laughed uproariously. ‘You certainly can, my love.’
I sighed. My family are so weird. From the outside looking in, they probably appear deeply ordinary, an average suburban family, but sometimes I honestly wonder whether I’m adopted. It would explain so very much. And yes, I know everyone goes through phases where they feel like their family isn’t on their wavelength, but I often have moments like this when I feel like mine are a completely different species.
‘So anyway,’ said Hayley, frowning in Mum’s direction. She was perched on Gary’s meaty thigh, looking dainty as anything, and turned back to look at him so tenderly that I think that was the precise second I knew for sure what their news was. I was instantly filled with happy emotion, plus that feeling again that this could be the making of her. Hayley needed someone to love who adored her back and not just because she was pretty.
‘We’re pregnant,’ she announced to the room, unable to conceal the news a second longer.
I knew it.
Wendy instantly leapt from her seat, clearly delighted. All her usual frostiness and affectation vanished as she let the good news infuse her with grandmotherly excitement. I too squealed and raced over to give Hayley a hug. Derek’s reaction was more unusual.
‘What do you mean we’re pregnant? You’re not pregnant are you son?’ he demanded to know, looking utterly thunderstruck in Gary’s direction.
Still, once he’d been reassured that this was a physical impossibility, he too was pleased as punch and there was much backslapping between himself, Gary and Martin. Even Pete managed to mumble something about how having a child had been the single most important thing Elvis had felt he’d done, which coming from him was practically a speech.
‘I’m going to be an aunty,’ I shrieked as I hugged Hayley again and, for the first time in years, I felt her usually tense shoulders relax a little as she hugged me back.
‘I’ll be asking you to babysit all the time,’ she said, her odd manner making this sound more like a threat than she probably meant it to.
‘Any time,’ I said as we pulled apart.
After that there was a sort of happy pause and briefly I wondered what we were all waiting for, and then I realised. We were waiting for Mum. So far she hadn’t said anything and her silence had become conspicuous.
We all ended up staring at her and, finally sensing that something was required of her, she clapped her hands together and widened the rather fixed grin she was wearing even further. ‘Well, well done both of you,’ she said eventually. ‘I’m really pleased. Though don’t think I’m going to let it call me Granny. I’m far too young to be a granny aren’t I Mar? So it’ll be Nana Alli all the way. And when are you due my darling?’
‘Well,’ said Hayley, ‘Strictly speaking I shouldn’t really have told you yet because I’m only eleven weeks so I haven’t had my scan yet, but all being well it’s going to be a November baby, so he or she will be here for Christmas.’
‘Oh,’ came the collective soppy gasp from all of us, apart from Mum who looked vaguely distracted. By this point her luke-warm reaction was starting to annoy me. Apart from anything else I could see Hayley was starting to get wound up by it. I didn’t blame her.
‘Oh, well that’s great,’ she said, looking faintly doubtful. ‘But just thinking aloud then Hayls, you’ll be all right for the first lot of auditions but we might have to work out what to do about the live shows, all being well and you get through of course.’
‘Mum!’ exclaimed Hayley. She looked genuinely shocked. ‘Are you actually thinking about Sing for Britain? Tell me that’s not the first thing that’s entered your head? I know it’s a shame I can’t do it now, but I promise you I’m much, much happier that this is happening.’
I don’t usually feel sorry for Hayley but at that moment I really did. My sister had my future niece or nephew in her belly, Mum’s first grandchild, but all she could think about was her own pipe dream.
‘Course it isn’t love,’ she added hastily. ‘But someone’s got to think about these things don’t they? I mean Beyoncé didn’t just sit back and let her pregnancy ruin everything, did she?’
Hayley looked dumbfounded, but for a second I thought she was going to let Mum’s insanity go, mainly because she usually likes to appear terribly demure around Wendy and Derek. However, perhaps it was all the hormones or something because in the next moment she let rip.
‘Ruin everything? Is that what you really think? That my baby would be ruining things? Ruining what anyway? I’m thirty-three for Christ’s sake and totally sick of going to crap auditions, which I never get. And besides, there’s always next year anyway. This year, however, we’re having a baby Mum. A baby that has taken us two years to make, so which stupidly, I thought you might be pleased about. Especially given I don’t have a fucking career to worry about because I’m not frigging Beyoncé.’
‘Hayley,’ boomed Derek. His ruddy face had taken on a purple hue, so horrified was he by such a display of emotion in public, especially from a female. Little did he know that when not in their presence Hayley likes to swear like a sailor.
‘I’m not sure you should be addressing your mother like that, young lady.’
‘Sorry,’ muttered my sister, instantly horrified to have lost control in front of the in-laws.
Mum looked mildly rebuked but typically wasn’t wise enough to know when to keep her mouth shut. ‘Don’t be silly Hayls,’ she insisted. ‘Having a baby doesn’t have to mean giving up your dreams this year. You don’t want to leave these things too late.’
‘Maybe you should leave it love,’ suggested Martin quietly, which was the most I think he’d ever stood up to her in all the years they’d been together.
‘All right Mar,’ replied Mum stonily, unused to anything that even remotely resembled criticism from him. I noticed she had a creeping patch of redness developing on her chest.
‘Well, we’re all delighted for you Hayley anyway,’ interrupted Wendy, and for once I was firmly on her side. ‘I for one cannot wait to be a granny. It’s unbelievably exciting and I can’t believe you’ve kept it secret this long Gary. Ooh, imagine a little Gary running around at Christmas.’
We all tried, but it was hard. For starters the baby would only just have been born so it being able to run around was unlikely, wasn’t it? Secondly, the thought of a muscular, dwarf baby version of Gary was disturbing. I hoped whoever was in there looked like Hayley.
Later, when they finally all left, it was a relief. Pete skulked out the front door, seconds after their departure. I planned on escaping too, albeit only to my bedroom, but needed a word with Mum first.
‘What did you have to go on about Sing for Britain for?’ I said.
‘Don’t you lecture me,’ she snapped.
‘I’m not lecturing, I’m just saying.’
‘Well don’t. Honestly, I don’t know where I’ve gone wrong with the pair of you. You living at home, single, wasting your life away and now Hayley, throwing away her chance of success.’
I recoiled,
