Chapter 18
Chapter Eighteen
Hamish
I named the group chat My Chosen Hens.
It's just Amy, Marie, and me. I'm the only rooster in there.
My phone buzzes while I'm in the kitchen making coffee, just back from a two-mile run where my knee was my friend again.
Marie writes: Confirm you're both coming to couples yoga at 6
I answer: Aye, we're coming
Marie: Great! Hamish, can you bring any athlete friends? It'll add masculine energy
Amy jumps in: It's COUPLES yoga. Why does it need masculine energy?
I don't have athlete friends in Boston, I type. My mates are all in Europe
Marie: Yes you do! Celtics. Bruins. Red Sox. Patriots. You're famous
Not in Boston, I explain yet again.
Marie: Bring Jayson Tatum
"Jesus, woman," I mutter and reply, I met him once. Was a handshake and a photo. I said nice to meet you, he said you too. Then we both left and never spoke again
Marie: For men, that's friendship. You're practically besties. Invite him
I text back: I'm not texting Jayson Tatum asking if he wants to do couples yoga
Marie: Jaylen Brown?
Me: Also no
Marie: David Pastrnak
Me: I don't have his number
Marie: Shane Hollander and Connor Storrie?
Me: Who the hell are they?
Amy: Those are the guys from the Heated Rivalry miniseries. They aren't real athletes, Mom. They're actors
Marie: It doesn't matter. This is couples yoga. They're a couple
Amy: Mom, yoga is supposed to be relaxing. You're making it the opposite of relaxing. It's also making me want to rewatch Heated Rivalry
Me: Again? You've watched it four times, pet! And I don't know them, Marie
Marie: Wear something comfortable. No kilt. See you at 6. Be early
Amy: Not coming at all could be the new on time
Amy shuffles into the kitchen with the careful movement she's had lately. At thirty-three weeks, she's more beautiful than ever, round and Madonna-like.
She opens the fridge, squints inside, reaches for a soda, pops it open, and drinks half in a long gulp. Then belches.
My delicate flower.
"My mother," she says, "is going to start an influencer empire with my uterus as the mascot."
I lean against the counter and watch her. I used to think love was fireworks and lust and drama and play.
Turns out, sometimes love is watching your wife belch like a goalie while drinking soda, and thinking, I would fight a bear for you.
"It'll be fun. Get ta see yer sisters. I heard Declan and Andrew and Amanda are going, too."
She gives me the flattest look.
"I know she means well, but I just don't feel like socializing. This breech thing—they're all going to ask me a million questions."
"Ye dinna ken for certain that the baby will stay breech," I assure her. "Mebbe yoga can help."
She shoves her spoon aggressively into her skyr. I take that as my cue to go get our bags.
We get in the car and head toward Mendon, about forty-five minutes away. I've grown accustomed to driving in Boston, and it's fun to communicate using my middle finger. I've learned an entire language called Horn.
Toot, the light changed!
Beedeep, beedeep, ye're an idjit!
HHHOOONNNKKK, what are ye, textin'?
Amy stares out the window for a while, quiet. Then she breaks the silence.
"We need to talk about money."
"Aye," I say.
"I'm not worried about being poor. I'm worried about how we're making decisions."
"Decisions?" I swallow.
"You have a job. The broadcasting gig. Investments. And yet, you're tense all the time."
The trees we're passing are green, the sky bright, and it all feels too cheerful for this conversation.
"Every choice feels like I'm walkin' a tightrope over ma family's future," I admit. "Our little family, and ma bigger one."
Once the dam cracks, the flood comes.
"My income doesn't just cover me. It ne'er has. I help Mum and Da and ma brothers and sisters. Most of their bills are on autopay. I help ma old team, the feeder league. I think about the wee ways life costs money, and the sudden, unexpected ones. The boiler. The flight. The rent."
I hate that my throat closes.
"And now there's a bairn. Our bairn. Every time I hear 'flexible schedule' or 'it depends,' I translate it in my head to 'you'll be the one to make it happen.'"
"You're carrying everyone," Amy says quietly.
"Aye. And I'm afraid I willna ever get ta stop. I want ta breathe, ye ken? But who am I if I'm no' helpin' everyone, using ma gifts ta spread ma good fortune? I didna get where I am wi'out help, and the people who supported me along ma career should share, aye?"
"And yet you're tired."
"Weary, I guess. I havena thought it through much, until recently. Then ma bloody knee blew out, we got engaged and marrit so fast, now a bairn—it's a lot, pet."
"I didn't know you were going through all that." She blinks rapidly.
"Ye're goin' through more! Yer entire body is building a soul. Ma issues are so small in comparison."
"They're not small. They're yours."
Silence for a beat. Then:
"Okay," she says. "Then here's mine."
She looks straight at me.
"I'm scared of becoming invisible. I'm scared of being the person who remembers the appointments and the daycare forms and the sleep schedules, while your schedule is treated like the important one."
I flinch, because she's right to fear it.
"I'm scared my ambition will just become a hobby," she says. "I refuse to be the supporting character in my own life."
I reach over and take her hand.
"Amy. I dinna want that."
"I know. But life has this momentum. Sometimes the things we want, even important things, get lost."
We drive on, hands linked, the conversation settling into the silence.
We pull up to the studio, park, and step inside.
The room is lit like a spa crossed with a romantasy book cover. Soft music. Fairy lights. Pale wood floors. The air smells like eucalyptus. And hanging from the ceiling, swaying gently, is a suspicious array of woven slings.
Amy stops dead. I stop dead. We both stare up.
"No," she says, flat.
The class roster isn't exactly what Marie promised. Among the normal-seeming couples are Corrine and Agnes, women in their late 80s or early 90s, dressed in matching athleisure and bright yoga socks. Their expressions say they've survived the McCarthy hearings and will survive this, too.
An influencer couple is already filming themselves, the woman murmuring, "breathe into your divine pelvis" into her phone in an ASMR whisper while the man adjusts the ring light.
Shannon and Declan are here, Shannon in black and white, Declan in a white T-shirt, gray joggers, and an expression identical to the one Uncle James wears when pissed. He looks like he's been kidnapped and his captors are demanding a ransom he can't afford.
Andrew and Amanda are here, too. Andrew is scanning for exits with the concentration of someone who accidentally joined a cult and knows the poisoned Kool-Aid is coming soon. Amanda is glowing, one hand fluttering to her flat belly a bit more than it should, and I grin.
Is our bairn going to have a same-age cousin?
Corrine spots me and hobbles closer.
"Hamish! Why aren't you wearing a kilt?"
"Because yoga in a kilt gets ye arrested fer indecent exposure."
She pouts, then winks. "But indecent exposure is fun."
"This is couples yoga," Amy cuts in. "About half of the women seem to be pregnant. Do you have something you'd like to announce?"
Agnes overhears and starts over, leaning on her walker. It has a bumper sticker on it that says "My other ride is my book boyfriend."
"Corrine knocked me up and we're having a medical miracle."
Corrine's grin goes feral. "Agnes and I have been secret lovers since 1952."
"I'm only here because the couples rate is cheaper." Agnes yanks her hand away. "Plus, you're not my type."
"I'm everyone's type!" Corrine sniffs, giving her a flat look. "I didn't hear any complaints from you when we went to that key party back in '72."
Declan appears behind me, having no idea he's initiated a rescue. "I'm close to calling in a SWAT team. For real. I have extraction insurance."
"That's for civil unrest or war," I remind him.
His eyebrow arches and he looks pointedly at Agnes and Corrine.
"I'm only here because Amanda made me," Andrew informs us, and she pats his arm.
"You're here because I need friends and I can't just be a mother. I'm me, a whole separate person, and I need... I need..." Her voice wobbles, her eyes fill. Then she starts crying.
Shannon freezes, stares, then points at her.
"Oh my God. You're pregnant, aren't you?"
Amanda nods and cries harder.
"I KNEW IT!" Shannon gasps and grabs her in a hug.
Amy embraces her around her own big belly. "Cousins!"
They squeal, and Shannon joins in. Andrew pulls out a small plastic bag of foam earplugs. Without a word, he offers them to Declan and me.
We take them.
Marie sweeps in wearing a flowing garment that makes her look like she's about to lead a ayahuasca ritual and sell us mastermind weekend retreat opportunities with a limited time offer.
"There you are! My chosen hens!"
"I'm going to sue you for that phrase," Amy mutters. Marie claps her hands.
"Mats down! Partners together!"
A doula named Hemlock Tsongas from Easthampton has been enlisted to co-teach, and she begins intoning affirmations in a voice trained to calm wild animals.
"You are open. You are safe. You are supported."
"That sounds like American tax code," I whisper to Amy.
"Birth is nothing more than a vagina audit," she whispers back.
"I'm happy ta check yer yoni maths anytime, pet."
Marie handles the yoga instruction while Hemlock circulates among the couples, adjusting postures and murmuring encouragement. It's a decent system. Marie gets to be in charge. Hemlock gets to actually help people. Everyone else gets to suffer equally.
Hemlock mentions breathing techniques for labor, and I perk up.
"We started childbirth classes last week," I say to Amy. "I ken all about this."
"You took notes for twenty minutes and then we left because I had a panic attack," she whispers back.