he replied, his head lolling back down into the snow, listing to one side. “I think I’m gonna pass out now. And I think I’m going to enjoy it.”
The woman who was handing Maggie a coffee was a good few inches shorter than her. Probably a good few years younger than her. And definitely a whole lot more pregnant than her.
She was also, Maggie thought, heart-breakingly pretty. Blonde hair, tied up in a loose pony. Gorgeous skin. Huge, amber-coloured eyes. Five foot nothing and about ready to pop.
She lowered herself slowly down into the plastic chair next to Maggie, huffing and puffing as she sat, assuming the ‘bowling ball between legs’ pose beloved of heavily pregnant women the world over.
“I’ll be needing one of those soon,” she said to Maggie, pointing down at the inflatable cushion she was perched on. “After Luca was born I didn’t sit down for three days – just lay on my big wobbly belly, demanding caviar and champagne, while I watched reruns of America’s Next Top Model and hated all the thin girls!”
Maggie gave her a half smile, not sure if she was joking or not.
“Joking,” she said, clearing the matter up. “But I was pretty sore, and I still hate all the thin girls. You know how it is. Do you? Do you have kids?”
“One daughter,” replied Maggie, transferring the scalding hot coffee into the other hand to avoid adding third degree burns to her bruised coccyx. “But she’s 18 now. And one of the thin girls.”
The woman – Leah, she now knew, Marco Cavelli’s sister in law – did the usual surprised double take. Refreshingly, she didn’t even try and hide it. She didn’t seem the sort of person who was easily embarrassed. She was just too comfortable in her own skin to even bother.
“Wow,” she said, sipping her own hot chocolate and grimacing at the taste, the heat, or possibly the combination of the two. “You started early. High school sweetheart or too much swigging cider in the park at the weekend?”
Maggie laughed out loud – spilling Nescafe’s finest on her jeans as she did. She’d hit very close to the mark. Maybe she’d had a misspent youth as well.
“A little bit of both, actually,” she replied. “Seemed like a disaster at the time, but…well, it wasn’t. It was the best thing that ever happened to me.”
Leah nodded, her blonde pony bobbing vigorously. “I know exactly what you mean. Luca was something of a happy accident as well, and he’s – “
“Adorable,” finished Maggie for her.
“Yes. I’d say I was biased, but it’s quite obviously a statement of objective fact – he is the most adorable little boy who ever walked the planet. Although he’s not exactly delighted right now – when we got your call we were about to head back up to Scotland with him. Instead, he’s stuck back in Marco’s flat, being looked after by his landlady, who he regards as one step down the moral ladder from Cruella de Vil. The landlady’s looked after him before and…well, let’s just say it took the mention of ambulances and emergency operations to persuade her to do it again!”
Maggie had been at the hospital for the last three hours. She’d drunk approximately fifteen of these coffees, in their finger-killingly thin plastic containers. She’d had her arse X-rayed. She’d been poked and prodded by a boy of about 12 who claimed he was a doctor but had to be lying. And she’d been given two paracetamol and an inflatable cushion to sit on. Her precious first edition was crumpled and soggy and stuffed in her backpack, she’d never got to her chocolate tiffin, and all things considered, it had been the Worst Day Off Ever.
Still, at least she was in one piece. Which was more than could be said for Marco. He’d been whisked away by the doctors once they got here, and had been too doped up to talk once the paramedics arrived. So Maggie had lingered in the family room as she waited for Doogie Howser to tell her what she already knew – she had a sore bum – and used Marco’s phone to call his family.
Rob – his brother – was on voicemail, but Leah had picked up straight away, answering in a fake American accent with ‘what gives, stud-in-law?’.
There’d been a fairly awkward conversation where Maggie explained what had happened, Luca squawking away in the background, and a slightly stunned pause where Leah finally connected the words ‘Marco’, ‘accident’, and ‘hospital’.
They’d arrived an hour later, and Leah had come straight through to find Maggie, while her husband went to ‘harangue the living daylights out of the staff’, as Leah put it.
Since then, the two women had been sitting together, sipping hot beverages, and making small talk as Maggie wriggled around on her inflatable cushion. There was a small fake Christmas tree on one table, and a few dusty drapes of tinsel over the doorframe. It was one of the least festive places she’d ever been, and she was desperate to just get home, take more pain killers, and soak her nether regions in hot water and Radox. Hopefully Ellen would be in later, and they’d have a fun old night applying ibuprofen gel, eating Chinese takeaway, and swapping war stories.
Luca, it turned out, wasn’t Marco’s son at all. He was super uncle, not super dad. He’d been staying here with Marco – who was delivering a guest lecture at the Law Institute – while Leah and Rob had a few days together in their cottage in Scotland.
“Though technically it’s not ours,” said Leah. “It belongs to a midget called Morag. Which I know sounds ridiculous because I look like I still need one of those plastic steps toddlers use to reach the bathroom sink, but Morag is both a midget and a thin girl. I’ve never forgiven her for making me feel fat the first time I stayed there, and tried to squeeze into her clothes. I only had a wedding dress with me at the time…”
Maggie raised her eyebrows, about to ask the obvious question. And also to ask what kind of wedding dress, purely out of professional curiosity.
“Long story,” said Leah, grinning. “Let’s just say it ended with loads of fabulous sex, me moving to Chicago with Rob, and eventually with Luca arriving on the scene to turn all our lives upside down. And now, with little Bella here,” she finished, rubbing her vast tummy.
“It’s a girl?” Maggie asked, feeling the familiar combination of broodiness, regret and several shades of envy flood over her. She recognised its arrival, and tried to mentally scoop it back into the bitter little box where it belonged.
“We don’t know for sure,” replied Leah, “but I’m insisting that the universe provides me with at least one other person who doesn’t pee on the toilet seat.”
“Just wait until she’s a teenager and you’re sharing a bathroom cabinet with her,” said Maggie, recalling the disaster zone that was Ellen’s shelf back at home. “You might yearn for a bit of pee on the toilet seat.”
“Ha! That may be very true…oh, look, here’s my lord and master – he’ll have news for us…”
Leah dumped her hot chocolate cup on the table, and dragged herself to her feet as quickly and gracefully as it was possible for one human being containing another human being to do.
The man who
