Page 45 of A Found Family at the Cornish Country Hospital

As it turned out, when the eggs were checked on the day after retrieval, eleven of the fourteen had fertilised. It was still enough for a football team, but there’d no longer be any reserves. After that, the wait was back on, to see whether the eggs would develop into viable embryos, and their clinic made a decision on day five about which eggs were suitable for freezing.

‘Seven.’ Jase had been thrilled when he’d recounted the news from the fertility nurse. They were back to a football team with a couple of reserves, but this time it was for five-a-side. Aidan had known he should be grateful, but the dwindling number had been in direct contrast to his growing anxiety. It was only when he’d updated his page, that he’d started to feel better.

‘IVFmumma85 says this is the best result we could have hoped for, and not to forget that we’ve still got fourteen eggs on ice we can use if we need to.’ Aidan read out the latest comment to Jase, as he scrolled through the feed.

‘She’s right, but I’ve got this feeling we’re not going to need them. Just look at those cells.’ Jase grinned at the photograph that was now the profile picture on their Facebook journey to parenthood page. It was of the divided cells in the highest-grade embryo the clinic had frozen for them. And they’d select some to be thawed, once Ellen was ready for transfer. Both he and Aidan carried the same picture in their wallets; it was the closest thing they had for now to a photograph of their child.

‘There are so many lovely, supportive comments,’ Aidan called out as Jase headed to the kitchen to make them both a cup of tea. When he’d decided to share their story, he’d made a conscious decision to ignore the not-so-nice and frankly downright horrible comments, that were aninevitable consequence of going public. So, instead, he deleted unkind comments, banned certain phrases, including the word ‘abomination’, which had been a favourite of his father’s in reference to Aidan’s sexuality, and blocked certain users from being able to comment at all. There would always be the people who wanted to spread hate, but what he chose to focus on was that there were far more people who wanted to send love and support. It was like focusing on how many embryos they did have, rather than how many eggs they’d lost, and all they needed was one to make it to the end.

‘Oh my God.’ Aidan had looked at the username three times since the thumbs up had appeared under his latest post just thirty seconds before. The profile picture was tiny and there was a chance it was a fake account, but when he clicked it and saw he had thirty-seven friends in common with the commenter, he couldn’t deny who it was.

‘My dad’s just liked the post about us being able to freeze seven embryos, and he’s put a thumbs up in the comments.’ As Aidan called out again, he felt as if he was trying to convince his husband that an alien had landed in their front garden, because it sounded every bit as far-fetched.

‘You’re joking.’ Jase came back through from the kitchen and watched as Aidan clicked on the commenter’s name and went back into his dad’s Facebook profile. They’d never been ‘friends’ online, any more than they were in real life, and Aidan had always suspected his father would be horrified to be linked to the account of his openly gay son. But now that he looked, a friend request had popped up on the bottom of the page too.

‘My God, it’s really him.’ Jase put a hand on Aidan’s shoulder and gave it a squeeze, which meant he knew he wasn’t dreaming. ‘I think it’s a start.’

‘I think it’s a bloody miracle.’ Aidan blinked again, still not certain if he could believe what was in front of his eyes, but at thesame time knowing this wasn’t the product of some elaborate scam. A part of his father, however tiny, had been able to express some happiness that Aidan and his husband might be a step closer to becoming parents. And if that was possible, then absolutely anything was.

The three weeks Isla had spent out in Florida were both the longest and shortest of her life. It had passed far too quickly, and she’d wanted to freeze time with her mother, and her sister’s beautiful little family of four. But she’d also missed Reuben with a strength she wouldn’t have believed possible, even though they’d spoken for at least half an hour, every single day. They’d had the sum total of three dates before she’d left, one of which had admittedly spanned the entire weekend before she’d flown out. But the length of time they’d been dating wasn’t some kind of formula that could be equated with the depth of her feelings. They were out of her control, every bit as much as she’d expected they might be. Except, instead of being scary, that lack of control was exciting, and she couldn’t wait to get back to him. The flight to Heathrow had been long enough, but now they had a night in a soulless airport hotel to recover, before starting the five-hour drive back to Port Kara.

‘Do you think they keep a record of those photos they take when you do the electric scan of your passport?’ Isla looked at her grandmother, as she loaded the last of the cases onto the luggage trolley.

‘I hope not; I looked like the wreck of the Hesperus.’ Joy wrinkled her nose. ‘And frankly my love, you don’t look much better!’

‘Well thank you very much.’ Isla laughed, because she knew she looked like she’d spent a rough night in hell. She had no idea what the wreck of the Hesperus was, but her grandmother had always used it to describe things that were in a pretty shoddy state. Isla had been quite surprised that the electronic passport system had even permitted her entry, as the mug shot they’d taken was so different from her carefully posed passport photo. Her hair looked like she had been plugged into the electricity, her skin seemed to have had all the moisture sucked out of it during the flight, and the bags under her eyes almost deserved their own spot on the baggage collection belt. How some people could step off an eight-hour flight looking even half-way decent was a complete mystery to Isla.

‘Well, I’ve got nothing to declare, except for what an amazing time I’ve had.’ Grandpa Bill winked as he pushed the trolley through customs and out into the arrivals hall.

‘Someone’s waving at you.’ Isla couldn’t see who her grandmother was talking about at first. But then she spotted him, waving almost as frantically as she was trying to smooth down her hair.

‘I don’t believe it, it’s Reuben.’ The old Isla would have thought she needed to play it cool, and not give away just how thrilled she was to see him, in case it made her more vulnerable, but those days were gone. She didn’t care what anyone thought about the wild-haired woman running towards him and into his arms.

‘God, I’ve missed you.’ He kissed her before she could even answer, but when she kissed him back it said far more than any response could have done. She was home, and there was nowhere else she’d rather be.

28

‘Well that’s it, we’re PUPO.’ Aidan clutched the scan picture in his hand, snapping a photograph of it to upload to their fertility journey story.

‘Dare I ask what PUPO is?’ Jase slipped an arm around his waist as he spoke, his face wreathed in smiles despite his obvious confusion. It had been the most momentous of days, after all.

‘Pregnant until proven otherwise. Ellen has got two embryos on board, so she’s pregnant. At least for now.’

‘Do you think we’re about to have the longest two-week wait of our lives?’

‘Oh, it’s guaranteed.’ Aidan shrugged. ‘And if it works, we’ll then have the longest nine months of our lives. But, whatever happens, I’ll never regret a second of this.’

‘Me neither.’ Jase squeezed his waist and Aidan sent up a silent thanks to whatever force it was that had brought this man into his life. Before they’d started trying for a baby, he wouldn’t have believed it was possible to feel any closer to Jase, or to learn anything more about him. But the conversations they’d had, and the moments they’d shared, had deepened the love they had for one another as a result. Even if none of their attempts ultimatelyproved successful, he’d still consider himself the luckiest person in the world to have found Jase.

‘I’d better upload this picture. I’ve had at least thirty messages already asking for an update.’ Something else that Aidan could never have believed, was that so many people would be interested in their journey, and that strangers would be rooting for them, as well as all the people they were lucky enough to call friends. The selflessness that Isla and Ellen had shown had undoubtedly been the pinnacle, but they’d been shown so much kindness along the way, and it had restored Aidan’s faith in human nature. ‘Right that’s it, the picture and update is on Insta and Facebook now.’

Aidan stopped dead as a Facebook notification popped up on his phone.

Sean Kennedy reacted to your post.

There was a love heart emoji next to the notification, and then another one appeared.

Sean Kennedy commented on your post.

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