Chapter One
My husband flung his arms around me. Suddenly I was being whirled round and round the kitchen. I gasped and gave a nervous giggle. There can’t be many married couples who engage in a spot of Strictly Come Dancing early on a Tuesday morning in late April. But then again there aren’t many married couples like us. Only yesterday my immediate neighbour, Alison, had caught Marcus and me on our doorstep. She’d been hurrying out of Number 3 about to embark on the school run just as I was waving Marcus off to work – or, rather, my husband was kissing me good-bye. Except his cursory brush against the edge of my mouth had swiftly slid to my lips and turned into a lingering kiss which almost immediately had become a full-blown hungry devouring of my mouth.
‘Mmm, mmm. Oh, Florrie. Mmm, mmm. I need you. I need you so much. Mmm, mmm. I’ll miss the eight oh-seven and catch the eight thirty-two. Mmm, mmm. Get back in the house, Florrie. I can’t help it. Mmm, mmm. I simply have to have my wicked way with you and–’
‘Oh for goodness sake, Marcus!’ Alison’s cut-glass accent had sliced through the air instantly putting a stop to things. ‘What sort of message are you conveying to Tiffany?’
Marcus had promptly released me. We’d gazed at Alison’s bespectacled daughter. Plugged into her iPod, Tiffany had been oblivious of her surroundings. The little girl had been neatly dressed in the uniform of Darwin Prep, the local private school. She was the most hot-housed child we’d ever met. The likelihood that Tiffany had been listening to iTunes was improbable, but there was every chance she’d been absorbing French vocabulary specifically downloaded for her by Alison. My neighbour had given her daughter a little prod in the back.
‘Get in the car, Tiffany. Mummy will be with you in two minutes.’ She’d turned back to glare at Marcus. ‘It’s high time you stopped this exhibitionist behaviour on your doorstep every morning. Do you really think the residents of The Cul-de-Sac want to witness borderline soft porn?’
Marcus had smiled at Alison disarmingly. ‘There are only three houses in The Cul-de-Sac, Ali. It’s hardly the world and his wife watching. Do I detect a touch of jealousy?’
Alison had pursed her lips and given Marcus a frosty look. ‘Most certainly not. However, behaving lecherously in a public place is a big no-no. It’s beyond uncouth.’
‘Uncouth, eh? You don’t fool me, Ali,’ Marcus had playfully retorted. ‘I don’t think old Henry is giving you enough attention. C’mon, admit it. We’ve seen the sweep of your hubby’s headlights along The Cul-de-Sac at midnight. What sort of time is that to be coming home from the office? Your Henry is so burnt out from City trading he’s not stoking your fire.’
Alison had immediately looked like she’d swallowed a gobstopper. ‘My fire,’ she’d spluttered, ‘does not need stoking, thank you very much. And if Henry chooses to work long hours, that’s his business. At least we know Christmas will be in the Caribbean as usual.’
And with that my neighbour had stuck her nose in the air and stalked off to her brand new four by four. Any onlooker would have been forgiven for thinking Alison, a vision in full make-up and high heels, had been heading off to a smart London office instead of simply keeping up with all the other high-maintenance mothers and their spoilt offspring at the gates of Darwin Prep.
At that precise moment, Daisy, our other immediate neighbour at Number 1, had opened the door to her house. Husband Tom had stepped out, three children scampering around his legs. The kids had been wearing mismatched overcoats suitable for St Mildred’s Primary, the local school where Tom was headmaster. The children had also been arguing furiously. Tom had looked both henpecked and harassed as he shepherded his clamouring brood over to the family vehicle.
‘Morning, Florrie. Morning, Marcus,’ he’d called over his shoulder. ‘I saw you both through the window, by the way. Nice to see romance is alive and kicking, even if it is at Number 2, and not my house.’
‘I heard that,’ Daisy had called after her husband. She’d scowled at Tom’s back. ‘I’m ready, willing and available – just as long as it’s before nine in the evening.’ She’d shrugged and turned to Marcus and me. ‘After that I’m out cold. The kids are exhausting.’
Tom had shut the car’s rear door on the still noisy children. Walking back to Daisy, he’d plonked a dutiful kiss on her cheek. ‘I have a pile of pastoral work to catch up on with the vicar this evening. I’ll grab a sandwich while I’m out, so don’t wait up.’
Daisy had given an exaggerated sigh. ‘Story of my life,’ she’d grumbled. ‘No rumpy-pumpy for me this evening.’
‘When are you ever awake for rumpy-pumpy?’ Tom had countered.
‘I’m awake now, aren’t I?’ Daisy had said belligerently. With her bed-head hair and crumpled pyjamas splattered with that morning’s egg and baked beans, it was fair to say she hadn’t looked her most alluring.
‘You two should have a date night with each other,’ I’d suggested.
‘Ah, but you don’t have children,’ Tom had sighed. His expression had been one of long-suffering. ‘They change your life. Wear you down. Pretty much wear you out too. I can’t remember the last time Daisy and I managed to eat a meal peacefully together without one of the kids emitting a blood-curdling scream and all hell breaking out.’
‘Take no notice of him,’ Daisy had added hastily. She was fully up to date on my many attempts to get pregnant. And the many failures too.
‘All I’m saying,’ Tom had sighed, ‘is that the days of being a loved-up couple like Florrie and Marcus here are a thing of the past for us.’ He’d turned back to us with a deprecatory shrug. ‘I take my hat off to you both. Honestly. I don’t know any husbands and wives who have been married for five years still enjoying the honeymoon period.’
He’d given a warm smile and for a moment his whole face had transformed. He was actually a very good looking guy. Seconds later he’d morphed back into put-upon Tom complete with drooping mouth and matching posture.
‘Forgive me for holding you both up. I must get the children to school and then,’ he’d perked up slightly, ‘have a coffee in the staff room for ten minutes. It’s the one place where there is peace, quiet, and grown-up conversation.’
He’d inclined his head by way of farewell and, like a man going off to his execution, opened the driver’s door. The Cul-de-Sac had briefly been filled with the din of still arguing children before Tom had pulled the door shut after him. From behind the steering wheel he’d raised a tired arm by way of farewell. Moments later he’d driven off in a cloud of exhaust.
Daisy had turned to us and suddenly given a cheerful grin. ‘Hurrah! Peace until I collect the mini mob at half past three. I’m going to put the kettle on and watch a bit of Jeremy Kyle. Fancy joining me, Florrie?’
‘Are you trying to persuade my perfect wife to be a lazy good-for-nothing woman?’ Marcus had teased.
‘Excuse me?’ Daisy had instantly bristled. ‘The moment Jeremy has finished telling some poor cow that the father of her unborn child is an unfaithful lying bastard, I’ll be off the sofa and cleaning this house from top to bottom. I shall then tackle an overflowing laundry bin, work my way through a mountain of ironing, and finally head off to the supermarket for a mammoth shop that will leave my arms like stretched spaghetti for the rest of the week. My days are full to bursting, Marcus. Make no mistake about it.’
‘I’ll consider myself told off,’ Marcus had said graciously.
‘And I’m busy too,’ I’d reminded Marcus.
Despite not having a litter of kids making demands upon my time, I did have a huge canvas awaiting my attention in the loft room. Whilst I’d yet to strike it big and be represented by an art gallery, nonetheless I’d recently started to make a decent living producing colourful works for a local restaurant.
But all of that had happened yesterday. Sometimes things can change dramatically in the space of just twenty-four hours, which Marcus and I discovered on this particular Tuesday morning resulting in him dancing me around our kitchen. You see, after five barren years of marriage, I was pregnant. We gazed again at the double blue lines on the pregnancy tester before my husband squashed me into another hug.
‘I can’t believe it,’ he murmured into my hair. ‘It’s nothing short of a miracle.’
Suddenly I couldn’t think of anything to say. Already the enormity of the situation was starting to make itself felt. My heart quickened. Anxiety? No, Florrie, I told myself, just shock. Mentally, I took a deep breath. It would be fine. Everything would be fine. To the outsider my life was perfect. Enviably so. I lived in a desirable house in The Cul-de-Sac in the popular village of Lower Amblegate. I had fab neighbours and was married to a respectable man who was earning nicely thank you very much as a property surveyor. A little baby was the icing on the marital cake. I was the luckiest woman in the world. Wasn’t I?