by Annie Dyer
“Sounds familiar.” The remark came from Killian who walked through the door with Eliza at his hip. “The Wonderful Witch that is mummy is currently taking a nice relaxing bath in the hope she’ll come out of it in a better mood.”
“We’ve been hoping that for three decades, mate,” Jackson muttered. “I’m surprised there’s no ornament made by you in here.”
Killian shrugged and passed Eliza to me. “She needs a nappy change. All yours, Uncle Seph. Daddy needs a break for half an hour.” He gave out a groan as he collapsed. “Claire’s not sleeping well, which means I’m not sleeping well.”
Eliza cuddled into my knee, playing with the decoration I’d been looking at. It was an old one, a Christmas fairy with feather wings and a slightly tarnished crown.
“I’ll have her for a couple of hours.” Even though she smelled of poop and definitely needed a change. “When are you starting toilet training?” I looked at Killian.
“After Christmas. Feel free to come stay with us and help out. In fact, maybe I can order you a book on toilet training and you can do it for us.” Killian pushed himself down into the comfy chair that was known as having the power to make you fall asleep in two minutes flat.
Eliza chose that moment to fly off my knee and run at her father. “Daddy!” She dived straight on him, tugging his beard. “Pway time!”
I stood up. “Let’s get you cleaned up and we’ll go and play on the swing.”
“Yay!” And then it was my turn to have a toddler run straight into my legs at full throttle.
7
A Xylophone – From Teddy to Eliza
Payton
“What’s this?”
I grinned at Ava as Victoria walked into the room and spoke, the room that we’d nabbed for a couple of hours this afternoon. It was decorated to Ava’s standards; big helium balloons in silver and champagne, material draped over the sofas to make it look like a boudoir and the table had been decorated as if it was high tea at the Ritz.
“Your mini-hen do. I hear Max is having a surprise stag tonight.” Ava beamed.
If she hadn’t been an interior designer, she could’ve gone into event planning. Some days her job seemed to blur, elements of planning, design and even art blending into what she did to make people happy in their homes. Ava had a talent that had surprised us all, considering she’d applied to universities in the States and never shared with us what she intended to do.
“By surprise, does he actually know?” Victoria sat down and looked suspicious.
No one had a chance to answer: the door opened and over a half dozen more people piled in. Claire, Vanessa, Jacob, Sophie, Amelie, a colleague of Victoria’s from the history department where she worked, and Katie - Claire’s sister-in-law - piled in.
“Are you all here to make sure Max definitely gets married?” Victoria was pulled into a big hug by Amelie, one of our oldest family friends.
Claire headed straight for the sandwiches. “Absolutely. Sorry, was I meant to wait?”
I shrugged. I wouldn’t tell Claire not to eat food even when she wasn’t what seemed fifty-five months pregnant.
There was noise, lots of fussing, questions and jokes. Jacob made some comment about the size of Max’s dick that made me and Ava double over with laughter, but when Ava stopped laughing, I saw something else in her expression.
“You want to grab five minutes?” I linked my arm through hers. She hadn’t stopped for the last hour, dressing the room as soon as the balloons and food were delivered, while I made sure Victoria didn’t find out what was going on.
“I think so. Let me just tell Vanessa we’re nipping out.”
Ava broke away from me and tapped Vanessa on the shoulder. I couldn’t hear what was said, I just saw Vanessa nod and smile, pat Ava on the shoulder and then head to the tables where the nibbles for the afternoon tea were spread.
We’d had it catered, mainly because of time constraints as making up an afternoon tea was quite fun and something I would’ve enjoyed doing with Ava. But it also would’ve meant getting Vic out of the way, which would’ve gone horribly wrong at some point. There were several trays of canape-type nibbles laid out, then on the table where we’d sit, traditional afternoon teas had been laid, using some kitsch stands that Ava had sourced. Finger sandwiches and tiny cakes took up two plates, while scones with jam and cream filled the third. Champagne was there for those who weren’t driving or weren’t pregnant, and we had several teapots of tea. This wasn’t diet friendly.
“Let’s just nip out to the store. I could do with bringing in more champagne.” Ava tucked her hand through my arm and ushered me out. “Don’t let Mum catch us. I don’t need forty questions right now, and she knows something’s up.”
We headed out of the dining room onto the hallway and in the opposite direction from the kitchen, although that would’ve been the quickest way to go.
We loved our mother, but if she smelt that something wasn’t quite right with one of us, she was a bloodhound trying to solve it. While this was something we all appreciated, sometimes we needed to deal with our own shit first.
The store was an outbuilding across from the kitchen and contained an extra fridge, freezer and cold wine storage. Our parents had bought a winery over in Toronto a couple of years ago, and wanted to be able to store some of their produce at their own home for gifts and to drink, so they’d converted an old stables, the ones we’d played in as kids. In fact, I remember tying Seph up in there and leaving him for a good few hours.
“What’s the matter?” I didn’t pants around. Ava hated sharing what was wrong, preferring to tough it out.
She shook her head, blonde curls scattering about her shoulders. “It’s Eli.”
I sat down on a pallet. It was freezing in here but telling me her problem was her fiancé and the man I shared my office with had just added fire to my veins. “What’s he done?”
She shook her head. “Nothing. That’s the problem. We still haven’t set a date to get married. He’s not getting here until Christmas Eve and I really wanted us to have a couple of days to ourselves because we’ve hardly spent any time together recently.”
“He’s been mega busy at work, Aves. We both have.” We’d had a case that we’d worked between us, a multi-million pound litigation and it had taken over both our lives.
“It isn’t just that. He could’ve asked me to go to his sister’s and we could’ve come here later, but he didn’t. It feels like we’re just growing apart and I really don’t want that to happen.” There were tears in her voice, which wasn’t like Ava.
“Have you told him how you feel?”
“That would be too obvious. I didn’t want to sound like a nagging girlfriend, not while he was so busy. He fell asleep at the kitchen table one Saturday morning, Payts, and then went into work on Sunday. And I just feel that if I mention it now, everything will come out and I’ll sound like some immature girl who has no idea how to manage a relationship.” She rested her back against the wall and closed her eyes, probably forcing back tears.
I wasn’t usually the person of choice to confide in about relationships. Apart from Owen, all of mine had been a disaster.
“I know the easy solution is to get Christmas out of the way and then bring it up. But I don’t know how to.” She sounded full of despair. “What do I say? Are you still in love with me? Do you still want us to be together…”
She stopped talking as the door opened.
My twin, tall and broad and bespectacled today – even though we all knew he didn’t need glasses – stood in the doorway looking flummoxed.
“Joseph. We’ve spoken about you listening in on conversations.” I glared at him. Hard.
He sighed, his shoulders relaxing. “I saw you come in and Mum was about to follow to get some wine for tonight. I figured you didn’t want her coming in, so here I am and I genuinely tried not to listen, I was just waiting for the right time to interrupt.” He bit his bottom lip. “Do I need to hit Eli?”
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br /> “Why do men always think that hitting someone is the answer?” I glared at Seph. “It isn’t. You’re not hitting anyone. Especially someone you work with. Jackson will have you assassinated.”
Seph shrugged and stepped through the doorway, closing it behind him. “What’s he done?”
Ava shook her head. “Nothing. Which is the point. He’s just been busy and we’ve kind of drifted. And I don’t know if he wants to be with me anymore.”
I saw Seph’s expression grow darker. Our youngest brother wasn’t one to be jumping into fights or even the first to come to our defence – we had Max and Jackson for that – but he felt stuff far easier.
“Aves, I know he’s been mad busy at work. And I know his sister has been struggling with her mental health – you do know about that?” Seph looked torn. “Ava, he thinks you walk on water. There’s no way he wants you to split up.”
“You don’t know that.”
He shrugged. “I know what he’s got you for Christmas. Or one of the things, anyway, because I’ve been hiding it in my office. If he wasn’t bothered about you he wouldn’t have had it organised by September.”
She looked at her feet.
“What is it you want, Aves?”
“Him. I’d quite like to get married now. I just want to spend a bit more time with him; be a couple…” She brushed at her eyes.
I looked at Seph. He looked back. I knew exactly what he was thinking; not necessarily a twin thing, more of a does she remember when they got together.
“Aves, we love you, but do you remember when you started seeing Eli and you weren’t ready for the full blown coupley thing?” Seph’s hands were making dramatic gestures which meant he was extremely far out of his comfort zone. “You weren’t ready and Eli did everything in your time scales?”
She nodded.
“Talk to him. Tell him your timescales have changed. I think if you would ask him to set a date to get married, he’d be thrilled.” I jumped in, needing to save Seph from anymore declarations of filial love, or the possibilities of knocking something over with his jazz hands.
Ava looked at me with those huge blue eyes. They were a genetic mishap: all the rest of us had brown eyes.
“You don’t think he wants out?”
My sister had never had this before. She’d toyed with men like a cat with a mouse, discarding them when they ran out of flavour. For her to be feeling that Eli was losing interest in her made me want to both feel slightly smug and wrap her up in a room at the top of a tower.
“No, Ava. I don’t think that. I think you’re in a normal relationship where occasionally someone has a priority other than their partner, and life gets in the way, because maybe, maybe, you’re taking each other for granted a bit.” I knew I sounded harsh. Maybe I was channelling Claire.
“Don’t you and Owen do that?”
Seph eyes landed on me. He folded his arms. Grinned.
“Sometimes. It’s inevitable when you’ve been with someone for a while.”
The door opened again before Seph could chirp in, and Jackson appeared, pointing at Seph.
“What the fuck are you doing? Crushing the grapes with your feet for this wine? Marie’s wondering if you’ve started drinking in here and have keeled over in an alcoholic coma.”
“On my way.” Seph did some stupid thing with his hand that had never worked even when he was fifteen and it had been remotely cool.
“We’d better go back. Enjoy this party that you’ve planned and stop worrying. You just need to talk to him.” I pulled out two bottles of champagne and passed them to her. “Come on, we all know you can talk.”
The carnage was only slightly surprising when we got back to the party. Sophie – one of Vanessa’s best friends – had brought the traditional hen party games of pin the penis on the image of Maxwell, and a variety of sex toys that Jacob was giving a sales pitch about.
The image of Maxwell was a life size cardboard cut-out, with him just wearing tight fitted shorts. I hoped that it had been photoshopped somehow, and that hope was the only way I was going to be able to forget that image existed.
Sophie had provided knitted penises in a variety of sizes, one of which was currently stuck on Max’s head.
“Champagne?” Ava offered me a glass.
“No thanks. I might need to drive later.”
She didn’t ask where to, which was a relief as I had no idea where I’d be going. Owen would be at Max’s stag night, which was really an excuse to play poker and drink whisky and I’d be in bed with a good book and a hot water bottle, which sounded like bliss.
No alcohol.
Because there’d been no period.
Just over a month ago, the condom had split. I’d been on the Pill, but the conclusion I’d come to was that it was worsening my migraines, so I’d taken a break to see if it helped.
We’d had rather energetic sex one evening and when Owen went to clean up, I’d heard the immortal words of ‘Houston, we have a problem.’ The solution was for me to take the morning after pill, but for some reason we’d decided to leave it to fate. We were both in our thirties, financially secure and in a relationship that was heading to the alter at some point soon. We wanted kids, but neither of us could get our heads around planning when to start trying for one.
My period should’ve started four days ago and there was no sign of it being on its way. Maybe it really did only take one time. I had two pregnancy tests ready to try out – I just wasn’t sure when to take them – maybe when I knew more about how I would feel. Relieved or disappointed if I wasn’t? Elated or freaked the fuck out if I was?
And I hadn’t told Owen.
I knew he’d be pleased if I was. He adored Teddy and Eliza, and Simone Wood’s little boy, Leo, who we ended up babysitting every couple of weeks. I just needed to be able to manage my reaction for when I told him, one way or another.
“That’s totally too long for Max’s penis!” Claire’s voice rang out.
Victoria had correctly placed what was an obscenely long cock in exactly the right spot.
“To be fair, it’s about right.” She tipped her head to one side. “He’s a grower not a shower, so when you saw him aged seven I suspect you didn’t get the full picture.”
“It’s not size, it’s what they do with it,” Jacob chipped it. “I’ve had many a night with a fella with a big dick only for him not to have a fucking clue how to use it to its best effect.”
“Max knows exactly what to do with it.” She looked at Claire with a little smirk. “I can give you details if you want. He can be very creative.”
Claire looked like she was about to throw up.
I saw Vanessa look evilly at Claire. “Jackson does this thing where…”
“No. I can’t even think about this!” Claire clapped her hands over her ears and started giggling. “Stop the pain!”
“Have an éclair.” Amelie thrust the cream cake at my sister. “It’ll do you good.”
There was a slight knock at the door, a timid knock. I was close enough to hear it, the rest of the party too busy giggling now about some horrendous incident involving Jacob and a sex toy disaster.
I opened it slightly, aware that certain people would be freaked if they saw the life size Max cut out. I had no idea what we were going to do with it after.
Owen peered round the door, totally ignoring my gestures to stay away.
“What the fuck is that?”
“I was trying to stop you from seeing it.” I pushed him back out of the room. “What’s the matter. This is a girls only thing.”
“Then why’s Jacob there?”
“He likes dick.”
He nodded. “Fair point. Did I really just see a life size cut out of Maxwell? Wearing tightie-whities?”
“You did. Shall I store it in our bedroom?”
“Not unless you want to pay for my therapy. The cakes have arrived. Do you want both cakes in here or would that be encouraging Claire to poison the one for us tonig
ht?” He’d closed the door now, the laughter drowned out.
“I think they’d like to see them. Does Max know about his stag party?” I put my hand on Owen’s chest, feeling the hard muscle under his shirt.
The possibility of dragging him up to our room was definitely strong.
“He’s pretending not to. Seph mentioned something before poker, and because your brother has no volume control, Max overheard. Is Ava okay? I saw you scurry over to the store before and she looked upset.”
His arms were round me now and I used the moment to bury my face into his chest, inhaling his scent.
“Scurry makes us sound like rats.”
“Rats are very intelligent creatures.”
I looked up. “That is true and the best way to dig yourself out of that possible hole.”
“I’d rather dig myself in other holes.” His grin was sheer dirt. “Back to Ava. Is she okay?”
“She thinks her and Eli are on the rocks.”
Owen laughed, the last thing I expected him to do.
“Why’s that?”
I pinched him. “It isn’t funny. He’s gone to see his family and didn’t ask her. He isn’t getting here until Christmas Eve…”
“Let me interrupt you there, Sweetcheeks. He’s getting here tonight in time for Max’s stag and he’s planning on taking your sister out tomorrow for the day because in his words ‘he’s been neglecting the Princess’. When he said it, he was fairly drunk, so I think he was serious about the princess thing, rather than…”
“Summing her up for what she is.” Because Ava was the family’s princess. “Is he worried about them?” Owen wasn’t a gossip, but he was a good friend. He and Eli had gotten along well since they first met. I teased him regularly about their bromance.
Owen nodded. “He knows they’ve not been seeing much of each other. He adores her, Payts.” He moved a strand of hair from my face. “These Callaghan girls cast a spell on poor men like us.”