Babyville (15 page)

“I will not stand for this,” I say, my voice getting louder and louder, and I know I'm starting to shout, which is ridiculous but I can't contain this anger. “Who the fuck do you think you are? Do you think you're better than the rest of us? You're different and it's okay for you to miss the meeting?”

“I'm rea—really sorry,” he stammers, crestfallen. “The tube was cance—” but I'm on a roll and quite frankly I don't care about his stupid excuses.

“Everyone else managed to make it here on time, and I will not have members of my team treating me with disrespect.”

I burst into tears.

What
the hell is going on? What the hell is wrong with me? I run out of the room, sobbing like a child, embarrassed as hell, and crash through the door of the ladies', collapsing on the loo and crying uncontrollably into my hands.

“Maeve?” There's a gentle knocking on the door and I know Stella's concerned, but I can't stop crying. I sound like a child, and I want to stop because this is my biggest nightmare come true. I have lost it in front of my staff; I have humiliated myself in front of my staff, and now I can't stop crying.

And worst of all, I don't even know what I'm crying about.

“Maeve? Are you okay?” I hear more footsteps through my sobs and can just about make out Nat's voice asking Stella what's wrong. “Go back to the office,” Stella says, and the fact that Nat does makes me feel a bit better. There's something in Stella's voice that is unbelievably reassuring, and after a while my sobbing becomes hiccuping, and after a while the hiccuping slows down until I'm almost normal. I pull some toilet paper off the roll and dry my eyes, then open the cubicle door to see Stella standing there with a concerned expression in her eyes.

“Everything okay?” I say with a smile, and I turn and walk out the door. I feel absolutely fine.

 “I fucking
knew it,” Ted's saying as I walk back into the room, only remembering to wipe the mascara from under my eyes just in time. “She's turning into Julia. I swear, it's that bloody chair. All the women who sit in it start off sussed and sexy, and that chair turns them into mad bitches from hell.”

“Johnny,” I say, as Ted jumps, then starts shuffling some papers guiltily on his desk. “Can I have a word in private?”

Johnny follows me out the door, both our footsteps echoing in the silence that has suddenly descended on the room, and he follows me mutely to the drinks machine where I put in some coins and punch in the buttons for two cups of tea.

And it's only when I turn to look at him that I realize how upset he is, and I feel terrible.

“I'm so sorry.” I hand him a cup of tea, but he still can't look at me. “Johnny, look at me.” Reluctantly he raises his eyes, and I continue, shocked at the hurt. “My behavior in there was appalling. I don't know what to say. It had absolutely nothing to do with you but I took it out on you because you were an easy target. There is no excuse for the way I spoke to you, and I promise you it won't happen again.” I can see I'm getting through.

“Johnny, there's stuff going on in my personal life. Not stuff I can talk about, but it's a difficult time for me. I should never have brought it into the office, and I should never have taken it out on you. Can you forgive me?”

Johnny smiles a very small smile and nods.

“Okay. Let's get back. Oh, and by the way, can you ask Ted to find out whoever supplies the furniture in this place and get them to change my chair immediately?” With this Johnny gives me a proper smile.

Now all I have to do is apologize to everyone else.

I stop
off at the chemist's on the way home again tonight. Every night I make sure I find a different chemist, just so they don't think I'm completely mad. Every night I get home and go straight to the bathroom with a pregnancy test, praying that the blue lines will have disappeared. They haven't.

Viv phones me every day. She phones to see how I am, and when I tell her what happened today, because I am still in shock about my behavior, Viv tells me that her pregnancy with me was exactly the same.

“I didn't have a minute's sickness,” she says fondly, “but my hormones were all over the place. I cried at absolutely everything and the anger? I had a positively rageful three months. If I wasn't shouting, I was crying. You're just like me,” she says, and then she stops, because she remembers that I am not just like her.

I am not going to have a baby. I am going to have an abortion.

Just as soon as I get around to making the appointment.

15

From sex kitten to blimp in
five easy minutes.

I'm enormous. How can I possibly be this enormous when I'm just, what, eight weeks, nine weeks pregnant? Okay, okay, maybe it's down to the sudden irresistible urge I've had for chocolate. Maltesers, Crunchies, Double Deckers. You name it, I've sent Johnny down to the vending machine to get it.

And the reason for yesterday's minor tantrum? The machine was out of Bountys. Who would have thought a bar of coconut covered with milk chocolate would elicit a flood of tears? Certainly not me. Not before yesterday. But if I can't eat exactly what I want to eat, my hormones go haywire, and I know Ted's comments about the Mad Bitch from Hell chair have been repeated amid much mirth.

Oh fuck it.

Viv keeps calling to see if I'm okay. And last week a parcel arrived with a year's supply of Pregnacare vitamin supplements.

“Why did you send this to the office?” I hissed down the phone to her.

“I knew you wouldn't be at home to take it in,” Viv said. Then, after a pause, “Maeve, love. I know you're going to have an, a you know . . .” She can't actually say the word. “. . . but you should be taking folic acid anyway. Not just for the ba . . . I mean that you need to be taking extra vitamins and minerals to keep yourself healthy.”

“I'm fine.”

“They'll help with the hormones,” Viv said, at which point I tore off the seal and downed three with a swig of cold cappuccino.

Ah yes. Cappuccino. I have read that coffee doubles your chance of miscarriage within the first three months of pregnancy, and have subsequently been drinking extra-strong cappuccinos from the moment I arrive at work until the moment I leave. The only unfortunate side effect thus far is that I'm spending most of my time at work sitting on a toilet seat, which isn't hugely constructive.

I came back from my thirteenth toilet break this morning (it was 10:34
A.M.
) to find Mike Jones loitering outside my office door, pretending to be having an intimate chat with Stella but undoubtedly waiting for me.

“Hi, Mike.” I flash him my most flirtatious smile, but evidently my killer smile only works with a killer suit and killer high heels. A huge baggy jumper from the Men's Department of M & S combined with size-eighteen drawstring trousers isn't exactly the sexiest look in the world, I have to concede. (Although my boobs are now fantastic . . . )

He looks uncomfortable, but comes into my office and sits down, gesturing for me to do the same. “Um, everything all right?”

“Yes. Great. Everything all right with you?”

He nods distractedly, then lets out a big sigh, finally meeting my eye. “Maeve, I feel like this is déjà vu. I can't believe this is happening again but I've got to ask you what the fuck is going on.”

“What the fuck is going on?” I'm smiling, keeping the tone light, but my heart's pounding, because please God, let me not have jeopardized the one job I've wanted all my life.

“The word on the floor is that you're—”

“Turning into the Mad Bitch from Hell?” I cock an eyebrow and note his surprise. He thought I hadn't heard it.

“Turning into Julia?” I continue, chancing a grin, which is—thankfully—returned, together with an embarrassed shrug.

“Thank fuck for that. I thought you'd start screaming at me too.” He looks down warily at the chair on which he's sitting. The chair behind my desk. My chair.

“Yes,” I say, nodding wearily. “That is the Mad Bitch from Hell chair, and no, I don't think it will affect you as (a) you're a bloke and (b)—”

“I'm already a mad bastard?” He's enjoying this.

“Well.” I shrug. “That is the word on the floor.”

“Come on, then, Maeve. What's it all about? All I keep hearing is that you're throwing these tantrums and everyone's scared shitless of you. I had to give Julia a break because I couldn't have all her staff feeling that way, and now you've morphed into her and I want to know why.”

I sit
up straight and look him in the eye, wait until I have his full attention.

“I'm pregnant.”

“You what.” The shock on his face is a picture, and I can see exactly what's going through his mind. First, fuck, why did I give the job to some stupid woman who's got herself up the duff in five minutes? Second, who the fuck am I going to get in to replace her, and third, hang on. She's single. Who the fuck is the father?

“Joke,” I say weakly, wishing I hadn't said anything, wishing I hadn't felt the need to put him to the test. His sigh of relief is audible.

“Fuck. I thought I was going to have a heart attack.” As Mike recovers from the shock, I think quickly. What the hell am I supposed to say? How the hell am I supposed to explain myself? Family problems? He'd want to know what. Mike Jones is not the sort of man to be satisfied with a vague explanation. “You don't like it?” he'd say. “Well, fuck off, then.”

“I'll tell you the truth if you won't tell anyone,” I say, and he leans forward, his attention immediately caught. “I've been having a few problems.”

Mike's eyes are full of sympathy.

“It's actually gynecological, one of my ovaries has a fibroid on it the size of a golfball, and my hormone levels are . . .” I don't have to say any more. Mike has already stood up and is holding a hand up to silence me.

“It's all right, Maeve,” he says, and my explanation has had exactly the desired effect. It's female, it's gynecological, and therefore he doesn't want to hear any more about it. “I completely understand. Do you need any time off? Is there anything we can do?”

“I'm fine,” I say, grinning on the inside. “I may need a couple of days but I'll give you good warning. They'll probably want to do a laparoscopy to investigate the—”

“Fine, fine.” He's already halfway out the door. “Just take whatever you need.” And with that he disappears back up to the safety of his office.

It's
Nat's birthday and we're all off to lunch to celebrate. I tell the others I'll be along in a little while, tell them I just have some stuff to do in the office first, and I sit at my desk for a few minutes, bracing myself before I pick up the phone.

“Viv, it's me.”

“How are you, love?”

“Nervous. I'm going to phone the clinic now. I just wanted to talk to you first.”

“Do you think that maybe you're not doing the right thing?” Again there's hope in her voice.

“No, Viv. I am doing the right thing. It's just so scary, having to actually do this. Look, I'm fine. Sorry. I'd better go now, just to get it over and done with.”

“Good luck,” Viv says, but her voice is flat. “You'll be fine. I'll come with you.”

“I know, Viv,” I say. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

 “Well
Woman Clinic. Hello?”

“Oh hello. I wonder whether I could make an appointment to come and see you?”

“Of course. Is it a smear?''

My voice drops. I can't help it. Admitting it to someone else feels so shameful. “No. An abortion.”

“Of course. Can I ask how many weeks pregnant you are?”

“I think eight weeks. Maybe nine.”

“That's fine. You'll need to come in and have a consultation first. How about this Friday? At three
P.M.
?”

I quickly shuffle through my diary. “Yes, that's fine.”

“Do you know where we are?”

“Yes.” My finger traces the address in the Yellow Pages. Station Road.

“And if I can just take your details.”

I give them to her, feeling as if I'm making an appointment with the dentist, because this seems so ordinary, and I put the phone down, swivel my chair round and smile the first proper smile I've smiled all day.

Until I see Stella.

We
just look at one another for a while.

“I'm so sorry.” She looks at the floor. “I came back to get my mobile and I walked in on your conversation and I tried not to listen but . . .”

I don't know what to say. I feel a bit shaky, so I keep sitting down, and I just look at Stella, who eventually looks at me.

“I suppose that explains the Mad Bitch from Hell?” She attempts a grin, and suddenly I want to tell her everything. I want to be able to confide in someone other than Viv, and something about Stella just tells me I can trust her.

“Don't tell anyone?” I whisper. “Please. Swear you won't tell anyone.”

“Oh God, of course I swear. I swear on my life. But are you okay? How do you feel?”

I hesitate for a second, but I need to talk about this, I have to talk about this. “Other than mad, and bitchy, I'm fine. Oh, and angry, and tearful. And generally as if I'm completely losing the plot. But other than that I'm fine. Can't you tell?”

We both laugh.

“Have you ever had an abortion?” I venture, and Stella nods.

“It was a long time ago. I was at university and we were stupid and I had to have an abortion. I came back to London and had it done in the holidays.”

“How was it?”

“It was a long time ago, and I think when you're young you don't process things in the same way. I was eighteen. A child. It probably bothers me more now than it did then.” She stops, thinking she's said the wrong thing.

“I'd rather you tell me the truth,” I say to reassure her. “You don't have to censor yourself.”

“It's difficult. I do think about it now. A lot. But I know that there was absolutely no way I was ready to have a child at eighteen. I guess you're not ready either.”

“No. I'm not ready for a child. I don't want a child. Never have. I want a career. Independence. Freedom. I don't want to be trapped by a baby. Plus of course there is the fact that I don't actually have a partner so it's not even as if I'd have any support, emotional, financial, or otherwise.”

“It's Mark Simpson's, isn't it?” Stella says simply, after I drift into silence, and I know I should be surprised, but I'm really not. I nod.

“Are you shocked?” I ask, because she certainly doesn't look it.

“No. I knew something had happened that night. The chemistry between the two of you was so strong I could almost touch it.”

“Oh shit. Do you think anyone else noticed?”

“No, I don't. I like watching people, but the others were too interested in chatting him up, or chatting to one another, to sense anything. And then one night in the bar I saw you look at him . . .”

“Shag or Die,” I say, smiling ruefully.

“Shag indeed.” She smiles back and leans forward confidentially. “I'm sorry but I have to ask. Was it—?”

“Fucking amazing.” I'm smiling, which is extraordinary really, given the circumstances, but it feels so good to be able to talk about it.

“Shit.” She stamps her foot petulantly, then rolls her eyes. “I knew it. So. Are you going to tell him?”

“I think so. Not because I want him to be involved, not at all, but, well. I heard the rumors—”

“That he was firing blanks?”

“Well, yeah. And clearly he's not.”

“You definitely need to tell him.”

“I know. But I haven't even spoken to him since that night. How would I say it? How do I tell him?”

“What about, ‘Babe, your boys can swim'?”

I start to laugh.

“Seriously,” Stella says, “why don't you arrange to meet him for lunch? Call him now.”

“Now? Christ. I don't want to actually talk to him.”

“That's the point. I just passed him in the lobby, leaving for lunch. Call and make an appointment with his secretary. She'll put a lunch in his diary.”

“Excellent idea.” I pick up the phone, and after a brief chat with Sheila in the Legal Department scribble in a Thursday lunch.

“God,” I laugh. “Can you imagine his face when he comes back this afternoon and sees he's having lunch with me on Thursday?”

“He'll probably think you need another shag.”

“Yup, because he'd really want to shag me looking like this.” I gesture to my jumper and tentlike trousers.

Stella's face suddenly becomes serious. “Maeve, you still look gorgeous. More voluptuous than usual, but that's no bad thing. And anyway, they always say that men prefer women with a bit of meat on them.”

“I have to say I do think my new boobs are fantastic.”

“There you are, then.” Stella gestures at her own flat chest. “There's a bonus if ever there was one.”

“Stella, thank you.” It's an effort not to throw my arms around her and hug her.

“What for?”

“For making me feel fantastic. I feel like a weight's been lifted off my shoulders.”

“Any time. And if you want me to come with you, that's fine too.”

“Thanks. My mum said she'd come, but if I need you I'll call you.”

“Come on.” Stella looks at her watch. “If we're quick we'll still get to the canteen in time for coffee.”

I'm
nervous about lunch. I'm nervous about what to say, and even though Stella has coached me through the appropriate words, she can't coach me through Mark's reaction, and what to do if he doesn't see my point of view.

I get to the restaurant first. Ten minutes early so I can try to relax as much as possible before he arrives. Under normal circumstances I'd order a drink, but one of the side effects of my pregnancy appears to be a serious aversion to both alcohol and cigarette smoke, so I make do with a glass of sparkling mineral water.

It's not quite the same.

And then I see Mark walk through the door and seconds later he is at the table, confusion and wariness etched on his face.

“How are you?” he says, taking a seat, and of course it is awkward, for these are the first words we have spoken to one another since that night.

“Fine. You?”

“Fine.”

And we grind to a halt.

A waiter arrives with menus and we are both inordinately interested in the choices therein, neither of us looking up until the waiter finally leaves with our orders.

“So. How's life?”

“Fine. Yours?”

“It's okay.”

“I hear Julia's on holiday.”

“Yup. New York.”

“God, I love New York.” Jesus, I'm really struggling here.

“Yup. Me too.” And we both run dry. “Maeve?” I look up quickly. “Why are we having lunch together?”

I put down my glass of water, because this is ridiculous. Any thoughts I had of us having a nice lunch, with me casually throwing in the fact that I'm pregnant over coffee, have now disappeared. I have no choice. It's now or never.