Page 1 of In This Together

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HANNAH

‘…I baptise you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.’

Right on cue, TJ’s wide eyes filled with horror, and he started to scream bloody murder in the vicar’s arms.

Hannah thought she would cry too if someone threw cold water over her head when she was trying to nap. She smiled, pretending all eyes in the congregation weren’t on her as she accepted her baby beside the church font, whispering to him as she bounced him in her arms. The drenched, already thick and unruly mass of black hair on his head served as confirmation that he was now a blessed soul.

She wasn’t sure she believed in God and the bible, but she believed in something. And she had many blessings to be thankful for. Luke, her eldest son, who was going through the hormones of a late teenage boy but was a talented, smart kid. Jackson, her middle boy, who was straddling the age of innocence and pre-pubescence – one minute playing tag with friends and the next sneaking glances at the magazines Luke kept under his bed that Hannah pretended not to know about.

And she had Rod, whom she sometimes referred to as the biggest kid of them all, more affectionately known as her husband. When they got pregnant in college, it was as if Rod had frozen in time, forever throwing his clothes on the floor to be laundered by someone else, addicted to all sports – watching, playing, talking about them – but the same guy she’d fallen in love with and was still very much in love with. He was her very good-looking, menace-in-the-bedroom, lazy-ass best friend.

For all their imperfections, including her own, Hannah’s family was her world and it was important to her to have them blessed – just in case.

‘Can I take him?’

‘Sure,’ Hannah said, handing off TJ to the waiting arms of Sofia.

Hannah’s family didn’t stop at her kids and husband. It extended to the three most important ladies in her life – best friends, Andrea and Rosalie, and Sofia, who was biologically Andrea’s kid sister but who felt like a sibling to Hannah, too.

Sofia held the baby’s soaked head of hair against her chest, and her eyes shone as she made faces to TJ. It had been a while since Hannah had seen the sparkle in those beautiful eyes.

The cause of that spark going out was standing right next to her – Jay, Sofia’s husband, whom everyone could see was a waster, except Sofia.

‘It looks good on you,’ Hannah told her, receiving a soft smile in return, but one that didn’t quite reach her cheeks.

‘I’m going to be the best god-mommy you’ve ever had, baby boy,’ Sofia told him, miraculously turning his tears to giggles.

‘I don’t think so. You’ll be second best.’ The voice belonged to Rosalie, who appeared next to them, tickling TJ’s stomach with her perfectly manicured fingers.

Rosalie always looked the part and today was no exception. Her long hair fell in salon-styled curls across her shoulders. Though she was willing to tickle TJ’s tummy, she was standing a safe distance from him in her tailored cream coat, which probably cost more than Hannah earned in a month.

Together, the three women and a baby led the christening party out of the church in New Jersey.

‘I don’t understand why I’m not a godparent. I’m a godparent to Luke and Jackson,’ said Andrea, following behind them.

Andrea was Hannah’s oldest and most loyal friend. She and Sofia had moved with their dad from Nashville to New Jersey when Andrea was a young girl and Sofia a baby. They’d moved into a house on the same street as Hannah’s parents and Andrea had been in Hannah’s class at school.

Their friendship had been formed quickly, when Hannah had shown Andrea the answers to their math homework because Andrea had forgotten to do it. The reality had been that Andrea hadn’t just forgotten, she hadn’t had time. She was a young girl with too much responsibility at home.

‘I thought you said you didn’t want to be TJ’s godmother?’ Rod said, sidling up to Andrea.

‘That’s not at all accurate,’ Andrea quipped, stone-faced. ‘I said, if something happened to you and Hannah, wouldn’t I have to take the kids anyway?’

‘Therefore, you don’t need the title,’ Sofia said across her shoulder. ‘Whereas Rosalie and I haven’t been godmothers before and weneedthis.’

Secretly, Hannah secretly hoped that asking Sofia to be a godmother to TJ would give the sisters something new to connect over because recently, there’d been tensions between them.

They reached the churchyard, where Rod called to their group to bunch together for photographs.

Hannah, Rosalie, Andrea and Sofia stood in front of the church, with the remaining friends and family gathered behind them. Luke and Jackson stood to Hannah’s left, already looking dishevelled in their school trousers, shirts now partly untucked with skewed ties.

‘Plus,’ Rosalie said, already smiling as Rod handed his camera to another churchgoer and offered instructions on focusing the lens, ‘I buy the best gifts.’

‘That isn’t true,’ Andrea said through her own tight smile, her eyes squinting against the sun’s rays as Rod slipped into the row between her and Hannah. ‘What about the drum kit I bought Jackson for Christmas? He said that was the best gift anyone haseverbought him.’

Rod held out his hands from his side and turned to Andrea. ‘And she wonders why we didn’t make her godmother?’

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