His face turns white.
“Or the time I couldn’t remember how to cook and nearly died from food poisoning.”
Caylon shakes his head, muttering, “Now you’re just making my point for me.”
“Yet despite all this I raised a perfectly healthy son. If it was a job people actually value, I might even qualify for a bonus. You’re self-sufficient, employed, able to open and heat small tins of food. That’s more than many people can hope for.”
He opens his mouth to argue, and I happily jump in, taking her side. “You turned out rather well. I have to agree with your mum.”
Effie’s eyes sparkle. “See? You even have excellent taste in women. I like this one. You should stop arguing with your mother and take her to bed immediately.”
It’s my turn to go beetroot red.
“I’m just going to finish up here, then I’ll go to bed, too.” She twirls a strand of hair around her finger, pulling it out to leave a ringlet in place. “This day has been absolutely awful, and it’ll be a gift to put it behind us.”
She gets off the couch and moves over to join us, cupping Caylon’s face briefly before turning to me. “I’ll grab the recordings of your mum, then delete the original. Then you can decide later if you want to do anything with them or not.”
I nod, unable to speak.
Effie raises her eyebrow as her gaze shifts back to her son. “Crazy or not, I’ve still got mad skills.”
“Thank you.” I want to say more, to express how much worry she’s eased from me with just a few keystrokes, but the words aren’t there so I just shake my head.
“You’re more than welcome.” She retreats to the sofa, picking up her bag of lollies, her mouth twisting in dismay at their reduced state. “Need to put some more protein on the shopping list.”
“Protein?”
I turn Caylon so he’s facing the bedroom. “Don’t worry about it. There are far more important things to keep in mind.”
Helping him back into bed is an exercise in patience. Once he’s reinstalled there, I fetch a glass of water from the bathroom so he can wash down another couple of painkillers.
As soon as he’s finished, he passes the bottle to me. “You look like you need some, too.”
I swallow a couple and strip my shoes off, crawling into bed next to him. Despite the groans it elicits, he insists on moving so he has him arm slung over my waist. “I should’ve warned you not to listen to my mother. She’s literally insane.”
The feeble joke almost twists me in half with a ridiculous snort of laughter. “Careful what jokes you tell now. They could come back to haunt you.”
“We’ll just have to avoid having children. Then there’ll be no one to make sure I get my comeuppance.”
I don’t mean to stiffen but I know he senses it. His attention turns to laser focus. “What’s wrong?”
I’ve tried to keep a secret from him before. It didn’t work and I don’t have the energy to try again.
Luckily, the words are easier to say in the dark. Easier still with his arm around me. “I’m pregnant.” Even saying it aloud, the notion still seems completely unbelievable. As though if I close my eyes and hope really hard, the problem might go away.
He shifts, though every change in position must be fantastically painful. He snuggles closer, wrapping his free arm around me as well, cocooning me in his warmth. “Bit too soon for me, even if my boys are fantastic swimmers.”
The joke works better than it should, flexing into my anxiety. “Nice to see you’re equally modest about everything.”
I say nothing for a long time. So long that Caylon’s grip lessens, the strokes of his thumb along my arm fading, slowing in pace. “I think… It must be Wilbur’s.”
“Yes.”
His voice is so calm that I settle more firmly into his embrace. I try to imagine how the reverse of this conversation would have gone, and it instantly dissolves into carnage.
I remind myself to remember this. Not the words, but the feeling. His acceptance. Like I could tell him anything and it wouldn’t matter because he’s already picked me and doesn’t care what comes along with that. That his love will just shift and morph to cover anything I offer.
My tears come and I let them, not trying to pretend that I’m not upset, to hide my emotion because it’s hard on the people around me. Caylon’s hand moves to cup my head, rocking me, comforting me.
