Page 26 of Because of Them

“Any plans?” Maisie asks.

“Yep.”

“What if you were meeting the Queen?”

Michael scoffs. “Especially if I was meeting the Queen.”

In my lap, Maisie jumps with a gasp. It’s hard to breathe but not because the baby is pressing on my lungs and not because Maisie has settled her weight against my chest. I stare out the window, willing the tornado of emotions to calm.He doesn’t mean it.He’s just saying it to entertain Maisie.

“You sure you’re ready for this?” I ask as Michael reaches for the car door.

He squeezes my knee and withdraws his hand, leaving behind a persistent tingle. One that lingers even as we cross the road. One that spreads when his palm rests on the small of my back as we step up the front steps.

Maisie runs off through the open door to find her cousins, but Michael hesitates in the entry.

“You should eat this,” he says as he holds out a pear. “So you don’t start feeling sick.”

I take it from him, spinning the fruit in my hands to break the stem.

“Technically, the pear is for last week. Sixteen weeks is an avocado, but that doesn’t make for a very good snack.”

The pear is juicy when I bite into it, filling my empty stomach and easing a fraction of the never-ending nausea I’ve grown accustomed to. “I want an avocado too,” I say after swallowing a few hasty bites. “With a greasy roast chicken and a fresh roll and the saltiest chips you can find.”

Michael wraps his arm around me and kisses my forehead. “Done.”

We walk, arm in arm through the house. In the kitchen Callum greets us with an enthusiastic, but exhausted, thanks. Cassidy’s eyes widen when she sees us. She squeaks when she takes the small housewarming gift—a plant I would kill in a week but that I’m sure will thrive in her care—from Michael. She spins back and forth on her heel, before settling to place the terracotta planter on the kitchen windowsill.

“To get the morning sun,” she says quickly as she steps back, beaming. Her eyes dart from me to Michael and her mouth drops open, but she clasps her hands across her face and disappears outside before I have a chance to ask her if everything is okay. I assumed Callum would have told her I was bringing Michael, but maybe the message was lost along the way.

Callum hands us each a drink from the fridge and we head outside. Michael and I feel like the black sheep of this jumbled group of friends. Cassidy moves to sit on the grass with two women. One looks oddly like her, only blonde. Under her tight grey dress there’s a gentle, but obvious, curve to her stomach. A giant rock sparkles on her finger and I clench my fists against the strange pulling in my gut. Sucking in a breath through my clenched teeth, I fight to relax my fingers and spread them against my stomach. It isn’t round like hers yet. It’s bigger than it used to be and on a good day in the right clothes I almost look pregnant, but I’m still waiting for my stomach to really pop into that round, obviously pregnant shape.

As though sensing my discomfort, Michael leans close to me and whispers, “You look beautiful.”

The warmth of his breath settles behind my ear and spreads down my spine leaving a new feeling deep in my core. The same one I’ve been trying to fight off since that moment in the car. I take a small step forward, ignoring the low grumble in Michael’s throat when I do.

He’s full of moments like this lately. Offering me a hand up, but not forcing the help on me. Standing protectively at my side when I need it, whispering words that give me confidence and simultaneously make me want to melt into his arms. And it feels good. Trusting him, knowing he is always there. And especially the melting into his arms. But it worries me too, these feelings I’m suddenly recognising. The way I want more.

The other woman sitting with Cassidy and her sister has long brown hair tied in a braid and wears a knitted jumper over her ankle length blue dress. She leans back on her hands, tilting her head up towards the sun and soaking in its rays. I don’t know her, but something about her makes me want to. Snapping her head back to Cassidy and Madison, she opens her mouth in shock before letting out a wicked laugh.Yep, I definitely want to know her.

Rolling my shoulders back in an attempt to muster up the courage I need to join the small group of women, I notice Michael has disappeared from my side. Maisie has run off back inside to show her cousins her new room. Callum leans against the brick wall, chatting with a tanned man I do not know. His sister followed the kids upstairs.

My choices are to stand here, drinking my lemonade alone, waiting for someone I know to return to my side … or sit on the grass with the other women. I choose the latter, but I gnaw at the inside of my cheek as I make my way across the grass.

“Audrey!” Cassidy cheers when I’m close, pushing up from her laid back position. “I’m sorry we don’t have chairs.”

I brush it off, awkwardly dropping to the ground. I sit with my legs crossed and my hands in my lap, and feel oddly like I’m the new kid at school. Whether she notices my discomfort, or just realises her manners, Cassidy nudges my knee with her own and turns to the brunette.

“Audrey, this is my old roommate, Amira.”

Amira smiles, nodding her head in my direction before laughter from the guys distracts her. She tilts her head back up to the sky, but from this close I can see her gaze fall on the unknown man now talking to Michael.

“And this is my sister, Madison,” Cassidy continues. “She’s pregnant too … she’s pregnant.” She over-enunciates the ‘t’ sound the second time, trying to hide her slip.

I brush off her concern and turn to Madison. “It’s okay. I’m sixteen weeks pregnant.”

A weight I hadn’t realised I was carrying falls from my shoulders. Other than Michael and Cassidy, I haven’t told anyone other than my medical team. Not even my parents, not even …

“Maisie doesn’t know,” I quickly add. I jerk my head around, to see the kids running back into the yard.

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