TEN
Bad Dreams and Dad Bods
Arthur - 14 Weeks
“Arthur, wake up!”
The light comes on, and I bolt out of bed like a bat out of hell, shouting, “Where’s Buckety?!”
“No, it’s not that. I’m not going to be sick. I just had a terrible nightmare.”
My heart pounds in my chest, and I feel slightly annoyed at being woken like this. Rubbing my eyes, I climb back into bed and motion for Tessa to snuggle up to me. “It’s okay, sweetie. Nothing bad has happened. Let’s just go back to sleep.”
My eyes close, and I’m suddenly back to being the captain of the Avonian National team in the Cricket World Cup finals, where a minute ago we were beating India fifty to zero.
A shove on my arm brings me back to the room.
“Arthur! I’m serious. It was a very bad dream about the baby."
"What happened to him?” I ask, blinking slowly.
"The baby was crawling around on the floor right in front of us. Then I looked up for a moment to see if it was still raining, and when I looked back down, she was gone. Welostthe baby. We searched for hours, until it was dark outside. No matter where we looked, we couldn't find her. We had everyone searching: Ollie, Ben, Xavier, even your dad and Gran, but she was nowhere to be found."
“It’s going to be just fine. I was raised here; no one lost me. In fact, I can't think of a safer place to raise a child."
“Yes, I suppose that’s true.” She sighs and lays down. “But it’s not exactly a normal place to grow up, is it? There are no other neighbourhood children to play with. She’ll end up being a bit of an odd duck, won’t she?”
“Hecan play with your nieces and nephews all the time. And someday we’ll add one or two more to the pack.” My eyes flutter, and I give in to how heavy my lids feel.
“But where will the baby even go to school?"
Oh, Christ. I guess we’re going to have this conversation right now, aren’t we? "He'll have the finest tutors until he's old enough to go off to Eton."
Tessa gasps audibly. "Boarding school? My baby is not going to boarding school! She will stay at home with us until she’s at least twenty.”
I stifle a yawn. “Do we really have to decide this now? At three in the morning when you’ve just woken from a nightmare? We do have about fifteen years to sort out the issue of boarding school.”
“I know. I’m sorry. There’s just so much to worry about when you’re having a child. I mean, how do we not fuck this up entirely?”
“We will, like every parent to go before us. We’ll just try not to fuck him up too badly.”
“Well, that hardly makes me feel better!”
“Tessa. We’ll be fine. If Lars and Nina can raise five of them, surely we can raise one.”
“Lars is literally a rocket scientist.”
“But Nina’s the one doing most of the childrearing, and she’s not exactly the brightest bulb in the chandelier. Yet, their kids seem to be turning out just fine.”
“That’s because they live in a normal house with normal neighbourhood children to play with and they go to a normal school.”
“I’m sensing a theme here. Listen, I promise we’ll do whatever we can to make sure our child has a normal, yet extraordinary upbringing, allowing him to be both prepared for ruling the kingdom and managing to fit in with your relatives. But first, for God’s sake, can we get some sleep? I’m so tired.”
Tessa turns off the light, then sighs loudly again.
I roll over, then put one arm around her and give her a kiss on the cheek. “It’ll be okay, Tessa. I was raised here, and look how I turned out.”
“Umm...” she says, teasing me.
