“Why are fish so smart?” Zara asked me.
I shrugged exaggeratedly. “I have no idea why fish are so smart. Do you know why?”
She nodded seriously. “Because they are always in schools.”
I laughed at her smug little face, smudged with strawberry ice cream, and tackling a new angle on her melting cone.
“Want some, Rags?” She offered her treat to the golden retriever sitting loyally beneath the outdoor table.
Rags took a couple of healthy licks with his long pink tongue and I scowled. Zara looked up at me to see what I would say, the little demon that she was. I shrugged at her. “I don’t care if you want slobbery dog germs on your ice cream. Do what you want.”
She giggled at me and kicked her dangling legs in the chair. “Brynne talks funny.”
“I know. I’ve been telling her that for a long time, but she doesn’t listen.” I shook my head sadly. “Still does it.” I pulled out my mobile to take some pictures of her and got canned poses the instant she understood what I was doing. Zara cracked me up something fierce. Her parents were in for it once she became a teenager. Good. God.
More giggling. “She talks like the words on SpongeBob SquarePants.”
My mouth fell open in mock surprise. “You know, you’re right! Will you tell her?”
She shrugged. “She’s nice and I think she can’t help it.” Zara gave me a look of censure and went back to her strawberry ice cream. Something along the lines of: Only a real dickhead would make fun of how someone talks, you idiot. She was so her mother’s daughter.
“Nice one, E. Letting your niece share with the dog. I saw the whole thing from the window of the shop.” Hannah looked disgusted with us both as she joined us. “I step away for two minutes—”
“He said he didn’t care, Mummy,” Zara interrupted, selling me out with no trouble at all.
“Oh, Raggsey is pretty disease-free, I think.” I gave the dog a nice pat on the head. “And you are a little traitor!” I pointed a finger at Zara. “So sue me, Han. I’m just the uncle here. Letting them run amuck in wild abandon is my role.”
“Yeah, well, I haven’t had the indulgent auntie role . . . yet.”
I shot her a look and discerned something in her expression. Not sure what, but I knew suspicious in my sister when I saw it. Her mind was busy.
“What does that cryptic comment mean?”
“You and Brynne.” She shook her head a little. “This is really serious isn’t it? I’ve never seen you like this.”
I looked out at the sea with its millions of reflecting ripples and adjusted my sunglasses. “I want to marry her.”
“I thought so. . . . Well, I guessed you were heading there with her. Talking to her this morning pretty much confirmed it, and then today when she needed a nap I started putting it all together.”
What does Brynne having a nap have to do with anything? “So you approve?” I asked.
Hannah looked at me curiously. “Approve of you and Brynne getting married? Of course we support you. I want you to be happy and if you love her and she loves you . . . well then, it’s meant to be.” She reached for my hand over the table. “It happens that way sometimes. Nobody’s perfect. Fred and I started out the same way, E, and I wouldn’t change a thing about us or when the babies came. They are a blessing.”
I picked up her hand and kissed it. “They really are, and someday maybe, but a family is not anywhere in the equation right now. I’m just trying to get her used to the idea of getting shackled first.”
Hannah looked relieved. “Oh, good. I like her even more now. I must admit I was worried you might be trapped into it and I hated to think of that for you, little brother. I’m glad for you if it’s something you want.”
I snorted. “Right . . . she’s the one that needs trapping. Brynne’s hard to pin down and having a relationship is scary for her. I’ll be lucky to get her to the altar in a year from now. I’m trying to convince her that a long engagement will work best.”
Hannah nodded slowly like she was absorbing it. “So you’ll wait until after to have the wedding? That’s one option, but Dad’s going to hate it. Remember how he was when Freddy and I jumped the gun with Jordan. Dad had us married within a month.” She mocked my father’s words at the time, “ ‘No grandchild of mine will be born a bastard! Your poor mother would be heartbroken if she were here to see—’ ”
“What?!” I gaped at her. “Brynne’s not . . . I mean, you’re greatly mistaken if that’s what you’re suggesting.” I glared at Hannah, shocked at her speculations. “You thought . . .” I shook my head vigorously. “No, Han! My girl is not preggers. No way. She’s been very careful with her pills. I see her take them every morning. Hell, I’m sure I heard her in the bathroom this morning getting her pills.”
Hannah shook her head slowly at me, her gray eyes looking sympathetic and strangely wise, but even so, I wasn’t buying it.
“You think she’s pregnant? And that’s why I want to marry her?” I was truly shocked and more than a little insulted that my sister would imagine us so irresponsible. “You couldn’t be more off the mark, Han. God! O ye of little faith,” I said scornfully, reaching for my coffee.
“Maybe you two should talk to Freddy, then,” she said, “because I would bet my house that Brynne is very preggers and that the two of you are going to be parents whether you like it or not.”
I choked on my coffee, startling the dog, who banged into the small table and made it rattle on the cobbled patio.
Hannah looked down at Zara, who for all intents and purposes appeared to be listening to every word of our conversation. “Be a love and take Rags over to the grass for a roll around, okay?”
Zara pondered for a moment before deciding that battling her mum was a no-win and left with Rags as requested, melting ice cream in hand.
My heart rate sped up instantly and I felt fear coupled with anxiety and excitement all at once. “We’re not talking to Freddy—wait just one goddamn minute, Hannah! What the fucking hell?! I want to know just what makes you willing to bet your magnificent house that she is.” I was shouting now. “Tell me!” I dragged my hand over my beard, feeling a sweat break out as I glared at my sister and waited for her to shake off her misguided attempt at a joke.
Hannah looked around the courtyard area of the sweets shop and smiled pleasantly at a few of the other patrons who were now staring rudely at us. “Ease up, brother. How about we take a walk instead.” She gathered her shopping bags and stood up, offering me a patient look that spelled out clearly, Listen to your big sister, you enormous arsehole.
I thought about leaving my sister and niece, both of them right there in the village center, running back to the house to get Brynne, putting her in the Rover and driving back to London. We could get away from here and pretend this was all some weird, impossible dream or misunderstanding. I seriously did. For about five seconds.
I somehow got to my feet despite the sudden weakness in my knees, picked up my purchase from an earlier stop at an antiques shop, and followed my sister instead.
“How late is she?” Hannah asked as we walked.
“Late? Fuck, I don’t know about this stuff! She said the pills she takes makes her periods skip out sometimes.”
“Ahh, so she wouldn’t know if she was late. Makes sense. She told me all about being sick last night. Said you had to pull over on the side of the road. She also mentioned being lightheaded last night as well.”
“Yeah, so?” I said defensively. “Maybe it was something she ate.”
Hannah bumped me in the shoulder. “Stop being an arse. I’ve had three children, E, I know the symptoms of pregnancy, and my husband is a doctor. I know what I’m talking about.”
I felt a line of sweat trickle down my back. “But . . . this can’t be possible.”
“Oh, stop moaning and tell me facts. I assure you it can be very possible. What happened when Brynne felt lightheaded?”
“She had to sit down and said she was thirsty.”
“Thirst is a symptom,” Hannah said in singsong.
“Fuck, and after that she had to puke. Oh, God.”
“Some women get morning sickness in the evenings,” she announced, “Fred will even tell you it’s very common.”
“What else happens to you?”
“I got very moody and emotional. It’s the massive amounts of hormones raging around.”
Check. My Medusa joke from a couple weeks ago suddenly didn’t seem funny anymore.
“Extreme exhaustion, necessitating naps.” She tilted her head all the way to the side. “I’ve never napped in my life except for the three times I was pregnant.”
Check. Brynne was sleeping right now at my sister’s house. I wanted a smoke, and then another, and to just keep on going until the whole pack was gone.
“Breasts get very tender to the touch, a little painful. Again, it’s the hormones starting the process for milk to feed the baby.”
I just gaped at her, and I’m sure my mouth was hanging open like the village idiot’s as she talked about hormones and breasts and milk production. This cannot be happening. It can’t. Not now.
But my sister rambled on, scaring the absolute shit out of me with every subsequent sentence that came out of her mouth.
“This last part is something that happens and trust me, I would rather not say, but I suppose I should tell you anyway since you asked.” She held up her hand to stop me from speaking. “I don’t want to hear if it’s true or not. I really don’t need to know.”
“What?!” I yelled at her. “Stop fucking around and tell me!”
Hannah glared at me and then slowly changed it into a smirk. “Pregnant women get very randy and want sex all the time. Their men are usually too stupid to realize why they’re getting lucky with the extra shagging all of a sudden.” She got a kick out of telling me that one, I am sure. “It’s definitely the hormones.” Hannah folded her arms and waited.
“We need to go back,” I said in a strange voice. Even to my ears I didn’t sound normal. All I could see was Brynne begging me to fuck her in the shower before I came here. Oh my God. Petrified shock didn’t even begin to cover the enormity of this bomb drop.
As I stood there beside my sister, gazing out over the Somerset coast, on a warm summery day in July, with my niece chasing the dog over the grass, I knew two things were an absolute certainty.
The first was that Brynne wouldn’t take the news well at all.
The second part came to me quickly and with extreme clarity. The reaffirmation that I was a very, very, lucky man for reasons I could only admit to myself. I wouldn’t even tell Brynne the reason. It was all for me to know and to keep private. Very simple logic, really. And the more I thought about it, the easier it was to accept the possibility.
If Brynne is truly carrying my child . . . then she can never leave me.
