at the age of 35, that I had a low egg count. When I’d asked my gynaecologist how he thought it would affect me, he’d said brightly: ‘The best way of finding out is to get on with it!’ Noticing the silent tears appear in my eyes, he’d then asked: ‘Have you ever been pregnant?’ He had touched a very raw nerve.

‘Once,’ I’d replied quietly. ‘I had an abortion, a long time ago.’

‘Well that’s good news,’ he’d said optimistically. ‘I suggest you keep trying, and it will happen.’

I had never seen my abortion as ‘good news’.

I felt a despair and loneliness that the years since the abortion had failed to completely shift. When friends all around me had seemed to be gleefully falling in love, getting pregnant or talking about starting a family, I had withdrawn from socializing with them. Friends were easy to lose, it seemed. As time had passed, I had begun to think more and more about the person who got me pregnant when I was 19. I had viewed him through rose-tinted glasses and still wondered how different life might have been if I’d told him the truth, instead of ending our relationship. Would we have kept the baby? Would we still be together now, as a family?

But today, finally pregnant again, at last I felt able to make up for lost time with Katie. I listened with renewed interest – plus a mix of trepidation and awe – as she recounted her birth story, wondering what my experience would turn out to be.

‘Anyway, I’d better go back into the group, we’ll be starting again in a minute.’

‘Keep me posted,’ she commanded.

‘I will.’

This time I didn’t return to my usual seat, I deliberately sat next to Aisha.

Chapter Eight
Aisha

Sunday 2nd May

I had a dream last night that Jason missed the birth.

It was just before the baby arrived. I had gone into labour, but I couldn’t find him anywhere. I searched frantically around the house, panting as my contractions got more severe. Barely able to stand on my feet, I called him endless times, but he didn’t pick up. I called our mutual friends and family, and some of his colleagues, begging them to help me track him down, but no one could find him. I panicked that maybe something had happened to him. Finally I called an ambulance and I could hear its siren whirring down the street coming closer and closer to our house to take me to hospital. I was all alone…

Then I woke up.

The dream left me feeling unsettled; a feeling that, if I was honest, I hadn’t been able to shake since the day I found out I was pregnant.

I had delayed taking the test until I was sure my period was three days late – and even then I promised myself I would wait until the following morning to take it because you’re meant to get a more accurate result first thing. Jason had pulled an all-nighter at work the night before, and at 10 a.m. sent a text to say that they still weren’t finished and he would probably be home very late again. ‘At least I’m clocking up the overtime. I can probably afford that trip to Paris I’ve been promising you,’ he quipped, in an effort to placate me. It was hard to tell over text whether he was being sarcastic or not, and it was typical that he happened to be on an all-nighter at the exact same time that I was going to discover if we were pregnant. I knew he’d be so excited too and I wanted to share the moment with him. But the suspense was killing me. It was a moment I’d waited for, for some time. Jason might describe us as ‘casually’ trying, but it was anything but casual for me.

Jason and I had been open about our desire to have children since we’d started dating six years ago, so once we had got married three years later in Hong Kong I imagined we would start trying straight away, but Jason had been adamant about laying stronger foundations for our financial security before we did. When he’d been transferred to the London branch of the city trading firm he worked for in Hong Kong, ‘Project: Baby’ had been nearly ready to begin, and when he’d racked up a reasonable amount of overtime after a few months, it had finally been green-lit. But then another whole year had passed, without a hint of a pregnancy. Admittedly, neither of us had been fastidious about keeping track of the all-important dates in my cycle for the first six months, but I then began paying close attention. With Jason’s increasingly erratic work schedule, it had sometimes been challenging to pencil in any night of hot sex, let alone on the days I’d been most fertile. And whenever we had found ourselves able to spend a cosy evening at home together, one of us – mostly Jason – hadn’t felt up for it. Scheduled sex had never felt less sexy. When he rebuffed an advance, I had sometimes got the impression that perhaps Jason wasn’t ready to be a father yet, but I had pushed these thoughts out of my mind and carried on. As the weeks had passed, my wish to fall pregnant had grown stronger and stronger; I recalled myself as a young girl pushing my dolly around in the miniature pram Dad had bought me. She was called Brenda. I had loved that doll so much. A strong maternal instinct had been in me from such a young age so when it didn’t happen as quickly as I always imagined it would, I began to get superstitious about it.

If I’d happened to spot a solitary magpie on my jog around the common, I’d saluted it and muttered under my breath: ‘Hello Mr Magpie, how’s your wife and children?’ while urgently scanning the area for his mate and feeling deflated when I couldn’t find them. Each time I’d neared the end of my cycle, finally two weeks post-ovulation, I had obsessed over whether I was going to get my period or not. Each trip to the toilet had become a heightened experience as I hoped there wouldn’t be blood on the loo roll; each day I had been overly aware of my body, wondering if a slight sensation in my abdomen was a premenstrual ache or a tiny, fertilized egg implanting itself in my womb. And then when my period had come, there had been a brief dalliance with denial, wondering whether the first drops of blood were spotting related to implantation. I had googled pregnancy symptoms so exhaustively I knew every possible scenario. But this hope had always been followed by the crushing disappointment and acceptance that I was not pregnant again that month.

At 35, I wondered if I’d left it too late. A year of trying wasn’t long in the scheme of things, but when you were suddenly desperate for something, it felt like an eternity.

But that morning, my period slightly late, I felt different.

I woke up feeling really positive. After receiving the text from Jason, I decided to walk up to Clapham Common to keep myself occupied. Just a short stroll from our flat, I approached the common on the south side, taking my usual short cut through the back streets to reach the open space for a light morning run. I saw two magpies and then three, fluttering playfully between two big oak trees, almost bare of leaves, as crisp and clear as anything. It was a bright day, the air felt fresh and smelled of moist bark, and the dew hadn’t yet dried on the grass.

I stopped to watch the magpies as they hovered around the low braces of the tree, coming together for a moment and then scattering, their movements so rhythmic and graceful, they had to be a little family.

‘One for sorrow, two for joy, three for a girl…’ There were definitely three. ‘A girl,’ I whispered under my breath. ‘It’s happening – I’m having a girl.’ I felt it in my gut and there was nothing I could do to stop a huge smile spreading across my face.

After a shorter than usual circuit of the common, buoyed by Mr Magpie, his wife and child, I called Jason. He didn’t answer, so I sent him a message:

Hey baby – call me asap!

I tried to get on with some work. But although I read the email from my editor at least five times, as she detailed the list of amends to my latest illustrations, nothing was sinking in.

I tried ringing him again – no response. Even when the little white ticks on WhatsApp had turned blue, so I knew he had read my message, he still didn’t reply.

An hour passed, then two, and still no word. I just couldn’t wait any longer. I decided to take the pregnancy test on my own.

After drenching the stick and my hand in pee, I sat nervously on the closed toilet seat, my knickers still around my ankles, waiting for the result. I started trembling as one minute passed and the control line appeared. Then, slowly but surely, I watched in delight and disbelief as two clear blue lines came into view inside the ‘pregnant’ window.

‘Oh. My. God,’ I said slowly, out loud. ‘Oh my God. I’m pregnant!’ And I looked to the ceiling and personally thanked each of the three magpies that had brought me luck that Friday morning.

Finding out you are pregnant is one of the most defining moments in a woman’s life. The moment you realize that nothing will ever be the same again. And sharing that news has to be handled in the correct way. It was times like this that working from home as a freelancer was particularly hard because although I was glad not to have to contend with the claustrophobic, hot London Tube during rush hour each day, I was all on my own. The cosmos had shifted significantly, I was cradling an enormous secret in my abdomen, but I had no one to tell.

For a moment I was transported back to the times when Jason and I would meet after work when we lived in Hong Kong.

We’d had a small, but really cute one-bedroom apartment in Kowloon, high up on the twentieth floor and with a tiny balcony. The slightly batty porter, who had often been found talking to himself as he manned the security desk downstairs, had had a soft spot for me.

‘Mèilì, Lady Aisha!’ he would say –‘beautiful’ – when I walked past him most mornings, my arm interlocked with Jason’s as we’d head into the city, to our workplaces together.

‘Hey, she’s mine!’ Jason would joke in return, squeezing me tightly.

The thrill of seeing him waiting to surprise me at lunchtime outside my publishers’ building amongst the high rises of Central Hong Kong, looking handsome in his smart suit and attracting a few admiring glances from my colleagues – both male and female – had always lifted my spirits. After work we would meet for cocktails and dinner, or simply get on a tram, travel up to the Peak or explore a new area of the city, always holding hands. It had felt amazing to be on an adventure together…

I checked my phone again to see that Jason had still not responded, so I googled: ‘What should you do when you first find out you’re pregnant?’ and was confronted by a host of instructional lists telling me to work out the due date (20th May), find a midwife and figure out my finances, all the while avoiding a host of food and drinks, including caffeine, soft cheese, raw fish and alcohol: four of my greatest pleasures in life. I suddenly hankered for a double espresso and a cream cheese and smoked salmon bagel.

I looked at the clock. It was midday. I was going to struggle to survive a whole seven hours in possession of this huge secret until Jason came through the door late tonight. Besides, the little blue lines might have faded by then and I wanted him to see them too. I touched my stomach, trying to work out if I felt pregnant; it was all very surreal.

I took a shower and stared at my naked body in the bathroom mirror as I searched for non-existent signs that I looked different this morning. I tried calling Jason one last time but still no reply. Nothing for it – I’d take a leaf out of his book from when we lived in Hong Kong and go and surprise him at work for lunch. I had to tell him the happy news in person.

When I reached Jason’s office building near Moorgate, he still hadn’t responded to any of my messages so I asked the man on reception to let him know I was there.

The City building couldn’t have been more different to my cosy workspace at our kitchen table. I looked at my reflection in the tall, mirrored wall next to the elaborate reception desk. It was still me all right, but if I wasn’t mistaken, I looked a little paler than usual, perhaps a bit fuller around the face. Could pregnancy hormones be kicking in already?

When the receptionist had located Jason, he finally appeared through the lift doors. ‘Hey, what are you doing here?’ he said, looking more concerned than overly happy to see me. I became conscious of my jeans and trainers, a contrast to the smart pencil skirts with matching jackets of the women walking with purpose around me.

I took in his appearance – unkempt hair, bloodshot eyes, and the same shirt he was wearing yesterday, only now it looked like it had been thrown around a dressing room by a team of rugby players.

‘You look awful,’ were my first words. They were allowed because I was his wife and it was true.

‘Thanks, I feel it too,’ he murmured, not looking me in the eye.

‘I’m serious, you look shit.’ I bit my lip; stress wasn’t good for the baby. He was spoiling my special news.

‘It’s been a long night, babe, don’t make me feel any worse. Please,’ he said, firmly and slightly too loud, because a woman nearby glanced over at us.

Self-consciously I rubbed my wedding band. ‘Did you get any sleep at all?’ I probed.

‘A little, in one of the pods,’ he replied defensively. ‘I feel like I’m coming down with something too.’

‘And you had a few beers?’ I continued. I knew the smell of last night’s alcohol and he reeked of it. It reminded me of our early dating days, when he’d sometimes rolled into bed at my flat at 3 a.m. stinking of beer, but desperate to see me, blabbering soppily. A heightened sense of smell was another pregnancy symptom I’d read about.

‘A couple – we popped out at God knows what time to try to unwind for a bit before going back,’ he admitted. I wondered who the ‘we’ was, knowing that late-night shifts were often a solitary job. But I didn’t interrogate him further; he was clearly shattered.

I pressed my fingertips into my belly. Somehow I had expected him to know instinctively why I was here, meeting him for lunch like this, out of the blue. I’d only ever done it once before, and that was on his birthday.

‘Shall we get a sandwich or did you come here just to tell me I look like shit?’ he asked, heading towards the revolving door. He hadn’t even kissed me or reached for my hand. It wasn’t like Jason. I wondered if this was a bad idea after all. Maybe I should have just waited for him to come home in his own time. He seemed awkward about me being here.

We walked in silence into the warm day outside. From nowhere I felt tears fighting their way up to the corners of my eyes. But I wouldn’t let them break free, not here, amongst the pencil skirts and wafts of Elnett.

I forced a smile. ‘Where shall we go then? I’m starving.’

Jason suggested Pret so we got takeaways and, as it was such a nice day, headed to Finsbury Circus Garden. The pregnancy test was burning a hole in my bag. I wanted to steal a look at it, to check it still had a positive reading. That I hadn’t imagined it.

‘So, I didn’t come here to tell you off,’ I said, taking a deep breath and feeling a little stronger for it as we sat down on the grass together. ‘I came because I have some news. Some good news.’

I delved into my bag and encased the little stick in my palm. I moved fractionally closer to him, so as not to show it off to the entire garden, which was busy with office workers eating their own Pret sandwiches.

I revealed the tip of the stick and unclasped my fingers from around its body, so the two blue lines in the ‘Pregnant’ box were clear to see.

I watched his face for a reaction. He was staring at the stick, unmoving.

‘I’m pregnant,’ I whispered, in case he needed it spelling out. He can’t have thought I’d come here to show him a negative result.

His eyes were wide with shock, yet he still said nothing. I looked up at him, my eyes just as big. ‘You’re going to be a daddy, Jason!’

‘Wow. Oh wow, Aisha,’ he said at last, sitting upright, inhaling deeply and blowing the air out loudly. He took the stick from my hand and held it, not caring who might see. ‘Oh wow.’ He was almost laughing. ‘This is for real, right?’

‘Yes, baby – of course it is!’ I said, my eyes darting between the stick and Jason. ‘I really wanted to do the test with you this morning, but you weren’t home and I couldn’t wait any longer. I’m sorry.’

I paused. Willing him to say something – anything – to suggest he was happy.

Another couple of seconds passed.

‘Isn’t it brilliant?’

‘It’s amazing!’ he smiled at last. ‘It’s fantastic!’ and almost immediately it was Jason who was dabbing tears from his eyes.

‘We’re going to be parents,’ I beamed, finally able to let a feeling of pure joy wash over me. ‘We’re going to have a little baby.’

‘It’s – it’s mind-blowing,’ he said, and put a hand on my stomach. ‘To think our child is growing in there.’ And with those words, tears welled up in my eyes too. No amount of blinking could make them stay put.

‘I promise I’ll be a good dad,’ he whispered, tears rolling down his cheeks. ‘I swear, I’ll try my best.’

I pulled him into a big hug and he buried his face into my neck, breathing me in as he cried.

‘I know,’ I murmured. ‘You’ll be the best daddy ever.’

Five minutes later, I was still trying to console Jason, who was properly sobbing, on the grass, in the middle of Finsbury Circus. Was this normal? Surely this scenario should really be the other way around given I was the one with the raging hormones?

‘I don’t know if I’m worthy of this,’ he said, before adding, ‘but I’m so pleased you got your wish.’

He was right, I had got my wish – but wasn’t it his wish too?

In that moment, being pregnant was all that mattered. However, looking back, I couldn’t help but wonder exactly what he meant by not feeling ‘worthy’.

Chapter Nine
Lucy

Wednesday 5th May

The third meeting of The Baby Group was at Aisha’s house that evening and, as she only lived around the corner from me, it meant I didn’t have to carry my heavier-than-it-looked best ceramic dish very far. I had made an organic spinach salad with shaved carrot, toasted pine nuts and mango pieces, topped with a lime dressing – not my best effort compared to the first salad, but still impressive, considering I’d pulled it together after a full Wednesday at work. I needed to start taking things slower. After having a few Braxton Hicks contractions in the night I was fearful the baby was going to arrive ahead of the date of my planned caesarean on 24th May. I still had a week and a half left at work as I was keen to maximize my maternity leave, so this little baby needed to stay put. I turned down Oscar’s offer to carry the salad dish for me, but was heeding his advice to give up going anywhere on the Tube. From now on, he insisted I took an Uber to and from the office, because the last thing I wanted was for my waters to break somewhere between Clapham Common and Leicester Square. So this Baby Group was already proving its worth, allowing me to retain the semblance of a social life, right on my doorstep.

‘You’re basically paying for new mates,’ Oscar had joked when I first told him about joining the group.

‘No, I’m learning how to have a baby!’ I had protested.

Despite owning a sizeable number of pregnancy and childbirth books, most of them had remained unopened. And I had joined the group to grow a network here on my doorstep. I hadn’t found it particularly easy to build strong connections with the women at work and many of my old friends, including Katie, had moved out of London in recent years. I was still making up my mind about some of the others in the group, but Aisha had surprised me and was so far the lead contender for a new buddy.

It was a beautiful evening that felt properly warm, and as I strolled to her house in my flats and a long, clingy black dress – the only dress that still fitted me – I marvelled at how pretty this part of South London was. Most of the homes on the streets around here were well looked after, with pruned roses and the odd palm tree in the front gardens, white slatted blinds at windows and shiny gloss finishes and brass trimmings on front doors. You had to earn a substantial amount to afford one of them.

Oscar and I had only moved to the area two months ago. But our fling had begun two years ago. At first it had been exhilarating. I had never quite been sure if there were other women too and, initially, I hadn’t cared. It had all been part of the fun – stolen evenings in hotels during ‘business trips’ or booty calls after nights out. The sex had been intoxicating. But as time had gone on, my heart had started to yearn for his full attention, just as much as my body longed for his touch. I was falling in love with Oscar. He crept into my thoughts more often, although I questioned whether he was as into me as I was into him.

Then, one evening in January last year, Oscar had called to ask if he could come and stay with me that night. When he came over, there had been something different in his voice. He’d seemed willing to discuss the ‘us’ that had so far been off limits. ‘I’m ready to focus on the future now,’ he had said, before kissing me passionately all the way to the bedroom. The thought that he might want to be with me officially had been electrifying.

We had decided he would still live half the week in his Marylebone bolt hole, and the rest of the week he would spend at my Brixton flat. But my dreams of him and I going the distance, which, in my mind, involved having a family together, had soon become unfounded when he continued to make it crystal clear that he had already done the marriage and babies thing, and he didn’t want to do it again. Not getting married I could live with, but I had been devastated he didn’t want children with me.

So that was when I had had to take matters into my own hands. I had to think about my body; my biological clock. I was fed up of people making assumptions about me. I had to make a decision.

My getting pregnant changed everything. And now here we were – happy – I was so glad he had finally embraced it.

The only thing left to sort out had been where to live – we couldn’t keep the Marylebone/Brixton arrangement with a baby.

‘Clapham seems nice,’ I had suggested, imagining long walks on the common with my baby. Having a newborn in summer had to be the best timing, and I had envisaged a sun-drenched maternity leave of sitting outside pubs sipping a cheeky glass of prosecco over lunch with my new yummy mummy pals, while our babies dozed soundly in their prams next to us.

It wasn’t hard to find the perfect house to rent just south of Clapham Common near the chi-chi and sought-after Abbeville Road, with its handy array of independent delis and boutiques, including an overpriced butchers, a fromagerie, a Gail’s bakery and a gastro pub that buzzed with locals at every time of day or evening. For me it had to be that area – and through a turn of fate, an acquaintance of Oscar’s ran an estate agents in that patch, and found us the perfect place which we snapped up before it even went on the market. It all fell into place so easily. It was a good idea, wasn’t it?

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