‘She’s almost ready.’
I wasn’t quite sure how my night of not drinking had turned into birthing a cow with a white wine hangover but there I was at seven thirty on a Sunday morning, wearing rubber gloves up to my armpits, kneeling in a shed full of soiled straw while my dad whistled the theme tune to Hollyoaks. Mum was right; he’d definitely been watching Channel Four.
‘Can you see the water sac yet?’ he asked, ruddy cheeked and a hundred per cent hangover free.
Holding in a not-so-dry heave, I shook my head. I’d woken up in the middle of the night and attempted to put myself back to sleep with a brand-new cocktail of my own creation, half a glass of chardonnay and half a glass of sparkling rosé, washed down with the dregs of a bottle of cabernet and three strawberry Pop-Tarts. Every time I closed my eyes, I remembered my conversation with Adam and every time I opened them, I second guessed myself. Was a break the best idea? Had I made a huge mistake?
‘You look exactly how I feel,’ I whispered to the cow. ‘Only, I’ve got a load of booze in my stomach instead of a miniature cow. Basically the same though.’
‘I’m not sure we needed to come out, Peter.’ My dad dusted off his knees and stood up beside another ruddy-cheeked pensioner while I gipped quietly at the side of the cow. ‘She seems as though she’s doing fine to me.’
‘She was making a god-awful racket before you got here,’ Peter replied. I still had trouble taking Farmer Jones seriously. Jonathan Roberts, Abi’s cousin, claimed he had shot him in the arse with an air rifle when he was little but he’d never been able to prove it and I was still too scared to ask.
‘I’d appreciate it if you could hang around until the calf’s out. Karen is one of my favourites.’
I looked up quickly. Karen? Karen the cow?
‘Absolutely,’ Dad said, thumbs in his belt loops, smile still on his face. ‘We’re happy to stay as long as we’re needed. Aren’t we, Livvy?’
I nodded my head slowly, lips sealed together. I would not vomit.
‘Sorry to have called you so early.’ Farmer Jones gave me the same look he had given me when he caught me climbing over his back wall with a tiny backpack full of Kiwi 20/20. ‘Jack’s on his holidays or I wouldn’t have bothered the pair of you.’
Jack Townsend was the closest thing Dad had to a nemesis. And by nemesis, I mean he was also a vet. They used to belong to the same golf club and Dad insists that, once upon a time, Jack Townsend called him a ‘shithouse’ at the Rotary Club Christmas dinner. It seemed unlikely to me but who’s to say what those crazy kids used to get up to at the Rotary Club? Technically, Jack wasn’t even a business rival of Dad’s. Townsend & Townsend specialized in livestock and large animals, they didn’t look after pets like we did which was why I was not used to spending my Sunday mornings, hungover, with my arm covered in cow-friendly KY Jelly, preparing to shove it into a cow’s birth canal.
‘Always good for us to keep our hand in,’ Dad said, casting a glance down at me and my lubed-up limb. ‘So to speak.’
‘I’ll go and make some tea,’ Farmer Jones said, hands deep inside his waxed jacket pockets. It was bloody freezing for September. ‘Looks as though we could be here for a while. Milk and sugar?’
I gave him a thumbs up from the business end of the cow while Dad settled himself on an old milking stool by her head. I’d set up a dustbin by the side of us, ostensibly to be used for birthing related business but in reality, it was my puke station.
‘Now then,’ he picked up the bottle of vet lube and squinted to read the tiny writing, ‘what was all that about last night?’
I tried to swallow without throwing up.
‘I didn’t mean to give you a shock,’ he said. ‘Mum and I discussed it and we both thought you’d be excited. You’re more than ready to take things over, Liv, I don’t need to tell you that.’
I pouted and tried a shrug. Didn’t feel great.
‘And you’re old enough to take on the extra responsibility.’ He sounded as though he was reassuring himself as much as me. ‘I’m not going to be around forever, Livvy, and I don’t want to work myself into the grave.’
I took a deep breath through my nose and tried to open my mouth. Nope, not ready. I really didn’t want to have this conversation with him until I’d sobered up and considered my response. As it was, all I had right now was me shouting ‘I don’t want to and you can’t make me’ before storming off to my room and I had a feeling that wouldn’t work any better at thirty than it had at thirteen.
‘It means a lot to me that you’re doing this,’ he said. ‘Your mother was always worried about me pushing you into the business but you were a natural. And thank goodness you’ve got a good head on your shoulders, your granddad never thought much to lady vets but you would have proven him wrong, love.’
Thankfully, I didn’t need to speak to let him know how I felt about that.
‘I know, I know,’ Dad said, chuckling at my expression. ‘But things were different back then. He’d have had you sitting out front, taking names and numbers. And what a waste that would have been. You’re twice the vet I ever was.’
And a million times more hungover, I added silently. My dad really was a brilliant advert for sobriety. A brilliant, annoying advert that I would have gladly sacrificed to the first god who offered to get me out of this shed and back into my own bed with a bacon sandwich, a cup of coffee and the first two seasons of The O.C.
‘Of course, I’ll be around if you need me,’ he assured me, getting up from his perch in order to get wrist deep inside Karen again. I couldn’t work out whether he hadn’t realized that I had yet to breathe a single word or if he was simply thankful for the opportunity to get his speech out without argument. I tried to look humble and appreciative and engaged, all while investing every atom of my being into not chucking up. Squatting beside a cow’s dilated cervix was not helping. ‘And we should start interviewing for another vet as soon as possible, lighten your appointment load so you’ve got more time to get to grips with the business.’
It hadn’t occurred to me that we would have to bring someone else in. Interviewing was not a skill that came naturally to me: the last person I brought in was the nurse we had before David and that had been terribly tense after I came in early one morning to find him locked in one of the dog crates, wearing a leather gimp suit and covered in, well, the exact same stuff I was covered in. We had to let him go. As did his wife.
‘A family business is a wonderful thing,’ said the half-man half-cow beast that had been my father. ‘The thought of you carrying on the surgery, it makes an old man very happy, Livvy. And who knows, maybe one day your children will take it over?’
I’m never having children, I replied silently. Just cats. And cat vets are even less likely to be accepted by the patriarchy than women. Probably. Karen the cow let out a heavy, loud moo, distracting my dad just long enough for me to retch over my shoulder. Oh, dear god.
‘Oh, she’s not happy.’ Dad pulled his arm free and clapped his hands. ‘Action stations, Livvy. Have you got the chains?’
I held up the chains and the calf puller as the cow howled.
‘Right, it’s all go from here,’ he said, getting down on his hands and knees and inspecting the area. ‘Watch how I grip his legs. You’ll be doing the next one on your own, after all.’
All at once she began to squirm and a round, opaque bag full of yellow fluid fell out of the cow and straight onto my feet. Without missing a beat, I turned away and puked into the dustbin.
‘Ah,’ Dad frowned as I stood up, trying to work out how to wipe my face when my arms were covered in heavy duty lubricant. ‘Are you not well?’
He couldn’t hide his disappointment but I knew if I told him I was hungover he’d be even more upset.
‘I had a kebab on my way home last night,’ I said, sacrificing my jumper by sliding my hand inside my sleeve and wiping off my face. ‘Must have had a dodgy one.’
‘That’ll be it,’ Dad agreed readily. When I proudly announced my first period at the dinner table, he had excused himself and I heard him crying in the downstairs toilet. He might think I was old enough to run a business but he wouldn’t deal well with the thought of me getting leathered and upchucking an entire bottle of wine while we were working. ‘Well, don’t worry about that. Birthing a calf isn’t strictly in your everyday job description anyway. Perhaps you can send the other vet out on farm calls.’
I nodded and watched as two little legs appeared from a place that did not look as though little legs belonged. Dad took hold of them gently and pulled in time with Karen’s contractions.
‘Easy, girl,’ he said. ‘Nice and easy.’
‘No epidural, no gas and air.’ I peeled off one of my gloves, seeing the calf was almost all the way out, and patted Karen on the head. ‘You bloody champion.’
I couldn’t wait to tell Cassie about this. Karen was being way cooler about childbirth than she had been. Chris had Snapchatted the whole thing and Cass had not taken to nature’s greatest miracle with the grace she was generally known for.
‘And there she is.’ The little calf rolled out onto the floor between my dad’s knees, all slime and legs and big eyes. ‘Oh, I do beg your pardon. He.’
‘Good work,’ I told Karen, snapping off the other glove and sinking to the ground, close to my puke station. It was done. Everything was OK and surely I was less than an hour away from my own bed. Hallelujah, praise be to Karen. ‘I hope Farmer Jones has got you a push present.’
Karen turned her head and mooed while my dad gave the calf a good rub down, chatting to him as he went.
‘Cassie got a fancy handbag from Chris but you’ve probably not got much use for that,’ I said, patting her on the head. ‘Still, can’t hurt to ask.’
Having spent half of my morning watching a cow give birth, spending half the evening making sure my godson didn’t die shouldn’t have been such a daunting prospect but I’d never been a natural with kids. Animals were so much more resilient. Whose idea was this soft spot nonsense? Why didn’t we just keep them in for another week until they were fully cooked? I couldn’t work it out.
‘You’re sure this break is a good idea?’ Cass asked. ‘I know you’re stressed about the surgery stuff but are you not worried you’re throwing the baby out with the bathwater?’
‘How is that a saying?’ I asked, poking a sleeping Gus gently in his pudgy belly. ‘Who has ever thrown a baby out with the bathwater? How drunk would you have to be to do that?’
‘I know Adam is a really good bloke but he is still a bloke,’ she went on, applying her bright red lipstick perfectly without a mirror. ‘What if he meets someone else?’
‘We’re not seeing other people,’ I reminded her, already having explained the terms of our break at least three times since I arrived. ‘He gets it, he knows I need time to work out my stuff.’
Cass frowned, utterly unconvinced. ‘Well, I don’t. When it was Adam who wanted a break, you freaked out, but now you want one you expect him to be totally cool with it and not so much as look at another woman?’
I pushed out my bottom lip and considered my already chipped fingernails. So much for this afternoon’s efforts at self-care.
‘Yes?’
She sighed, raised her eyebrows and turned her attention back to making sure her handbag was fully stocked with, well, as far as I could see, absolutely everything on earth.
‘We haven’t broken up; we’re taking a time-out to make sure we know what we want. Not just from each other, you know, from life in general.’
‘You watch way too much telly,’ Cass said, shaking her head at me. ‘You should just have a baby, that’ll sort your priorities right out.’
‘Speaking of which, what do I do if he throws up?’ I asked as Gus opened one brown eye and stared at me, all puckered up like a miniature Popeye.
‘If it’s just spit up, wipe him off and he’ll be fine.’
‘What if it’s proper 360 degrees Exorcist vomit?’
‘Call a priest.’
‘What if he poops himself?’
‘He will poop himself, Liv, he’s a baby. You know how to change his nappy.’
I stared down at the tiny thing in the Moses basket and for the first time that day was thankful my stomach was empty. Knowing how to change a nappy and actually having to change a nappy were not the same.
‘Does baby poop affect nail polish?’ I asked, considering my newly home-painted talons. I had planned to spend the afternoon really getting to know myself, working out what I wanted from life and creating a plan to make my dreams a reality. Instead I ate two packets of Wotsits, painted my nails and watched fourteen different YouTube make-up tutorials. Deep and meaningful was so difficult when you were hungover.
‘You will both be fine,’ Cass said, combing her fingers through the roots of her stick-straight black hair to give it just the right amount of tszuj. ‘You’re really worrying too much.’
‘What if he starts crying and won’t stop?’
‘You leave him in his basket, lock yourself in the bathroom, turn on the shower and the taps and cry just as loudly until he stops.’ She flicked at a smudge of mascara on her cheek. ‘Next?’
She was joking. She was probably joking.
‘This one’s more for you.’ I settled down at the huge table Adam had given them as a wedding present and wrapped my hands around my blue-and-white striped mug. I had come up with exactly one good idea all afternoon. It had hit me halfway through a fantastic video on how to properly highlight my earlobes. ‘What do you think about joining me at the surgery?’
Cassie stopped dropping things into her Chanel bag and laughed out loud.
‘Funny,’ she said. ‘You’re funny.’
‘I’m serious,’ I replied. ‘If my dad really is retiring, and I really have to take over, I’ll have to bring someone else in, and why shouldn’t it be you? Think about it, Cass, it would be so much fun.’
Across the table, all long dark hair and perfect make-up, dressed in sleek black trousers and chiffon shirt, Cassie stared at me. Bundled up in a giant turtleneck jumper, baggy leggings with a greasy mess of a topknot and not so much as a smudge of mascara, I smiled back.
‘You want me to come and work at the surgery?’ She dropped a shiny silver lipstick into her bag then changed her mind, took it out and handed it to me. ‘Doing what?’
‘Professional Marilyn Monroe impersonating,’ I replied, pulling the lid off the lippy and giving it a sniff. ‘The pay isn’t that good and you’d have to wear a wig but I think you’d enjoy it. What do you think I want you to do? I want you to be a bloody vet.’
She pulled a face and settled on a stool by the breakfast bar. Because Cass had a kitchen table and a breakfast bar. And a dining room and a family room and a living room and all kinds of other rooms she didn’t need. But then, if I was married to Chris, I’d want lots of rooms to hide in as well, it seemed fair.
‘Liv, I haven’t worked in a surgery forever,’ she said, absently resting her hand inside Mingus’s basket. ‘And I’ve got Gus now, I can’t go back to work yet.’
‘Not right away,’ I agreed readily. ‘Whenever you’re ready. Two, maybe three days a week if you feel up to it to start with. We can work the hours around Gus’s nursery schedule and you and I would get to work together. It would be like Animal Hospital, only without Rolf.’
‘I always said he was creepy,’ she insisted, pointing at me across the table. ‘I always said it.’
‘You did,’ I admitted, swatching the lipstick on the back of my hand. ‘You did always say that.’
Cass looked down at her baby, thankfully fast asleep, and frowned.
‘You don’t have to commit to anything right now,’ I told her. ‘Talk to Chris about it. I’m sure he’d rather you were doing a couple of days at the surgery in the village than five days a week in your school. That place terrifies me – when did teenagers get massive? Every single one of them looks like the scary kid from Grange Hill. I can’t imagine you’re in a rush to go back?’
‘They are all giants. It’s hormones in milk apparently,’ she replied. ‘And no, I’m not in a rush to go back. Chris isn’t keen.’
‘Then this is perfect!’ I said, a little too loudly, a little too excited. Gus stirred in his basket, objecting to my enthusiasm by blowing a raspberry before going back to sleep. ‘It’s going to be amazing, Cass.’
If I had to choose someone to work with, it would always be Cass. Abi was an amazing friend. She was clever and funny, she never judged me and I knew, if push came to shove, she would know the best way to get rid of a body, but Cassie was a sweetheart, everyone loved her and even though she had retrained as a science teacher, I knew she could still be a fantastic vet. She’d had a run of bad luck in her first job at an RSPCA centre in Reading but I was certain I could convert her. Surely the lure of working with your best friend would be stronger than the trauma of having to bust through polystyrene ceiling tiles to escape a rabid Alsatian?
‘If I was going to go back into practice, I would only do it with you,’ she said, shifting in her seat and tapping a black high heel against the leg of the stool. ‘But I’m actually thinking I’m not going back to school after my mat leave is up.’
‘I don’t blame you, schools these days, not safe places,’ I nodded quickly, my hair bobbing back and forth on the top of my head. ‘Come and work with David and me. He makes a really good cup of tea and he will do all the gross bum stuff you don’t want to do. With the animals, obviously.’
‘It’s not that …’ Cass glanced up at the clock on the kitchen wall. Chris was running late, as usual. I could hear him singing off-key in the bedroom, just like his brother. ‘I’m really enjoying being a mum. And we’re thinking about trying again quite soon – I don’t want too much of an age gap between the kids.’
‘We have a brilliant maternity policy,’ I said quickly. Or at least, I assumed we did. There had never been a pregnant woman working at the surgery as far as I knew, but if I was going to be in charge, maternity leave would be at least twelve months at full pay and all the Haribo you could eat. ‘We’d work around you. We could definitely offer you something better than any school.’
‘I’m not going back to any school, Liv,’ she replied. ‘I don’t think I’m going back to work at all. I’m going to stay at home with the baby.’
I sucked in my bottom lip and rolled my mug between my hands.
‘Oh.’
‘I know what you’re thinking,’ Cassie said, an awkward look on her face. ‘I never thought I’d want to be a stay-at-home mum but the thought of missing out on any of this—’
She paused to point at the baby. He stared at me with his mouth wide open, as surprised by this turn of events as I was.
‘It physically hurts to be away from him. Isn’t that crazy? Chris makes good money and it’s an amazing opportunity not many women get. I’m not going to drag myself back out to work on principle. What’s the point in that?’
‘I think that’s what principles are,’ I replied quietly. ‘You do it because it’s something you believe in, even when there’s an easier option. You do it on principle, that’s what that means.’
‘Then maybe it’s your principle, not mine.’ She jumped off the stool and went over to the vintage mirror by the door to needlessly check her make-up. ‘I want to be there for my family, Liv. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that.’
She was right; working was a matter of principle for me. When I was growing up, every time we went out people would come over to thank my dad for helping their pets, then they would nudge my mum and congratulate her for marrying such a good man, telling her how proud she must be to have secured such a wonderful husband as if she didn’t have anything of her own to celebrate. She was just his wife, just my mother, nothing else, and I hated myself as much as anyone else for treating her the same way.
‘There’s nothing wrong with being a stay-at-home mum,’ Cassie said, her voice harder than I was used to. ‘Although I know you and Abi are going to have a lot to say about it.’
‘No, Cass, not at all,’ I forced myself to disagree with her. She was right, if that was what she wanted, I should be supporting her. It was her choice. That’s what we were fighting for wasn’t it? A choice? ‘I’m surprised, that’s all. And you know, disappointed, because I wanted to work together. If staying at home with La Ming is what you want then that’s awesome and I’m glad it’s an option for you. If you’re happy, I’m happy.’
She turned on her heel and glared at me so hard I almost fell off my stool.
‘What do you mean, you’re glad it’s an option?’
Oh god, I’d woken the beast. Cassie hardly ever lost her temper, but when she did the only option was to duck for cover until she calmed herself. I wondered if me using her baby as a human shield would calm her down or make her even madder.
‘Nothing!’ I replied quickly, trying to smother the fire before it really took hold. ‘I’m happy for you and Gus-Gus, I am.’
‘You’d understand if you had kids,’ she said, grabbing a rose-gold compact from her bag and jabbing herself in the face with the powder puff. ‘Or if you had a partner who actually earned a living.’
Too late. She was officially pissed off.
‘Evening, ladies.’ Chris’s aftershave entered the kitchen ten seconds before he did and I buried my nose inside my mug like it was a giant Cornishware gas mask. He buried his head in Cass’s hair and she softened instantly. I didn’t get it, I really didn’t, but in this instance I’d take the assistance without complaint.
‘Evening,’ I said, still holding my breath. ‘Nice tie.’
It wasn’t a nice tie.
‘Thanks.’ He waved it in Gus’s face and the baby stuck his tongue out at his father’s poor fashion sense. ‘You look … well, you’re only babysitting, I suppose.’
I looked down at my black leggings and soft grey jumper and tucked my hair behind my ears.
‘So what’s going on with you and Adam?’ Chris asked, earning a swift elbow in the ribs from his wife. ‘What? I can ask her, can’t I? She can always tell me to sod off.’
‘Sod off,’ I replied, tugging my sleeves down over my chipped nails. ‘Go and have your dinner.’
‘No, really, what’s going on?’ Chris reached into the Moses basket and lifted Mingus, holding him against his chest and smiling at his googly faces. For all his faults, no one could argue with how much he loved that baby. It was like watching a YouTube video of the gorilla that had its own kitten. ‘You had enough of that slacker or what?’
‘Where are you going for dinner?’ I asked, politely declining to answer his question. ‘Somewhere nice?’
‘This amazing new farm-to-table place in Nottingham, called Fetch,’ Chris replied, bouncing the baby up and down on his potbelly. I used to make fun of Adam for all the time he spent running but I made a mental note to be more supportive in future. If we were still together, of course. If not, I would be stealing his trainers and digging potholes in his favourite routes to make sure he got as fat as possible. ‘Have you heard of it? I can make a call if you want to go, I know the owner.’
‘So do I.’ I kept trying to make eye contact with Cass but she was too busy looking at everything in the room except me. ‘I pulled dental floss out of his dog’s arse twice last summer.’
He handed the baby off to Cass and gave me a double thumbs up.
‘Sounds fun,’ he replied, brushing out his dark blond hair and smoothing down his eyebrows in the mirror. He kissed Cass on the cheek and opened the kitchen door. ‘I’ll get the car out.’
‘He’s been fed.’ Cassie laid a grumpy Gus back down in his basket and shook off our disagreement. She was so good at brushing things under the carpet it was a wonder she hadn’t tripped over and broken her neck. ‘So he’ll go to sleep soon. We’ll be home before midnight, text me if you need anything.’
‘I really do think it’s nice that you want to stay at home with your kids,’ I said, standing as she hung her bag on her shoulder, her expression perfectly placid. ‘I’m sorry; I really thought it would be fun for us to work together. I hadn’t taken any of this into consideration, obviously.’
‘Obviously,’ she replied, folding her arms across herself. I wasn’t forgiven just yet. ‘That’s half the trouble with you and Adam. You’re both thinking about yourselves and not each other. If you really wanted to be together, none of this would be happening. You’d just be together. You’re going to ruin your life because of FOMO, Liv.’
She followed Chris out the kitchen door, leaving me and Gus alone to stare at each other, brown eyes to blue.
‘I hate your mum,’ I whispered.
He blew another raspberry in response before slapping himself in the face.
‘Only joking,’ I said. ‘Your dad can be a right cock though.’
I could have sworn I saw him nod.