Page 50 of The Fall-Out

I felt Patch’s chest shake with laughter. ‘So what if she does? I’m not her Oasis CD you borrowed and haven’t given back. She’s got no claim on me.’

And I do? I thought. If Patch was an autonomous adult, which obviously he was, I didn’t have any more of a claim on him than Zara did – apart from the slender gold band on my finger and the two not-so-autonomous non-adults tucked up in their beds upstairs. And I couldn’t imagine those things holding much sway with Zara if she decided to trample over my life in pursuit of what she wanted.

You didn’t have too much of a problem trampling over hers, though, said a niggling voice in my head, but I silenced it as quickly as I could. It was over; I did nothing wrong. But the refrain I’d repeated so often over the years seemed to have lost some of its power to reassure me.

‘Patch?’

He brushed a kiss on the top of my head. ‘What?’

‘If she did anything – said anything to you – that I wouldn’t be okay with, you’d tell me, wouldn’t you?’

I felt his chest rise and fall again, this time in a deep breath that ended in a sigh. ‘I can’t promise you that.’

‘Why not?’ I jerked my head up, craning my neck so I could see his face. But it was expressionless.

‘Because I wouldn’t want to hurt you.’

‘It would hurt me far worse if you were keeping secrets from me.’

‘People always say that, don’t they? But I don’t reckon it’s always true.’

‘Of course it’s true! If there was anything I needed to worry about, I’d want to know.’

‘So you could what? Worry about it more?’

‘So I could do something about it.’

‘Babe. If – massive if, obviously, because this is categorically not happening, okay? – Zee suddenly said she wanted us to be an item again and I wanted it too, what exactly do you think you could do about it?’

The thought felt like one of the players on the TV had kicked a football through the screen and it had hit me in the stomach. ‘I’d tell you not to.’

‘And what difference would that make, if I wanted to?’

‘I don’t know.’ My voice was a hoarse whisper.

‘Exactly. So you have to trust me, right? I don’t want to – I wouldn’t want to even if she did, which as far as I know she doesn’t. It’s you I married. It’s you I love. It’s you who’s the mother of my kids. Okay?’

‘Okay.’ His words soothed the hurt a little bit, like when one of the kids fell over in the park and grazed their knee and I gave them a chocolate button so they’d stop crying.

‘And speaking of the kids…’ Patch began, then stopped.

‘What about them?’

‘I’ve been thinking, Nome… Now’s probably not the best time to talk about it.’ He kissed the top of my head, like I was one of the children and he was about to turn out the light.

‘Damn it, Patch, what? You can’t just say something like that and then say you’re not going to say whatever it was.’

‘I’ve been thinking… I’ve been wondering whether we should have another baby.’

‘What?’ I jerked away from him. ‘Patch, what the fuck? Because I’ve been wondering whether you should have a vasectomy.’

We pulled apart and looked at each other. His face was as shocked and wounded as if I’d suggested carrying out the procedure right then and there with a butter knife from the kitchen drawer.

‘You’re joking,’ he said.

‘I’m not.’ I swivelled round to face him, hugging my knees to my chest. ‘I know now’s not the best time to bring it up and obviously it’s your body and totally your choice but I’ve been on the Pill for ages and I’m sick of it. It kind of feels like it’s your turn. Because I definitely don’t want another baby.’

‘Why not? You’re a fantastic mum.’

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