Stop the Clock

by Alison Mercer

  And as for David himself . . . When she’d been staying with him in Auckland back in 2000, he’d taken her out early one morning to fish for red snapper. It had seemed as good a time as any to bring it up, so she’d told him, ‘Mum and Dad do miss you terribly, you know,’ and he’d looked away from the boat and stared out across the water to the horizon and said only, ‘The thing about being out here, Nat, is that you can do things like this. I know that they’re upset, but it’s my life.’

  David’s departure shook both his parents – whatever they tried to think of it, Natalie knew they felt it as a rejection – and since he’d gone, Natalie found that everything she did attracted attention and concern. Pat worried about David too, but impotently; she worried about Natalie with a purpose. And when Pat worried, Larry worried too, because they were that kind of couple: they were almost indivisible, and rarely expressed different points of view.

  Natalie had often thought: Thank God for Richard. They loved Richard; she could hardly have found a son-in-law more guaranteed to please them. They were delighted with their first grandchild, too, but that didn’t stop them fretting. There was still plenty that could go wrong, and they wanted to do everything they could to ensure that it didn’t.

  Almost before Pat had got her coat off she was asking when they were planning to move Matilda into her own room, and was she still disturbing them at night and how was Richard coping with that and his heavy workload, and had Natalie managed to get Matilda into a proper routine yet?

  Meanwhile, Larry went from room to room to see if there were any DIY jobs that needed tackling – another feature of Richard’s perfection as a son-in-law was that, like Natalie, he wasn’t particularly handy, and Larry was, and this meant he could make himself useful.

  Then Larry asked whether their preference was to trade up or extend, whereupon Pat said, ‘Move right out of London, I should think,’ and Natalie didn’t hear Richard sigh, but suspected that he wanted to.

  Richard needed to stay in or near London for work, and Natalie had grown up in Home Counties suburbia and didn’t particularly want to go back. When they got married in central London, she’d hoped to send out a signal – we are cosmopolitan now, and this is home – but it seemed likely that both their families were going to continue to call this into question.

  For lunch Natalie washed a pre-prepared salad and heated up a shop-bought quiche. She felt that this was a bit of a poor show (Lucy would have cooked something nice, even with a three-month-old baby), but although she’d planned to master lots of new dishes while she was on maternity leave, it hadn’t quite happened yet.

  After helping to load the dishwasher Richard escaped to the office on the pretext of doing some work and Larry settled in the most comfortable armchair (usually reserved for Richard) with the Post Sudoku. Pat cuddled Matilda, who was, as ever, soothed by her grandmother’s air of calm, sensible authority. Natalie made a bottle of formula.

  ‘Have you given up on that awful breast pump, then?’ Pat asked.

  ‘I have,’ Natalie said.

  ‘That must be a relief,’ Pat said. ‘I expect you’ll start to get your figure back now. I think lots of women find they carry a bit of extra weight while they’re feeding.’

  Natalie saw the anxiety in her mother’s face and realized that this was something Pat was particularly concerned about. Maybe she thought Natalie’s post-baby bulk would make Richard vulnerable to temptation? Natalie felt herself reddening, and turned her back on Pat while she screwed the top on the bottle and shook it vigorously.

  They went into the sitting room, where Larry was already dozing, and Pat gave Matilda her bottle, and asked Natalie, a little hesitantly, ‘Any more thoughts on whether you’re going to go back to work?’

  ‘I’m going to take the full entitlement, which is a year,’ Natalie said.

  In her view, this was a major concession. Her antenatal group acquaintances were all planning to return to work in the autumn, when their babies were six months old.

  ‘And your employers are happy with that, are they?’ Pat asked.

  ‘They made the rules. They can hardly object if I take advantage of them.’

  Pat sniffed. Neither she nor Larry were admirers of the Government, and they found it strange that Natalie made a living out of attempting to justify its actions, although they always noticed if there was a spokesperson’s quote from the Department for Children, Schools and Families in the Post, which was their paper of choice.

  ‘And what about after the year’s up?’ Pat asked.

  ‘I’m thinking about going back part-time.’

  ‘They’re so important, these formative years. It’s time you don’t get back, you know.’

  ‘Did you enjoy it?’

  ‘Beg pardon, enjoy what?’

  ‘Being at home with me and David when we were little.’

  ‘You have to remember it was jolly hard work back then. There were no disposable nappies, and we didn’t have a washing machine, let alone a tumble-dryer. I’m not sure enjoyment is what it’s about, really. Children aren’t a hobby.’

  ‘They certainly aren’t,’ Natalie agreed.

  Pat looked down at Matilda, who was drifting back off to sleep. ‘But they’re what it’s all about. Aren’t they? Who knows, maybe seeing you with your little one will make your brother re-evaluate,’ she said.

  David’s partner, a consultant radiologist at the Auckland hospital where David also worked, was a youthful forty-five to his thirty-eight. By choosing to cohabit with an older woman, and one with such a high-flying career at that, David had signalled his lack of interest in reproducing, while still leaving his parents a glimmer of hope that one day he might wake up brimful of the desire to propagate himself and move on to a nice girl in her twenties.

  ‘I kind of get the impression David’s happy as he is,’ Natalie said.

  ‘Happiness isn’t everything,’ Pat said. ‘Happiness doesn’t mean you’re immune to regret.’

  Natalie felt faintly reproved by this. But then she got out the latest batch of photos of Matilda so Pat could choose which ones she’d like copies of, and Pat said, ‘Oh, she’s gorgeous – she’s so like you were,’ and the awkwardness of the return-to-work conversation was forgotten.

  That evening, once Matilda was down, Natalie squeezed into the black top and trousers and sequinned cardigan she’d decided to wear for her night out with the other mothers from antenatal class. They were pre-pregnancy clothes she was just about able to get back into. When she checked out her reflection she thought she didn’t look too bad; at least she had a waist again.

  She went into the office to say goodbye to Richard, and he said, ‘Have a good time. You deserve it. You should make the most of it. Say hello to them all from me.’

  They exchanged a dry kiss and she went downstairs and into the living room, where Pat and Larry were watching the news.

  ‘Oh, you look lovely,’ Pat said. ‘Doesn’t she, Larry? Natalie, I do declare, motherhood suits you.’

  As Natalie’s taxi moved away she reflected that perhaps Pat was right; maybe after all those years of feeling inadequate and restricted, she was finally going to come into her own.

  After so many evenings spent at home attempting to breastfeed Matilda and worrying about mastitis, it was bizarre to be out after dark, in a cocktail bar, knocking back margaritas. Natalie guessed that everybody else was finding it slightly strange too, because they kept talking about their babies, as if that would compensate for the unfamiliarity of not being with them.

  Adele was the only one who hadn’t made an obvious effort to dress up, and yet she was the clear winner in the style stakes. She was wearing a little yellow cotton sundress that looked as if it might well have come from a charity shop, and yet showcased her suntanned limbs and long, honey-coloured hair as if made to measure. The effect was insouciantly leonine; she looked as if she’d barely made an effort, but would be terrifying if she did.

  More than once, someone said, ‘But
we must all keep in touch. We will, won’t we? We must do this again,’ and Natalie wondered if they would, once they were all back at work and scattered across London. Pretty much everybody seemed to be planning to move to bigger houses in outlying parts of the city, apart from Natalie and Richard, and Marcus and Adele.

  After her second cocktail she felt ridiculously sleepy – too much to drink after too many broken nights, and she wasn’t used to alcohol any more. It would probably be as well to get home before too long, anyway – Matilda still often woke a couple of times during the night, and refused to let Richard comfort her; only Natalie would do.

  ‘So, who’s up for another drink?’ said Jessie Oliver, who had organised the get-together. ‘Nat, how about you?’

  ‘I think I’d better pass, actually,’ Natalie said. ‘I’m probably going to head off soon.’

  ‘You sure? How about you, Adele?’ Jessie said.

  ‘I’m going to make a move too,’ Adele said.

  ‘Oh dear oh dear, this will never do. It’s only half past ten! OK, before you guys go, I’d like to propose a toast. To our babies.’

  They clinked their empty glasses, and there was a round of goodbye embraces, through which Natalie moved self-consciously but sincerely; whether or not these women were going to turn out to be part of her future, they had already been through a lot together.

  Then she and Adele were out of the warm, perfumed, over-eager babble of the bar and striding quickly through the surprising coolness of the summer night. Adele was wearing a thin white cardigan over her frock, and Natalie wondered if she was warm enough, but then she concluded that Adele was not the type to feel the cold, or to admit to it if she did.

  Neither of them spoke for a while, and Natalie found herself hurrying to keep up. She glanced at Adele’s profile and saw she looked both determined and preoccupied, but couldn’t deduce whether she was angry, or sad, or both.

  ‘I’m sure there’s a mini-cab office somewhere along here,’ Natalie said, but Adele ignored her.

  Try again. ‘It was a nice evening, wasn’t it?’ she ventured. ‘I hope we do it again soon.’

  ‘I don’t suppose we will,’ Adele said. ‘It was nice while it lasted, but we were all just going through the same thing in the same place, and now we’ve done it and everybody’s moving on. It takes more than liking people to make the effort to stay in touch. There has to be something else.’

  Then she took Natalie firmly by the hand and led her a little way down a quiet side street.

  Natalie giggled.

  ‘What are we doing now?’ she asked.

  Adele stopped and squared up to her. She shifted closer so that her body was pressed up hard against Natalie’s. Then she planted her mouth on Natalie’s and kissed her.

  After a while she withdrew.

  ‘I’ve been wanting to do that for a long time,’ she said.

  ‘I guess it had crossed my mind,’ Natalie said. ‘I mean, once or twice. I’m a bit new to this kind of thing. Not totally new, but mostly new.’

  Adele took her by the hand again, and Natalie felt something that shocked her – a distinct crackle, a tug of energy passing from palm to palm.

  ‘Come back to mine,’ Adele said. ‘I’ve got the place to myself. He’s taken Paris to his mother’s.’

  ‘I should be getting back.’

  ‘When are they expecting you?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. Midnight?’

  ‘Then come home with me, and I’ll call you a cab.’

  Surely that was a harmless suggestion? Sensible, even.

  ‘OK,’ Natalie said.

  They kept holding hands as they walked along. Natalie stumbled and lurched towards the pavement and Adele pulled her back upright. Natalie giggled again and realized that she was drunker by far than she’d expected to be. She also realized that she didn’t care.

  9

  Publish and be damned

  TINA’S UPBRINGING HAD instilled in her a range of values that she was able, with a little effort, to ignore: chastity, truthfulness, willing self-sacrifice, and so on. It had also taught her one guiding principle for which she had enduring respect: May as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb. And so, once her pregnancy was so advanced that it was not going to be possible to keep it secret for much longer, it was inevitable that she’d be tempted to use her column to announce it.

  She hadn’t piled on the weight, but there was only so much you could do with tunic tops, empire-line dresses and forgiving jackets. Her hair had the implausible bounce and vigour of a celebrity’s crowning glory in a shampoo ad, she’d gone up from an A cup to a C, her belly button was no longer an inny and she had a weird black line bisecting her belly from her navel to her pubes. The smell of cooked cabbage made her want to vomit, and after every lunch break she had to fight the urge to crawl under her desk and nap.

  The changes weren’t just physical, either. She had discovered a perturbing ability to cry; it had turned out to be a very bad idea to watch that film about unmarried, institutionalized mothers in 1950s Ireland. Yet her response to stress had slowed down; deadlines didn’t fill her with adrenalin as headily as they once had. Perhaps she just didn’t care quite as much. The baby thrashed around and pummelled her insides so insistently that it was impossible to forget how much her life was about to change, and while her old priorities hadn’t been swept aside entirely, they seemed to have been suspended.

  She carried, in her wallet, the printout she’d been given after the twelve-week scan, showing a smudge of white curled against shades of grey. If you didn’t know what it was, you couldn’t have guessed; it looked like the ghost of a bean. But she had been told it was a boy. Her son! At the twenty-week scan – a couple of weeks ago now – she’d been startled by the array of bones he had sprouted, all as sharply visible as the remains of a dinosaur exhibited in a museum: the spikes of ribs, the limbs, the skull. She was gestating something as hard and enduring as a fossil, something that was, if not yet visibly human, at least obviously animal . . . and much too big now for its life-size image to fit easily into a wallet.

  She knew from her baby books – her current guilty pleasure – that he was now growing toenails and fingernails, had capillaries blooming with blood beneath the skin, could hear her heartbeat, her voice, the grumbling of her stomach before mealtimes. So far, nobody had said, ‘So when’s it due?’ or offered her a seat on the tube, but surely it wouldn’t be long. When she was in her swimming costume the real reason for her enhanced embonpoint was immediately obvious, but so far she’d managed to avoid bumping into anyone she knew in the pool.

  She fancied that, just lately, she’d been the focus of sidelong, calculating glances from some of her female colleagues, most notably Anthea Trask, the lissom mother of five, but also, lately, Rowena Fix, the fearsomely efficient features editor, and even Julia, Dan’s girlfriend, who seemed to be surviving in her position as Rowena’s general dogsbody. Maybe they were trying to work out if she’d had a boob job. It was sod’s law that now Tina finally had a cleavage worth drawing attention to, showing it off was the last thing she wanted to do.

  Dan had barely looked at her at all. Soon after she had decided to keep the baby she had bumped into him coming into the building with Julia one morning. After that she kept seeing them together, usually at lunchtime, when they paraded up and down the road outside the office, holding hands, and laughing at each other’s jokes, and looking like the picture of young love. Once she’d even walked in on them in the basement room where spare back issues were kept – though mercifully they’d been doing nothing more intimate than gazing into each others’ eyes.

  She knew it was unreasonable to be hurt, and yet . . . She told herself that what she missed was the bantering, flirty friendship she’d once had with Dan, and she’d wrecked that as soon as she’d slept with him – it wasn’t really Julia’s fault. It did occur to her to wonder whether Julia knew that something had happened between her and Dan and had put an embargo on any further con
tact, but she dismissed that as self-aggrandizing; why should Julia be jealous?

  She kept going back to that awful conversation . . . ‘Really? You look younger.’ So humiliating. But thinking about it now, hadn’t what he’d said actually been rather innocuous? Couldn’t it even be interpreted as a sort of compliment? To be sure, it had been an awkward moment, but was it possible that that was more to do with her own feelings about having been left behind in the race than anything he had said?

  But then . . . it was irrelevant now whether or not he’d been put off because she was at an age where she might want to chivvy things along towards commitment and reproduction. She was having a baby, and it might or might not be his. There was no way that was going to be welcome news.

  Mulling it over, she realized how little she knew him; she found it impossible to predict his reactions. Would he be angry? Upset? Would he push her to have a paternity test done as soon as possible – even though she had decided she wanted to wait until after the baby was born, because testing in utero carried a small risk of miscarriage and now she had decided to have this baby, she really didn’t want to lose it? Would he press her to tell him who the other candidate for paternity was, even if she said she couldn’t? Would he say the magic words – ‘Whatever you want, I’ll support you’ – or would he accuse her of wrecking his life?

  Justin’s response was much easier to foresee. He had forbidden her to contact him, so from the outset he would be angry, but coldly so, and his first concern would be for his reputation. He would warn her to keep him out of it. He would hint darkly that embittered ex-girlfriends tended to come off worst if they attempted to go public about their relationships with powerful men. And he would wash his hands of her and make sure she knew that she was on her own.

  Which was how she felt: alone, with only the growing baby for company. Surely that was the best, the safest, the least complicated way. She didn’t want anything from anybody else. She didn’t need anything from anybody else. All she wanted to do was keep her head down, hang on to her job and her sanity, and stay healthy. And so she drifted along in a soporific, self-contained state, lying low, biding her time, knowing that sooner or later she would have to cope with the reaction to her news, but not yet quite ready to invite it.