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“Yes! Twice! I was on the way home and I felt it, Will, it was the strangest thing, like bubbles popping or something. It was so weird. Like, I’ve had things before where I wasn’t sure, but this—it was so alien. I just knew. I knew it was him.”
“Him?”
They haven’t found out the sex. It was Hannah’s decision more than Will’s—a kind of superstition, although she can’t put her finger on why she doesn’t want to know.
“Or her.” She blushes. “It just feels weird to keep saying it when he’s becoming a real person.”
“I really want to feel it,” he says, and she can hear the delighted grin in his voice. “Do you think I’ll be able to yet?”
“I don’t know.” She puts her hand over her belly now, as if to test, but of course it’s not moving. “I’m not sure. Are you on your way home?”
“Yeah, I knocked off early,” he says. His voice changes and he sounds suddenly weary and pissed off. “Work was a bitch. Do you think it’s normal to hate your boss?”
Hannah bites her lip. Poor Will. He never wanted to be an accountant. He wanted to change the world—but he fell into this when he moved to Edinburgh, and now he can’t afford to quit.
“I mean… I don’t hate Cathy,” she says, a little lamely.
“There aren’t many Cathys around, though,” Will says. “Not in accounting, anyway. And like my dad always used to say, if work was meant to be fun, people wouldn’t pay you to do it.”
Hannah laughs at that, but when they have talked about supper and said their goodbyes, she puts her phone away with a sinking feeling. Will has always been the main wage earner—accountancy just pays better than bookshop work, that’s all there is to it. But now it feels like the pressure of her impending maternity leave is getting to him. She just doesn’t know what to do about it.
* * *
“CAN I FEEL IT? Is it moving now?” Will has taken the stairs two at a time, and now he pulls Hannah into a big bear hug, his leathers cool against her cheek. Hannah shakes her head.
“I don’t think so. I can’t feel him at the moment, but even if I could, I don’t think you’d be able to tell anything from the outside. It’s too soon. I think the books said it’s normally about six months before the dad can feel any movement.”
“He moved,” Will says, as if trying out the words. He stands there, the huge foolish grin spreading across his face, like he doesn’t know what to do with himself, and then he kisses her, as if he cannot contain himself, his hands on either side of her face, his lips cool against her warm ones. “Our baby moved. Oh my God, Hannah, this is real. It’s really happening.”
I know, she wants to tell him, but she doesn’t, she just stands there, smiling back, feeling their shared happiness balloon between them, huge and fragile.
“What’s that smell?” he says now, breaking their reverie.
“Oh shit, the onions!” Hannah had forgotten in the excitement of hearing Will’s feet on the stairs. “I’m making Bolognese.”
They go through to the kitchen, where Hannah peers into the pan, scraping the sticking onions off the bottom.
“I think they’ll be okay. Just a bit caramelized, maybe.”
“They’ll be delicious,” Will says reassuringly. “Hey, how was the appointment, by the way?”
God, the appointment. It feels like a million years ago, and for a moment Hannah has to struggle to remember what happened.
“Oh… fine… I mean, not totally fine. I was still a bit up. But it’s no big deal. They don’t think it’s pre-eclampsia or anything serious, I just probably need to destress a bit. The midwife wants me back next week, just to check.” She pauses. This is the moment she has to say something. About her visit to see Ryan. Because she can’t keep this from Will. It concerns him too.
“I had a free day after the appointment,” she says carefully, tipping the mince into the pan so that she doesn’t have to look at him as she says the words. “So I… well, I called in to see Ryan.”
“Sorry?” Will cups his ear. The meat is spitting and hissing, making it hard to hear above the noise of frying. “Who did you see? I didn’t catch what you said.”
“I went to see Ryan,” she says, more loudly. She puts down the spoon and turns around. “Our Ryan. Ryan Coates.”
“Wait a second.” Will is frowning. She can’t quite read the expression on his face—it looks like disbelief mixed with a kind of controlled annoyance he is trying not to show. A flush is climbing up from the collar of his biker jacket, staining his tanned cheeks. “You went all the way to York to see Ryan Coates? And you didn’t tell me?”
“It wasn’t premeditated,” she says quickly, though that’s only half-true. “I didn’t even call ahead to warn Ryan. I got halfway there and realized he might be out.” That part at least is right. “But I had to, Will, I couldn’t get what Geraint said out of my head, and I wanted to hear it from Ryan, and find out whether Geraint was some kind of delusional stalker or if he really is a mate of Ryan’s. If he was making all this up I needed to know—maybe even get the police involved.”
Will looks a little less blindsided, as if he can see the sense in this last part at least, but he’s still shaking his head in bewilderment.
“And you couldn’t call? I mean—York! It’s not exactly down the road, is it?”
