Chapter 17
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Leo
A s soon as I’ve stopped crying with explosive joy and sweet relief, I call my insurance guy to get Sadie added to my medical insurance. Then I call my own doctor, because I trust her, and arrange to pay out of pocket for a scan to make sure everything is as it should be. I can’t wait to see that dark, blurry, indecipherable image on the screen. I wish we could go right now.
Fuck that. I wish I could make an announcement on TV so everybody knows that my hail-Mary, never-gonna-happen wildest wish has come true in a way I could never have anticipated. All of a sudden. Out of nowhere. And irrevocably. Because there’s no taking this back now.
I started the year pining for Sadie, and now we’re having a baby together. That’s wild .
It’s not exactly perfect - she hasn’t told me she loves me yet, and we aren’t living together. And she still seems a little reticent, like she’s forever holding back and observing and waiting for the other shoe to drop, but I know my girl. I know the fact that she’s going ahead with her pregnancy is a pretty strong indicator that we’re on the right track, to say the least.
She’s placed all her chips in the centre of our table and betting everything on what we have.
“Mind if I tell Tim?” she asks. She looks tired, her eyes puffy and violet shadowed, but her wan smile is setting fireworks off in my chest.
“Of course. We’ve got so many people to tell.” I sigh happily as I think of them all. “The gang, Gary, my family, your family - ”
She makes a face. “Just Tim from my family for now.”
I pause. I know Sadie’s relationship with her parents, especially her father, is strained. But they will need to know sooner or later. We can’t exactly keep it secret.
I won’t press the issue now, though. Everything will happen in its own good time.
She picks up her phone and starts pacing as she waits for her brother to answer. “TIm,” she says finally, “I, er… No, nothing’s wrong …” She fidgets, smiling awkwardly at me. “It’s…well, it’s…” She stops stock still, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath. “Actually, I’m pregnant.”
I watch her face. There’s trepidation there, sure, but I can also see the beginnings of happiness. Especially now she’s said it out loud to her twin.
She looks right at me and smiles a smile that fills me with fresh relief, starting to giggle at whatever Tim has said. “Yes, Leo! Who else?!” Her face softens as she listens, and she places her hand over her heart. “Thank you, bro,” she melts, before giving me a mischievous look. “Sure, he’s right here.” She hands the phone over to me, snickering under her breath.
I take the phone, ready to take any anti coming my way. “Hi, Tim - ”
“Can she hear you?”
“I, er…” I stand and walk into the bedroom, trying to ignore her shaking her head and laughing at me. “Not anymore.”
“OK, mate, I’ll get this part out of the way: if you ever hurt Sadie in any way, I’ll turn your insides into your outsides and make you beg for death, blah blah blah. Now…” I can hear him smiling. “This is the best news I’ve heard in… ever . And I am very happy for you both.”
I breathe out a huge sigh of relief I wasn’t aware I was holding on to. “Thanks, Tim, that means a hell of a lot coming from you. And I promise, you’ll never have to worry. I’ll take care of her like you wouldn’t believe .”
“I know,” he replies sincerely, “I don’t doubt that for a second. And, listen, if you need anyone to talk to about fatherhood, I’ve been doing it for almost half my life, and I’m always happy to help.”
I need to spend way more time with Tim Stewart. The man is seriously good people. And he’s my kid’s uncle, too, so I will make a point of doing just that.
“Thank you, I will definitely be taking you up on that.” It hits me that I have a huge shit ton to learn between now and when the kid is born, and I never knew it was possible to be so excited and so spine meltingly daunted all at the same time.
“Tip number one: coconut oil.”
I lift my eyebrows. “For?”
“Nappy changes. Saves you having to rub too much when you clean them up. Just a little coconut oil makes the whole process so much easier, dude, trust me.”
I grab a pen and write ‘coconut oil’ on my hand. “Cheers, I will definitely be picking some up.”
I can do this. Coconut oil. Sure, makes sense. I’ll do my research to find the best brand, the proper organic stuff, and get ten or twenty jars. Because I’m going to be prepared, and my baby will have nothing but the very best coconut oil on his or her skin.
I am going to rock the shit out of being a daddy if it kills me.
For ages and ages after the scan, I keep my arm wrapped around Sadie’s shoulder as we stare at the printout of the ultrasound they gave us, stunned and enraptured in my car. This grey-blue fuzzy blob is our whole world right now. Our future, our present, our every waking thought.
I will never forget the other-worldly whomp-whomp of the little heartbeat. It made everything real, not just a theory. There really was something wonderful in there, busily growing and heading towards being an actual human being. I closed my eyes to take the noise in, let it fill my head, while holding tightly to Sadie’s hand as she kept her watery eyes glued to the screen, like she was already looking out for and watching over the little bean. I know she’s going to be the most terrific mother; big hearted, easygoing, and accepting, but with eyes like a hawk and a fierce mama bear streak. I know how badly she had to pee - she had to drink loads of water beforehand, and the way she fled to the toilet without even wiping the gel off her stomach spoke volumes - but she held out as long as possible, not wanting to say goodbye to the heartbeat just yet.
I kiss her hair, grateful that my child will have her.
Grateful that I will, too.
And, god forgive me - Sadie forgive me, too - but I am beyond grateful that the locum doctor she called about her migraines last time prescribed her a drug that shouldn’t be mixed with hormonal birth control, without taking any medical history. By rights, that is horrendous negligence on his part, and Sadie was rightly furious when the new doctor explained everything to us…but I’m not sorry. I will never be sorry. And, given the way she quickly calmed down, ran a hand over her still flat stomach, and let it go, I don’t think Sadie is truly feeling resentful in her heart, either.
“I can’t believe how much this little blob means to me,” she murmurs. “Just this piece of paper, even…it’s everything. It’s the one thing I’d save in a house fire.”
“We’ll frame it. Put it where it’s the first thing we see every morning.” I take her hand and stroke her fingers. “Anyway, Eli and Dean know you’re pregnant, but…are you ready to tell the gang we’re going ahead?”
She nestles into my neck. “As I’ll ever be.” She chuckles. “Funny. I’d never have said any of us were really kid people.”
I look down at her. “They’ll love her. Or him. You know that, right?”
“Oh, yeah,” she replies, “just…it’s going to be interesting to see.”
We finally get out of the car, heading towards the studio, holding hands like we’ve never done anything else. “I’ll call my family after this,” I add. “You gonna call yours, or tell them in person?”
She hesitates, her lips twisting into a grimace. “I suppose I do have to tell them at some point.” She sounds like she’d rather have root canal work done without novocaine. While dipping her toes in acid at the same time. With her hair on fire. And her fingernails being ripped out.
“‘Fraid so.” I stop in the street and lift her chin up. “Talk to me.”
She looks to the side, clearly picturing what’s to come and, by the way her mouth purses, not seeing anything good. “My dad is going to be an arsehole about this,” she says finally.
“In what way?” Forewarned is forearmed, after all. Anything I can’t head off at the pass, I can brainstorm about beforehand.
“In that he’s still mad at me for not being able to retain the stand up guy that is Peter, and in that he’s still one thousand percent pissed off that Tim and Nat had Eleanor as teenagers, out of wedlock.” She looks up at me for a split second before moving away. “He’s getting worse as he gets older.”
“Pumpkin, you know I’d marry you tomorrow.” It’s the truth, after all.
She laughs. Great. Just what a man wants to happen when he…well, in fairness, that wasn’t a real proposal. “I didn’t say it to force you to marry me,” she retorts, as if it would put me out to do it , “and anyway, it’s much too soon for anything like that, on top of everything else. Just…” She places her hands on my chest in a way that’s almost soothing, and my heart skips a beat. “He’s not going to be very nice about this. And he’s probably going to be a complete bastard to you. And I’m not happy with that, or ready to deal with it.”
Hmm.
I think this might be one of those situations where I have to back her up, but be ready to step in. He’s not going to upset my girl any time I’m around, and certainly fucking not in her condition. I know she can handle herself, but it’s different when it’s your parent. It’s harder to say what needs to be said and stand up for yourself the way you would with anyone else.
“Tell you what,” I say finally, “invite them over to dinner at my place. It’s a nice house which will hopefully impress them, I’ll be with you, and we’ll tell them together.”
She mulls my words. “Or I can bring you to the next Stewart family dinner. I was going to try to skip it, but…” She looks listless, and irritated about it.
“Deal. When is it?”
“Tomorrow evening. Six o’clock sharp ,” she says in a tinny, nasal impression of, I assume, her father. “Tim will be there, which is something. And Jacob, which will be… Well.” She shrugs. “It’ll give my dad at least one kid to be loudly proud of.”
“Sounds like a plan. We tell your parents and your other brother in one fell swoop. Rip the band aid off, everyone will know, and it’ll all be sorted.”
“Yeah,” she says sceptically.
Sadie
This is going to be horrible.
Nope, ‘horrible’ doesn’t cover it. It’s going to be the stuff of nightmares. I think I’d honestly rather follow Pennywise down a drain.
Dad has only seen Leo in passing, and he’s always been disgustingly scathing about him, referring to him as ‘that thug’ and ‘that lout you work for’ just because he has long hair and tattoos. Never mind that he’s wealthier and more successful than Dad could ever dream of being, and a way better person as well. But Dad thinks the Peter type is best, the suit wearing prig who feels and behaves like he’s superior to everyone, as though that truly makes him better. Jacob, my permanently-business-suit-clad IT god brother, is his pride and joy, the ‘right sort of man’, though he’s nowhere near as snobbish as Peter; just a bit on the awkward and stiff side. Tim is almost there, in Dad’s narrow mind, but he blotted his copy book when Nat got knocked up and Dad’s been trying to make him sorry ever since. I’m simply a crashing disappointment, and he frequently makes bigoted comments about how ladylike I’m not.
Wait until he hears that the thug I work for impregnated his black sheep daughter. He’s going to have a shit fit like nothing he’s thrown at me before. And I really, really wish I could swerve it somehow.
But Leo radiates such calm, such confidence that he can handle it and that everything will turn out OK. I could almost believe him, but I know the sort of nasty, offensive things my dad will say, and Leo’s bound to get his feelings hurt.
Well, not this time, Pops. If he starts, I’ll kick off, too.