The Other Woman

by Jane Green

  Dan nods. “I understand all of that,” he says finally. “I do. And I know she can be difficult, but she’s only difficult because she loves us.”

  “She loves you,” I point out gently.

  “But she’s trying to love you too,” he says.

  “I know.” I sigh as I catch sight of the clock in the hallway.

  “Oh, shit, Dan. We’re supposed to be at their house in less than five minutes.”

  “No, we’re not. I canceled.”

  “You did? And you’re still alive?”

  “Oh, ha ha. Don’t push your luck. After our warm exchange on the train, I decided that dinner with them would be overicing the cake somewhat.”

  “Did she mind?”

  “No, of course not. And anyway, if I wasn’t exhausted before, I really am exhausted now.”

  “So does that mean we get to have our early night?” I grin, a twinkle finally back in my eye.

  “That would depend on what exactly qualifies as an early night,” Dan replies, beckoning for me to join him on the sofa, where he wraps an arm around me and pulls me close, making me feel safe, and warm, and loved.

  “Do I take it you really have forgiven me, then?” I say, reaching up to kiss him.

  “I’ve almost forgiven you,” he says, smiling as he pulls away. “Why not take me to bed and make me forget all about it…”

  The next day, as I’m about to leave the office, I start to feel period pains. Just slight cramps, the usual indicator that my period is on its way. And what perfect timing, because a period now would mean no period on my wedding day. I grab a Tampax from my bottom drawer and run to the loo, but there’s no blood. Nothing.

  So I leave, and, as I’m desperately trying to hail a black cab on Marylebone High Street—yes, I know, something of a joke during rush hour, but I’m exhausted and can’t face the tube tonight—it occurs to me that it seems to have been ages since my last period.

  When, in fact, was my last period?

  A cab swings round the corner and stops, and as the person gets out and pays, I dash over and grab the door handle. Once we are on our way, sitting at the lights on Gloucester Place, a vague feeling of unease comes over me, a feeling that is neither comfortable nor familiar. I rummage around in my bag for my diary and flick back furiously to four weeks ago.

  I may be completely disorganized, but my diary contains all the information I need to know, and I am pathological about marking my periods. For almost twenty years I have been meticulous in marking when they start, how long they last, and when the next one is due.

  But clearly this whole run-up to the wedding and the insanity of my life has thrown me, because four weeks ago I apparently failed to mark down a period. Did I forget? Could I have forgotten? How strange—but then I’ve never been as busy or as distracted before, and it would be somewhat understandable…

  I flick back more pages to the period before, which is marked. This means my next period is in two weeks’ time.

  But hang on. Again, that can’t be right. If it’s due in two weeks, then I would have had one two weeks ago and I remember exactly what we were doing two weeks ago, and I definitely didn’t have my period.

  Surely some mistake…

  Half an hour later I’m in my bathroom at home, sitting on the loo, an empty Boots bag lying on its side on the floor, and I’m staring at a pregnancy test that is showing two very distinct, strong blue lines.

  “Shit,” I whisper, over and over, fear and happiness and disbelief all mingling together as a smile starts to spread upon my face. “What’s Dan going to say?”

  “Pregnant? You’re pregnant?” Dan stops in his tracks and just stares at me, which wasn’t quite the reaction I was hoping for.

  Dan had a work dinner, so I’d spent the rest of the evening alternately surfing baby sites and dreaming about Dan sweeping me up in his arms and crying tears of happiness.

  I’d only known I was pregnant for a few hours and already it had opened up a whole new world for me. I’d spent the rest of the afternoon at babyzone.com and ParentsPlace.

  I now know that my due date is 30 August. I know that it’s not abnormal to feel cramps in the beginning—hence my vague period pains that weren’t—and that it doesn’t necessarily mean a miscarriage is on the way. And I also know that it’s probably best not to tell people until I’m twelve weeks and in the clear.

  Then of course I just had to check out babynames.com. So far my number-one choice for a boy is Flynn, and if it’s a girl I love the name Tallulah, although knowing Dan, he’ll want something much more prosaic like Tom or Isabel.

  After a while I had read everything I could, so I switched to things like which buggy is best (apparently the trendiest one right now is something called the Bugaboo Frog), whether I ought to be a Huggies or a Pampers girl, and how to decorate the dream nursery for your little prince or princess.

  So much to learn! So much I never knew!

  By eleven o’clock I’m still online, still surfing baby sites, but the shock finally starts to wear off and in its place is this huge excitement. Dan’s been ringing all day but I haven’t even been able to pick up the phone because I know I won’t be able to keep it in, I’ll just end up blurting it out, and I so want to tell him face to face, to see the joy and excitement in his eyes.

  Dan’s going to be a father! I’m going to be a mother! We’re going to be PARENTS!

  And now, finally, he is home, and I’m standing in the hallway watching my fantasies of Dan sweeping me up in his (strong, manly) arms and covering me with ecstatic kisses sail smoothly out the window.

  “Yes, I’m pregnant.” My elation immediately gives way to a burst of fury, followed swiftly by the feeling that I’m about to burst into tears. Clearly, the Web sites weren’t lying when they explained what happened to your hormones.

  “Aren’t you happy?” My voice is starting to break.

  There’s a pause. “But weren’t you using something?” Dan says finally.

  “Oh, Dan, for fuck’s sake!” The anger takes over again. Whoops. I can only pray the next nine months aren’t going to be this much of a roller coaster. “Yes, I was using something but clearly it’s not one hundred percent effective, probably because of those bloody antibiotics, but still, that’s rather beside the point. I’m pregnant, Dan, and we’re getting married in four weeks, and I would have thought you’d be thrilled.” By this time I’m on the verge of hysteria, and Dan, clearly realizing his mistake, finally comes out of his daze.

  He attempts to put his arms around me in a conciliatory gesture (yes, I’m stiff and unyielding—wouldn’t you be?) and places a paternal kiss on the top of my head. “I’m sorry, darling,” he says. “I’m just tired and, frankly, in shock. I just hadn’t expected this.”

  “So you’re pleased?”

  “Are you?”

  “I’m over the moon.” The anger disappears as quickly as it appeared, and a second later I’m hugging him and giggling uncontrollably. “I mean, at first I was in shock, but now I can’t believe it! I’m having a baby, Dan! We’re having a baby!”

  And I squeeze him and don’t even mind as he laughs nervously and says, “Of course I’m pleased. I just didn’t expect it to happen quite this soon.”

  Oh, bless him. He’s in shock. And he’s allowed to be, just as I spent the first few hours in shock. And so I lead him over to the sofa and make us both a cup of tea (Caffeine? What’s the deal on caffeine? I resolve to get back on the Internet just as soon as I’ve finished with Dan, and anyway, one cup surely won’t hurt), and when I bring it in to him I sit down and cuddle up next to him, smiling indulgently at the shock so clearly etched on his face.

  “I know you wanted to take glamorous weekend trips to Europe,” I start gently, “and I know we talked about waiting a year before trying for children but this is a blessing, and we’ll still be able to do all the things we wanted to do, we’ll just have someone else to do them with.”

  “I know.” Dan nods, as a frown
crosses his face. “But how are we going to tell my mother?”

  “Your mother?” I look at Dan in disbelief. Oh, for God’s sake. I can’t believe what Dan just said. “What the hell’s this got to do with your mother.”

  “Oh, come on, Ellie.” Dan rolls his eyes. “She’s only paying for our entire bloody wedding. I think she has a right to know, don’t you?”

  “No, Dan, actually I don’t. First, as you well know, if there were any way possible for us to have paid for this wedding ourselves, we would have done—”

  “You didn’t say that at the time.”

  “No, of course I didn’t say that at the time. I thought she was offering to pay out of the goodness of her heart, not because she was going to take over everything.”

  “She hasn’t taken over everything,” Dan splutters.

  “No? Correct me if I’m wrong, Dan, but many moons ago when you first proposed, didn’t we talk about a quiet wedding? Something small and intimate are the words that come to mind. Didn’t we say we wanted only close friends and family?”

  Dan is quiet, and bloody right too. He knows he’s not going to win this argument, and more to the point, he knows I know he knows. But the anger is now back and the less he says, the quieter he becomes, the more fired up I become.

  “Do you honestly think I wanted three hundred people I hardly know at my wedding?” I shout. “Do you think I wanted Chilean bloody sea bass or humongous white bloody ribbons tied around the backs of chairs?”

  “Well, why didn’t you say anything if you didn’t like it? God knows you’ve had enough time.”

  “Because I didn’t want to seem ungrateful, and because I realized a long time ago that this was not my wedding, this was her wedding, and that the easiest thing I could do would be to give it up and let her get on with it.

  “But just because she’s involved in every single tiny aspect of our wedding day,” I continue, “does not mean she has to be involved in every single tiny aspect of our lives, and this has nothing to do with her, so no, in answer to your question, we do not have to worry about how we’re going to tell her because we’re not going to tell her, at least not until we’re back from our honeymoon, and the reason we’re not going to tell her until then is not because she would freak out at my being—shock, horror—pregnant on my wedding day, but because this has nothing to do with her.”

  “Of course it has to do with her.” Dan shakes his head. “This is my child, her first grandchild. She has every right to know.”

  “Jesus, Dan.” I shake my head in disgust. “Do you want me to phone her every time we have sex as well? You know, just in case there’s some area of our lives in which she feels left out…

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” I continue, feeling furious and victorious at the same time, knowing that there’s very little Dan can say, “you probably already do that, don’t you?”

  Dan’s voice turns cold. “You can be incredibly childish, Ellie. Why don’t we carry on talking about this when you remember you’re an adult?”

  “No, why don’t we talk about it when you remember you’re an adult, and that you don’t have to go running back to Mummy for help with everything, and that Mummy doesn’t have to know everything about your life.”

  “You’re always accusing me of having a dysfunctional family,” Dan spits, “but you’re not exactly equipped to talk about normal relationships with your mother, are you?”

  “You bastard,” I whisper suddenly, tears glinting in my eyes. “How dare you bring my mother into this?”

  “You know what, Ellie? I’m fed up with your being able to say whatever you want about my mother when God forbid anyone says anything to you about yours.”

  “I don’t have a mother,” I say imperiously, spinning on my heel as I prepare to leave, astounded that Dan would stoop so low, astonished that he knew exactly where to hit so it would hurt the most. “You may remember that she died when I was a child. I would strongly suggest you stay in the spare room tonight. You’ll find the sheets in the bathroom cupboard.” And with that I sweep out of the room, collapse in the loo in floods of tears, and wish I hadn’t given up smoking when I met Dan.

  By Sunday all is forgiven, and we are both caught up in the excitement of having a baby. But this close to the wedding we have resolved not to tell anyone, and so Sunday lunch at the Cooper house, as much fun as it occasionally is, is something that I just can’t handle, given my delicate state.

  First and foremost, I know how snappish I’ve been of late. And second, I have a horrible feeling Linda might guess I will be walking down the aisle pregnant, and I really want to keep it to ourselves until we are back from the honeymoon. So I think the safest place for me to be right now is as far away from them all as possible.

  And of course Linda has been driving me crazy, although at least now I know why I’ve been so irritable recently. If I thought PMS was bad, it’s clearly nothing compared to the early weeks of pregnancy.

  The more I’ve thought about it, the more I’ve come to see that space is the problem. I know plenty of girls who have problems with their mothers-in-law because they always think no one is good enough for their perfect sons, and that the sons could have done so much better, and I’ve realized how lucky I am in that I don’t have this to deal with.

  My problem falls at the opposite end of the spectrum. Linda wants to be my mother. She’s trying much too hard, phoning me every day, three times a day, wanting to meet me for lunch, buying me presents. I know she means well, and I know how ungrateful I seem in resisting her, but it’s just too much for me.

  I thought, before this, that I would be the luckiest girl in the world if my future mother-in-law, whoever she might be, would take me under her wing and claim me as the daughter she never had. But of course I now see that I’m far too independent for that. That I don’t just want any mother, I want my mother, and that that simply isn’t going to happen. There isn’t anybody who can take her place.

  I’m trying so hard to stop Linda from taking over my life. I understand that her intentions are nothing but good, but there is also no denying that Linda believes boundaries are there to be crossed. She seems unable to hear the word “no.” This weekend I’ve explained to Dan that I just need some space, need to remember who I was before I became one half of Ellie and Dan.

  And if I’m lucky, I will find a way to turn Linda into an ally and friend, and she will find a way to accept me as her daughter-in-law and not her daughter. If I’m lucky, all it will take is a little space, a little firmness in establishing boundaries, and we will be able to play happy families once again.

  So this weekend Dan will, naturally, still go to lunch at his parents’. I certainly don’t want to get the blame for both our absences, and besides, Fran has invited me over for lunch, and, much as I now love being part of a couple, there are some traditions I still miss, and the odd Sunday lunch with Fran, Marcus, the kids, and various waifs and strays is one of them.

  The phone rings just as I’m getting ready to leave the house, having left just enough time to stop and pick up some flowers en route.

  “Hello?”

  “You’re obviously far more devious than you look.” Emma’s voice echoes down her mobile. “I can’t believe you managed to get out of lunch today, and now I’m here and I’ve got no one to talk to.”

  I laugh. “You’ve got Dan and Richard.”

  “But you’re the only person who makes this ridiculous Sunday tradition bearable. How did you do it?” Emma groans. “And, more to the point, why didn’t anyone bloody tell me before I arrived? I could have had a lie-in.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say, checking my watch and hoping I’m not going to be late. “But I had a prior arrangement and just for the record, your mum didn’t seem to mind at all.”

  “No, because she’s got her precious Dan all to herself.”

  I raise an eyebrow and say archly, “Please tell me she didn’t actually say that.”

  “Of course not. But even if she�
�s not missing you, I am.”

  “At least that’s something. Listen, I’ve got to go, can we catch up later?”

  “Sure, I’ll fill you in on the party you’ve been missing.”

  “Just don’t tell me anything I won’t want to hear.”

  “Don’t worry. I know my whole family thinks I don’t know the meaning of the word tact, but I’m far more diplomatic than people realize.” I put down the phone, not wanting to think about exactly what Emma meant.

  “Ellie!” “Sally! What are you doing here?”

  “Didn’t Fran tell you I was coming?”

  “Nope, but it was pretty last minute for me too, I think.”

  Sally twirls around on the doorstep before ringing the doorbell. “How do I look?”

  “Lovely as ever,” I volunteer, which is true. Sally has a freshness and a sweetness about her. Her hair always seems to be freshly washed and smelling of flowers, although she swears it’s her perfume. And I grin as I look at what she’s wearing underneath her full-length shearling coat: her sexy Seven jeans that she swears are her lucky charm and always wears when she wants to impress. Or pull. “So I take it there will be an eligible single man here?”

  “However did you guess?” She smiles sweetly.

  “But I thought Fran had stopped fixing you up with people. What was that whole discussion about nobody ever being good enough for you?”

  “Ah, yes, but that was before Fran mentioned Marcus was friends with Charlie Dutton.”

  “Charlie Dutton?”

  “You’re hopeless, Ellie!” She shakes her head at my lack of knowledge, well aware that I don’t pore over Heat and OK! and Hello! in the way that Fran does, that I would never know a celebrity was in the house unless Fran or Sally told me. “I can’t believe you don’t know who Charlie Dutton is.”

  The door opens and we’re swept in on a gust of warmth and noise, hustle and bustle. Fran and Marcus kiss us hello, taking our coats and shoving us down to the kitchen, where we attempt to resume our conversation in hurried whispers while our coats are being put away.