“We wanted to give the child an opportunity to personalise it,” Oliver was saying. And, when he put it like that, it seemed marginally more likely that Esther would go back to the office and write “bedroom adequate” and not “couple expects kid to sleep in white box.”
“Yes,” I contributed helpfully.
“Lucien and I sleep down the hall. We have an en suite, so the main bathroom will be entirely free.”
Esther nodded and smiled and seemed to be making some notes but didn’t say anything immediately.
Which I told myself was fine. Didn’t mean anything. Wasn’t a sign of doom.
We showed her our room, which I’d scrupulously tidied of pants and sex toys that morning, and the bathroom, before looping back downstairs to tick off the kitchen and my study.
“The pen is for Spud,” Oliver remarked. And because it was Oliver doing the remarking, not me, there was no implication ofin case you think this is where we intend to keep our foster child.
“Is he new?” asked Esther.
Which was exactly the kind of question that the material we’d read—the material Oliver had read—told us we should have expected.
“Um,” I said, having apparently forgotten the most basic facts about my own life.
Oliver put a reassuring hand on my arm. “A few months, but he’s settled in very well. The pen’s probably not strictly necessary anymore, but it means he has a familiar space.”
“And he’s comfortable with strangers?”
Spud gave a cheery “Ruff” of confirmation, which Oliver capitalised on with an opportunistic “As you can see.”
Esther made another note. Which probably didn’t readThe hot one is a bit too smug, but only probably.
Having run out of house, we returned to the sitting room, where I stood frozen by an uplighter and Oliver offered Esther a cup of tea.
“That’d be great,” she said, “two sugars.”
“I’ll get it!” I reverted to exclaiming.
I didn’t want to look like I was running away, but I’d long since learned you can’t always get what you want.
Safely in the kitchen, I took a moment to splash water on my face, which helped slightly with the stress but not with the manure. Then I had a not-that-minor-actually freak-out over which mugs to use. Because, on the surface, it seemed a pretty straightforwardchoice. When Oliver and I had moved in together and consolidated our kitchens, he’d provided things like a whisk, frying pans that weren’t covered in a thin laminate of bacon grease and crockery that actually matched. I’d provided an absinthe spoon, a Breville sandwich toaster with its nonstick coating flaking off, and a collection of mugs that I’d mostly stolen or been given by people with more irony than compassion.
This meant I could go with some nice Le Creuset stoneware mugs in assorted tasteful colours. Or I could give the social worker who was going to decide if Oliver and I were the right sort of people to raise a vulnerable teenager theUnicorns Are Just Horny Poniesmug Priya had got me for my twenty-eighth birthday, theThere It Goes, My Last Flying Fuckmug Priya had got me for my twenty-ninth birthday, theCold, Smooth, and Tasty (Like Your Mum)mug Priya had got me for my thirtieth birthday, and theAny Text or Photomug she’d got me as a moving-in present.
Again, the choice should have been obvious. Except, if I took the nice stoneware mugs out, there was a very real chance Esther would think I was trying to trick her. Because I was clearly not the kind of person who owned nice stoneware mugs, and then she’d probably wonder what else I was lying about. Or she’d start to think that maybe I’d murdered the real Luc O’Donnell and Oliver Blackwood, who were the kind of people who owned nice stoneware mugs, and stuffed them under the floorboards. Whereas if I gave herMassive Twat(Priya again, this time just to annoy me), she’d realise what an authentic, down-to-earth person with nothing to hide I was.
Or she’d think I was a misogynist with no sense of boundaries.
Oh.
It was that one, wasn’t it?
I went back out with a tray of nice stoneware mugs.
“Everything all right, Lucien?” asked Oliver, since I’d taken about six hours to make three cups of tea.
“Absolutely!” I exclaimed.
“I was just asking Oliver,” said Esther, politely ignoring my weird, weird behaviour and taking one of the mugs, “why you decided on fostering.”
My mind went blank. “Pardon?”
“I was just asking why you decided on fostering.”
