Page 46 of The Half Sister

Being pregnant doesn’t feel how Kate thought it would. After the interminable wait to get here, she expected fireworks to be going off and an instantaneous rounding of her tummy. But at six weeks, all she feels is really nauseous and a bit weirded out that there is a human being growing inside of her.

She’s glad to be almost done for the day, but the rush hour has already started as she heads back to the office from her last appointment in Soho. The summer heat from above ground has turned the Underground into a furnace and the labyrinth of tunnels becomes hotter and hotter the further down she goes, with the only relief being the whoosh of air that precedes the train. Though even that feels like she’s stuck in the diffuser of a high-powered hairdryer.

She gets caught up in the throng of people clamouring to get on the already packed carriage. There’s pushing, tutting and the occasional shout of, ‘Move the fuck down’, which, if it had been winter, would have been, ‘Can you move down please?’ The heat does funny things to you.

Kate clings on to the rail, eyeing the healthy-looking young guy who is slouched in the preferential seat for the elderly and pregnant. She fantasizes that in the weeks and months to come she’ll bare her bump and demand that he give up his seat, but right now, she looks like she’s just had a heavy lunch. She’d be happy if that was the truth, but she can’t remember the last time she had a decent meal, her insides unable to cope with the mere thought of carbohydrates and protein. So, to save herself from starving to death, and on Matt’s insistence, she’d taken to carrying a box of cereal around in her bag – the cardboard-tasting flakes being the only thing she can stomach right now.

She gets off at Canary Wharf and watches in awe as fellow commuters rush past her on the escalator. Men, with sweat staining their shirts, race up the steep risers towards civilization. The women take their time, preferring to be taken down in the apocalypse than display a wet patch on their blouse.

The coolness of the air-conditioned office building is a welcome relief, but as she’s waiting for one of the lifts, her phone rings.

‘Hello darling, it’s only me,’ says Rose. ‘I’m glad I caught you.’

Kate can’t help but sigh. ‘What’s up?’

‘Well, I just wondered if you’d spoken to Lauren at all.’

‘Not for a couple of weeks, no,’ says Kate.

‘It’s only that I wondered if there was a problem between you...’

‘I don’t know, is there?’

‘She won’t admit it to me,’ Rose goes on. ‘But I’m pretty sure she’s still talking to that girl, or maybe even seeing her.’

For a split second, Kate doesn’t know who her mother’s referring to, but then the cold hard realization hits her. She’d spent the last couple of weeks desperately trying to silence the noises in her head, refusing to let Jess infiltrate her thoughts, which had been easier to do without Lauren to constantly remind her. Though she had to admit that, even for them, two weeks was a long time to go without speaking and she missed her. Could she dare to hope that the next time they spoke, any thought of Jess being their half sister would be forgotten? It didn’t sound like it.

‘I’m really not interested,’ she says.

‘It’s breaking my heart, all of this,’ says Rose, her voice cracking. ‘I can’t bear it when you two aren’t talking.’

‘We’re just busy,’ says Kate, by way of an excuse, but evenshe’snot falling for it.

‘Goodness knows the girl’s caused enough grief as it is, let’s not let her ruineverything.’

Kate stops herself from saying,She already has.

‘Lauren is a grown woman,’ she says instead. ‘She can do what she wants.’

‘Not if it’s at the expense of the family.’

‘You keep talking about this wonderful family of ours, as if it’s the Holy Grail,’ says Kate, seeing red. ‘That we’re somehow untouchable by anything immoral or unethical. But guess what, Mum – right now, we’re in the middle of a shitstorm, all lined up like sitting ducks, waiting for the bullet that is going to blow us all to smithereens.’

‘If you’re referring to your dad—’ starts Rose.

‘I’m referring toyou,’ snaps Kate. ‘When areyougoing to stand up and take responsibility for whatyou’reputting your precious family through?’

There’s a deathly silence at the other end of the line and Kate instantly wishes she could suck her words back in. She’d not intended to say them. She hadn’t expected to be brave enough.

‘We obviously need to talk,’ says Rose eventually.

Kate breathes out.Finally we’re getting somewhere.

‘Can you come over at some point this week?’ asks Rose.

‘Yes, of course,’ says Kate, suddenly eager to sound conciliatory. ‘I can probably pop in the day after tomorrow.’

‘Fine, I’ll see if Lauren can get cover for the kids for an hour,’ says Rose. ‘But Kate...?’

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