Page 3 of Be Less Panda

‘I guess she’ll tell you soon enough. But if you’re interested, I have told Bob’s future grandmother.’

‘Sorry! I should’ve asked. How did it go?’

‘She did a fabulous job of pretending she didn’t know that she was getting a new grandchild. She sends her love.’

‘I gather you’ve already told Mark?’

‘Ah, yes.’ He sounded sheepish. ‘It accidentally slipped out.’

At least he was being honest. ‘When?’

‘Um … The day you did the pregnancy test.’ Jack sounded even more sheepish now.

‘That long ago? Why didn’t you say?’

‘I thought you’d be upset.’

Em sighed. ‘At least it’s not a secret anymore. I better go. I need to tell Dad now.’

Em dialled her father’s number.

‘Hello, love. Is everything ok?’

‘Yes. Why do you ask?’

‘You don’t normally phone me on a Thursday morning.‘

‘I wanted you to be one of the first to hear my news.’Or, at this rate, the last. Em heard him shout, ‘Cynthia! Come here, darling. Em’s on the phone.’

Em didn’t wait for her soon-to-be stepmother to arrive. ‘You’re going to a grandad in the summer.’

‘That’s me £10 down then,’ he laughed.

‘That wasn’t what I was expecting you to say!’ Was no one going to be surprised? None of the pregnancy sites she’d been avidly reading had said anything about family and friends being this laid back about your big announcement.

‘Sorry, love. It’s just that at your wedding Cynthia bet me £10 that you were already pregnant. I thought if I’d not heard anything by the end of this month, I’d be in the clear.’

2

Lucy put down her phone and leaned back in her office chair just as her PA, Kizzy, walked in.

‘You look miles away,’ Kizzy said.

‘I was thinking about how everything’s going to change now.’

‘Why? I’ve warned you not to make any big decisions while Mercury is in retrograde.’ Kizzy placed Lucy’s latte on the desk.

‘I fail to see how the position of the planets affects the lives of me and my friends,’ Lucy said, immediately regretting it when she spotted Kizzy picking up a marker pen from the tray on the whiteboard. ‘I don’t need diagrams,’ she added.

‘You clearly do because I’ve been through this with you before.’

‘And I didn’t believe it last time either.’

‘It’s up to you, but if you make serious decisions between now and the 9thMarch, you’ll regret it. My Auntie Beryl ignored that advice, and look what happened to her.’

Kizzy always had a relative with a story to illustrate whatever point she was trying to make, but she was part of such a large family it was difficult to keep track of who was who.

‘Is she the one who married the bigamist?’ Lucy asked.

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