Page 7 of The 3am Shattered Mums' Club

‘I can second that. I’m a really heavy sleeper. Sometimes Daz has to shove me to let me know Skylar is waking up. Sounds terrible, but I’ve let him off the night feeds. He’s an accountant and forgets how to count if he’s not had a full night’s sleep. But if I’m awake, you only need to holler, and I’ll send you some cat memes or something to cheer you up. Then you’ll know you’re not all alone in the world. In fact, I might do the same to you both, if you don’t mind?’

‘Fab, what’s your number, Mel?’ Sophy brought up a new contact on her phone as Mel began reciting the mobile number.

Jude was now fast asleep; his little chin resting in the crook of Mel’s hand.

‘We could start our own club.’ Sophy put her phone down on the table, a small spark of something igniting within her; a notion that this was something more than just an impromptu coffee with two mums she had only just met.

‘The 3 a.m. Club!’ Mel scoffed.

‘The 3 a.m. Shattered Mums’ Club,’ Aisha said triumphantly and finally with a genuine smile.

Sophy and Mel exchanged glances and grinned.

‘Good one!’ Sophy said.

‘Credentials for exclusive membership include: bags under eyes, stitched perineum, leaking boobs and a twitchy right eye,’ Mel reeled off in a heartbeat, making Sophy and Aisha roar with laughter, and Sophy had to squeeze her buttocks together to stop any excess pee slipping out. Sophy watched Aisha wipe a tear from her eye as she felt her heart swell and her stomach flip. This, she realised was the most she had laughed in ages. This was what she craved in life: belly laughs with women who understood her. She couldn’t bear the blank stares that came back at her from women she had tried, but failed, to connect with, or worse still, that droll tone followed by ‘OMG that’s hilarious’ as they remained expressionless.

When they had all organised themselves and ordered coffees, and slabs of millionaire shortbread and blueberry muffins had been shared around, Sophy raised her half-drunk cup of decaf oat latte – feeling as though she needed to cement this moment in time, for fear it could evaporate as quickly as it had arrived – and said, ‘Here’s to the 3 a.m. Shattered Mums’ Club.’

And the other two women raised their mugs in unison, and they all chorused, ‘The 3 a.m. Shattered Mums’ Club.’

5

AISHA

Aisha had watched the man walk past the house three times now. Always on the other side of the road, and he hadn’t looked anywhere near her house, but it still unnerved her.Heunnerved her. She had been trying to distract herself with how extraordinarily pretty Holly Willoughby was looking onThis Morning, and a great distraction it had been from the monotony of changing nappies and wiping up sick, but she couldn’t help but feel uneasy about the odd rhythms of the man on the street. During the ad breaks, she kept returning to the window to monitor his movements until she stopped returning to the sofa. She stood by the window, this time with Jude in her arms – Otis was happy lying on his back for now – and she watched the man. He was tall, with a green parka-style coat and a brown leather ear-flap trapper hat that kept his face partially covered. He reached the end of her road then turned around and walked back again. She presumed he went all the way to the other end, as it was several more minutes until he passed her house again. He was wearing biker boots over jeans, but she hadn’t seen him arrive on a bike, nor could she see one close by. She was trying to commit all this information to her memory should the police call by with news of a break-in. She would be pleased that she would be able to give an accurate description. Yet she didn’t feel that this was someone who was scoping the street to plot a burglary. It felt more ominous. The longer she watched him and thought about why he was here, the more she began to think he was here for the boys. She knew it was silly, but she couldn’t help the dark feeling in the pit of her stomach. She watched him walk past a fourth time, and then waited for several minutes to see if he returned. This time, he didn’t.

‘You okay?’ Charley’s voice drifted through, breaking her reverie.

Aisha spun around and saw Charley standing in the doorway to the sitting room.

‘Er, yeah. Fine, why?’ Aisha couldn’t help the slight sarcastic tone that had been creeping through when it came to her girlfriend these last few weeks. There was Charley, fully rested, her neat blonde hair tied back in a perfect French plait, glowing skin, on a coffee break from doing something she truly lovedandthat made her money.

‘Because I love you and I’m just checking you’re okay.’ Charley edged into the room. Aisha clocked how Charley was dressed in a pristine white shirt that she had tucked into a pair of light-blue three-quarter-length cotton trousers. Not a hint of baby puke in sight. Her cheeks looked plump and flushed. She was radiant. She looked like a woman who’d had a full night’s sleep. Whereas Aisha could feel the tiredness consuming her body, like she had been possessed by it, as though tiredness had been injected into her blood. She wanted to crawl out of her own skin and step into something that resembled Charley’s ensemble.

You could have bloody checked in at 11 p.m., 2 a.m. and 6 a.m., Aisha thought to herself as she continued eyeing Charley. She was sure Charley had just had a meeting with someone, so that explained the smart turnout. But it still stung that Aisha could barely cobble together a limp pair of leggings and T-shirt. Aisha remained tight-lipped and didn’t return the term of endearment. She was pretty sure she still loved Charley, but she was seeing her through a fog right now. Most days, she had no idea what day it was let alone had time to consider her and Charley’s relationship. Charley was good with the boys, there was no denying that. She was one hundred per cent there at the weekends, but during the week she regimentally stuck to her schedule of getting into the bath – where she read a book for half an hour– and was then in bed by ten. She was an ex-Catholic schoolgirl, and an only child of heavily religious parents, who had not only been shocked when she came out but also extremely offended. They now only sent cards at Christmas and on her birthday, and never once mentioned Aisha or had initiated meeting the babies.

But Charley seemed happy with her life and her choices and loved her job. She was inundated with work, was always working on a jingle, a voiceover or narrating an audiobook. But she made sure she only worked Monday to Friday, leaving herself free and available for Aisha and the twins at the weekend. But that two-day bit of respite only made Aisha feel more anxious as she counted down the hours to when she would once again be all alone.

‘Anything interesting out there today?’ Charley joined Aisha at the window and looked out onto the street of other terraced houses and the avenue dappled with trees.

‘Just some man that has walked past four times.’

‘Is it that bad that you’ve started counting how many times people walk along the road?’ Charley laughed and Aisha felt something snap inside.

‘And that’s funny because?’

Charley stopped laughing and put a hand on Aisha’s shoulder, which Aisha immediately shrugged off.

‘Okay, it’s like that, is it? Well, you just let me know when you need to eat your lunch and I’ll—’

‘Now! Now is when I want to eat lunch.’ Aisha took a tightly bundled Jude from her shoulder and passed him to Charley.

‘Oh, right. But you know it’s only ten forty-five in the morning?’

Aisha stopped on her way out of the lounge.

‘Yes, but when your day and night merge together, there are no longer set times to eat. So unlike your regimented schedules – which by the way seem to have become even more regimented since the babies were born – I get to eat when I like.’ Aisha tried to keep a lightness to the tone of her voice, the words coming out in a stage whisper. She had vowed once the babies were born, she would not raise her voice nor get angry. But right now, although her voice was tame, inside was a raging fire, and this was not the sort of person Aisha had ever been. It was also not the tone she’d ever taken with her girlfriend before. Neither she nor Charley were the passive-aggressive type. Or hadn’t been. That was what had made their relationship work so well.

---