I unlocked the back door and tentatively crept towards the vision.
As I got closer, I couldn’t believe my eyes.
It was a baby! Complete with a pink baby grow and a pink dummy, sucking on it with glee as it stared up at me with chubby cheeks and huge blue eyes.
What had I been drinking last night? Has someone spiked my drink at Amelia’s party?
What kind of person could abandon a baby in someone’s garden? This was unbelievable!
‘You poor thing.’ I reached out to pick it up and bring it inside the house and it disappeared.
Pfffft! Just like that. Vanished.
Karl found me two hours later, sitting at the farmhouse kitchen table, still in my fluffy pink pyjamas and giant slippers that looked like cows’ faces, staring blankly at the garden.
‘God, what a great night!’ He kissed the top of my head and yawned. ‘Want a coffee? I feel like I’ve swallowed a Brillo Pad.’
‘Huh?’ I said, not really hearing was he was saying.
‘Coffee? Want one?’ He rummaged around in the cupboards, pulling out mugs and a French press.
‘Mmm.’ I nodded absentmindedly.
He flicked the kettle on, lounged on the chair in front of me, and started chuckling. ‘Do you remember dancing on the table last night? That was hilarious! You, Amelia, and Kerry doing a Coyote Ugly impression, flashing your knickers.’
I didn’t answer. I was too busy worrying I had a brain tumour. That’s what happened, wasn’t it? I’d seen a programme about it once. People started hearing things and seeing things. Freaky things. Things that couldn’t possibly be explained. Omigod, that was it. I was going to die! I was still young. I had my whole life ahead of me. Fun, mad shopping sprees, exotic holidays, lots of alcohol-induced partying (I’m not an alcoholic, honestly!). Except…I was getting this weird feeling. Suddenly all that stuff seemed inconsequential – childish, even. I was thirty-three years old, and now I wanted…
‘I want a baby!’ I blurted out, not really knowing where the thought had come from. Maybe we’d been abducted by aliens on the way home last night and one of those sneaky guys had implanted a weird chip in my brain. It could happen. I watched the X Files, you know. Or was reaching thirty-three the new forty? Did you start having a midlife crisis, or, even worse, a nervous breakdown?
Karl’s dark brown eyes sprang open and his jaw dropped. ‘What?’
I adjusted myself in the chair, elbows on the table, leaning forward with an excited feeling simmering away beneath the surface. ‘I want a baby.’ A large grin had suddenly implanted itself on my face.
He ran a hand through his short dark hair. Now it was his turn to do the blank stare bit. ‘Oh, right.’ He rose from the table as if he hadn’t heard me. ‘Well, I need a coffee.’ He poured the boiling water into the French press and brought it to the table with two mugs. As he flopped back down again, he said, ‘Er…did I just hear you right?’ He poked his fingers in his ears, as if someone had suddenly shoved Blu-Tack down them and he couldn’t hear. ‘Either I’m having the most bizarre dream in the world, or you just said you wanted a baby.’ He pressed the plunger, poured out two steaming mugs of strong coffee, and pushed one towards me with a puzzled look.
I nodded. ‘Yep, that’s what I said.’
‘But you said you never wanted kids.’ His eyebrows furrowed together so he looked like he had a unibrow.
I laughed. A slight chuckle at first. Then it turned into a giggle, then side-splitting, hilarious, uncontrollable laughter. I slammed the table with my hand. ‘I know! How weird is that? I’ve gone through my whole life being adamant I don’t want kids. Not a maternal twinge in my body. Until today.’
He threw me a who-are-you-and-what-the-fuck-have-you-done-with-my-wife? kind of look.
‘Gina, are you ill? Have you got a fever?’ He reached out and touched my forehead.
‘No. It’s just the most bizarre thing. All of a sudden, the only thing I know is I want a baby. Your baby.’ I reached forward and grabbed his hand, squeezing it. ‘So, what do you think?’ I jumped up from the chair and leapt onto his knee, wrapping my arms around his neck. ‘It’s a great idea, isn’t it? You’d make a fantastic dad. Look how good you are with Jayne’s kids.’
‘Well, yeah. I mean, I guess I’ve always wanted to have kids one day. I just thought it would eventually happen when I was in my thirties.’
‘You are in your thirties.’ I grinned.
‘Oh, God, you’re right. When did that happen? In my head I’m still twenty-one.’ He grinned back.
‘So this is perfect timing,’ I said. ‘I mean, we can afford a baby now you’re doing so well at work. We’ve got a three-bed house so it’s big enough. I can still do my beauty business from home. And our kids would be adorable.’ I clapped my hands together with excitement. ‘Just think, they’d have your thick, dark hair, my green eyes, your calm-in-a-crisis, gentle nature, and my determination. What a perfect combination!’
‘I need some caffeine to let this sink in.’ He took a huge gulp of coffee, swallowing thoughtfully. ‘I suppose they’d also have your dirty laugh, sense of humour, and fun-loving spirit. And they’d have both my practical ability to do DIY, and my business brain.’
‘Oh, yeah, what else?’ I grinned, getting into the swing of things. ‘My organizational skills.’
‘As long as they don’t get your map-reading skills. They’ll get lost on the way out of your womb if they do,’ he chuckled.
‘Or your leave-dirty-socks-around-the-house skills.’ I raised an eyebrow. ‘So, what do you think?’ I looked down at him expectantly.
‘Does that mean we can start trying now?’ he raised a seductive eyebrow at me.
I leapt off him and grabbed his hand, pulling him up. ‘Hell, yeah!’
Sibel Hodge is the author of bestselling romantic comedy Fourteen Days Later. She has 8 cats and 1 husband. In her spare time, she’s Wonder Woman! When she’s not out saving the world from dastardly demons, she writes quirky chick lit with a hefty dose of screwball comedy. Her other books include My Perfect Wedding, The Fashion Police (Amber Fox Mystery), Be Careful What You Wish For (Amber Fox Mystery), and How to Dump Your Boyfriend in the Men’s Room (and other short stories).
Her work has been shortlisted for the Harry Bowling Prize 2008, Highly Commended by the Yeovil Literary Prize 2009, Runner up in the Chapter One Promotions Novel Comp 2009, and nominated Best Novel with Romantic Elements in 2010 by The Romance Reviews. Her novella Trafficked: The Diary of a Sex Slave has been listed as one of the Top 40 Books About Human Rights by Accredited Online Colleges. For more information about her books, please see: http://www.sibelhodge.com/
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