It's A...

Charlotte rubbed her belly, beaming, and opened yet another pale-vomit-coloured onesie.

"It's lovely, thank you," she enthused, to a backdrop of clinking flute glasses.

She loosed her grip on her abdomen just long enough to take another swig of nosecco, and glance around the rolling lawn. It was bathed in summer sunshine, and criss-crossed in yellow bunting. Various friends and relatives were dotted about, mingling.

Her best friend, Imelda, had arranged this surprise baby shower, and it couldn't be anymore perfect. Charlotte glowed.

Her skin was dewy, her hair thick and glossy. She sat in the garden seat on the patio like a queen. Receiving her tribute of baby clothes and nappy cakes as her fitting tributes.

Her mother-in-law approached. Charlotte's smile flickered for only a moment. She locked it into place and turned the full blaze of it onto the approaching woman, who looked like she had a mouthful of lemons.

"Hallo, Susan!" Charlotte trilled, hoping her smile reached her eyes.

Here we go.

If it wasn't nagging her about getting the epidural, it was regaling her about the good old days when they gave you an enema. Or else it was bottles, or what position the baby should sleep in, and where, and oh, Charlotte didn't know what else.

Keep it brief. Be nice. It's her garden.

"So," Susan's voice sounded strained, as if she was trying just as hard as Charlotte to be civil. "How is my grandso.... How is my grandchild doing?"

Not, how is my daughter-in-law, who was up fifteen times last night to pee, and is suffering with heartburn and constipation as we speak...

"Oh, fine, fine," Charlotte laughed a breathy little laugh, unsure what Susan wanted her to say.

"I suppose it's difficult to know, isn't it," Susan continued, peering at her, "What with this not-having-scans thing."

Charlotte flushed pink, her teeth digging into her lower lip to stop something rude tumbling out. Bursting into tears was just as likely. Cursing her hormones, she bit harder.

"It's the dangers of the soundwaves affecting the-"

"Yes, yes," Susan scowled. "You've said." There was another hot moment of silence, both women muffling their anger at the other. Disrespectful! blazed in Charlotte's eyes. Selfish! in Susan's. "It would be nice to be reassured though, wouldn't it," she ploughed on. "I mean, you don't even know what you're having."

Charlotte wished she could just snap at the insufferable woman. Being able to take the bait, rise to it on a wave of indignation my baby, my choice! would smooth the wobble out of her voice.

"We're having a baby," Charlotte tried to sound firm.

"Don't know if he's a healthy one, though do you?"

Charlotte's mouth flopped open and closed like a dying goldfish. This last made her so cross she didn't know where to start. The constant assumption she was carrying a boy grated on her, layered on top of the hardly-veiled criticism that she wasn't making good choices.

"I- I- I'm sure I would know," she said, cursing the pricking under her eyelids. Damn!

"How?" Susan was relentless.

"I'd just know!" Charlotte almost wailed this, and dabbed angrily at her cheeks with her sleeve.

It wasn't worry about her baby. She did feel fairly sure he or she was healthy, really she did. There was no reason to think otherwise, was there? It was frustration, and feeling cross, and helpless. She hated that, unable to do anything else with her boiling emotions, her body just turned them into tears.

Baby is OK. I'd know. I know I would.

Several swallows of bubbly bridged the gap left in the next moments.

"Look," Susan's voice softened, sounding a little gruff. "I understand you wanting to find out the gender on the day. That's how we always used to do it." She popped a piece of nicotine gum from its blister pack. "A nice surprise, I suppose-"

Charlotte hiccoughed, and gulped again, trying to compose herself. "It's not much of a surprise, is it? It's fifty-fifty."

"There is that," Susan agreed. "But it's really the health I'm thinking about-"

"Do you think I don't?" Charlotte hissed. Her husband, Jez, was walking over, and she didn't want him to hear the argument escalate.

"Well," Susan had the grace to look a bit uncomfortable, "As to that-"

"It's all I think about, every minute of every day! I've cut out alcohol, and sugar, and sushi, and, and I haven't had a ciggy for nearly a year, and-"

Susan blushed at this, and looked away down the garden at the other mingling guests. She'd not given up smoking, or beers, when she was pregnant. Mind you, the doctor prescribed her stout, for her iron. Different times.

"...so it really does upset me, Sue, when you say things like that, as if I don't c-c-care..."

"You haven't upset her, mum, have you?" A manly growl cut through their conversation, and a shadow fell across the patio. He bent his shaggy head and kissed Charlotte on top of her head.

"H-h-hormones," Charlotte stammered.

The light really had gone out of the day, and Charlotte felt impossibly tired. I just want this to be over. The shower. The pregnancy. All of it. I am so done with all the questions, and the judgement. Once our baby is here, it'll be easier. It'll be better.

+

Labour progressed mercifully fast, which Charlotte had been told was unusual for a first time mother. Squeezing Jez' hand tight, she pushed again, at the midwife's urging, and, oh!

Jez's face went white. The midwife gaped.

"What? What is it?" Charlotte meant, "What's wrong?" and did not expect the response,

"It's a puppy!"

+++++++

Thank you for reading! After a couple of dystopians, I needed to do a light-hearted palette-cleanser.

This was stuck in my head the whole time, so now you, too, must be cursed with the earworm:

See you tomorrow!