And Baby Makes Two - Dyan Sheldon [59]
I didn’t have to think about Shinola for the rest of the day. Everyone wanted to hold her and play with her. The kids wanted to feed her. Nan even wanted to change her. You’d think I’d brought the baby Jesus instead of Shinola Spiggs.
There was food all over the place. Crisps and chocolates. Nuts and pretzels. Biscuits and chunks of cheese and olives. My stomach wasn’t growling, it was echoing. I chose a seat where I could reach the nuts and the cheese.
“Here you go,” said Justin.
I looked up to find he was handing me a glass of champagne. I didn’t mean to look at Hilary, but it was sort of an automatic response.
“Well, you’ll want to join in the toast, won’t you?” said my mother.
“OK, now that everybody’s here, it’s music time!” cried Dara, and she raced to the stereo before anyone could beat her to it. “Then we can open our presents.”
“Oh, please,” we all begged. “Not Phil Spector.”
“It isn’t Christmas without the Ronnettes,” said Dara.
“That calls for another round,” said Mick.
Everybody laughed and held out their glasses. Including me.
Everybody made a big deal of the presents from me and Shinola, even though they weren’t much. It was lucky I’d got an extra aftershave for Charley, just in case, since they hadn’t split up this year. The Spiggs always told everybody how I gave her a tin opener for her birthday when I was seven, but even she acted like we’d given her a dream trip to Hawaii this year.
“Why, this is lovely, Lana.” She actually sounded sincere. “Thank you… They’re my favourite.”
Shinola got a ton of clothes. Most of it was at least six months too big. So she’d have something to grow into. It was kind of scary that the Spiggs, my nan and my sisters all thought the same like that. She also got a ton of toys. All the stuff from Hilary and Charley and Charlene and Dara was educational. My nan gave her a teddy that was nearly as big as I was.
“Where’s it supposed to sleep?” I asked. “In my bed?”
“It isn’t easy to be called Mum,” said my nan.
And, except for the quilt Nan made me, all the stuff for me was pretty much for Shinola, too. Charlene and Justin gave me a mobile phone with twenty quid prepaid on it, so I could walk around the flat and talk on the phone at the same time.
“In case there’s some emergency,” said Justin. “You should have a phone nearby at all times.”
“We didn’t even have a phone when I was a girl,” said Nan. “And my mother had seven of us.”
Dara and Mick gave me a subscription to some mother and child magazine and a gift certificate for Mothercare in case there was stuff I needed for Shinola.
“But this is for a hundred pounds!” I knew Mick made a lot of money doing something in the City – and Dara made a lot of money doing something all over the world – but a hundred pounds! They’d never’ve given me that much to spend on myself.
“Babies grow fast,” said Dara. “They always need something.”
Charlene’s kids, Drew and Courtney, gave me a set of Sesame Street videos.
“Wow,” I said. “Just what I always wanted.”
“Try this then, why don’t you?” said my mother. She handed me a long white envelope with a red bow stuck on it.
I took it without much enthusiasm. You can’t fit much in an envelope.
“What is it?”
“That’s the idea of opening it,” said my mother.
Nobody spoke while I opened the envelope. Even Shinola was quiet.
I removed the papers folded inside.
“It’s the lease.” I looked up at Hilary. “The lease to the flat.”
The Spiggs smiled. “That’s right.”
I looked back at the lease. It couldn’t mean what I thought it meant. I looked back at the Spiggs. Could it?
“I’ve asked your mother to make an honest man of me,” said Charley. He put his arm around my mother.
Hilary patted his knee. “And since it seems a shame to waste two houses on us, I’ve said yes.”
“You’re getting married?”
What irony! My mother was getting married before me.
“Not for a while,” said my mother. “But I’ll be moving in officially right away. Permanently.” She smiled. “Now that you’re grown up.”
“Isn’t that great?” said my nan. “Now you don’t have to wait on a council list for the next