‘Liv!’ Ali sat up the better to complete the bra removal and yanked it so hard it snapped back and hit her in the face. ‘He’s not falling for me. He’s just being nice because he thinks I’m carrying his child.’
Liv shot to her feet abruptly and loomed over Ali. ‘Jesus, will you just listen to what you said there?’ She leaned down. Ali could smell her beer. ‘What are you doing, Ali? You quit your job, you’re ignoring your mum, you’re leading this poor guy on—’
‘Why do you care so much?’ Ali shot back.
‘Because I’m a normal person. Because I care that you’re lying and hurting people. Because you’re going to hurt yourself.’
‘I don’t have to listen to this.’ Ali grabbed her phone and stomped off to bed.
The following day, Ali sat on the edge of Miles’s bed mulling over the day’s plan. Obviously, the screenshots had gotten the better of her in the dead of night. After Liv went to bed, Ali snuck her bottle of wine out of the living room and had finished it lying on her bed with one foot on the floor to stop the room spinning and one eye closed to focus on the pics.
@peacock44: I do not buy that Sam guy. He seems like such a nerd and she’s so desperate to have a baby daddy she just has to fake it and pretend that they’re some loved-up couple.
@Mayo_gal: She’s just desperate full stop. Did you see that ‘bump update’ post? Like, calm down, you’re about ten minutes preggers, but she’s obvi gagging to get in with the whole Insta-mammy gang.
@peacock44: And she announced it before the piss was even dry on that wee stick. Who tells everyone they’re preggers when they’re six weeks gone? #thirsty
@cassieD: Is she even up the pole at all? She said last week that she was eight weeks along but then I went back and checked the date on her announcement post and that puts her at about ten and a half? I’ve had two babs and believe me no one gets that wrong.
@Mayo_gal: Oooh juice. Do you have receipts?
@cassieD: See below
@cassieD had posted a screenshot of Ali’s pregnancy-test post with the date circled in red at the bottom of the pic. Below that she’d uploaded a video she’d evidently captured from Ali’s IGTV Real Talk series.
Anxiety had pierced the comforting buffer of booze. Feck, she had been a bit sketchy regarding exact dates. It was careless. Honestly, she couldn’t believe anyone was actually paying that much attention, but then again, tens of thousands of total strangers were watching her every move – odds were at least some of those were freaks who took screen recordings and bitched on internet forums.
She suddenly noticed the album she’d been playing for Miles had ended. Without the music, the air pump that kept Miles’s mattress inflated – a necessity for bed-ridden people – was louder. This made her think about what the air mattress was for, which was not good for her mood.
‘What’ll we have, Dad? I actually brought you the new Elbow album!’ She jumped up to retrieve her bag and swap out the CDs. Then she grabbed the hand cream from her little make-up bag and gently picked up Miles’s left hand, watching his face carefully for any sign he was registering her touch. Not even a flicker. The knowledge seemed to thud in her stomach. She forced herself to smile – that was Mini’s most irritating advice when confronted with hardship of any degree. Don’t like school? Smile! Fake it till you feel it. Dad in a depressing nursing-home room? Smile. It could be worse!
Ali squeezed hand cream onto Miles’s cool, dry hand and began to massage his fingers, wrists and forearms. Guy Garvey’s sweet voice crept over them and Ali felt soothed by this simple contact with her dad. No over-thinking about being a bad daughter and not loving him enough. No fear of where this was all going, just stroking his pale, parched skin and praying he could feel her love somewhere inside his shattered mind.
‘I love you.’ She tried out the words. Why were they always so hard to say? They seemed to unlock a terrible abyss of pain that was really better left alone, shored up by everyday faff, rather than confronting the real horror of her dad’s illness.
‘I’m doing really well on Instagram these days. Nearly seventy thousand people follow me now. I know you probably don’t know what that really means but, believe me, it’s good. And I have a kind of boyfriend too. Sam. He’s sweet. You’d really like him.’
Ali switched hands and squeezed out more moisturiser. She sang along to the music and watched Miles. His eyes were open, as was his mouth. His high cheekbones were more defined every day she came. What would happen? How long could someone go on like this?
A soft knock at the door jolted Ali back to the present. Tabitha, Ali’s favourite of all the care team, stood at the door.
‘Ali, do you want to go get yourself a coffee? And maybe an ice cream for your daddy?’
This was Tabitha’s coded way of saying she needed to change Miles or do some other routine procedure that, mercifully, Ali and Mini were spared knowledge of.
‘Yep, sure. Thanks, Tabby. I’ll be right back, Miles.’ She kissed his cheek and hopped off the bed.
She slipped past Tabitha but, instead of taking a right towards the coffee station, she veered left, heading in the direction of the examination rooms. The screen-grabs had hovered on the edge of her mind all morning. Even the fug of hangover couldn’t dull the stab of anxiety – truth be told, the hangover was probably giving the unease an even more sinister edge. That was the terrible catch-22 of alcohol: it dulled the pain and relieved her angst only for it to come back ten times worse, thus requiring more booze to drown out the effects of the last booze. Exhausting stuff.
She looked into the doors on either side of the deserted corridor. There were hospital beds and the usual array of table trays on wheels and nurse call buttons. In the last room on the right, she found what she was looking for: some class of medical equipment. She glanced behind to check she was alone and then slipped in and shut the door. The room was small, with grey rubber floors, pale blue walls and a window looking on to the small courtyard. She closed the blinds partially, in case anyone happened to look in, and proceeded to examine the equipment. It looked to be a monitor of some description. Whatever it was, it should do fine. She just needed a hint of ‘hospital’ for her purposes. Provided this thing wasn’t an instrument exclusively associated with the care of old people – like a soul-catcher for the near dead or something – she was grand.
She stepped out of her boots and took off her jumper. She hopped up on the bed and switched the front camera on so she could talk to her followers. She checked the shot, pulling the monitor closer so it was just behind her in the background, mussed her hair slightly and took a deep breath.
‘Hey, gals! Sorry for the whispering but I’m actually in the hospital right now and I’ve just seen little Ali’s Baba for the first time! I was a bit muddled on my dates before – ugh, scatty Ali! – but now they’ve confirmed I’m eleven weeks pregnant. So that’s all straightened out.’
She watched the clip back, adjusting the filter and scrutinising her delivery. This lie was on a new level – she couldn’t ignore that – but fuck it. She kept thinking back to Kate and those bitches on Rants. She needed to up the ante. The ‘hospital shot’ would give it the ring of truth she needed. Plus, she was doing so well. She’d even been invited to design a new Ali’s Baba range for a pram company. She couldn’t jack it all in now. Not when she was so close. Her resolve sufficiently steeled, she hit the Add to Story button. Then she Google Image searched ‘eleven-week-old foetus ultrasound’, saved the picture and uploaded it to her next Story, adding a little waving-hand emoji and a speech bubble so it looked like the foetus was introducing itself. Cute. She smiled. She paused for a moment, licked her lips, then hit Post.
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