Jill Mansell - Mixed doubles

‘Believe me, I know how you feel,’ Nancy was saying now to a tearful woman who had just discovered her husband had a bit of a predilection for lacy underwear. ‘Tell me, is it just the undies or does he wear frocks too?’

He did, he did, confessed the woman, between sobs. She’d found a flouncy yellow chiffon dress in the back of the wardrobe and wondered what on earth it was doing there. It was horrible, not her taste in clothes at all.

While Dulcie bit the chocolate off a jaffa cake, Nancy suggested to the woman that shopping together for clothes might bring her and her husband closer, and could also help to avoid costly mistakes.

The next caller was more up Dulcie’s street.

‘... the thing is,’ pleaded Greta from Scarborough, ‘I really love him, Nancy. If he left me I don’t know what I’d do, I just need someone to tell me how I can keep him ... I’ll do anything ...’

Dulcie ate another jaffa cake. She knew that feeling all right.

‘Right, Greta. I understand completely how desperate you must be feeling,’ said Nancy cosily. ‘I can hear it in your voice. But first of all I have to tell you what you mustn ‘t do.’

‘What mustn’t she do, Nancy?’ enquired one of the show’s presenters.

‘Yes, Nancy,’ said Dulcie, ‘what mustn’t we do?’

‘Please, please don’t be tempted into thinking all your problems would be solved if you had a baby.’ Nancy sounded sorrowful. ‘Because believe me, Greta, that would be the biggest mistake you could make.’

The jaffa cake was melting. Dulcie licked chocolate off her fingers and conjured up a mental picture of a tiny baby, the image of Liam, wearing tennis whites and waving a miniature racquet.

This was a possibility that hadn’t so much as crossed her mind.

‘It’s crossed my mind,’ admitted Greta from Scarborough. ‘Don’t let it,’ Nancy said firmly.

This was like being told not to think of pink elephants. Dulcie promptly imagined Liam showing off his new son, driving him around in the Lamborghini, proudly telling everyone how fatherhood had changed his whole life .. .

‘I know,’ said Greta, beginning to sound a bit desperate, ‘but it worked for my sister. She got pregnant and her bloke stuck by her. And she did it on purpose,’ she added defiantly. ‘He thought she was still on the pill but she stopped taking it.’

‘Deceit and trickery,’ Nancy looked sad and shook her head, ‘deceit and trickery. Trust me, pet, this isn’t the answer. Getting pregnant – when all you’re trying to do is hang on to a man – is a recipe for disaster. You’re just grasping at straws.’

Dulcie lifted up her white sweatshirt and gazed down at her flat stomach. Then she shoved the biscuit tin under the sweatshirt and surveyed the odd-shaped lump. Nancy had got rid of Greta now. She had moved on to John from Norwich who was forty-four but his mother had never let him have a girlfriend.

Dulcie knew from the tone of Greta’s voice that she would go ahead and do it anyway. You could always tell when people were going to ignore Nancy’s sound advice.

Dulcie pulled the biscuit tin out from under her sweatshirt, opened it and thoughtfully bit into a bourbon. There was no doubt about it, getting pregnant accidentally-on-purpose might not do the trick — but then again, what if it did? It could be a risk worth taking.

What a shame there wasn’t a Predictor pregnancy kit for men, a just-pee-on-this type of thing that would reliably inform you whether the prospective father of your child might actually be quite keen on the idea.

Or, on the other hand, if he was a fully paid-up member of the run-a-mile club.

Minutes later, it came to her.

Brilliant, thought Dulcie excitedly, amazed that a solution so perfect and simple hadn’t occurred to her before. Or, indeed, to Nancy.

Who needed a pre-pregnancy test? All she had to do was bend the truth a bit.

It wasn’t even fibbing, it was ... well, it was research.

Chapter 28

‘You’re what?’ said Liza, horrified, when Dulcie announced her momentous news the next day out in the back garden. ‘You’re kidding!’

‘I found out last week. Isn’t it terrific?’

Dulcie beamed at them both. Pru, sitting cross-legged on the grass, looked dazed. Liza, frowning, swirled the ice cubes around in her tall glass.

‘I don’t know,’ Liza said finally. ‘Is it terrific? How does Liam feel about it?’

Feeling quite pregnant already, and weirdly protective of her nonexistent child, Dulcie decided Liza was jealous.

‘I’m telling him tonight. I bet he’ll be chuffed.’

Pru was shielding her eyes from the sun, peering at Dulcie’s stomach.

‘How many weeks are you?’

‘Six.’ Dulcie was firm. She had consulted her diary and committed the necessary dates to memory. She had learned her lesson from the Bibi fiasco, the lesson being: If you’re going to lie, be thorough, be convincing and above all be consistent.

All the same, she was glad she had her RayBans on. It wasn’t so easy fibbing to your friends.

‘Morning sickness?’ said Liza, giving her a slightly odd look.

‘God, morning sickness!’ Dulcie groaned and clutched her stomach. You didn’t watch as many soaps as she had in her time without becoming something of an expert on the various signs and symptoms of pregnancy. ‘I’ve been throwing up like nobody’s business—’

‘Cravings?’

‘Cravings!’ Dulcie rolled her eyes. ‘Tell me about them! Custard creams, pickled beetroot dunked in chocolate spread, peanut butter and honey sandwiches—’

‘You’ve always eaten those.’

‘I know, but then I just fancied them,’ explained Dulcie. ‘Now I crave them, totally. Morning, noon and night. And cornflakes mashed up with double cream and marmalade.’

‘I read an article in the paper recently,’ Liza went on. ‘Some professor was saying women who crave green olives have boys, and if they go for lemons it’s a girl.’

Dulcie had already decided Liam would prefer a son. To start with, anyway. She patted her stomach and said happily, ‘I’m eating millions of olives. I know it’s going to be a boy.’

Then because Liza and Pru were both still exchanging furtive glances, she wailed, ‘Isn’t anyone going to congratulate me? Come on, I’m having a baby here! Is this exciting or what?’

Pru looked away, pretending to pick a bit of grass off her shirt. Finally Liza spoke.

‘It might be exciting,’ she said drily, ‘if it were true.’

‘But it is true!’

Liza reached across and whipped off Dulcie’s dark glasses. ‘You might be able to do it to everyone else, but you can’t lie to us.’

Oh bugger, so much for subterfuge.

‘Damn.’ Resignedly, Dulcie grabbed her glasses back. ‘How could you tell?’

‘You might be flippant,’ said Liza, smiling at the expression on Dulcie’s face, ‘but even you aren’t that flippant.’

‘Plus,’ Pru added, looking apologetic, ‘if you really were pregnant, you wouldn’t be able to keep it to yourself for an hour, let alone a week.’

‘I made up the bit about the olives, by the way,’ said Liza.

Feeling ganged-up on, Dulcie said nothing. She drank her glass of tonic and pulled a face. At least now the game was up, she could stick some gin in.

‘Sorry.’ Liza was trying not to laugh. ‘What were we, the practice run?’

Dulcie nodded.

‘Thought so. It’s a really sick thing to do, you know.’

Since Liza wasn’t Liam’s greatest fan, this came as something of a shock to Dulcie; it made her sit up a bit. Hang on, was she defending him here? Was she actually on Liam’s side?

‘I thought you’d approve,’ she protested. ‘I’m being responsible, aren’t I? If he’s thrilled, I’ll do it for real. If he isn’t .. . well, then I won’t.’