Page 16 of Prognosis Baby Daddy

The figure didn’t even make Katya blink. Was it a new dress or a pair of shoes or a new man that had taken precedence over the rent and electricity? Katya sighed. ‘Mama...’

‘Please, Katya. It’s expensive with four teenagers. And if you ever bothered to come home instead of tripping around the world, you’d know that.’

Katya gripped the telephone receiver and bit her tongue, the unfairness of her mother’s statement stinging. Like she’d been on a continuous Contiki tour! She’d been working her butt off in some of the world’s hotspots so she could support her mother and four siblings.

She knew how expensive it was, damn it - she’d been practically supporting the entire family since she’d started work.

‘If it’s too much for you maybe you can ask your rich count for a loan?’

‘Mama!’ Katya gasped.

Was her mother serious? She’d known the minute she’d told her mother that she knew a Count and was going to Italy to work for him in the world-famous Lucia Clinic that she’d said the wrong thing. But her mother had been persistent in wanting to know why she was leaving MedSurg and a steady source of income and Katya certainly wasn’t about to tell her about the baby.

And, just for once, she’d wanted for her mother to be impressed. Proud even. But, as usual, her mother didn’t fail to disappoint her.

‘Don’t be so shocked, Katya. You always were so high and mighty.’

‘Well, somebody had to be, Mama.’

As soon as the words were out, Katya regretted them. Not because they were wrong but because she knew what was coming next. Katya held the phone and listened while her mother gave her the usual hard-luck story. How hard her life had been with five children and no man about the house. How she’d done the best she could with what she had. What an ungrateful daughter she was.

And then the real prize. ‘You think you’re better than me? Don’t forget, if it wasn’t for you, Katya, Sophia wouldn’t be so horribly disfigured.’

No matter how many times she prepared herself for it, how many times she heard it, it still rocked her to the core. The angry little girl inside who had lost her childhood to her mother’s reproductive irresponsibility clawed and begged and screamed to retaliate. To respond with righteous indignation.

But the guilt - the guilt her mother knew how to manipulate so well - paralysed the words, froze them in her throat, every time. She looked up and saw Ben watching her. ‘I’ll send the money, Mama,’ Katya said, her voice shaky, her hands trembling as she cast her eyes downwards again.

‘Good girl.’

No ‘thank you’. No apologies for asking or pretense that this was the last time.

‘You know, Katya,’ Olgah continued, ‘if you played your cards right, were nice to your boss, he might...I know from the magazines he’s a terrible playboy but he might like a nice little Russian girl. We’d never have to worry about money again.’

Olgah was so matter-of-fact that Katya felt physically ill. As an emotion so vile injected its poison through Katya’s body, she realised for the first time, that she hated her mother. There had been plenty of times growing up — home alone, trying to raise her four siblings while her mother was god knew where —when she had felt rage and fury and frustration towards her.

But this?

Suggesting first that she go to Ben for money and then that she ingratiate herself to ensure a lifetime of financial security for her family? This was truly corrupt, even for her mother. It became imperative to Katya right then and there that her mother never find out that the baby she was carrying was the heir to the Medici fortune.

‘You owe it to Sophia to at least try, Katya.’

Katya gasped. The unfairness of her mother’s words raged inside her but the overwhelming impotence she had felt from childhood neutralised her rage, her hate. It didn’t seem to matter how far away she got from Moscow, her mother’s ability to reach across the world and tap into her childhood psyche was astounding.

‘Goodbye, Mama,’ Katya said, swallowing hard as a rush of bile rose in her throat.

Katya replaced the phone, cutting off her mother’s reply. She felt dead inside. Damn her mother. Damn her to hell. When she turned she found Ben watching her.

‘Everything OK, cara?’ he asked softly.

Katya could see the concern in the depths of his eyes. She knew he had gleaned enough from the one-sided Russian conversation to know that it hadn’t been a happy family reunion. His kindness was unbearable when she felt so raw inside.

She shook her head. ‘Mothers.’ She gave him a half-smile. He chuckled and Katya knew he was waiting for her to elaborate. To say more. But...she couldn’t.

If she’d needed to escape the theatre before the phone call, it was an absolute necessity now. ‘See you after lunch,’ she said and fled the room not waiting for a response.

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Ben kicked at the agedpaving stones of the Piazza Duomo. He scanned the outdoor cafés thronged with locals and tourists alike in the glorious sunshine, hoping to see Katya sitting at one of them. Gabriella had told him she was coming here and it was only the lunch-break so she couldn’t have got too far. Katya had covered well but he could tell that the phone call from her mother had upset her. He couldn’t explain why he felt the need, but he wanted to check if she was OK. He remembered the look they’d exchanged in Lupi’s doorway that morning, like she could see all was not well with him, and he wanted her to know that he was sensitive to her emotional state as well.

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