‘It could be, yes. It’s just something to be aware of,’ Carol repeated. ‘Have you had a discussion about whose eggs you are going to use?’
‘I think we’ll go for the surrogate eggs, if that’s an option,’ Kate said.
She spoke clearly and tried to keep her voice from cracking. They were acting on advice from Mr Abadi, who said this would give them the best possible chance of conceiving in the quickest time, and although Kate tried to tell herself that it didn’t matter how they got there, that a baby was yours as soon as it was in your arms, she was also struggling to come to terms with it, with the fact that her child would have no genetic link to her.
‘All right,’ Carol said. ‘Then you’ll also need to consider if you’re OK with the fact that Marisa looks different from you, Kate?’
‘She looks like Jake,’ Kate replied.
‘I know, but he’ll be providing his sperm, so …’
‘Yes, I realise that. I’ve thought a lot about it.’
And she had. She had gone over it again and again in her mind, until she had come to the conclusion that all of Marisa’s advantages outweighed this one, rather solipsistic concern. She knew Jake was desperate to be a father and she could no longer bear the idea of letting him down. She wanted to be fine with it, so she told herself she was. Gradually it became a version of the truth.
‘I’m fine with it,’ Kate said to Carol.
In the chair next to her, Jake reached over and squeezed her hand.
On Kate’s advice, Jake had kept in touch with Marisa regularly by text since the party.
‘We don’t want to scupper our chances with her,’ Kate said, half joking. ‘She was probably picking up digits left, right and centre that night.’
They were sitting on the bench in the garden, admiring the hydrangea which had just started to flower. The sound of a computer game being played at loud volume trailed over the wall at the far end. They lived next to a council estate and a tall red-brick stairwell blotted out a rectangular segment of sky at the end of their garden. It was why they’d got the house for such a good price – the estate agent said the stairwell had put lots of buyers off, but neither Kate nor Jake particularly minded. London, after all, was a patchwork of different housing, the tower blocks springing up in derelict spaces after World War II bomb damage, pressed up against older houses like new gold fillings in a mouthful of yellowing teeth. Living here felt like they were breathing in the actual city, rather than an airbrushed version of it. Kate appreciated the patchwork history.
‘I feel like we’re dating,’ Jake said. He poured her a glass of rosé.
She squinted at him.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Just that I’m over-analysing each of her texts because I want to show we’re interested but I don’t want to come across as too keen.’
She laughed. ‘You are silly.’
The wine and the sunshine had given her a pleasant light-headedness. She rested her head against his shoulder. ‘The only person you’re dating is me.’
He held her closer to him.
‘Thank goodness.’
They arranged to meet Marisa in a cafe at the weekend, the daylight rendezvous feeling appropriate and unthreatening. Kate dressed in clothes that were presentable but not too fashionable because she wanted to appear her most dependable and stable self. She settled for a white linen shirt and boyfriend cut jeans with trainers. Jake wore a grey T-shirt and his favourite chinos. They arrived half an hour beforethe allotted time so that they could settle in and quell their anxiety, and they chose a table by the window so that Marisa could see them easily when she walked in.
When she arrived, she smiled at them and made her way over to the table.
‘Hi,’ she said. Her hair was down over her shoulders. Out of fancy dress, she looked even more wholesome than Kate had remembered. She was in a pink cotton sundress and the straps kept slipping down her tanned arms. The top button was undone, revealing a triangle of bright blue bra. Looking at her, the one word that Kate kept returning to was ‘ripe’. She knew, instinctively, that this woman would carry their baby; that she was the one and this knowledge calmed her. It suddenly made a peculiar kind of sense that their struggles had led them here, as though their baby had been waiting to be born until Marisa came along.
‘So nice to see you again,’ Jake said, shaking her hand.
They ordered drinks and Marisa’s tea came with all sorts of unnecessary paraphernalia including a tiny egg-timer and a Japanese-style tray and a lengthy explanation from the waitress of how long to let it brew.
‘Wow,’ Jake said. ‘That’s a complicated cup of tea.’
They laughed.
‘I’m more of an English Breakfast man myself,’ Jake continued. Kate felt a twinge of affection for how he had taken on the difficult business of breaking the ice so that she didn’t have to. She wanted to stay silent for a bit, and simply observe.
Jake and Marisa talked about their respective families and their upbringings, and Marisa painted an idyllic picture of a contented childhood. Her parents, she said, were still happily married (‘It makes it quite difficult to live up to, to be honest,’ she added) and she and her younger sister, Anna, were very close.
