Page 59 of One Day at a Time

‘Are you going to answer it?’ Alyssa asked her, the only one who had a clear line of sight to Dylan’s name.

Maddie shook her head as she declined the call.

‘Nope. He’s probably calling to say that him and Rachel have remarried and they’re off to live in the Little House on the Prairie.’

Despite the sore subject, that made Alyssa laugh. ‘You know that’s not a real place, right?’

‘In my mind it… Ouch. Holy shit, what was that?’

Sharon was still staring at the white tracing paper that was churning out of the machine next to her. ‘I was waiting for that. Have you been feeling any contractions in the last couple of hours, Maddie?’

‘Only those Braxton Hicks things again. They were a bit haywire an hour or so ago, but they calmed down until now.’

She’d been having them on and off for the last couple of days, and Candy, one of the other midwives, had reassured her yet again that they were perfectly normal.

Not this time. Sharon put her hand on Maddie’s arm. ‘That’s because they weren’t Braxton Hicks. Ladies, I don’t know if you’re going to make it to midnight, because Maddie here is definitely in labour.’

30

ORLA

‘Erm, since… well, since Aidan punched him out on the night of the bar’s birthday party.’

It felt like those words had been going round in Orla’s head for days. Probably because they truly had been.

When Kimi had shared them on Christmas Day, at Carlo and Yvie’s family and friends’ lunch at the café, Orla had understood what it meant when people said that time stood still.

‘Oh, shit, no – have I done it again?’ Kimi had wailed. ‘Goddamn it. I thought you must know because he had a black bloody eye.’

He’d lied to her. He’d flat-out lied.

‘He told me he’d walked into a machine at the gym,’ Orla said in voice so robotic she didn’t even register it as her own.

Kimi had gone into a full panic. ‘Fuck, fuck. First, I’m so sorry that I’ve hurt you yet again. And second, my brother is going to kill me.’

Another realisation dawned on Orla. Aidan knew too. And not that they’d been chummy, or even had a proper conversation since the day he’d given her a lift to Weirbridge, but there wouldhave been nothing to stop him knocking on the door, and saying, ‘Hey, sorry about punching your husband. You should really leave that prick.’

She might have added that last bit all by herself, but still… Was she the only person in the street that didn’t have a clue what was going on in her own life? She had never felt more heartbroken, or more stupid or more humiliated. She’d chosen to believe him, even though every single nerve in her body had told her that he was lying. What a fool she was.

Kimi was still panicking. ‘Tell me what you want to do and I’ll do it. I don’t even care if it’s illegal at this point. I’m so sorry, Orla.’ Even in her trance-like state, Orla had felt a pang of sympathy for the woman with a knack for blowing up Orla’s life. Maybe that’s why she’d managed to hold her cool and speak in a calm voice.

‘Can you go and get my friend, Keli, please? She’s over at the table I was sitting at. Can you just make some excuse to get her here without causing a big fuss?’

‘Given my track record, I can’t guarantee it, but I’ll try. Aw bugger, I’m hopeless.’

Kimi had gone off, and Orla had held on to the bar top to steady herself, somehow managing to stay upright and keep breathing until Kimi returned a couple of minutes later with Keli in tow.

‘Orla, I know you’ve had a stressful time, but this isn’t the answer,’ Keli had chided her. ‘It’s not good for the baby.’

Before Orla could even try to work out what the hell was happening, Kimi had jumped in.

‘Sorry, it’s all I could think of at short notice. I whispered to her that you were over here trying to sneak a bottle of vodka into your bag.’

That’s when Orla had known for sure that she’d never understand the workings of Kimi’s mind.

‘So there’s no vodka?’ Keli had tried to keep up. ‘Oh, thank God. I didn’t fancy trying to prise that from your hands. Fighting with a preggers chick in public is the kind of thing that can get you cancelled.’ As she’d clocked the drained complexion on Orla’s face, her mind took another leap, to the obvious question. ‘What is going on then? What’s happened?’

Orla was still holding on to the bar top. ‘He lied again, Keli. The night of my baby shower, when he got the black eye and he told me it was at the gym…’ The words had dried up as Orla had lost the power of speech.