‘Oh ho, you can’t give me that clickbaity headline and leave me hanging …’ The sonographer moved to the printer to retrieve the pictures of the baby. ‘Will I buy you a carvery after?’ Sam suggested.
‘Wow, overcooked meat! I thought you’d never ask.’ Ali made a stab at trying to sound flirty. Though, with a giant veiny belly covered in scan jizz, it was a pretty futile attempt. Sam pulled his hand back and rubbed it awkwardly. It must be wet from her tears, she realised. He pulled himself upright and seemed to shake off something of the sentimental glow that had settled around them just seconds before.
‘Well, yeah, of course, I mean, you’re providing a meat cave rent-free to my kid so, I guess, I owe you.’
‘Yeah, cool,’ Ali agreed and tried not to sound as disappointed as she felt. She was certain they’d been having a moment there. She accepted the roll of paper held out to her by the sonographer and began scraping the jelly from her bump. She pulled her dress back down and slid off the bed. ‘Thanks for the lil show and tell there. I’ll be leaving a full review on Yelp but some top-line feedback? It wouldn’t kill you to be just a shade nicer to these preggo bitches, especially the ones that come in alone.’ She flounced out of the room, leaving Sam to just grin awkwardly at the guy.
Walking back past the waiting room, Ali found several of her cheerleaders from earlier still parked, waiting to heave their bellies down the hall to be jellied up.
‘He’s not the worst,’ called one, smiling. ‘He came, that must mean something, Ali.’ She offered a big thumbs up.
Ali grinned and mouthed ‘thank you’ just as Sam caught up to her.
‘Aw, yous two are so good together, would ya not forgive her, Sam?’ one of the others piped up as she snapped a quick pic of Sam’s startled face. Ali seized his hand and half dragged him down the hall to the exit.
Once out on the street, she tried to brush it off as nothing, but she could tell Sam was preoccupied.
‘So, how’s everything been going?’ Ali needed to distract him. ‘How’re the lads?’
She’d never grasped the individual identities of Sam’s friend gang. In her mind they were an amorphous mass of pasty, freckly Irishman all called some variation of Sean or Schmiddy or Murph, working in the kind of places where they had nap pods, free lunches and a statement wall with artful graffiti on it. She realised now that she’d always resisted his attempts to include her on nights out with ‘the lads’ because the less face-to-face contact she had with people in Sam’s life, the easier it had been to lie to him day in, day out.
‘Yeah, they’re grand.’ Sam was carefully maintaining a distance of about two feet from her at all times. He’s really making sure he’s not sending the wrong signal, Ali thought ruefully. ‘Schmiddy and Sinead are actually getting married in a couple of weeks. The first to succumb.’
‘Wow, that’s so proper,’ Ali marvelled.
‘Ha, well, so’s this thing.’ Sam tapped her bump and then snatched his hand back as though it had burned.
‘You can touch it.’ Ali took his hand and pressed it to her belly. She watched his face, searching for anything of the old way he used to look at her, but he was studiously avoiding her eyes. Instead, he gazed at the firm little bump. It seemed so insistent, always right there between them, binding them in spite of everything.
‘Can you feel it yet? Move, I mean.’
His eyes flickered to hers and the desolate look there felt like a punch to Ali.
‘Yep, starting to. It’s lovely. You’ll be able to feel it soon too if … if you’re around, like …’ she trailed off awkwardly, letting his hand drop and resumed walking. ‘Anyway. So dying to murder this carvery! Not something I think I’ve ever said before.’
‘Yeah.’ Sam seemed thoughtful and neither of them spoke until they came to the Merry Cobbler, which seemed to be emanating a powerful gravy fug.
‘You sure this is what you want to eat?’ He looked sceptical but Ali was already feeling the crazed hunger setting in.
‘Tinder, we are not above a carvery. Now, in!’ Ali was adamant that she was going to make the most of this non-date. ‘It’s demented how hungry you get when you’re preggers – you can go from zero to this crazed cannibalistic hunger in minutes,’ she explained as they found seats. ‘And it’s always this, like, really specific thing. The other night I could not rest until Liv went down to the shops for mushrooms for me. She fried them and I ate them straight out of the pan. It was weird. Then other things you normally like are suddenly completely foul. I read that some women eat things that are not even food!’
‘Like carvery?’ Sam grinned.
‘You’re such a snob.’ She mugged. ‘Though Miles would be turning in his grave if he knew I was about to pound back some leathery meat drenched in demi-glaze and served with scoops of smash. If he had a grave, obvi. What can ashes do?’ she mused. ‘Rustle in their jar?’
Sam laughed awkwardly. ‘So, what did happen with that? And why was Erasmus there? Where did you scatter Miles?’
‘Oh. You do not want to know.’ Ali grimaced. ‘It was so bad. It might even be slightly illegal. I’m not sure.’ A server appeared with plates and instructions on the carvery, which was laid out under glowing heat lamps in the centre of the dark pub.
‘You can help yourselves to our buffet-style carvery. Feel free to go up as many times as you like. There’s also a cold buffet with starters like prawn cocktails and crab salad,’ he advised.
‘Brill, thank you.’ Ali smiled and, tucking the plate under her arm, moved toward the trays of meat and veg.
‘Hang on, wait up.’ Sam hurried after her.
‘I’m sorry, Sam. I’m only the host body.’ She shrugged as she slapped a slab of meat-like something on her plate. ‘The lil parasite is in charge. I’m just doing its bidding, ya know? I think I’m going to need a separate potato plate,’ she muttered thoughtfully, scanning for the server.
Once they were settled back at the table, Sam began to fill her in on Schmiddy and Sinead’s wedding.
‘It’s huge. They’re having about 300 in Strokestown House. I’m a groomsman and I’ll be doing a short speech after the best man.’
‘Oooh, pressure. I wish I could be of some help, but we all know what happened the last time I was hauled up in front of a crowd.’ It was a gamble, she knew, to refer to the fateful night that Blake Jordan had announced she was pregnant at the Glossies WildCard launch. Luckily, Sam managed a laugh.
‘Yeah, maybe I could say I was pregnant and just kind of stun them into not even noticing how shit my speech is.’ He winked.
‘Just, please, whatever you do, don’t spend the whole speech going on about what a gas lad Schmiddy is and then be all “fair play to Sinead for taking him on, she’s a lovely girl”. I hate that. It always makes women out to be so boring. Just these totally bland, anodyne girls who will be “taking on” the burden of some “mad gas man”. Women are way fucking better than that. Dig up a bit of dirt on her too!’
‘Yeah, Sinead’s very cool,’ he agreed. ‘It’ll be weird to see her in a wedding dress,’ he added thoughtfully. ‘I’ve seen her arse so many times. She’s a real flasher when she’s drunk.’