Celeste rallied. ‘My only doubts are because I worry about you, but you’ve had this in the back of your mind for a long time, I need to remember that. And if it’s what you really want, I will be there for you. So, this is why you’ve been acting a bit odd?’
‘I’ve had a lot on my mind,’ Jade nodded.
‘I don’t suppose we could ask Linc if he needs another job, could we?’ Celeste quickly realised her suggestion had been taken the wrong way. ‘I don’t mean as a sperm donor! I mean as a baker – I’m going to need help while you’re off having a baby.’ She began to smile. ‘I’m going to be an auntie.’
Tilly was smiling too. ‘What happens next? How do you choose the sperm donor?’ She’d almost sobered up but when her glass missed the edge of the table as she put it down and she had to rescue it from the ground, Jade knew she’d have a whopping hangover in the morning.
Jade took out her phone and brought up the website of the clinic she’d chosen to use so she could show the girls some details, hopefully get their backing all the more, because now she’d told them, she knew how much she really wanted that. She found the appropriate screen and showed them how you could select a donor by narrowing down the search. If you wanted, you could select race, eye colour, height, hair colour. Each donor had a number and if you delved further you could find out hobbies and interests, medical details including screening tests, a description of them and their personality traits, their skills, their job.
‘There’s a lot to think about, plenty to consider,’ she explained to them both when she put her phone down. ‘And it isn’t cheap. Neither was the egg collection,’ she informed Tilly. Celeste already knew, of course, that Jade had used her own savings, and she still had more – she’d always been sensible with finances and they’d worked some of the time they travelled, which meant she hadn’t made too bad a dent in her bank account. ‘I have enough money for a couple of attempts. I mean, it might not even work, but I have to try.’ Her voice shook; she hadn’t realised how emotional she’d become talking about it with them both.
Celeste and Tilly both reached over for a hug, uttering their encouragement and support.
‘How will it work with a business to run?’ Tilly asked. She ran her own shop, Tilly’s Bits ’n’ Pieces, so she knew what it was like – they all did.
‘I will have to do what everyone else does and look into childcare, juggle both. The good thing is that if the cake side really takes off, I can work slightly different hours to the bakery.’ She and Celeste had already talked about that a long time ago, they’d discussed taking on another worker should they need it, and so it wasn’t a total surprise and Celeste still seemed on board with the idea.
With a deep breath, Jade said, ‘I’m about to fall asleep on my feet.’ She realised Linc had disappeared already too and, disappointed, all she wanted to do now was go home.
‘I’m ready to go too,’ Tilly yawned, eyelids heavy.
‘Me too.’ Celeste smiled at her sister and gave her another hug before they set off.
Jade smiled a little when they nodded goodbye to Benjamin and his eyes lingered on Tilly. He was definitely starting to care for her more than he was letting on.
The walk home seemed endless even though it wasn’t far at all and as they passed the tea rooms Jade began to wonder what had happened to Linc. Why had he disappeared so quickly from the beer garden, and why hadn’t he even bothered to say goodbye?
But it had been an eventful day and with an early start looming, her thoughts soon fizzled out the minute her head hit the pillow.
Perhaps getting everything out in the open was what it took to get a good night’s sleep.
Chapter Eleven
‘Easy!’ Joseph told his son when Linc came into the tea rooms for his lunch break after working at the waffle shack, took the mug of coffee Patricia had made him and plonked it on the table so hard it slopped everywhere. ‘What’s going on with you? You’re like a bear with a sore head this morning. You didn’t sink that many beers at the pub last night, did you?’
The last thing Linc wanted to do was discuss with his dad what was bothering him. He felt as gloomyas the overcast day outside. It was as though summer couldn’t be bothered to hold up its end of the bargain. ‘No, unlike you and Barney. You should both know better at your age.’
‘He’s good company.’
‘He is,’ Etna agreed, sitting down with the both of them. Patricia was enforcing regular rest times for her boss and this was one of them. ‘He’s excited about his wedding. Did he bend your ear about it?’ she asked her brother as all three of them nursed a coffee.
‘He told me all about it, invited me along,’ Joseph smiled, ‘and he told me all about the Wedding Dress Ball, although I said I’d heard plenty about that from you over the years.’
Linc had to admit the coffee calmed him down. It was a good one, made out of the fancy machine – way better than one you got at those chain cafes selling stuff that tasted like dishwater and had no right calling itself a coffee.
Etna and Joseph were on to talking about the wedding, the ball, what it all would entail.
‘We could go together,’ Joseph suggested to his sister.
‘You should be warned, brother dear – I like to dance.’
‘Even with your ankle?’
‘Stop fussing about my ankle. It’s fine, I’ve not had much bother from it at all the last couple of days. And I don’t have to dance the whole time. How about you, Linc? I assume you’ll be going along to the wedding – it’s an open invitation to anyone coming to the ball, it seems.’
‘I don’t think any of it is my scene.’
‘Rubbish. I’ve heard you talk about school functions where you’ve enjoyed getting in amongst it and you told me it was hard as you had to hold back and be responsible, and that the kids had laughed at your dancing.’
