As the days marched forward and she was booking more and more sponsored content and ever more followers became invested in her story, she had the persistent feeling of detached unreality, as though this was all happening to someone else. When she and Sam were joking around on the couch at night or kissing under the covers in the morning, she could almost forget that a huge problem was looming. These moments of forgetful joy were fleeting, however, and within minutes anxiety could be depended on to return and choke the happiness back out of her.
‘Actually, Shelly and Ali, could I borrow you two for a couple of minutes?’ interjected Holly, saving Ali from Hazel’s probing questions.
Shelly jumped up eagerly, looking a little relieved too. ‘Absolutely,’ she said as she glanced over at her daughter and the woman who must be her minder. Ali had pored over Shelly’s profile since joining Insta and had never seen any mention of minders or nannies. In fact, there wasn’t a whisper of childcare on Hazel’s and Polly’s channels either. They had all the accoutrements of motherhood but their pristine lives rarely seemed sullied by the presence of actual children. These secret minders must be how they could take lavish sponsored family holidays yet also sit enjoying ‘a bit of peace with the love of my life’ on a sun-soaked Portugal beach, as one vintage Hazel caption read. Only Eugene’s left hand had made it into shot.
Ali followed Shelly and Holly over to another out-of-the-way picnic table teeming with colourful mini doughnuts, fruit skewers and an elaborate chocolate fondue, all untouched. As they were taking their seats, Amy Donoghue appeared, looking as gloriously out of place as ever with her tatts and her torn cut-offs, fishnets and Doc Martens.
‘We need to wrap up – fifteen minutes, Shelly, max,’ she said cryptically. Ali could see Shelly’s gaze flick back over to the opposite side of the lawn where Dan Devine appeared to be gesturing erratically and screaming, ‘Show me the money!’ into his phone in front of a rapt audience assembled just below him. Amy leaned in and whispered something, causing Shelly to relax slightly. Straightening up, Amy said, ‘We’ll see you in the car park,’ and after snapping a couple of pics of the spread for the ’gram, she marched back towards Dan, signalling to Georgie’s minder on the way.
Jeez. It’d be so fucking handy to have that. Shelly wouldn’t even have to post about the Daddy Bears’ Picnic – that’s true success, thought Ali: famous for an Instagram account you didn’t even have to manage anymore. That was the other thing about her new-found Insta-fame – it was a lot of work. Plotting posts, replying to endless DMs and comments. Ali had devised a master doc of stock responses to followers and that saved some time but, Christ, it was a bit tedious.
As Ali took her seat, a young, pregnant woman with an adorable bump snuck over.
‘I am so sorry to interrupt …’ she began. ‘I just love you so much …’
Shelly seemed to prime herself for the customary receiving of adoration and indeed Ali, who wasn’t used to being accosted in public, also presumed that she was there for Shelly. However, the girl clumsily swooped in and hugged Ali. Through the fan’s hair, Ali could see Shelly’s face. She looked stunned and even … was there a hint of jealousy there?
‘Oh, right. Thanks!’ said Ali. The proximity of a very real, pretty large bump was freaking her out, as though this girl’s pregnancy would make Ali seem even less pregnant by comparison.
‘I’m mad into the chicken fillet rolls as well,’ the girl offered shyly. ‘I can’t help myself … As you said, the baby wants it!’
Ali was drawing a blank until the girl prompted, ‘Remember? The day you were talking about how pregnancy is like one big nine-month-long hangover?’
‘Oh yeah.’ Ali had actually been hungover for real that day and then realising the symptoms of early pregnancy were virtually identical to a hangover decided to run with it. It had proved very popular content.
‘Anyway,’ the girl glanced over at Holly and Shelly, ‘thanks for being so real about your life. I was really anxious when I first found out I was expecting and seeing you talking about you and Sam and stuff, it’s really, really helped me. Anyway, I’ll go now!’ She gave Ali another awkward little hug and then, as an afterthought, said to Shelly, ‘Oh, congrats on your new baby too, Shelly!’
Ali tried to stay composed as the girl hurried back to her friends but it was too much. Being singled out like that! And in front of Shelly and Holly! Ali was putting everything into not jumping up and dancing a little victory dance. She could see Shelly taking it all in and she didn’t look too pleased. She couldn’t wait to tell— well, she’d be pretty stuck to find someone that’d be interested TBH.
Kate had dropped off somewhat since Ali’s meteoric rise and things had been cool between them on WhatsApp.
Liv would listen alright but then she’d go and type it all up in her thesis to impress Emer Breen. She had, thank fuck, finally stopped berating Ali at every opportunity for lying about the pregnancy. She wasn’t happy about it but she was resigned to it. Also, she was now using many of Ali’s strategies (Liv called them ‘antics’) as fodder for her thesis. But Ali was just happy to have Liv talking to her again – Angry Liv was Scary Liv – and what did it matter if some elements of her life were being mined for the thesis. Her name was changed and the only people who’d ever read it were Emer Breen and a few academics.
This, Ali supposed, was the biggest drawback of her Insta-plan: even though she had gained more followers than she’d ever dreamed of, she was losing touch with Liv and Kate and was being forced to keep Sam at arm’s length. It was total fuckery, really – typical to get everything you’d always wanted and then not be able to enjoy it because of a pesky little lie. She’d said as much the week before to Miles on her routine visit. His silence felt vaguely consolatory somehow.
She’d taken to confiding in him more and more, especially since she was short of people who she wasn’t feeding some version of a lie, or avoiding altogether – she’d been giving Mini a wide berth. Mercifully, Mini was so far removed from the Insta-world that there was little danger of her hearing anything. Telling Miles seemed to take away the guilty feelings, momentarily at least. Thinking of Miles jolted her back into the moment. She was supposed to be at Ailesend before 4 p.m.
She tapped back into the conversation in time to hear Holly say, ‘Holistic Mama Retreat at Fannart Lodge – it’s very exclusive’.
Shelly was all ears. ‘How long are you thinking?’ she asked.
‘The retreat is seven days long – the programme is designed for that length of stay. I know it’s a big time commitment for you both but, between us, it is truly a luxury experience. Adrienne Mae, the woman who created it, is from California and apparently all the A-listers have gone to her retreats in Napa Valley. Reese Witherspoon, a few Kardashians. They want to launch in Ireland and we’ve hand-selected the clients who are attending.’ Holly dropped her voice and mouthed, ‘It’s two grand a night.’
‘Fucking hell,’ Ali blurted, then clamped a hand over her mouth. ‘Sorry – obviously I wouldn’t say that kind of thing at the mamas’ retreat.’
Holly continued, ‘You two are the only blog— ahem … mothers of influence who we’re inviting. Polly is going but she’s paying the full fee.’
Shelly looked keen. ‘Did you mention the dates to Amy?’
‘She says she can clear your commitments, but you might want to check with Dan first?’ said Holly and then, seeing Shelly’s disdainful reaction, immediately backpedalled. ‘I’m so sorry, my god. I didn’t mean that you’d have to check with your husband.’
Ali was intrigued – she’d never seen so much as a slight frown sully Shelly Devine’s immaculate features. And this looked like full-on annoyance. Ali flashed back to that night weeks ago when she’d been on her way to meet Tinder Sam and Shelly had been in her hotel room. Something about her faraway shots of Dan had seemed off.
Ali glanced across the lawn to where Amy had headed earlier but there was no sign of Dan now and the place was beginning to empty out. Was he waiting in the car obediently? She could see Sam standing over Polly and Hazel, speaking animatedly, and her stomach churned at the thought of what he might be saying to them.
Ali hadn’t felt immediately sold on the week-long retreat but maybe it’d be a good thing – she needed to slow things down with Sam. Soon he’d be demanding to meet her family and come to doctor’s appointments. Plus, he was dying to tell his sisters about the baby. Luckily Sharon was in Oz and wouldn’t be back for a couple of months, which Ali’d leveraged to convince him to hold off. But it was tricky when she was broadcasting it on her Stories ten hours a day. She’d blocked him once already and he’d texted her an hour later demanding to know why he couldn’t see her profile. She’d brushed it off as an accident and he’d seemed satisfied, but it was annoying having him on there. Also why the hell was he on Instagram?
‘Straight-man Instagram must be so weird,’ she’d remarked the previous night as he uploaded his pic of a burrito and captioned it with the burrito emoji.
