Well, he probably wouldn’t have time to. She was here to have a baby. So she’d have it.
And then she’d leave.
“About an hour later,” he went on, “there was this racket from the kitchen—shouting, plates smashing, all that shit. So I ran in because I thought maybe Hassan… I don’t know. I thought he was in trouble, and I wanted to help. But he wasn’t there. It was Dad throwing the plates, and Ma was standing there watching him with that look she used to have…” He narrowed his eyes, because he couldn’t describe it so much as he could reflect it. He’d grown up with that look. The look that meant she was about to slice him open on that tongue of hers, just to watch him bleed. And then throw him to his father’s big bad wolf.
“Dad was flipping out because I didn’t clean up after myself. I left the milk out, the cereal out, mess all over the counter, dirty bowl by the sink. But I didn’t. Obviously, I didn’t, because Jesus, I’d never be so fucking stupid. I swore it wasn’t me, so he called Hassan in. And Hassan, of course, swore it wasn’t him.
“But it was. I knew it was. It had to be, because it wasn’t me. And that meant he’d not only done something that would drop us both in the shit, he was trying to pin it on me. I couldn’t believe it. And they believed him, they took his side, and I was so fucking furious, and he was acting furious too, like I’d really done something, and I couldn’t believe his fucking nerve so I—I hit him. I hit my brother.” He ran a hand over his face as he breathed through the memory. That was the part he still couldn’t get over, the part that brought bile to his throat no matter how many years passed—the feel of his brother’s nose breaking beneath his fist, bone and cartilage crunching, blood spilling out.
He’d thrown up right after. And when it was all over, his dad had made him clean up the vomit.
Samir cleared his throat, pushing past the regret that clogged it. “Well, the second I did it, it was like a spell broke or something. I realised straight away—of course it wasn’t Hassan. Of course he wouldn’t lie. He wouldn’t fuck me over just to protect himself. It couldn’t be him. That’s when I realised it was my mother.” He laughed, but the sound was forced. “You know how she was. My parents liked to fuck with each other’s heads. Ma liked to fuck with ours. To try and turn us against each other. One minute you’re looking for someone’s lost keys, the next she’s convinced you that you ate the fucking keys and now you’re losing your mind. I don’t know why I fell for it, even for a second. Usually when she pulled stuff like that, I just kept my mouth shut and took the punishment but…”
But it’d been a week since Laura and her family had left, since her holiday had ended, and she’d disappeared from his life beyond snatched phone conversations. So he hadn’t been thinking straight, and he’d wanted to argue, wanted to fight.
Just like his parents.
“When I realised it was her, I… lost it. I started screaming, throwing shit at her, throwing shit at Dad, and I told them they were both crazy bastards and I was reporting them to fucking Childline or something.” He gave a bitter laugh. “I don’t know. I was pissed. They were pissed too, I guess. What’d they tell you, when you called?”
“They… they said you’d gone to boarding school,” Laura murmured. “They told me not to call. Because you weren’t coming back.”
“I suppose that’s right, really. I went to a boarding school for kids with behavioural and emotional issues, to deal with my ‘explosive anger problem’.” He rolled his eyes. “It… it wasn’t fun. I heard those schools are a hell of a lot better now, but then… it wasn’t fun.” He shrugged. “They didn’t send Hassan, either. They separated us. That part was almost easier, though, because I didn’t have to worry about him anymore, and he didn’t have to worry about me. We could survive on our own.”
He wasn’t surprised at her silence. It was probably a lot to take in. But he was surprised that, when she finally spoke, it was to ask, “So who broke your nose?”
“Hassan,” he said. “Hassan did it.”
“And you let him, didn’t you?”
“Well… yeah. I broke his.”
Out of nowhere, he felt the brush of her hand over his in the dark. The first time she’d touched him since they’d met again. It shot through him with the force of a tidal wave.
She laced her fingers through his, slowly, methodically, as if it was important that they do this completely and successfully. Once she had him, their palms locked together, that single point of contact anchoring him, she lapsed into silence again.
And he was content.
6
“You okay locking up?”
“Stop asking.” Max rolled his eyes, slicing mushrooms without even looking. The sight would never not worry Samir. He had very few friends, and the last thing he wanted was for one of them to chop their own finger off.
But if Max hadn’t dismembered himself yet, he probably never would.
“Cool.” Samir put the keys beside Max’s chopping board and clapped him gently on the back. Wouldn’t want to nudge that rapidly-slicing knife. He had plans that didn’t include taking Max to A&E, and he’d hate to leave his best mate bleeding tragically all over the kitchen. “See you tomorrow.”
“See you,” Max said, his voice far too innocent. “Good luck.”
Samir scowled. “What? I—why are you wishing me—wait, no, never mind. Doesn’t matter. You’re just trying to wind me up.”
Max’s answering laughter followed him out of the kitchen.
It had been almost four weeks since Laura had arrived in Beesley. Three weeks since he’d started taking his lunch break at her table—which was categorically not a date, since he was at work and she was just his friend. His friend whose presence, whose smile, whose growing trust in him, felt as fresh and untouchable as sea foam.
Platonic sea foam, obviously. As opposed to adoring, lustful sea foam, which Samir knew absolutely nothing about.
Two weeks since he’d offered to drive her to the hospital for her 20-week scan—you know, since she’d never been to their local hospital before. Norfolk was a treacherous place, what with all the aggressive good cheer and suspiciously polite old folks. She could get lost, or be kidnapped by a band of holidaying children. These things happened.
One week since she, after six straight days of blushing and lip-biting and squinting and Ummms, had said yes.
And it would probably take several hundred years for his best friend to stop teasing him about the whole thing.
He couldn’t pretend he minded, though. Samir hadn’t had many friends as a kid—it wasn’t easy to bond with people when he was busy trying to survive his parents’ reign of emotional terror. So the good-natured mockery was… nice. He just didn’t want Laura to hear the guys in the kitchen calling him Dad or asking him about the baby, because she’d probably overthink it and die of embarrassment.
She met him outside, even though she’d been sitting in the cafe five minutes ago. She hadn’t said it, but he got the impression that she didn’t want the townspeople to think they were together in any way. Which they obviously weren’t.
A couple of weeks ago, he’d overheard one of the town’s unrepentantly nosy old women ask Laura, “Are you married, dear?” As if it wasn’t pretty clear, by this point, that she wasn’t married. Laura had glanced at her own bare ring finger before saying, “I’m divorced.” Her voice had been strange. Off. As if she was lying. So now he had this suspicion that she’d never been married at all, but she didn’t want people to know. And he wanted to tell her that it really didn’t matter, but she hadn’t told him, so acting like he knew would be rude, wouldn’t it?
“Hey,” she said, her voice snatching him out of his thoughts. “You ready?”
“Yeah. Sorry.” He opened the car door for her, and she smiled. It was a small smile, contained, and she lowered her gaze as she slid into the car. There must be something wrong with him, because he snatched up that hint of pleasure like a dog taking crumbs from the table.
Ah
, well. If he had to be pathetic over someone, it might as well be someone as beautiful as Laura.
He got into the driver’s seat and said, “My car sucks.”
“Does it? I wouldn’t know.”
“I thought you might be a car girl. You know, cuz you drive that monster.” He pulled out onto the main road, feeling like he’d never driven before. Laura was in his car—in his care—which meant he sure as shit better look both ways.
“Oh, it’s not mine. It’s my—it’s Bump’s grandpa’s.” She put a hand to her stomach. She’d been doing that a lot more, these past weeks, maybe because she’d suddenly gotten a hell of a lot bigger. And, of course, she’d started calling the baby Bump. All of these things, independently, were adorable, but put them together and Samir frequently struggled not to melt in her presence.
Right now, though, what caught his attention was the guarded edge in her voice. It didn’t sound like she wanted to pursue the Bump’s grandpa thing, even if the words—and her slight hesitation—had piqued his curiosity. He was always curious where Laura was concerned. He felt like a bloodhound, sometimes, picking up every scent, hunting down all the little things she didn’t say.
But he wouldn’t push her. He knew that she loved to swim, and that she was kind of anal about her hair. He knew she’d studied Politics and IR, and that she loved profiteroles more than life itself. He didn’t need all of her secrets when he knew how to make her smile, did he? Friends didn’t tell each other everything.
So instead of asking about Bump’s grandpa, he said, “Speaking of Bump. You have any name ideas?”
“Of course I do!”
“You do?”
“Oh, yeah. The problem is…” She trailed off, but he could almost feel her laughter, bubbling beneath the surface. “The problem is, my ideas are awful.”
He raised a brow. “You think of names you don’t like?”
“Oh, no, I like them. It’s just… Okay, so I have this friend—well, I don’t know. We weren’t friends at all, which was my fault. I was kind of awful to her, actually.” The cheer in her voice had evaporated into empty nothingness. He didn’t like that. He wanted the happiness back.
So he said, “But you’re friends now?”
“Well, yes. I think so. You can never be too sure with Ruth. We’re friendly, at least. I like her a lot.” And then, as if she couldn’t hold back the words: “She’s my ex’s ex. So we… we started having coffee. We had stuff to talk about.”
Stuff to talk about? That sounded ominous.
“Anyway!” Laura said, and her voice was too light all of a sudden, all let’s-move-past-that-part-shall-we?
So he said, “Yeah, anyway. Ruth?”
“Well, she’s very honest. Painfully honest. She would never lie. So I’ve been asking her opinion on my names, and she had… feedback. Strong feedback.”
Even though Laura sounded amused rather than upset, Samir felt a flare of indignation. “Well, what does she know? Maybe she’s wrong. You need more than one opinion.”
“I chose her as a sounding board because she’s so sensible. I do realise that my choices can get a bit… flamboyant.”
“What are your choices? And what’s she been saying?”
Laura snorted. “Hang on, I’ll read you the texts.” She shuffled around in her seat, because her little bag had somehow gotten caught behind her. Her breasts bounced with every wiggling movement, but Samir didn’t watch because he was a gentleman, and gentlemen did not ogle unsuspecting friends—even if said friends happened to be unreasonably hot.
Laura finally reached her bag, produced her phone, and began reading out texts with wry intonation. “Okay, here we go. Me: ‘How about Canon?’ Ruth—”
Samir nearly crashed the car. “Did you just say Canon?”
“Yes,” Laura replied calmly. “It’s badass. And gender-neutral.”
He stared at her as best he could while keeping an eye on the road.
“What?” she demanded.
“I’m just trying to figure out,” he mused, “how you could seem like such a reasonable human being, but secretly harbour a desire to name your innocent baby Canon.”
“You and Ruth would get on so well.”
“What did she say?”
“As I was going to tell you before I was so rudely interrupted—”
“If you expected me to contain myself at Canon, you really don’t know me at all.”
She raised her voice over his mutterings. “Ruth said: ‘Do you want your baby to suffer?’”
“I’ve changed my mind about Ruth. You’re right. She should have final say on all baby names.”
Laura snorted. “Not final say—”
“Final say.”
“You haven’t heard my other ideas yet!”
“Okay,” he said mildly. “You have three chances to convince me that you’re capable of naming this baby.”
“Who died and made you the baby king?”
“Your good judgement.”
She laughed, and the sound washed over him like spring rain. “Alright, um… Let me think of the best ones… Okay, so, Satyr.”
“No.”
“Ocean.”
“Laura,” he said, very seriously. “Are you trying to kill me?”
“Oh my God, shut up. I like the ocean! The ocean is mighty! It’s beautiful! And I’ll be living right by it through this pregnancy, so it’s… symbolic, and stuff.”
“Last chance. Third name.”
She huffed. “You’re very closed-minded.”
“I’m trying to save your child from a lifetime of terrible jokes.”
“Fine. What about Solo?”
Samir felt a migraine coming on. “As in… Han Solo?”
“No!” she said, clearly outraged. “As in Solange!”
“Solange…?”
There was a pause. Then she gave a pained sort of sigh. “I’m going to pretend you didn’t just say that.”
“Okay.” He felt his lips twitch. “But here’s an idea—why don’t you just call the kid Solange?”
“Because I don’t know Bump’s gender! So it has to be neutral. Okay?” She peered at him suspiciously, as if he might be deliberately sabotaging her cursed baby name campaign.
Samir cleared his throat and did his best to sound serious. “Alright, I get it. So you want something like… Willow?”
“Hm.” She pursed her lips. He awaited her verdict with baited breath. Or rather, he held his breath to stop himself from chuckling at her adorably grave expression. Finally, she admitted, “I quite like that.”
“Really?”
“Well, it’s okay. A bit plain, though.”
He didn’t bother to hold back his laughter, now. “Oh, Laura. What am I going to do with you?”
“I imagine that’s up to you,” she said. And something in her voice caught him, hooked him, had his fingers tightening around the steering wheel and his gaze darting toward her. But she was looking out of the window, the curtain of her hair hiding her face.
He’d probably been imagining things, anyway.
Laura’s belly looked like an iced bun. An iced bun with raspberry jam dribbling down the sides. She really hadn’t expected to get stretch marks so suddenly.
She’d always been rather fond of raspberry jam.
“Ready? It’s cold.” The grim-faced sonographer didn’t wait for a response before slapping icy jelly all over Laura’s midriff.
“Crikey,” Laura muttered. “You weren’t joking.”
“Mmm,” the woman grunted. She was relatively young, red-headed, and apparently in a bad mood. Or perhaps she was just a grunting sort of woman.
Daniel had red hair. Would Bump have red hair? Probably not. It was a recessive gene or something.
Laura waited in self-conscious silence for something interesting to happen on the screen to her right. It felt odd doing this alone. The last scan she’d had, her sister had been right there with her, and they’d cooed at the blurry image as if it looke
d like a baby instead of a staticky kidney bean. For those precious minutes, she and Hayley had actually managed to get on.
Now Hayley was miles away and pissed at her—as usual—and Laura didn’t have anyone to squeal with. Well, she supposed that wasn’t entirely true: she could’ve squealed with Samir. He’d asked, right before she’d gotten out of the car. “Hey, Laura, you don’t—I mean, are you okay going in on your own? Because I don’t mind—”
“It’s fine,” she’d said, bright as the sunshine. Totally, utterly, 100% okay, that was her! She had to make it completely believable, you see—beyond believable—because she’d had this sick feeling that Samir might insist, if he thought she wanted company. And while part of her thought it might be nice to have him along, her rational brain knew that was just the crush talking.
Yes, she had a crush on Samir. He was Samir, for Christ’s sake.
Which was exactly why she hadn’t let him come in. It was one thing for a friend-friend to help out, but an inconveniently-sexy-friend who inspired weird, flushed feelings was a different matter entirely.
And yet, she’d let him drive her here. She’d even perved over his forearms during the journey. Oh dear. She was a shameless, crush-stricken hussy. A… crushy. If she didn’t watch herself, all these inconvenient feelings might bubble over like pasta left on the stove, and then where would she be? Lost and glum and lustful, with her knickers in a twist. That’s where.
So, no, she decided, she did not want to squeal with Samir. Even if her heart did backflips every time he smiled at her. Even if it was almost painfully sweet of him to offer.
And yet… when she imagined someone sitting beside her during this moment, it wasn’t Hayley, or her father-in-law, Trevor, or even Ruth.
It was him.
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