Sticks and Stones 14

I haven’t picked up from where I left off for some weeks, in which plenty has happened.
The editing course that Suzie wanted to take has gone bust, all but one of the gerbils has died, the kittens have become thieves of food, constantly jumping on tables where plates haven’t been cleared quickly enough, and everything in the house is going wrong.
Suzie’s pregnant again, and she’s finding life increasingly difficult to manage. She refuses to have an abortion, not that I’ve asked her to, but hasn’t come to terms with the fact that the next three years of her life, and mine, will be taken up with the birth of what I assume is our baby. I read through the whole of what I’d written and was happy to find that Suzie had had a period since Alan’s stay. Although I couldn’t really imagine her fucking him, the confused macho-man in me needed confirmation that the new arrival was mine.
The only other niggle concerning the baby is that I was sure I always came outside, although on one or two occasions I was less than quick to exit and, as Suzie pointed out, I’d often go back inside after I thought the lion’s share had been expelled.
I discussed how poor the quality of life had become with my eighty-year old friend at the bar only the night before finding out.
‘Le seul cadeau dans la vie, c’est la naissance,’ he’d said. (The only gift in life is birth.)
His expression seemed beautiful but sad.
The next day, I arrived at the house to find Suzie trying to bite back her fears of being pregnant.
‘It’s been almost two weeks,’ she said.
‘I’ll go and get one of those testers, shall I?’ I replied, divided in my thoughts between supreme happiness and utter despair.
I had the strange idea that the baby would be small because of the amount of sperm I’d given to Suzie, secretly wishing I’d tanked her up unreservedly at the time of conception.
Since the tester came back positive, which was five days ago, Suzie has been a bag of nerves, unable to talk to doctors or family, half wishing that she had the guts to live with abortion and half hoping that a flood of love would allow her to accept the new baby completely.
She blames me for ‘going at her all the time’ and not taking proper precautions, to which I reply that it takes two to tingle.
‘It’s my body that has to go through the pain,’ she told me. ‘I don’t have my own mind any more. Pregnancy takes reason and rationale out of the equation, and when I had Clara my doctor told me that my stomach muscles might not be able to take another birth.’
She cried and I winced, urging her to look at Clara, who had become quizzical when she saw her mother cry.
The muscles bit worries me. There’s no sense in giving birth when the four children stand a chance of being left motherless, and a friend of mine had recently lost his girlfriend straight after giving birth to their second child through a brain haemorrhage.
I didn’t want to be in his shoes, no matter how much I admire him, because the children would never be the same without their mother, but it’s adversity that brings out the best in little ones.
I started the DJ thing two weeks ago, doing Fridays and Saturdays. Although the owner only wants me for Saturdays from now on at a knockdown price of sixty euros, it has gone reasonably well.
Fridays have been dead but fun, and Saturdays have been busy but full of real weirdos, so, on that basis, we decided to ditch Fridays. Saturdays would be a no-lose bonus for both parties.
I was paid tonight! I had to wait at the bar again, sipping my beer, wondering how to approach Francoise for the money as I had for the last four nights, but it’s done now. I went off for a beef curry at the local Chinese takeaway and returned to an envelope with (almost) the right money inside.
I stayed up till five last night trying to work out how to mix records, and slept through the alarm at seven.
I woke at nine (I need at least three or four hours’ sleep to hear an alarm clock when I’ve had a few) to a phone call from Suzie asking what went wrong. I was supposed to do the school run but she’d done it for me, and there was no animosity in her voice.
I said I’d be over at midday to cook a nice lunch and went back to sleep with a couple of Nurofen to rid the industrial drilling in my brain.
After a bath at eleven, I went to get bacon, eggs, baked beans, mushrooms and bread from Intermarche, as Suzie needed feeding.
‘Get me bacon,’ she’d whimpered over the phone, already down with a migraine.
I got home and cooked a marvellous fry-up. Clara and Suzie ate all that I put in front of them and I sighed at the glory of pregnancy. At least Suzie ate what I gave her, now that she had two to feed.
I’ve been after sex for the last three days now.
I’ve tried everything in the book with her but she won’t relent.
‘Suzie?’ I asked. ‘I want to come inside you. Can I do that, now that you’re pregnant? It won’t hurt.’
‘No, you can’t,’ she blurted back like a feline. ‘I don’t want twins!’
‘I just want to say hello to the little one in there.’
‘No, Jim. Not tonight. My head’s all over the place.’
‘Nothing new there, then,’ I replied, only to skulk off to make some tea and a spliff.
That was last night.