‘I can’t believe he turned up to a date with another woman,’ says Marissa, almost crying with laughter as I recount the story of my latest date with Luke to her and Becca. We went rowing in Henley and it was the perfect date, or at least it was for him and his date Meredith. She was less than impressed that I tagged along.
‘I know. When he said he was going to copy our staged dates for his own, I thought he meant after we’d finished, but he turned her into our unofficial photographer and made her take all our photos, pretending to her that we were doing a work project,’ I say.
We’re making our way towards the quieter end of Basingstoke town centre to go for lunch.
‘I’m surprised she didn’t push him overboard,’ says Becca, giggling.
I open the door to the restaurant and we wait to be seated.
‘But that’s the ridiculous thing, she was mad at me for coming and it was me that was in danger. She kept giving me these hard stares and rocking the boat whenever I moved around.’
‘So the big question is, was it worth it?’ asks Becca.
A smile breaks out over my face.
‘As of this morning, our latest photo had 10,000 likes and I’ve got heaps of new followers.’
‘That’s amazing. I really hope this little one helps me reach those crazy numbers,’ says Marissa, tapping her belly.
‘I’m sure he or she will,’ I laugh.
A waiter walks over to us. ‘Table for three?’
‘Yes, please,’ I say. He picks up menus from a pile and leads us across the restaurant.
‘Oh, hello!’ says Marissa in surprise, and I turn to see my parents, sitting on a table of two. I don’t know how I missed them.
‘Marissa!’ says my mum, shoving some magazines off their table and leaping up to give her a hug, before she spots me and Becca. She gives me a quick squeeze before wrapping Becca up in a warm embrace. ‘And so nice to see you, we haven’t seen you for ages.’
‘I know, I’ve been meaning to come round with Izzy, but work’s been so crazy lately,’ she says and I can see her cringing. I know that she feels awkward going round to see my parents since she started dating Gareth.
‘Of course, of course,’ says Mum, sitting back down at the table. ‘It’s just nice to see you today. And you two, also, of course.’
‘Thanks, Mum, I feel so loved,’ I say, but I’m only joking and my mum knows it.
I know how much seeing Becca means to them; they still feel like she’s a link to Ben. Even if the dynamic is beginning to change the more that Becca is starting to piece her life back together and move on, in a way they’ll never be able to do.
‘Did you want to join us?’ Dad asks. ‘We’ve only just ordered.’
‘I’m sure the girls would like to talk amongst themselves,’ says Mum. ‘You don’t want two oldies cramping your style.’
I see Becca looking a little relieved and I’m about to tell them that I’ll pop round to theirs later on, when Marissa jumps in.
‘Don’t be silly, we’d love to eat with you. Is that OK?’ she asks the waiter.
‘Um, sure, I can move a table across to make it big enough for five,’ he says.
I look at Mum, she doesn’t looked thrilled at the prospect, and neither am I, but both of us are so polite and British that we don’t say anything because the waiter’s already moving the table.
I wouldn’t normally have any objection to it, but this is the first time that my friends have seen my parents since I started fake dating Luke and I never thought to brief them to not mention him should this occasion arise.
‘Can you just move your brochures?’ asks the manager.
‘Oh, yes.’ My mum bends down and picks them up and the waiter slides in the new table.
Mum rolls up the brochures and tries to shove them into her handbag but they don’t fit and they slide across the floor to my feet. I go to help her and one unrolls in my hand.
‘Southeast Asia?’ I say, my brow wrinkling at the travel brochure. It’s a bit of a departure from their usual spot somewhere along the Portuguese coast.
‘Hmm,’ says Mum taking an extra-long sip on her water.
‘Oh lovely,’ says Marissa. ‘Are you thinking of going?’
‘Well, we’re—’ starts Dad.
‘Just an idea,’ says Mum. ‘Sue down the road went recently and said how wonderful it was and we were passing the travel agent’s. Gosh, it’s hot in here, isn’t it?’
She starts fanning herself with the menu.
‘It’s quite warm,’ says Marissa, slipping off her cardigan. ‘But then I’m hot all the time these days.’
She waves her hand across her bump that’s getting ever bigger.
‘But you look wonderful,’ says Mum. ‘Positively glowing.’
I sit down next to Dad and flick through a few pages. The brochures advertise group trips that seem to range from one week to two months.
‘When are you thinking of going?’ I ask.
‘In the new year,’ he says.
‘For a holiday? Or one of these longer trips?’ I feel the anxiety rise at the thought of them going away for a long time.
‘We thought—’ starts my dad.
‘We haven’t even decided we’re going yet,’ says Mum, firmly. ‘I mean, I need to look into whether it’s sanitary. You hear about people going to these places and getting awful tummy bugs, don’t you?’
For once, I’m relieved by my mum’s health paranoia. I know that I’m 31 and I should be old enough for my parents to go off on a trip, but I guess, like Mum, Ben’s death has affected me in ways I don’t always acknowledge. I may only see my parents once a week or so, but I take extreme comfort in knowing that they are only five minutes away if I need them.
‘I think if you’re careful about where you go and where you eat, I’m sure you’d be fine,’ says Becca. ‘I think it sounds like a great thing to do. Might be just the kind of break you both need.’
She takes my mum’s hand and gives it a squeeze like an unspoken nod to the pain they both still feel and the encouragement they need to take a step forward.
‘Told you,’ says Dad to Mum.
‘What are you going to get, Izzy?’ asks Mum, deliberately ignoring Dad’s comments. ‘I’ve ordered the butternut squash ravioli. Full of good minerals and vitamins.’
I look down at the menu. I was going to have a very cheesy, heart-attack inducing, meat feast pizza, but maybe I’ll go for a goat’s cheese salad instead.
‘I used a lot of squash when I was doing my food blog,’ says Marissa. ‘I did this really good squash cake with maple syrup and cream cheese frosting.’
‘Oh, I’ll have to get the recipe,’ says Mum, ‘I’m always baking cakes to take into work.’
‘Which is lucky,’ says my dad, tapping his belly. ‘With all the baking you do, I’d be as big as a house if I had to eat it all.’
Mum smiles at him and he smiles back and I take that and the holiday brochures as a sign that the brief moment of bickering was nothing to worry about.
‘So how’s your internet thing going?’ Dad says to me.
‘Oh, it’s good, thanks,’ I say, surprised that he’s asked.
‘It’s better than good,’ says Marissa, not looking up from her menu and therefore not seeing the looks I’m giving to try and get her to be quiet. ‘The post Izzy did with Luke has blown up.’
‘Who’s Luke?’ asks Mum.
‘Um, he’s a guy at work who’s been helping me with the photos.’
‘Single, is he?’ she says with a hint of a hope.
‘Not exactly,’ says Marissa, laughing.
‘Hmm, well you know your father was with someone else when I met him.’
I look between my parents, horrified and unsure what I’m supposed to do with this nugget of information, so I grunt like a disgruntled teenager and choose to ignore it.
‘Is he good-looking?’ Mum asks Marissa.
‘Very. He looks like a model.’
Mum turns back to me and raises an eyebrow. ‘Sounds promising.’
‘No, Mum. It’s not at all. He’s very attractive but that’s about all he has going for him. Trust me, you wouldn’t want me to go out with him.’
‘I’ve still got Roger Davenport’s number if you need it,’ she says.
Marissa splutters the water she was drinking.
‘Roger Davenport?’ she says. ‘As in, Roger Davenport?’
She holds up her hands and wiggles her fingers forcing me to clench my jaw.
‘That would be him,’ I say. ‘Mum ran into his mum and she wants to set me up with him.’
‘Bloody hell,’ Marissa says. ‘Sorry, Dawn, but I can’t really see Izzy with Roger.’
‘Well, could you see her with this Luke?’ Mum asks.
‘No, she can’t,’ I say, answering for her. ‘But luckily I’m absolutely fine being by myself.’
‘Do you want to order drinks?’ asks the waiter materialising by our table.
‘Yes, please,’ I say, ‘a large glass of white wine for me.’
Becca and Marissa order drinks too.
‘So Becca,’ says my Dad, ‘how are things with you? Work OK?’
I breathe a sigh of relief that the conversation has moved away from me and my fake love life.
‘Work’s fine, thanks, Simon.’
‘I saw your parents the other day,’ says Mum, ‘and they said you were seeing someone.’
A look of panic spread across Becca’s face.
‘Yes, um, his name’s Gareth. Nice guy. An accountant,’ she says, folding the corners of her napkin over.
Mum nods and gives a weak smile. If it had been anyone else talking she’d have turned to me and made a dig about hoping I’d meet a nice accountant too. I imagine it’s hard for them to picture her with anyone else too; I guess we’re always all going to be guilty of thinking of her as Ben’s fiancée, but she can’t be frozen in time forever, not like Ben.
‘So Marissa’s trying to decide whether she should find out if she’s having a girl or a boy,’ I say, jumping in to avoid the awkwardness that’s descended on the table. Becca looks grateful.
‘Oh really, it’s all so different these days,’ says Mum. ‘We weren’t given the choice; we just got presented the baby, like the scene in The Lion King where they hold it up.’
Marissa laughs. ‘I love that idea of a Lion King moment, but I’m such an impatient person. Plus I quite like the idea of doing a big gender reveal.’
My parents’ faces are blank.
‘It’s when you do a big announcement on social media revealing to everyone what you’re having,’ Marissa explains.
‘Very different these days,’ says Mum again. ‘It’s like these baby showers, will you have one of those too?’
‘I don’t know,’ says Marissa. ‘Usually they’re organised as a surprise by your friends.’
She looks at Becca and I with a small smile on her face.
‘Well, you know, they’re supposed to be a surprise,’ I say with a forced laugh, thinking that I’m an awful friend for not realising I’d need to do this. I throw Becca a WTF look and she looks similarly concerned. I start mentally calculating her due date to work out if we’ve got time to organise one.
The waiter takes the heat off me by bringing us our drinks and taking our food order.
‘Your mum’s so excited about the baby,’ Mum says. ‘She was wearing an “Expectant Grandma” T-shirt at Zumba the other night.’
‘Hmm,’ says Marissa, unimpressed. ‘She’s been wearing that since we told her, even before we’d announced it officially.’
‘I guess she’s trying to get her money’s worth,’ I joke.
Marissa doesn’t look so sure.
‘How much maternity leave are you taking?’ asks Mum.
‘I want to take off the full year, but I think we’ll have to wait and see how it goes with money,’ she says shrugging, trying to make it seem like less of a big deal than it is.
Marissa’s a recruitment consultant and a lot of her money comes from commission. I know she’s worried that they won’t be able to afford for her not to work. The only saving grace is that her mother lives nearby and she’s offered to help out with some of the childcare.
Mum gives Marissa a sympathetic nod.
‘It’s hard these days. You mothers are under a lot more pressure than we were. It’s a shame though, as I do think you should spend every second you can with them. It goes so quick.’ She takes a large sip of wine and I know that I’ve got to distract her from thoughts of Ben as a baby.
‘So they’re playing The Goonies at the classic cinema in Newbury in a couple of weeks, if any of you fancy coming with me?’
‘Is that that one with the sword-fighting that you and Ben always watched as kids?’ asks Dad.
‘No, it’s the other one we saw loads with the kids and the pirates.’
‘Don’t look at me,’ says Marissa, ‘I never got that movie either.’
‘Becca, are you in?’ I ask.
‘When is it?’
‘Two weeks today.’
She pulls up the calendar on her phone.
‘Oh, I can’t, sorry. I’m going to a wedding.’
‘That’s exciting,’ says Marissa. ‘Whose?’
She pauses and then swipes on her phone again.
‘Just someone,’ she says with a shrug.
‘You know you haven’t said anything to me about it; sounds to me like you’re making an excuse,’ I say, laughing. ‘Are you sure you’re really going to a wedding?’
‘Actually, it’s one of Gareth’s cousins, I’m going as his plus one.’
‘Oh,’ I say. ‘That’s big, going to a wedding.’
She nods and takes a sip of her wine.
I feel awful that I can’t get any excitement into my voice. It’s a huge milestone in a relationship and I desperately want to be a supportive friend like I would with anyone else. We’ve grown even closer over the last two years yet all of a sudden a chasm seems to have opened up between us and I can’t breach it.
‘I’ll bet it will be lovely,’ says Mum; she’s putting on a brave face too.
‘Thanks,’ she says. ‘I’m so nervous, it’ll be the first time I’ve met most of his family.’
‘Don’t be nervous, they’ll love you,’ says Mum, taking Becca’s hand and giving it a squeeze. ‘Any family would.’
‘Thanks, Dawn,’ she says and I see her blink back a tear.
‘Oh my God,’ says Marissa suddenly, pushing her seat back and clasping her little bump.
‘What’s wrong?’ I say.
A huge smile breaks out over her face.
‘I felt it kick, the baby actually kicked,’ she says, and I can see her eyes sparkling as she moves her hands over her bump.
We’ve been so distracted during Marissa’s pregnancy talking about the outfits that she can dress him or her up in and how it will make her Insta blow up, but seeing the look of utter contentment and wonder on her face it really hits me that she’s going to be a mum.
It almost moves me to tears. I look around the table and it seems I’m not the only one.
‘He or she is moving!’ Marissa says. ‘This shit just got real.’
I lean over and give her a hug. ‘It certainly did.’
Not only is Marissa’s baby the exact thing that this table needs as a distraction from all the awkward undercurrents, she or he will remind us of how life goes on and at times how wonderful it can be.