Chapter 10
10
As Jase closed the door of the counsellor’s office behind him, Isla had to fight the urge to cheer. And she could tell by the look on his and Aidan’s faces that they felt exactly the same way.
‘I can’t believe we’re all signed off and they think they might be able to find you a surrogate within the next couple of months.’ Isla whispered the words, almost afraid that, if she said them too loud, someone would come and tap them on the shoulder and say they’d changed their minds.
‘Me neither. It feels like we’ve been chugging along at ten miles an hour, and now we’re flying at full speed.’ Jase took hold of Aidan’s hand. ‘He seemed to think we’ve got good reasons for deciding which one of us will have a biological connection to the baby.’
‘That’s because we have.’ Aidan stopped and looked directly at his husband. ‘When we have a child, I couldn’t think of anything better than seeing a likeness of you in them somewhere, or of them having some of your traits. I fell in love with you for a thousand reasons, and if I can see just a handful of those in our kid, I’m going to love them all the more because of it.’
‘I don’t know how I got so lucky.’ Jase shook his head. ‘Although I’ve got a horrible feeling we’re going to put Isla off her celebratory lunch, before we even get to the restaurant, if we don’t shut up soon.’
‘I am feeling a bit queasy.’ She smiled as Aidan turned to look at her in mock horror.
‘We could bump this down from lunch on the Sisters of Agnes Island, to a drive-through at McDonalds you know.’
‘Do you know what, I could actually go for a big juicy burger right now and I never normally fancy things like that. Maybe all this talk of making babies is giving me cravings.’ Isla pulled a face. ‘God knows what I’ll be like when I start the treatment.’
‘If you need a burger at 2a.m., all you have to do is call.’ Jase linked an arm through hers. ‘In fact, if you need anything at all, at any time, we’ll be only too willing to help from now until forever. We owe you more than we can ever hope to repay.’
‘Unless it involves DIY, in which case we’ll pay to get someone in, because the Chuckle Brothers look like a crack team of builders compared to us.’ Aidan linked his arm through hers on the other side, and they set off like they were reenacting the Wizard of Oz . But Isla didn’t share the longing Dorothy had had to go home to Kansas, because right there, in the clinic corridor, sandwiched between Aidan and Jase, she had more of a sense of home than she’d had since her mother had left for America.
As the aroma of garlic and herbs she couldn’t have hoped to identify, drifted across the restaurant, Isla was very glad she hadn’t persuaded Aidan and Jase to take her to the drive-through. She might not have any idea how to pronounce the name of some of the dishes on the menu, but whatever it was the chefs were cooking up, it was making her stomach rumble.
The restaurant in the hotel on the Sisters of Agnes Island, which was cut off from the mainland in Port Agnes at high tide, was rated as one of the best in Cornwall. It was booked up for months in advance and Isla had no idea how Aidan and Jase had managed to get a table. From what she’d read, the restaurant was a favourite with the celebrities and other wealthy incomers who had second homes in the area. One glance at the prices on the menu had made her swallow hard, and it didn’t really matter that she didn’t recognise the name of most of the dishes, or know what they tasted like, because she’d be going for the cheapest option. Aidan and Jase had already insisted this was their treat, but she wasn’t going to let them blow a small fortune on her. They’d said they’d been given a gift voucher for the hotel at Christmas, which they needed to use, but Isla couldn’t help worrying that they felt they owed her in some way. When the truth was, they were the ones giving her a gift by allowing her to honour her dad in this way.
‘So, what’s it going to be, Isla?’ Jase lowered his menu to look at her.
‘The Caeser salad looks lovely, and I’ll just have some water I think.’
‘Nope, no salad leaves, not today. Anyway, calories don’t count when you’re celebrating. Everyone knows that, and I fully intend to have a day off from my diet.’ Aidan raised his eyebrows. ‘And if anything, you need feeding up.’
‘Now you sound like my nan.’ Isla couldn’t help smiling. Her grandmother had been known to turn up at the hospital with a Tupperware box of sandwiches, if she’d thought her granddaughter was looking too thin. It wasn’t something Isla felt was justified, but the love behind her grandmother’s gesture nourished her soul in a way that even the best sandwich in the world couldn’t compete with.
‘Not only that, but the minimum spend per table is two hundred pounds, so a salad and a glass of water just isn’t going to cut it.’ Jase smiled and she wondered for a moment if he’d worked out the real reason for her choosing a salad. But it didn’t matter, because he and Aidan were clearly determined to push the boat out.
In the end, she’d decided on the three courses Aidan had suggested she went for, because they sounded delicious: roasted red pepper and Cornish cheddar crostini, chilli, garlic and lobster bucatini, and warm pecan pie with clotted cream. Two courses in, and the food had exceeded even her highest expectations.
‘Well it’s going to be hard to go back to stir-in pasta sauce after this.’ Aidan pushed his plate away and sighed. ‘I didn’t know it was possible for something as simple as pasta to taste like it had been woven by angels. I knew it was going to be good when Gwen said the food here was almost better than sex, but I’m definitely going to have to drop the almost.’
‘Me too.’ Jase laughed at the look that had appeared on his husband’s face. ‘Hey, you said it first, which means you’re not allowed to be offended.’
‘You should know me better than that.’ Aidan was still feigning a look of mock outrage, but the twinkle in his eyes completely gave him away.
‘Well look who finally decided to take my advice.’ A strikingly good-looking man, who Isla guessed was probably in his late twenties, had suddenly appeared at their table. He had dark blond hair, green eyes, and the easy golden tan of someone who looked as though he spent a lot of his time outdoors. He wasn’t dressed like the other waiting staff, and he was hugging Jase in a way that suggested their relationship was a close one.
‘You were right, Rube, we should have splashed out ages ago, but we might never have done it without your very generous gift.’ Aidan held out his arms toward the younger man, earning him a hug too.
‘It’s nothing less than my two favourite uncles deserve.’ His words were muffled as Aidan held him close, releasing him just in time to regain the look of mock outrage.
‘We’re your only uncles!’
‘That doesn’t make it any less true.’ Aidan’s nephew shrugged, his eyes framed by long, dark lashes, and Jase suddenly clapped his hand over his mouth, as he looked at Isla.
‘Oh God, sorry, I’d forgotten you two don’t know each other. This is my sister, Tash’s, son, Reuben, but we all call him Rube.’ Jase turned towards him. ‘And this is Isla, who you’ve heard so much about.’
‘I certainly have. It’s so nice to finally meet you.’ Reuben held out his hand and, when she took it, the last thing she’d expected was for her body to react the way it did. It had been so long since she’d been attracted to anyone, for a moment she appeared to forget how to speak. When she finally regained the ability, she blurted out something she had no idea whether Aidan and Jase would rather have kept to themselves.
‘I’ve heard a lot about you too, especially in counselling today.’
‘Oh God, is it that tough having me as a nephew?’ Reuben grinned, matching dimples appearing on either side of his mouth.
‘It’s a bloody nightmare.’ Aidan’s smile mirrored his nephew’s, and Isla’s shoulders relaxed. It didn’t look like she’d given away any family secrets after all. ‘But as you well know, you’re also a big part of the reason why we’re desperate to become parents, and today the counsellor gave the three of us the go-ahead. So if the meeting with the surrogate goes well, this could just be the first thing of many that we have to celebrate.’
‘That’s amazing.’ Reuben didn’t look as if he could have been any happier if the good news had been his own. ‘I’ve got to go and meet with Francesco about next week’s order, but I’m going to start dropping off a fruit and veg box to you every week, and you can sort out the best bits for Isla. After all, you’re all going to need to be in tip-top shape to make sure I finally get a little cousin. Surely this is all about me, after all!’ Reuben laughed again and dropped the perfect wink. ‘It’s great to meet you Isla, and hopefully I’ll get to see you again some time. Nan keeps telling these two to bring you over for a family dinner. And that’s what you’ll be, soon – part of the family. Although, on second thoughts, that might be why they haven’t brought you, in case you do a runner.’
‘That’s exactly why we haven’t subjected Isla to family dinner night.’ Jase rolled his eyes.
‘You two just don’t appreciate it, because you were born into it. But, believe me, you’re lucky to have a family dinner night.’ For a moment, Aidan’s tone was more sombre than Isla had ever known it, but then he smiled again. ‘Even if you are all as mad as a box of frogs.’
‘We might be as crazy as Aidan claims, but I can at least promise good quality food. I run an organic greengrocers and deli, and I keep telling these two they need to ditch all the processed stuff they eat whenever Nan’s not cooking.’ Reuben’s dimples put in a reappearance. ‘I tried dropping off produce boxes before, but they never got through them. Left to their own devices, I swear they’d live off chicken nuggets and takeaways. This is my chance to get them to embrace the good stuff for a change. Nan always uses stuff from the deli when she cooks for us, and they never turn that down.’
‘It’s just the prep that always seems to stand in our way.’ Aidan pulled a face. ‘But you’re right, we must do better and my mother-in-law is a fantastic cook.’
‘So what do you reckon, Isla, are you up for a family dinner night?’ Reuben looked at her and she found herself nodding.
‘It sounds great.’ There was a note of wistfulness she just couldn’t keep out of her voice. It had been so long since she’d had a family dinner, where all of the people she loved most were in the same room together, without the aid of FaceTime. Aidan was right, Jase had no idea how lucky he was.
‘I’m looking forward to it already. I’ll let Nan know; she’ll be thrilled. I’ll deliver the first fruit and veg box tomorrow, so don’t let these two keep all the best stuff for themselves. They’ll eat the strawberries and grapes straight out of the box like donkeys, and leave you with all the stuff that’s supposedly hard to prepare.’ Reuben grinned again, and gave a wave of his hand, disappearing towards the kitchen, before his uncles could even respond.
‘We’d love to have you come to dinner, but don’t feel pressurised by Rube. I think he’s got his own agenda.’ Jase exchanged a look with Aidan, and she decided not to even ask what they meant. She already knew that a child raised by Aidan and Jase would be surrounded with love, and meeting their extended family would just enable her to picture that more clearly. It had nothing to do with Reuben’s slow smile, or wanting to hear that easy laugh of his again. She didn’t do romance and, even if she had done, she’d have steered clear of Reuben. The only way to keep your heart safe was to keep it to yourself, and she had a horrible feeling he might find it all too easy to make her drop her guard. She wouldn’t have taken the risk, even if there hadn’t been the added complication of him being Aidan and Jase’s nephew. He was off limits and, given how attracted she’d felt to him, it was probably just as well.
‘If you suddenly discovered your dad wasn’t your biological father, or there’d been a mix-up at the hospital and neither of your parents were genetically related to you, would you want to find your biological family?’ It was a question Aidan had asked himself so many times since he and Jase had decided to become parents, but he still didn’t know what the answer was, even as the woman seated across the table from him waited for a response. It was difficult to think about it from a general point of view when it was impossible for him to be objective, because the parents in question would be his parents.
Discovering that Sean and Anne weren’t related to him might have been a relief. It would mean he didn’t have to keep striving for their love and approval, or steadfastly avoiding a visit to their home just to discover he was no closer to the holy grail of being accepted for who he truly was. They could part ways, without the ties that bound, and all the platitudes about only having one mother and father and learning to cherish them whatever their faults. His dad wouldn’t have to sit nursing a pint, and occasionally glancing up at his son, po-faced, hoping that his dress sense would suddenly have changed, and that he’d finally have learnt to be ‘less obvious about all that gay stuff’, as his father had urged him to be so many times before. They could walk away from one another without any need for a backward glance, and let go of all the expectations that he’d find a way to fit in eventually. It was only when he realised that Chooky was still staring at him, that he remembered he hadn’t answered the question.
‘It’s a bit different for me than for most people.’ Aidan looked down at his hands, and twisted his wedding ring around his finger, the way he always did when he was anxious about something. He hadn’t minded any of the questions the clinic had asked him, but he’d dodged opening up too much about his relationship with his family. Now he had no choice, and he’d asked for this. Chooky, whose real name was Angela, was a good friend of Esther’s partner, Joe. She’d just joined The Sycamore Centre to work alongside him, as a children’s mental health specialist. They’d met when he’d been living out in Australia, where she’d apparently gained her nickname of Chooky, when she was still just a baby, because she’d had big eyes and a mop of hair that had made her look like a chicken. It was a name that had evidently stuck, and almost no one call her Angela. Aidan and Jase had first met her at a party, which Esther and Joe had hosted, and she’d felt like someone they could open up to from the start. So, when Aidan had discovered that she worked in children’s mental health, he’d asked if she’d be willing to meet with him and Jase, on their own, to talk about how a child might feel, when they discovered they’d been born as the result of egg donation. Now he was trying to avoid answering her questions with complete honesty, but Chooky wasn’t easily put off her stride.
‘What do you mean it’s different for you?’
‘I don’t have the greatest of relationships with my parents. So, I guess I would be interested in discovering if that might be different with someone else.’ Aidan finally looked up at her. ‘But I’ve got my father’s eyes and my mother’s nose, so I know there was no mix-up at the hospital. And, in a way, I guess that helps, because it proves that a genetic connection isn’t always important. I feel much closer to Jase’s family than I do to my own. If I’d grown up in a family like his, I really don’t think I’d be interested in becoming part of another one, just because I discovered I had a genetic link with them. Maybe I’d be a bit curious, but there certainly wouldn’t be any sort of gap I needed to fill.’
It was exactly what Isla had said about why she’d never wanted to register with one of those DNA testing sites. As far as she was concerned, Nick had been her father in every meaningful sense of the word, and no one else could fill the gap he’d left behind. It was obvious how much losing her father had hurt Isla, which made Aidan feel all the more awful for envying the relationship she’d had with her dad. But he couldn’t help it. No one had ever loved him in the kind of unconditional way that Isla and Jase had experienced. But he didn’t want to allow that to affect him any more, a child would be his opportunity to experience that same kind of unconditional love, and to make sure that their baby would never feel they had a gap to fill either.
Jase took hold of his hand. ‘I think Aidan’s right and that it wouldn’t go beyond curiosity for me. My parents are the people who raised me and loved me, and that’s what we want to replicate.’
‘That’s the single most important thing you can do to support a child’s mental wellbeing.’ Chooky had a gentle reassuring tone, and it was easy to imagine young patients finding her easy to talk to, as a result. ‘Having at least one stable adult in their lives, who loves them and protects them, makes an unimaginable amount of difference. I’ve seen it in with the children I work with, who’ve been through a lot of trauma. If they’ve lost parents in a devastating way, but have a grandparent, or an aunt or uncle, who steps up to be there for them, the impact of that loss on their mental health is far less damaging. Other children can seem, on the surface, to have gone through something far less traumatic, but if they don’t have that loving, stable adult around them, the impact can be catastrophic. It’s a terrible cliché to say that all you need is love, but when it comes to children, it’s a rule I wish the world would live by.’
‘Do you think we should tell them, from the start, how they were born?’ Aidan was fully aware that he was talking about a child that didn’t even exist yet, but he was so determined to get this right that he wanted to have every step straight in his head before they even began.
‘I’d say to be open and honest from the outset, in a way that’s age appropriate for the child to understand.’ Chooky picked up her phone. ‘There are some great children’s books on surrogacy and egg donation, and I can send you some links now if you like?’
‘That would be great, thanks.’ Aidan smiled. ‘I probably sound over-prepared, but I just want things to be perfect.’
‘I know you do, but they never are, not for anyone.’ Chooky’s voice was still just as gentle, but there was a firmness in her tone that left no room for argument. ‘You need to let go of the idea that it can be, because that will mess you up and put pressure on your child too. I don’t know how much counselling you’ve had as part of this process, but resolving the way you feel about the relationship with your own parents might be an important part of the process for you. I can’t foresee any problems with the two of you showing a child the love they need, but you really need to be okay too.’
‘I’ve been thinking for a while that it might be time we took a trip over to Ireland.’ Jase squeezed Aidan’s hand. ‘We can tell them face to face about our plans to start a family, and hopefully that will give us all a chance to start this next phase of our lives in a good place.’
‘You’ve got to have hope, haven’t you?’ Aidan painted on a smile, doing his best to give a casual shrug, but it felt as though someone had placed a slab of concrete on his chest. He knew exactly how his parents would react to the news, and the thought of looking at their faces when they did filled him with dread. But if it was a process they had to go through, in order to be ready to welcome a baby into their lives, then he was willing to face the pain he knew it would bring.