by Sue Margolis
‘Gosh,’ the radiographer had chuckled the moment he left the room, ‘I feel quite flushed. I know I shouldn’t be saying this, but your husband is dead good-looking. Liam Neeson came in once when Natasha Richardson was pregnant and I remember thinking I wouldn’t kick him out of bed in a hurry, but just between you, me and the gatepost, he’s got nothing on Mr Littlestone. And he’s so attentive. He obviously thinks the world of you. I tell you, Mrs Littlestone, take my advice and hang on to him. You don’t get many like that to the pound.’
‘Probably not,’ Beverley said, smiling. She couldn’t be bothered to explain about the surrogacy and how she and Tom weren’t married. It would have taken too long.
‘I’m sorry Mr Pettifer isn’t here,’ the radiographer went on, referring to Beverley’s obstetrician, whom she’d seen for the first time the previous week and who was costing Naomi an arm and several legs, ‘but he had to dash over to the Portland to do an emergency Caesarean. He promised to pop along if he finished in time, just to double-check everything’s OK.’
‘OK, that’s fine,’ Beverley said, doing her best to sound cheerful when deep down she felt distinctly lacklustre. She’d been dreading this moment for days. Having a scan meant seeing and confronting the living, breathing proof of her pregnancy. It meant she would be forced to look at the baby, her baby - the baby she was planning to give up.
She was lying on the couch, her hands under her head, doing her best to convince herself that she was about to undergo some minor medical procedure completely unconnected with pregnancy, when Tom reappeared. She could see the nervous excitement on his face.
‘Oh, you’re back. Brilliant,’ the radiographer said, gaping at Tom, her turkey neck colouring up.
It was only as she squeezed hard on the bottle of gel she was still holding and a good deal of it shot out of the spout and dribbled down the sides that the woman came back to earth.
‘Right,’ she said, reaching for a tissue and wiping the bottle, ‘if you sit yourself down next to your wife, we can start.’
‘Wife?’ Tom mouthed to Beverley.
Beverley shrugged.
As Tom sat down, the radiographer began running the hand scanner over Beverley’s stomach. Past experience had taught her that because she was only nine or ten weeks into her pregnancy, the pictures on the monitor would be incomprehensible to an untrained eye. They would look more like underwater sonar images than anything remotely human. Past experience had also taught her that the moment she so much as glanced at the screen, her heart would go out to the tiny scrap growing inside her.
‘Come on, Mrs Littlestone, take a look. You’re missing the main feature,’ the radiographer said. ‘I know there’s not a great deal to look at, but if you hang on I’ll see if I can locate the heart and you’ll be able to see it beating.’
As Beverley continued to stare at the wall, she felt the scanner glide across her tummy in smooth circular motions. Occasionally a button choked as the radiographer changed the image on the screen.
Tom glanced down at her, his face etched with concern. She could feel him looking at her, but she refused to make eye contact.
‘It’s OK,’ he whispered. ‘You don’t have to look.’
Gently, he pulled her hand from behind her head and held it in his. She could feel tears streaking her face. At that moment she would have sold her soul to the devil if it meant she could keep her baby.
‘Oooh, look. There you are,’ the radiographer piped up merrily, her finger hovering next to the screen.
‘That’s it... that faint black blob just there. You can just about see it beating. And very healthy it looks too. Have you got it, Mr Littlestone?’
‘Yes,’ Tom said excitedly, ‘I can see it. Wow, that is truly amazing. I can hardly believe it. That’s my child’s heart pumping away.’
He turned to look at Beverley, who was still crying.
‘I don’t know whether this is the right time to say this,’ he said, grinning, and patting her tummy playfully, ‘but my mum’s always had this mass of natural tight blonde curls. I mean, with her hair and your Jewish looks, we could have Harpo Marx in there.’
Beverley immediately burst out laughing. Then she wiped her face and turned her head towards the monitor. In the murkiness, among the shades of grey, she found it, the faint rapid flicker of her baby’s heart.
***
Twenty minutes later, Mr Pettifer having eventually turned up, looked at her over his pince-nez and confirmed the baby was developing ‘Splendidly, Mrs Littlestone, absolutely splendidly,’ Beverley and Tom were standing in Harley Street saying their goodbyes.
‘I’m sorry it was such a strain for you in there,’ he said. ‘It didn’t occur to me how difficult it would be for you to see the baby. Will you be OK?’
‘Yeah, I’ll be fine,’ Beverley said, doing her level best to sound upbeat. ‘I’m off to John Lewis to spend some more of Naomi’s money. I plan to drown my sorrows in a vacuum cleaner and one of those giant American fridges with an ice dispenser.’
He smiled.
‘Look, I can see you’re not fine. Your eyes are all puffy from crying. Come on, let’s go and get a cup of coffee and talk for a bit.’
‘No, really. The walk to John Lewis will do me good. You get back to work.’
She smiled a weak smile. Then he took off his large black shoulder bag and stood it on the pavement. The next moment he was giving her a big, friendly bear hug.
‘I’m sorry you’ve got to go through all this,’ he whispered.
Taken aback by this sudden show of affection from her sister’s boyfriend, she stood rigid and tense in his arms. He simply carried on holding her. Slowly she felt herself relax against him. Then, suddenly realizing just how much she was enjoying him holding her, she pulled away. Despite the bitter cold, her cheeks were burning.
‘Come on,’ she said firmly, ‘you have to get back and I have a date with a vacuum cleaner.’
‘Sorry,’ he said, sensing her embarrassment. ‘I didn’t mean to make you feel uncomfortable. You just looked tike you could do with a cuddle, that’s all.’
‘I know. And thanks. I appreciate it. But I’m feeling much better, honest.’ She reached up and gave him a quick peck on the cheek.
‘Bye, Tom,’ she said. Then she turned away and began walking briskly down Harley Street.
***
As she continued walking towards Cavendish Square, drops of freezing January rain started falling on her face. She tightened the belt on her new three-quarter-length black PVC coat (another Natalie-inspired purchase), pulled up the collar and cursed herself for having come out without a brolly. For the best part of a minute, she managed to keep her mind occupied with vacuum cleaners. Should she buy a cylinder model or an upright? An upright was easier to manoeuvre, but the wisdom according to Rochelle was that a cylinder picked up better. Then again, what did she know, the au pair did all her hoovering. Rochelle said she’d never use a vacuum cleaner until they invented one you could sit down in.
Despite her best efforts, she soon found herself replaying the moment during the scan when Tom had reached out and taken her hand. This threw her for a moment, but almost at once her mind was back on track. Did she want a model that used bags or one where the dirt went straight into the machine? She suspected old-fashioned bags would be less messy. Even when she remembered the way he’d looked at her just now when he realized how upset she was, her mind went back to crevice tools almost at once. It was only when she relived the moment of the hug and remembered how gloriously sexy it had felt to be held by Tom Jago that she gave in.
She fancied him. She fancied him something rotten. It wasn’t simply his good looks which had caused her entrails to loop the loop as she’d stood there in his arms. It was more. He was kind. He was gentle. He made her laugh. He was also extraordinarily perceptive. It had taken all her emotional strength to refuse to have coffee with him. If she was honest, she’d felt drawn towards him from the moment they met under the desk
in Naomi’s office. She was desperate to get to know him.
She felt far too unsettled to go shopping. Instead she went straight home.
Try as she might, she couldn’t get Tom out of her mind. For the next couple of days she went round in a virtual trance. This was partly due to the extreme tiredness she always experienced in early pregnancy. But for the most part it was thanks to her mind being full of thoughts involving Tom Jago tying her naked to a bed, massaging her with exotic oils and slowly, oh so slowly, bringing her to the most seismic of orgasms. Her concentration on mundane matters lapsed to such an extent that moments after imagining herself going down on Tom, she phoned a posh West End hairdresser (recommended by Rochelle) to make an appointment and asked the receptionist how much they charged for a cut and blow job. Then, a few hours later, when the milkman knocked at the door to be paid and remarked on how tired she was looking, she’d smiled vacantly and announced, ‘Do you know, I’m so exhausted these days, I can barely keep my legs open.’
Along with the lust, she was, of course, overwhelmed by feelings of guilt. What sort of woman had warped, depraved thoughts about being licked out by her sister’s boyfriend? For Christ’s sake, Naomi and Tom adored each other. They were about to have a baby - the one she’d agreed to carry for them. To have the hots for Tom was unforgivable. She wondered how long it would take God to process the retribution paperwork. And would He go easy on her, sentencing-wise, if she asked for all her other offences to be taken into consideration? After all, in the last three months she’d agreed to make a baby with a man who wasn’t her husband and give it away in return for money, and in so doing had caused her husband no end of misery. If there were such a thing as reincarnation, she thought, God would send her back as athlete’s foot.
***
Her attempts to get the better of her feelings for Tom weren’t helped by him phoning her three days after the scan. As soon as she heard his voice her insides turned to instant liquid mush.
‘I just wanted to check you were OK after the other day,’ he said, his tone distinctly awkward. She suspected he was still embarrassed about the hugging incident.
‘Oh, that’s sweet of you,’ she said brightly. ‘I’m fine now.’
‘Great.’
‘Yeah.’
There was an awkward pause.
‘So,’ he said eventually, ‘did you get what you wanted in John Lewis?’
‘No. I was feeling so tired that I decided to go straight home.’
‘I can imagine. It had been quite a morning.’
‘Yeah.’
She was trying to keep her replies as short as possible because she wanted to get him off the phone. Talking to Tom was throwing her distinctly off balance.
‘Oh, I nearly forgot why I called,’ he said. ‘I mentioned Queenie’s story to Naomi. She seemed pretty keen. Said to tell your mother she’ll be in touch as soon as she gets back from Cornwall... I take it Naomi’s told you all about this series she’s making with mad Fallopia?’
‘Oh yes,’ Beverley laughed, ‘in detail. Several times. OK, Tom, that’s great. I’ll tell Mum. She’ll be over the moon.’
There was another pause.
‘Beverley?’
‘Yes?’
‘Look, I was wondering... I mean, say no if you feel uncomfortable with the idea, but I was thinking that maybe it would help you if the two of us sat down and talked about this whole surrogacy thing. Perhaps I could explain to you just how much it means to me and how much Naomi and I appreciate what you’re doing. Might make you feel a bit better about it all...’
His voice trailed off.
‘Look, Tom,’ she said firmly, ‘that’s a really kind thought and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it, but I know the two of you are grateful... and despite the other day, I really am coping extremely well. Plus, if I feel a bit low, I’ve always got Rochelle.’
‘Of course,’ Tom said. ‘I forgot.’ He sounded disappointed - as if he’d truly wanted to see her again.
‘Bye then,’ he said.
‘Yeah. See you. Love to Nay.’
Beverley put the phone down. Was it even remotely possible, she thought to herself, that he had feelings for her which went beyond indebtedness and affection?
‘What?’ she said out loud. ‘Mr Superstar Film Director has feelings for a forty-two-year-old Finchley housewife. Yeah, right.’
Nevertheless she couldn’t stop her thoughts turning to Tom handcuffing her ankles to a table and taking her from behind. Then she started to feel guilty all over again.
Chapter 17
Four weeks later, Beverley was back in Harley Street.
She closed the door of Mr Pettifer’s consulting room and went into the reception to make her next antenatal appointment.
‘All right, Mrs Littlestone,’ the receptionist smiled, ‘we’ll see you in another month then.’
Beverley returned the smile, slipped her diary back in her handbag and walked into the hall. She was standing doing up her coat when the front door opened and Tom walked in.
‘Good Lord,’ she said, startled. He looked breathless - as if he’d been running. ‘What on earth are you doing here? God, there’s nothing wrong, is there? Is Naomi OK?’
‘Yes, yes, fine,’ he said, trying to catch his breath. ‘Nothing’s wrong. I was running because I thought I’d missed you.’
‘What is it, then? Why are you here?’
He held his hand out in front of him while he took another couple of breaths.
‘I know when we spoke after the scan you said you were coping fine with the whole surrogacy thing and that you and I didn’t need to talk, but I’ve been really worried about you.’
‘You have?’ she said, reddening. Having not seen or heard from him for a while, she’d just about recovered her emotional equilibrium. Now she was starting to get the hots for him all over again.
‘Look, it’s nearly lunchtime,’ he said. ‘It’s freezing out. How do you fancy a bowl of pasta?’
Beverley’s pregnancy sickness had in the last couple of days started to give way to constant hunger. A bowl of pasta? She could have downed a bucket of the stuff. Nevertheless she had to refuse. Lunch with Tom was a mad idea. It was crazy. If they said goodbye now, she might well escape with a minimal amount of churned emotion. She opened her mouth, expecting ‘No’ to emerge.
‘OK,’ she found herself saying brightly. ‘Why not?’
‘Brilliant,’ he said, grinning. ‘I know this great place round the back of the BBC.’
As they sat in the cab (Tom insisted, even though it was only a ten-minute walk), Beverley asked him how he’d known about her appointment with Mr Pettifer.
‘Resorted to subterfuge, I’m afraid,’ he said, pretending to look guilty. ‘I phoned masquerading as your husband and told Pettifer’s secretary that you’d mislaid your diary and didn’t know when your next appointment was.’
He was clearly desperate to see her, Beverley thought. But why? Could she possibly have been right? Did he have feelings for her? The hell he did. Gorgeous sophisticates like Tom Jago did not fall for dowdy suburbanites like her. Not that she looked remotely dowdy these days - thanks to Rochelle and Natalie - but Beverley found it hard to see herself as anything other than a frumpy forty-something housewife. No, she said to herself, Tom Jago was simply a very caring, compassionate man. Naomi was a very lucky woman.
***
The restaurant was packed with a mixture of BBC grey suits and pairs of Home Counties women up in town for the sales. As they ploughed through great steaming plates of spaghetti Napolitana, Beverley’s guilt about having lunch with Tom forced her to keep directing the conversation towards Naomi. She talked about how much she’d missed her sister during the five years they didn’t speak.
‘When she rang back in October, I couldn’t believe how much she’d changed. She’s so much more easygoing than she used to be. I mean, she’s an absolute pussycat now compared to how she once was.’
‘Oh, real
ly?’ Tom said, raising his eyebrows.
‘God, yes. And I can see how much being in therapy has helped her.’
Tom virtually choked on his spaghetti.
‘You OK?’
‘Yeah, I’m fine,’ he spluttered. ‘Bit of tomato went down the wrong way, that’s all.’
After a few seconds he stopped coughing.
‘You know, it’s going to be wonderful,’ she said brightly, ‘after the baby’s born and we’re one big family again. I can’t wait.’
Tom reached out and forced her to put down her fork.
‘Come on,’ he said gently, holding her in his grey-blue eyes, ‘that’s not quite how it feels for you, is it? Has it got any easier, knowing you have to part with the baby?’
She said nothing for a moment or two. In the end she could see no point in lying.
‘No,’ she said softly. ‘No, it hasn’t.’
He put his hand on top of hers and kept it there for a few moments.
Beverley decided to change the subject. This was getting far too heavy, too intimate for comfort. ‘So,’ she said, desperate to steer the conversation back to safety, ‘tell me a bit about you.’
‘Nothing much to tell. All pretty boring really.’
He told her he’d been brought up in Middleton, just outside of Manchester. His father was retired but used to run his own printing business. His mother was a housewife. He’d been married briefly to a girl he met when he was a student at Sheffield.
‘Brothers and sisters?’
He shook his head.
‘So what are they like, your mum and dad?’
‘Mum’s a hygiene and housework fanatic. You know the kind of thing - washes her rubbish before she takes it out, and puts newspaper under the cuckoo clock.’
‘She doesn’t,’ Beverley said, laughing.
‘No, you’re right, she doesn’t, but you get the picture. Drives my dad mad. Not that he’s any less strange. Hates all foreigners. Always going on about how the Asians should be repatriated. Yet at the same time he loves animals and babies and every Saturday he stands in the local shopping precinct collecting money for the blind and disabled. I suppose you’d call him a Nazi with a small N.’