Page 17 of Storm in a D Cup

‘Mila knows nothing,’ she huffed. ‘She says I’m no good at ballet because I’m too tall. She says it, like, slows me down or something.’

I took a long hard look at her. Her ballet instructor had a point. Maddy’s long, lanky legs gave her a funny gait that her hips hadn’t quite yet mastered. While Angelica had already filled out, Maddy was still on the slender side and a little jealous of her friend’s confidence. As much as Maddy flaunted her prettiness at home and acted cool in front of her friends, I knew she was scared of not being accepted. She was the Terrified Leader who was waiting to be caught out for not even believing in herself. Remind you of anyone?

But there was a big difference between us. Maddy was afraid ofothersnot appreciating her. She personally appreciated herself immensely, and when she referred to her thighs as ham joints, she didn’t really mean it. Apparently it was the thing to talk bad about your body nowadays. Today when girls say they don’t like their body, they mean they absolutely love it. In my day, when we didn’t love our bodies we just shut the hell up, hid inside huge sweaters and hoped to go through life unnoticed.

So if her dreams of ballet dancing were quickly disappearing, was she really aiming toward being a model as she had lately announced? Please God, no, I fervently prayed. She had artistic talent and a flair for fashion. Why not put it to work as a fashion designer? But ultimately whatever she decided to be, I only hoped the definition included the wordhappy.

Which made me wonder if I had been an adequate mother after all my efforts. And while asking myself that, I asked myself what the hell had possessed me to agree to have another kid with Julian. Blimey, as Julian would say, did I really have any clue at all? Kids these days were more difficult to handle – they weren’t the shy, docile idiots we… well,Iwas once upon a life ago. These kids today were like tsunamis. If you didn’t want to get in their path you had to run to higher ground and pray for damage control. Which I did.

‘Madeleine,’ I finally concluded. ‘I’m not discussing high-heeled shoes any further with you. Now go wash your hands and set the table.’

At that, Maddy stared at me, wide-eyed as if I’d just been assigned to her that very instant as her mother and had started giving her orders and rules out of the blue for the very first time. Then she huffed and marched out of the room.

I groaned and rubbed my aching head. Maybe I was still in time to change my mind and retract my baby promise to Julian?

*

Ironically enough, a few weeks later I found out Julian’s precious parcel had actuallyarrivedat destination.

I stared at the stick, my mouth opening and closing like a fish’s. A pregnant fish. Pregnant. I was actually,really, pregnant. At forty-three years of age. Now really, what were the oddsthe minute I went off birth control?Had Julian speed-delivery-orderedthe kid?

‘Exactly why do you want to be a father, again?’ I asked Julian as we were finishing dinner that night, my big piece of news burning a hole up my sleeve. Maddy was having another sleepover at Angelica’s and I was glad for the privacy.

Julian pushed his now empty plate forward and folded the tablecloth over to rest his arms on the clean, crumb-less underside. Although I hated it when he did that, tonight I hardly noticed.

‘Erica… are you having second thoughts?’

‘Of course not. I’m… happy to do this. And…’ I flashed him a shy grin ‘…that’s one thing we can cross off our list now, by the way.’

‘What is?’

I smiled, pushing my own crumbs before me into one little pile, Julian-style. ‘Baby Mission accomplished, baby…’

His eyes widened. ‘What? You’re…pregnant?’

The look on his face told me that there was no crisis to worry about. Screw (or, as Julian would say,sod) Renata and Judy and their paranoia. This man was in love with me, no doubt.

I smiled. ‘Uh-huh…’

‘I’m going to be a father!’ Julian yelled, lifting me and twirling me around the kitchen like in a cheesy Monday afternoon movie, but the look in his eyes opened up a new world to me. A world I never knew existed. Jesus – all these years he’d wanted to be a father and nevertoldme? What did that say about our marriage? Paradoxically, now I was even more worried than before.

‘Oh my God, Erica, this is so amazing, isn’t it!’ Julian cried as he smacked one last delicious kiss onto my mouth.

‘Oh, yeah, wow, it is!’ I assured him, not quite sure how I felt about it. I mean, I could have been happy, but my joy was overclouded by The Big Doubt – why Julian wanted this baby in the first place. He had a career, a business, two stepchildren whom although he loved immensely, had given him much ado the past seven years. Why go through it all over again just when you are about to sit back and begin to relax for once?

‘Idea!’ he cried. ‘We’ll decorate the study and paint—’

‘The study? But youloveyour study!’ I argued. ‘That’s your sacred ground! You don’t let anyone in there.’

‘But a baby’s a baby! Honey, we’re going to be parents!’

I already was one, and so was he, but pointing that out would be party-pooping at this point. Still, I had to draw the line somewhere. ‘Hold your horses, Julian. I haven’t even had an official blood test yet.’

‘You don’t need one. Iknowyou’re pregnant.’

Yes, so did I. I could feel it.

*

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