Leanne’s kindness made Vicky feel tearful. Was that how it was going to be now? Because that was what pregnancy hormones did to you, wasn’t it? Made you emotional and faint, made your boobs hurt, made you nauseous, made you burst into tears for no reason. God, how she needed to tell someone. But it should be Paddy first, surely? He had the right to know first, didn’t he? Then Lucy, no question. But she was just so full up with it all.
Full to bursting. She shook her head. ‘I’m okay,’ she said, ‘Just been a rush today. Better after a coffee though.’ She added a third mug to the two Leanne had already put out.
‘You don’t look okay,’ Leanne said, scrutinising her minutely. ‘You sure you’re not going down with something?’ She put a hand to Vicky’s forehead. ‘Are you feeling hot?’
It was such a sweetly maternal thing to do – not that she’d ever had much of that – that tears instantly welled in Vicky’s eyes.
‘Hey, Vic, what? What is it?’ Leanne said, putting both arms around her. ‘What’s happened?’
Vicky couldn’t stop herself. ‘I’m pregnant,’ she whispered.
‘You’re what?’ Leanne let her go and inspected her again. Then pulled her close again. ‘Oh, shit, Vic. Bloody hell. No wonder you look like you’ve seen a bloody ghost!’
She let her go again. ‘You just found out? Jesus – how far are you gone? Does Paddy know?’
‘He has no idea. I’ve literally only just done the test.’ She reached for her bag and pulled the stick out. ‘That’s why I was late.’
‘Shit,’ Leanne said again, perching on one of the chairs. ‘Christ, Vic.’ She frowned. ‘Christ, what will your mam say?’
Vicky didn’t give a shit what her mam might have to say. That maternal boat had long since sailed. She said so.
‘But what about Paddy?’ Leanne said. ‘I mean, are you even going to tell him? I mean, under the circumstances …’ She stood up again, to fill the kettle. ‘I mean, have you even decided what you’re going to do?’
Vicky was confused. ‘What do you mean, what I’m going to do? Do about what?’
Leanne blinked at her. ‘Well, you aren’t thinking about keeping it, are you? Shit, you are, aren’t you?’ she said, presumably reading Vicky’s expression. ‘Fuck’s sake, Vic – really? God, you’re too young! Seriously,’ she added, ‘you have to think about this, Vicky. Who knows where you’ll be … what you’ll be doing … who you’ll be with … It’s odds-on you won’t be with Paddy, that’s for sure. And what then?’ She spread her hands. ‘Who’ll want you with a kid as part of the package?’
Vicky was more stunned than she’d been when the blue line had begun appearing against the white. The thought of getting rid of it had never even occurred to her. Should it have? No. She couldn’t even countenance such a thing. ‘Of course I’m going to keep it,’ she said. ‘I’m a Catholic, for one thing. And for another, it’s Paddy’s, and as far as I’m concerned, we are going to be together. Why wouldn’t we be? Christ, Leanne, I’d never abort his baby!’
Leanne shook her head, then sighed. Then patted her arm. ‘Alright, calm down.’
‘I am calm.’
‘And, look, I didn’t mean anything by it – just, well, you know, I didn’t realise you felt like that, honest I didn’t. I mean, you know, what with him going to prison and that. D’you think he’ll feel the same though? D’you think he’ll actually want the baby?’
Which was a question Vicky hadn’t even allowed herself to think about. She stuck her chin out. ‘Of course he will,’ she said.
Vicky wished she’d had the foresight to get some travel sickness pills. The journey from Bradford Interchange to Leeds wasn’t only interminable, it was like sitting on the axle of a go-kart, as the bus wheezed and strained its way to Leeds. Not that it was hilly, or particularly windy – just stop-start, stop-start, in the endless traffic. The thought of doing this every fortnight weighed heavily.
And she wouldn’t even be there when it reached its destination, either. She still had to find a taxi to take her the rest of the way to the prison.
‘Best way,’ Gurdy had told her. ‘Or you’ll be faffing about with another load of buses. And it won’t cost you much. It’s only a couple of miles or so from there.’
He’d spoken with great authority – authority he really didn’t have. Or, at least, shouldn’t have. Since when did Gurdy know all about this stuff? Vicky knew he’d asked around for her – he’d said as much, sweetly. He’d been so anxious to help her out – had even offered to go with her, even though she knew that, at least this time, she must go alone. But it niggled at her that dear, sweet, good Gurdy seemed to have such ready access to the sort of information she required.
It sometimes felt, lately, that she was being sucked into a world she wanted no part of. Or, rather, catapulted – headlong. It had all happened so quickly. It was one thing to turn a blind eye to whatever ‘business’ Paddy got up to (something – as Lucy had always been quick to point out – that she’d been managing to do nicely these past couple of years), but here she was, on a bus bound for another, distant city – a city which housed the prison in which her boyfriend was now incarcerated. Her boyfriend, the convict. Her boyfriend, who had a record. And now she – and she couldn’t help but cradle her still barely visible bump with her hands – had become a prison visitor.
They’d stretched out on Paddy’s bed that last night before the trial, both looking up at the ceiling, Paddy drawing on a cigarette, defiant to the last, in the face of his mother’s fury when she came into his bedroom the following morning and could smell he’d been smoking in there.
‘Why should I care?’ he’d said, flicking ash into the ashtray which was nestled among his chest hairs. ‘I’ll be out of here, won’t I? And they’ll fucking disown me anyway.’ They since had, pretty much. ‘So it’s you and me, kiddo,’ he’d told her tenderly. ‘You and me against the world.’
They were words that she’d clung to while she’d cried into her pillow every night since. Him, her and their baby, against the world.
And he’d explained everything to her, carefully, as if to a child. That, once he’d arrived in the nick, he had to apply to the governor for something called a VO, which apparently stood for visiting order. That he’d be allowed two a month (unlike Gurdy, who’d needed to ask, Paddy knew exactly how prison worked), and that since his ‘lousy fucking parents’ obviously wouldn’t want one, he’d request both for her, which meant she could go and visit him once a fortnight. ‘Keep an eye on what you’re up to,’ he’d said then, teasing her, running a proprietorial hand over her naked breasts. ‘Make sure you’re not getting up to anything you shouldn’t be.’
And Vicky had laughed then – as if – feeling secure in his embrace, all thoughts of him snogging the likes of bloody Lacey, or any other random slapper, spirited away. So she’d sought to reassure him – both in word and, for another languid hour, in deed.
And when it could no longer be in any doubt that she was carrying his baby, she had felt a welling of something approaching joy. No, it wasn’t the best timing. Yes, she was obviously far too young. No, she wasn’t sure how he’d react – he had a lot on his plate, didn’t he? And, yes – yes, of course she was scared. But she was carrying Paddy’s child. Which meant she was carrying a part of him inside her. Which, since he had been taken from her, felt exactly as it should be.
Or