Miranda's Big Mistake (28 page)

‘You make the best mashed potato in the world,' said Miranda. The candles flickered romantically in the center of the table, lighting up her eyes. ‘Will you marry me?'

‘Do the washing-up and I might consider it,' Chloe told her. She watched Miranda dig enthusiastically into the tureen of extra-peppery, extra-buttery mashed potato and pile a third helping on to her plate. ‘Actually, there's a favor I've been wanting to ask you.'

‘Don't tell me.' Miranda held up her free hand. ‘Let me guess. Fenn can't cut hair to save his life and you want me to do it for you from now on.'

‘Um, no.'

From across the dining table, Florence chimed in with: ‘My son is unbearable to work with and you'd like Miranda to march into his shop tomorrow morning and fire a poison dart into his neck.'

‘Not that either.'

‘Hang on, I've got it,' Miranda squealed triumphantly. ‘You want me to ask Danny if he'd make a fly-on-the-wall documentary about you having the baby! You want him to film the birth so we can all watch you with your legs in the air, panting like an animal, yelling your head off and flashing your bare bottom to an audience of millions.'

Florence was laughing so hard she almost choked on a piece of beef. Miranda leaned across and patted her on the back.

Chloe, smiling at them both, said, ‘Well, you're getting closer.'

Florence began to choke again.

‘Not seriously,' said Miranda, appalled. ‘You can't want it to be filmed. Not…' she flapped her hands, in revulsion, in the general region of her own groin, ‘…oh, surely not!'

‘Of course I don't want to be
filmed
.' Chloe put down her knife and fork. ‘But I'd like you to be there with me.'

‘Be where?'

‘At the hospital. While I'm doing the panting and yelling bit.' She looked hopefully at Miranda. ‘I'm supposed to have a designated birth partner, you see. They keep asking me at the hospital if I've chosen anyone yet. And…well, if you're happy to be involved, I'd really like it to be you.'

Miranda stared at her, dumbfounded.

All that blood.

And awful
stuff
gushing everywhere.

Agonizing screams of pain.

That hideous disinfectanty smell that all hospitals have.

The sight of needles and, oh God,
forceps
…

The very real likelihood of fainting during a grisly bit and crashing to the ground, sending all the sterile instrument trolleys flying and probably fracturing her own skull in the bargain.

‘Of course I'll do it. I'd love to be your birth partner,' said Miranda.

‘Will you? Really?' Reaching over, Chloe clasped her hand and squeezed it with delight. ‘Oh, thank you! I'm
so
glad.'

‘Me too,' Miranda fibbed. Touched and flattered, maybe. Squeamish, definitely. But glad? Not really.

Oh well.

Florence raised a knowing eyebrow as soon as Chloe had disappeared into the kitchen to fetch the blackberry tart.

‘Liar.'

‘If she wants me to be there, I'll do it,' Miranda whispered back. ‘Maybe it won't be so bad after all.'

With wicked relish, Florence murmured, ‘What if it's
worse
?'

Miranda shrugged. She had to be brave, she couldn't give in.

Basically, when someone does you the honor of asking you to be their birth partner, how can you say no?

***

The next day, after work, Miranda was sitting in the window of a café on Montpelier Street when she saw Danny making his way along the pavement towards her. Without thinking, she tapped on the glass.

When he came in, Miranda admired his dark suit and lavender-blue shirt.

‘Look at you, all dressed up.'

‘Business meeting. I've been holed up all afternoon in offices over in Rutland Gate. Just finished five minutes ago.' Pulling out a chair, Danny ordered coffee from the pretty waitress, then glanced at his watch. ‘What are you doing here anyway? I thought Fenn dropped you home from work these days.'

Miranda shrugged. ‘It wasn't worth going home. I'm meeting Chloe at the Chelsea and Westminster in half an hour. We're being given a guided tour of the maternity wing.'

Danny leaned back in his chair.

‘Well, I can understand it being helpful to Chloe, but why do you have to go too?'

Bravely, Miranda said, ‘I'm her birth partner.'

She might have known she couldn't expect to fool Danny, who wasn't taken in for a minute.

‘Oh dear.' He looked amused. ‘And you can't think of anything worse.'

Miranda's resolve—to be strong and cheerful and lie valiantly through her teeth—promptly collapsed. Indignantly she demanded, ‘Well, can
you
?'

Danny started to laugh.

‘There are lots of worse things and you know it.' His espresso arrived and he began heaping sugar into the tiny steel cup. ‘Come on, birth is a miraculous thing. It's the most moving experience in the world.'

‘That's easy for you to say.' Miranda gave him a wry look. ‘You aren't the one Chloe's asked to be there, are you?'

‘But if she did ask me, I'd do it,' said Danny, surprisingly. ‘Like a shot.' He held up his hand before Miranda could open her mouth. ‘And no, don't even think it. Chloe wants
you
to be her birth partner, not me.'

Miranda sighed and with her index finger scrawled her initials in the foam on her cappuccino.

‘It's not that I don't want to be there for Chloe. I'm just terrified I'll faint or be sick or something. I don't want to ruin her big day.'

Danny smiled and shook his head.

‘You won't do that. Once it's all happening, you won't even think about passing out. Seriously,' he reassured her in a trust-me voice. ‘You'll be fine.'

To her amazement, Miranda realized that she
was
reassured. Not totally. But a bit. Danny had psyched her up, like a boxing coach. Oh yes, she could do it, she could, she really could—

‘You'll be an honorary aunt,' Danny told her with a grin. ‘Auntie Miranda.'

She pulled a face. ‘Mad Aunt Miranda.'

‘Don't worry about that. Mad aunts are the only kind to have. Much more fun than sensible ones.'

‘Did you have one?' said Miranda, interested.

‘When I was a kid? Oh yes. Mad Aunt Pearl. She'd take me on cat-tracking expeditions.'

‘Where you would…?'

‘Find a cat and follow it. Wherever it went. Up trees, along walls, through gardens—'

‘And cat-flaps,' said Miranda.

‘Mad Aunt Pearl was built like a tank. She wouldn't have fit through a cat-flap.' Danny was smiling, he clearly had fond memories of his eccentric, tank-sized relative. ‘Oh, but she was great. She used to dress up as a pirate. The neighbors thought she was mad.'

Eccentric, outrageous, certainly not run-of-the-mill Aunt Pearl was beginning to remind Miranda of someone she knew. She thought, so
that's
why he gets on so famously with Florence.

‘Okay, I'll do it. When Chloe's baby's a bit older, I'll take it on adventures and get my bottom stuck in cat-flaps.' Miranda was beginning to enjoy herself. ‘And we'll go to the circus together, and the pantomime, oh, and ice skating…and I'll be able to read to it, all the stories that I used to love when I was little.'

‘Which stories did you love when you were little?'

‘God, there were loads.
The Enchanted Wood
,' Miranda remembered. ‘And all those Laura Ingalls Wilder books. And
Flambards
, when I was a bit older. Oh,
oh
, and my absolute favorite was called
Footprints in the Snow
.'

Danny frowned. ‘I've never heard of that one.'

‘My grandmother gave it to me when I was six. It was the copy she'd had when
she
was a girl, so it must have been ancient. But I read that book over and over.' Picturing the old-fashioned cover with its taped-together spine, Miranda recited dreamily, ‘
Footprints in the Snow
by Racey Helps. It fell to bits in the end, of course. I remember crying when my mum said we had to throw it out.'

Their cups were empty. Danny was smiling at her reminiscences. Miranda smiled back at him; this was fun, she could sit here all evening exchanging childhood—

‘Hell's bells, what's the
time
?'

He consulted his watch.

‘Twenty to seven.'

‘I'm meant to be at the hospital by seven!'

Danny stood up.

‘My car's just down the road. I'll give you a lift.'

‘Typical,' Miranda said dryly as they sped through the dusty streets to the Chelsea and Westminster. ‘I'm so busy telling you what a terrific aunt I'll make that I'm late for my first Lamaze class.'

‘We'll make it.'

‘I'm not even going to have time to make our badges.'

Danny shot through a set of traffic lights on amber.

‘What badges?'

‘According to Chloe, all the other women will be with their husbands,' Miranda explained. ‘I was going to make up a couple of badges saying
We Are Not Lesbians
.'

Raising his dark eyebrows, Danny chided, ‘If you're going to be Mad Aunt Miranda you mustn't care what other people think of you. It's your mission in life to get them gossiping behind your back.'

Does he think I'm being prudish and narrow-minded? Is he teasing me, Miranda wondered, or having a bit of a dig?

Right.

‘That's all very well,' she retorted smartly, ‘but a girl has to keep her options open. What if the place is teeming with gorgeous doctors? I wouldn't want to put them off.'

***

Returning home from work on Saturday evening, Miranda pushed open the front door and sent a small, well-wrapped parcel skidding across the polished parquet floor. Bending to retrieve it, she realized that the parcel bore only her name, not her address.

Both Florence and Chloe were out. In the kitchen Miranda took off her jacket and flicked on the kettle. Then, mystified, she began to unwrap the parcel.

When she tore open the last layer of bubble-wrap, a lump came into her throat.

She was six years old again.

Footprints in the Snow
by Racey Helps.

It was the cover she knew so well, with Millicent Littlemouse and Nubby Tope sledging down a snow-covered hill on a basket piled high with sticks.

The
very same
cover, in the same faded green and beige colors. Only this time the spine wasn't held together with yellowing strips of tape.

Opening it with trembling hands, Miranda saw the date inside: 1946. Then she read the brief note Danny had tucked between the first pages. It simply said:

Is this the right one? Hope so. Happy reading. D.

Miranda blinked hard. What a really,
really
nice thing to have done for her. How he had managed to get hold of a copy of a book that had probably been out of print for the last fifty years, she couldn't begin to imagine.

Smiling idiotically to herself, Miranda made a cup of tea and carried the book through to the sitting room. She had been thinking a lot about Danny during the last couple of days. It had been lovely to bump into him again. They hadn't bickered—well, hardly at all. Danny hadn't brought up the subject of Miles and she hadn't so much as mentioned Danny's finger-waggling blonde. They had been relaxed in each other's company, at ease with each other in a way she had never imagined possible before now.

Amazing, thought Miranda.

Amazing, but nice.

She picked up the phone and punched out Danny's number. He answered on the fourth ring.

Miranda smiled again. It was even nice just hearing his voice.

‘How?' she said. ‘How? How? How?'

‘Are you impressed?'

‘Hugely impressed. But you have to tell me how you did it.'

‘It was nothing.' Danny sounded modest. ‘Just a question of trawling through every secondhand bookshop in the country. Found this one, finally, in a little back street in Newcastle—'

‘You didn't!' gasped Miranda.

Danny burst out laughing.

‘No, of course I didn't.' Fondly he said, ‘See? I can still fool you.'

‘Oh, ha ha.' Miranda, going pink, was just glad he couldn't see her.

‘If you really want to know, there's a shop on the Charing Cross Road that specializes in tracking down out-of-print books.'

‘Well, it was still really kind of you,' said Miranda.

‘My pleasure. You'll be able to read it to Chloe's baby when it's older. How did the Lamaze class go, by the way?'

‘Oh, you know. Not so bad. They definitely thought we were lesbians.' Impulsively she added, ‘I'd like to thank you properly for the book. Why don't you come over for lunch tomorrow? I'll cook.'

Danny hesitated. Then he said, ‘I'd have loved to, but I have to fly to Berlin tomorrow morning.'

Miranda knew her cooking wasn't brilliant, but was it really
that
bad?

‘When are you back?'

‘Not sure. Maybe a couple of weeks. Well, two or three.'

Oh dear. She heard the change in his voice. If that wasn't back-pedaling, she didn't know what was.

Miranda's blood ran cold as she realized why. Danny was fine as he was. He already had a girlfriend he was perfectly happy with. And now here
she
was, muscling in…He was being kind to me, that's all, Miranda hurriedly reminded herself. The last thing he needs is for me to start making a nuisance of myself, latching on to him like some desperate stray puppy.

‘Oh, brilliant! Two or three weeks in Berlin? That's
fantastic
!' She forced herself to sound bright and
totally
unclingy. ‘You'll have the most amazing time! Well, better go now, I really just rang to say thanks for the book. You have a great trip, okay? Bye-ee!'