I watch as Kate half wobbles, half marches towards me, though it’s plain to see she’s trying to execute the latter with grit. It doesn’t matter if she’s failing. The look on her face is like thunder, and I’m puzzled as to why.
‘Oh shit, who’s upset the she-devil?’ Sam mutters under his breath, spotting his girlfriend steaming towards us. ‘Hey, gorgeous!’
‘What the fuck, Jesse?’ She launches right in. ‘Your scars. You told her you had a motorcycle accident?’
‘Oh,’ I say, her grievance suddenly crystal clear.
‘Oh? That’s it, oh? You can’t keep that kind of shit from her!’
What? I can’t keep that kind of shit from her? Fucking watch me. Only because Kate’s expecting do I hold back from getting up in her face. I don’t fancy a scrap with my mate, not that Kate would need him. She’s a firecracker all on her own, more so since my mate put a bun in her oven.
‘I know what I’m doing.’ I breathe through my statement, calm as I can manage when on the inside I’m livid. I know what’s best for my wife. Me.
She’s the one recoiling now, and Sam’s quick to move in, a pacifying arm placed on her back. And Kate’s quick to shrug him off. ‘You’re lying, that’s what you’re doing.’
‘I’m protecting her.’ I can feel my teeth grinding, my jaw aching in an instant.
‘By lying?’ She laughs, and it’s sarcastic as fuck. ‘Haven’t you learned? Look what happened the last time you kept her in the dark.’ Her face is getting redder by the second, her rage probably matching mine, though I’m containing it far better than Kate.
‘Kate, calm the fuck down.’ Sam tries to encourage her away. She’s having none of it.
‘You can’t lie to her. It isn’t right.’
I swallow and reach for Kate’s hand, taking it in a firm grip and looking her square in the eye. I hope she sees how sincere I am. How determined. ‘Kate, lies are necessary when you know the person you’re lying to can’t handle the truth.’ I breathe in more oxygen, and Kate snaps her mouth shut, so I push on while she’s been silenced. ‘Ava can’t handle the truth, Kate. Not now. Maybe never. I don’t know, but in this moment I’m not telling her all that shit. It pales into insignificance, anyway. What matters to me, to Ava, is us. Our family. The kids. I want all of her energy on me and the twins. Not a nobody who’s not in our lives any more.’
She’s staring at me, absorbing my speech. ‘I think you’re mad.’
‘I feel it,’ I say. ‘But she’s falling in love with me again, and now more than ever, I don’t want anything to jeopardise that.’ I flick my eyes to Sam. He still has hold of Kate, but his eyes are on me. Sympathy is emblazoned across his face. And his small nod tells me he understands the angle I’m taking here. I’m grateful.
‘Oh shit,’ Kate blurts, her welling eyes overflowing when she blinks.
‘Hey.’ I move in to comfort her, to make sure we’re all right. ‘Don’t get upset.’
‘I’m not upset.’ She looks down, as do I, finding a puddle around our feet. ‘My waters broke.’
‘Oh, fuck.’ I step back, cringing, feeling all kinds of guilty for more or less inducing her labour.
‘What?’ Sam shoots a fiery stare at his girlfriend. ‘That’s what happens when you get stressed out!’ He takes her cheeks and moves in, smacking a big kiss on her lips. ‘If you weren’t in labour, I’d spank you stupid.’
‘Save it for later, Samuel.’ Kate gazes at him as Sam gazes back. ‘We’re going to have a baby.’
And like the news might have just sunk in, he flips to panic mode. ‘Fuck! I’m going to have a baby!’ He looks at me, and then to Drew. ‘We’re having a baby!’ he shouts, silencing the room. ‘Call an ambulance!’
‘Someone calm him the fuck down,’ Kate mumbles, and then that mumble turns into a moan, her body bending at the waist. ‘Ohhh, shit, there it is.’
‘What’s going on?’ Ava rushes over, looking to everyone, and then down at her feet. ‘Oh.’
‘Oh, your pretty shoes,’ Kate whines, clinging to Sam’s arm. ‘They’re ruined.’
‘Give it a rest, woman,’ Sam chides as Kate flings her other arm out and grabs me. I hold on to her as she pants, her red face now red for other reasons. Flashbacks, tons of them, steam forward and swamp my brain – visions of Ava in the latter weeks of her pregnancy, fooling me into believing she was in labour to wind me up, and then the moment she wasn’t playing any more. The moment it actually happened. I look across to my wife as I help Sam hold up Kate, a crowd of people growing. I watch as she throws out instructions, before taking Kate’s arm from me. I’m in a world of my own, rendered immobile by my memories, a useless heap of man amid the pandemonium.
‘Jesse!’ Ava’s sharp shout of my name snaps me back into the room. She’s looking at me in question. ‘You’re the only one who hasn’t been drinking.’ She must catch my confusion, because she pushes on urgently. ‘You need to drive us to the hospital.’
‘Right.’
‘An ambulance!’ Sam yells, frantically looking around the room, like he might find one in Café Royal.
‘Will someone shut him the hell up,’ Kate spits, forgoing the help of her boyfriend and putting all of her trust into Ava, clinging onto her friend. ‘Oohhhhhh God!’ Over she goes again, bending at the waist. ‘Shit, shit, shit.’
Ava starts walking Kate towards the exit, me and Sam following like the useless men we are. ‘Sam, I need you to time the contractions,’ Ava orders over her shoulder, helping Kate along. ‘Jesse, bring the car around.’
Kate takes slow, tentative steps, Ava matching her pace. ‘How bad does it hurt?’ Kate asks, looking to Ava for reassurance.
‘Like a bitch,’ Ava answers automatically. I find myself inhaling, a little stunned. ‘And when that baby’s ready to come out, you’re gonna feel like you’re trying to push a flaming watermelon out of your fanny.’
Kate laughs, and then stops, shouting at the doors of the elevator. ‘Motherfucker!’
‘About sums it up,’ Ava quips, accepting a wet cloth from Raya and dabbing at Kate’s forehead.
‘You’re stealing my thunder,’ Raya jokes, nothing but fondness in her tone as she takes Kate’s other side, the trio of women in a line before us, taking the ropes, putting us to shame.
All that’s left for me to do is put an arm around Sam and walk him on behind while I watch Ava talk Kate through it. Like she’s done it before. Because she has.
*
Five of us sit in the waiting room – me, Ava, Drew, Raya and Georgia. We insisted they stay at Café Royal and enjoy their party. They insisted on coming. It’s past midnight, and Georgia is asleep on Drew’s lap, Raya’s head resting on his shoulder. The constant moans and screams of women are leaking out of the doors of the maternity unit. It’s only been a few hours since we arrived, and I know more than anyone that it could be a long night. But not one of us is prepared to leave. This is a monumental moment in our friends’ lives. We all want to be here for it.
I peek down at Ava. She’s sitting next to me, her gaze fixed on our held hands in her lap.
‘You okay?’ I ask, wondering if she’s thinking about when she had our babies. Looking up at me, she sighs, her head falling onto my shoulder. I reach around with my spare hand and cup her cheek. ‘Does it really feel like you’re pushing a flaming watermelon out of your fanny?’
Her jerking body against mine makes me smile, her laugh soft. ‘Yes.’
‘Ouch,’ I quip, shuddering for effect. Her hand reaches for mine on her face and holds it there.
‘I don’t know where it all came from,’ she says, almost sad. ‘It’s the story of my life at the moment.’
I breathe out, my arse slipping further from the seat. I’m not sure whether I like these little flashes of recollections any more. They don’t excite me, more make me sad. Sad that the instinct is there, but the memory and the essence of that memory isn’t. I close my eyes, feeling so tired.
I have roughly two seconds of shut-eye before I hear some doors open. Shooting my stare towards them, I find Sam standing outside the maternity unit, looking like shit, his face washed out, his eyes bloodshot. For a moment, I’m terrified that something has gone wrong. Then a lazy grin creeps across his exhausted face, and my heart works its way back to a safe pace.
‘It’s a girl,’ he croaks, his voice like gravel. ‘We’ve gone and got ourselves a little girl.’
I’m up in a heartbeat, seeing he’ll collapse with a mixture of happiness and exhaustion if I don’t reach him quickly. He practically falls into my arms. ‘Fuck me, I never want to do that again.’
I smile, knowing exactly how he feels. ‘Congratulations, mate.’ I give him the biggest bear hug, taking most of his weight. A girl. I laugh under my breath. That’s it. Sam has joined Drew and me in girlie hell. I fucking love it.
I release him only when Ava makes it to us to take over the hug, though I’m on standby to catch him if his legs give. ‘Well done. How’s Kate?’
‘Knackered.’
We all come together, hugs and kisses given all around. And it’s beautiful. A beautiful moment in our lives. My only wish is that the twins were here, and as I look at Georgia, rubbing at her sleepy eyes, that wish turns into an ache. Only one more day, I tell myself. Then I see my babies.
Once we’ve said our goodbyes, I walk an exhausted Ava to the car, practically holding her up. I buckle her in, kiss her neck, and linger there for a time, just feeling her on my skin. She’s dozy.
‘I love you.’ Her whispered confession is drowsy, but her deeper nuzzle into me tells me she’s aware of what she’s saying. My heart could burst.
‘I know,’ I whisper back, kissing her hair, holding my lips there for ever.
In this moment, such a perfect moment, I decide what I must do in the morning.