Simon Beckett - Where There's Smoke

“Look at you, dressed up to the nines, and swigging beer from a bottle,” Lucy said, as she came through the French windows. “Oh, God, you’ve let Angus near you. There’s orange lolly all over your skirt.”

Kate glanced down at the stains on the cream-coloured fabric. There was a smear on her sleeveless white top, too. She didn’t care. “It doesn’t matter.”

Lucy regarded her. “My, it must have gone well!” She led Kate over to a table and plastic chairs, clustered in the shade of the overhanging laburnum. Emily went with them. “Go and help Daddy, Emily, there’s a good girl,” Lucy told her.

“Angus can help Daddy,” the little girl said, climbing on a chair next to Kate.

“Angus’ll get in the way. Go on, you’ll have all evening to pester Kate, but Mummy just wants to talk to her now.”

With a moue of disappointment, Emily slid off the chair and trudged over to the barbecue.

“I don’t mind her staying,” Kate said.

“No, but I do. I’ve not told her the facts of life yet, and I don’t want her suddenly asking what ‘insemination’ means in the middle of Tesco’s.”

Lucy settled back in her chair. “So. What happened?”

Kate tried to sound blasé. “They told me there’s no problem.”

“Just like that?”

“More or less. I’ve got to wait for the results of the blood tests and everything,” she held out her left arm, displaying the plaster the nurse had put over the needle mark, “but assuming they’re okay I can go ahead.”

“And they’re willing to use whoever you pick for the donor?”

“They say so, yes.”

Lucy’s face showed what she thought of that. “So they’ll basically impregnate anybody who asks, then.”

“Of course they don’t.”

Kate felt her mood touched by irritation. “Particularly not anyone single, like me. You have to satisfy them that you’re capable of bringing up a child on your own. Emotionally as well as financially. And they wanted to know how I’d cope with working and being a mother.”

The word “mother” sent a thrill through her. It seemed to take on a whole new context. She cleared her throat. “I told her — the counsellor — that for a lot of the time I could probably work from home, or even take the baby to the office with me. Then, later, I’d have to think about finding a nursery for some of the time.”

Lucy gave a snort. “You haven’t even had the poor mite yet and already you’re farming it out.”

“I’m being realistic. You’d be the first to criticise me if I wasn’t. Anyway, the counsellor was satisfied, and they take the child’s welfare pretty seriously.”

“So that’s it, then? You’re going ahead?”

Kate looked away from Lucy’s interrogative stare, watching Emily and Angus as they played near their father. “I don’t know. I haven’t made up my mind.”

“Are you sure?”

She tried to sidestep the question. “It’s no good deciding anything until I get the results of the tests.”

She could feel Lucy watching her. After a moment Lucy sighed. “What’s this place like, anyway?”

Kate took a colour brochure from her bag and handed it across the table. Lucy studied the photograph of the tree-shrouded building on the cover.

“The Wynguard Clinic,” she read. “Well, that’s certainly not NHS, is it?”

“No, it’s private.”

Kate told herself there was no reason to feel defensive. “They don’t just do DI, though. They carry out all sorts of fertility treatments. And they’ve got a fully equipped maternity unit.”

It had been a far cry from the first clinic she had visited, air-conditioned and carpeted. Lucy’s mouth turned down slightly at the corners as she flicked through the brochure. “So what’s this going to cost you, then?”

Kate noticed that Lucy spoke as if the decision was already made. She didn’t correct her. “It’s a bit more than the other place.”

“How much more?”

Kate felt her face going red. “It’s... er, five hundred. A cycle.”

Lucy’s head came up from the brochure. “Five hundred pounds! Each time you have it done!”

Kat nodded, uncomfortably. “Christ!”

“It isn’t that bad, really. You know, considering how few places actually do it. They give you two inseminations per cycle. And they’ll continue the treatment for up to twelve cycles, instead of nine, like the other place.”

“I should think they bloody will, if you’re paying them five hundred quid a shot!” Lucy stared at her, incredulous. “Bloody hell, that’s ridiculous! I mean, it could end up costing you five, no, six thousand quid! And there’s no guarantee you’ll even get pregnant, is there?”

“There’s a good chance. And it might work first time.”

“And it might not!” Lucy put down the brochure. “Look, if you’re this serious about having a baby, why don’t you just find somebody and...” she glanced over to where Angus and Emily were playing, and lowered her voice “... and sleep with them, for God’s sake? There’s just as much chance of getting pregnant, and even if you don’t, at least you’ll have enjoyed yourself! This is just...” She threw up her hands, speechless.

The last vestige of Kate’s good mood disappeared. “So what do you want me to do? Trawl through singles bars and ask anyone who takes my fancy back for a quickie?”

“No, of course I don’t!” Lucy’s mouth quirked upwards. “It doesn’t have to be quick.”

Despite herself Kate laughed. But she was still angry. “Well, that’s what it amounts to, isn’t it? I mean, to start off with you say that you disapprove of me having a baby, full stop. Now it’s okay for me to get pregnant, provided it doesn’t cost me anything, even if I have to turn into Supertart to do it!”

Lucy’s lips were clamped in a tight line. “It’s your money, Kate, you can do what you like with it. But millions of other women manage to get pregnant without having to pay six thousand quid for the privilege, and I can’t see why you have to be any different.”

There was a shriek of laughter from nearby. They looked around as Angus tottered towards them in an unstable run, hands held up in the air, orange-stained face split in a wide grin. Emily was close behind, laughing, and as she caught up with him Angus tumbled and thumped down onto the grass. Lucy went to pick him up. “Oh, now you haven’t hurt yourself,” she said, as his face puckered uncertainly. She rubbed the grass stain on his knee. “There, is that better?”

Angus still didn’t seem too sure, but Lucy plonked him back on the lawn. Emily hung back, watching her apprehensively. “I thought I told you that Mummy and Kate wanted to talk?”

“Yes, but Angus started running over, and I was only—”

“You were only chasing him. Now go over and help Daddy, like I said. We won’t be long.”

“But Mummy!”

“No buts. Go on.”

Sulking, Emily turned and walked away. Angus ran after her, his fall already forgotten. Lucy came back to the table and sat down. The interruption had taken the heat out of the argument, but Kate waited until the children were out of earshot before she spoke.

“Look, Lucy, I know you don’t approve. But what’s the alternative? I don’t want casual sex. I don’t want any complications. I just want a baby. This way I can have control over who the father is and have the legal and medical protection of using a clinic. You don’t get that on a one-night stand, do you?”

Lucy looked unconvinced. “I know, but it just seems so... impersonal.”

Kate nodded, emphatically. “That’s what I want.”

“But what about when the baby gets older? What will you tell it?”

Kate had asked herself the same question. She attempted an insouciance she didn’t entirely feel. “The truth. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”