39 Weeks (8 page)

I told him about my overzealous mum, and my over generous dad, who still thought of me as their not quite an adult child. I told him a bit about Fishers, trying to leave out the most boring bits, and I told him, well I mentioned, about Alec and me finishing a year or so ago, I thought I ought to as Rob had told me about his last girlfriend. And then we moved on to
the kind of music we liked, and the films we’d seen, and realised we both had a passion for visiting seaside resorts in the winter when it was virtually tourist free and the weather was on the wild side.

The more we talked the more I thought he’s the one, I mean ‘the one’ the actual one for me. It was mad
we’d only just met, it had been what
? A
n hour, two at the most, but I was well and truly hooked. I’d stopped talking and was so deep in my reverie it was
a
minute before I realised that he’d stopped talking as well. We l
ooked at each other and as if this was all part of
a film
script
he leaned in and kissed me. I elevated to cloud thirty four
at least,
and almost lost consciousness.

Then Shelley and Nick came back from wherever they’d been hiding. Shelley looked quite shocked when she saw just how familiar Rob and I had got, and started talking about leaving.
Nick looked
so surprised that
it was obvious
she’d only just decided it was time to leave
, and I said ‘b
ut it’s still early, I don’t want to leave yet,’ and I looked longingly at Rob, who seemed to me to be looking just as longingly back.

‘Um aren’t you forgetting something?’ she said giving me the raised eyebrow intense stare that meant she was serious.

I looked back at her matching the raised eyebrow stakes that signified an unspoken ‘What?’

She didn’t reply just carried on staring wide eyed and even more intensely.

Then it hit me
. F
or two hours
, since I’d first set eyes on Rob, I’
d forgotten I was pregnant.
I couldn’t get serious with anyone, no matter what level cloud I was on, even if he could have been ‘the one’ he couldn’t because I was having a baby.

‘Yes we should be leaving.’ I said sullenly.

‘Are you sure?’ Rob said breaking my heart with his look of regret.

‘Fraid so.’ Shelley said matter of factly as she started hustling me toward the door on the other side of th
e club, pausing only to write
her number on the back of an old parking ticket she managed to find in her bag, and pressing it in Nick’s hand.

‘But . . .’ Rob started to say

‘Sorry,’ I said.

‘Well can I at least have your number?’ The desperation beginning to creep into Rob’s voice made me want to cry. ‘We could meet up, when you don’t have to rush off. I’ll phone you.’

‘No she doesn’t like giving out her number, do you Judy?’

‘No . . I don’t.’ I said
,
the word’s dragged out of my mouth against my will.

‘Well . . . I could give you mine then.’ He said.

Shelley looked impatient. I knew she was right, I did have to go, cut this short or even right off before it could even get started. But a bit of me was thinking it was too late
,
it had already started.

We were half way to the door when Rob caught us up and pushed his scribbled phone number into my hand. Shelley looked at Rob and then at me and then continued frog marching me towards the exit, leaving Rob looking bereft. I felt a bit bereft myself but there was nothing else I could do.

We got a taxi, incredibly one turned up within seconds of us leaving Zee Zee’s
and that never happens except on occasions like this when you don’t want it too, and
took us
straight home. Shelley apologised for the entire journey, saying she
’d
had to do it, and it was for the b
est and better to end it now
and
before
I got really hurt when he found out I was pregnant and promptly dumped me, didn’t I think? But I didn’t think, I couldn’t think. I’d been literally snatched from the gates of heaven without so much as a by your leave.

When we got to my place I told Shelley she didn’t have to come in with me
, that I forgave her and that everything
was alright and that I was alright, and she should go home and not worry about it. She asked if I was sure, and when I said yes I was absolutely certain
,
she said she’d phone me tomorrow, and she went.

And now it is tomorrow
, and the wonderful dream of last night is just that, an impossible dream that’s never going to happen.

2
nd
August – Week 9
+ 1 Day

I’d mooned about for three days
thinking about Rob
, sighing a lot and feeling like the heroine of a tragic love story, something along the lines of true love being thwarted at the outset. The lurid dreams I’d been having every night didn’t help either, where Rob would take me tenderly in his arms, totally disregarding my beach ball stomach and everyone else looking on
disapprovingly, telling me he didn’t care about all that so long as we were together, and then . . . well you get the picture.

Eventually on day three I woke up to reality and made a concerted effort to relegate the whole sorry, wonderful, could have been, sad affair to my memory archive, and lock it away somewhere where I wouldn’t find it for a decade or two. It was sort of working but only if I tried really hard.

Yesterday we all got to see the drawing plans for the proposed reorganisation of the office. We weren’t meant to it was all supposed to be top secret, but as with most things in our office when one knew
sooner or later
we all knew. It had originally been e-mailed
by Norman
to Grahame as manager of the office
,
in the strictest confidence
, but
indiscretion is Grahame’s
middle name and
naturally
he showed them to Martin and me.
I soon got him to forward
the e-mail to me
so that I
could have a proper look I
’d
said
and
on the understanding it was all highly confidential,
and of course I straight
away forwarded it on to
Doreen, Vee, and Jack, who in turn forwarded it on to everyone else.

A certain something hitting the fan wasn’t even close to describing the mayhem that ensued. Work was entirely forgotten, another month end to get through or not, and nobody bothered even trying to pretend they were working or hadn’t seen the plans
. Grahame was put out because this was exactly the situation he was supposed to be avoiding, and why the plans had been sent
in confidence and
only
to him
in the first place
. In his usual inept style,
at least
where all things people related were concerned, he ineffectually tried to calm everyone down, but all that succeeded in doing was t
o make him the target of
a barrage of complaints and reasons why this one couldn’t sit here, and that one couldn’t sit there
, and where was the kitchen going to be.

He looked at me accusingly and said simply ‘Judy?’ to which I just shrugged my shoulders as if I h
ad no idea what he was on about.
I mean it didn’t have to be me that had let the cat out of the bag, it could easily have been
Clare, Normans personal assistant come secretary, couldn’t it?

The seating plan war raged on all day, and everyone went home disgruntled. Then first thing this morning
Norman called a meeting for everyone that was
going to be affected, which basically meant all of us. We filed down to the boardroom, rarely seen by most of us, full of determined acrimony and bravado
of how we weren’t going to be pushed around without some say so on the subject. I didn’t join in
much
,
knowing it wasn’t rea
lly going to affect me
given my circumstances, but no-one seemed to notice that I was
being
unusually quiet
.

Of course when Norman
asked us all so
congenially
, if somewhat patronisingly, to please sit down and started to explain why he’d decided to re-jig the office, and how it desperately needed some sort of a face lift, and how he thought it would be nice for us to be able to work in a pleasanter environment
, and of course
with him
being who he is, no-one said a word. Not one single word.

Doreen was brave enough to ask shyly about the kitchen arrangements, and we were told that a new refitted kitchen would be installed next to the new, still to be built sales office, and it would be big enough to fit two or three tables and
some
chairs in, so we would no longer have to sit at our desks for lunch.

We all filed out of the boardroom sheepishly, avoiding each other’s eyes.
After so much talk of mutiny and defiance of any changes to be made, even if they were for our own benefit, and then no-one actually saying anything
,
everyone felt
a bit like a deserter on D-day.
The subject of office re-organisation never came up again all day, everyone stoically keeping their objections to themselves and biting the bullet of unavoidable inevitability.
   

When I got home I was so tired I fell asleep on the settee, barely managing to take my jacket and shoes off before flaking out, and
I
missed the witching hour of my evening sickness altogether, I just slept right through it. I was feeling tired all the time lately and could fall asleep anywhere and at any time. If I made a superhuman effort I managed to avoid falling asleep at work, and of course there were always distractions at work, but when I got home . . . well that was a different story.

At half nine I stirred sleepily and had a strange craving for a cup of tea.
I dismissed it as weird, but annoyingly it wouldn’t go away, so in the end I gave in and made myself a cup.
Bizarrely i
t tasted like
divine nectar.
My first craving, I self diagnosed, and it was
for
tea of all things. I’d spent twenty eight year
s of my life saying how gross tea
was and now suddenly I loved it.

I decided to phone Shelley, for a chat primarily, but also to let her in on this new latest development. She was interested but something told me she wasn’t paying proper attention
, notably because I had to repeat everything three times before getting any kind of response. Then she let slip the reason for her lack of concentration. Nick was there, at her place, on a Tuesday night. This was serious, you just didn’t see blokes on a Tuesday night unless it was getting serious. A Friday or Saturday was fine, even a Thursday was accep
table. But Tuesday . . . well that
just didn’t
happen. And
it was way too soon for serious wasn’t it? I mean she’d only met the guy for the first time just over a week ago.

It turned out tha
t this was not the first time Nick had
been to her place,
she hinted that
he’
d been there a couple of
times
already
for coffee
aft
er they’d been out for a meal, and then another night
to see a film, but this was the first time he’d been to hers with the intention of staying. Now whether that meant staying the night or just staying for longer than it takes to drink a cup of coffee she didn’t make clear, so chances were it was still
undecided at this point, a see how it goes first time
on their own all evening
sort of date, that would resolve itself in due course as the evening progressed.
I cut the conversation short
as good manners dictated in
a
best friends got herself a boyfriend
scenario,
and she promised to phone me
back
tomorrow
, hopefully with all the gory details.

So, I thought as I closed my mobile, Shelley’s been seeing Nick. And unbelievably for Shelley after several dates she still liked him
, liked him enough to invite him round to hers on a Tuesday
night, I couldn’t get over the
whole Tuesday thing.
I couldn’t see Rob again, but she could see his mate Nick. Life was so unfair.

At that moment I hated my body, I hated the baby that was controlling my body and making it
do things I didn’t want it to
, and even though I’d sworn off relationships long before there was a baby to hate I was green as grass envious of Shelley and her new bloke, so I hated her as well.