Bridget Jones's Baby (20 page)

Suddenly felt I was going to cry. All those months of working and now Mum's dream—however bonkers—had come true. “Good luck, Mum. Enjoy it. You've earned it. Charm the pants off her.”

9 a.m.
Baby still has not come. Feel somehow fraudulent. Maybe it is a phantom pregnancy and the whole thing…Oh, goody! Phone again!

Was Magda with oddly cold tone.

“I suppose Miranda and Shazzer were the first to hear, even though it's me that's supported you all the way through, but Miranda and Shazzer are more fun and exciting, aren't they?”

“What do you mean?”

“The baby. You might have told me, after everything I've done.”

“The baby hasn't come,” I said.

“OH! I thought you'd crossed me off the list. But Bridget you're a week late! You're going to be split in two. You need to get it induced.”

“What list?”

“You have made a birth announcement list? You need to get it ready in your email. You won't be able to pull up all those email addresses when you're postpartum.”

10 a.m.
Magda is right. I don't want to be
pulling up addresses
and deciding what to say, when am in middle of newborn baby joy.

10.05 a.m.
If alleged baby actually exists.

Noon.
Right. Have pretty much got everyone's addresses assembled now.

Mark and Bridget are pleased to announce…

12.15 p.m.
Hmm, though. We've been keeping it low-key amongst the friends about being together till the paternity is resolved so as not to hurt Daniel's feelings.

12.30 p.m.

Bridget is pleased to welcome into the world…

—Yuk, creepy.

12.45 p.m.

Ladies and gentlemen. Please welcome…

Nope. Sounds like an MC at the royal variety show.

How about something more upbeat?

1 p.m.

Sender: Bridget Jones

Subject: Baby!

It's a boy! Bridget Jones has given birth to a baby boy, William, Harry, 7 lbs. 8 oz. Both mother and baby are doing well.

1.15 p.m.
Sounds a bit “samey.”

p.s. Bridget died in childbirth.

1.16 p.m.
Heeheehee. OK, SAVE.

1.17 p.m.
Oh my God. Oh my God. Have pressed SEND ALL.

3 p.m.
Total disaster. Both phones are going mental, ringing off the hook and texts keep pinging up every four seconds. Just opened email box: twenty-six emails.

“Congratulations!”

“The dying bit was a joke, right?”

3.10 p.m.
Gaah! Doorbell.

3.16 p.m.
It's a giant bunch of flowers from
Sit Up Britain.

Gaah! Doorbell again.

3.30 p.m.
It's a giant fluffy bunny from Miranda with a note saying, “It's cute, it's fluffy and I'm going to boil it!”

OK. OK. Calm, calm. Will simply send another group email and put it all right.

And maybe send back the flowers with a note of apology. And the bunny. Though it is really cute and does not deserve to be boiled.

3.35 p.m.
God, wish the phone would stop ringing and pinging, right.

Sender: Bridget Jones

Subject: Ignore last email.

Dear all, I'm really sorry, but I haven't actually had the baby yet. But when I do have the baby I'll be sure to let you know when that happy time comes!

3.45 p.m.
Have sent it.

3.46 p.m.
Oh, though. How can I now then send them another email when the baby actually does come? I'm like the boy who cried wolf. No one will believe me.

F
RIDAY 23
M
ARCH

6 p.m. My flat.
Yayy! Mark is back from work.

“God, those stairs,” he said, letting himself in, tie loosened, shirt slightly undone, all postwork and horny-looking. “Sorry I'm late, darling,” he said, kissing me on the lips. “The whole city's gridlocked. Had to abandon the car, and take the tube. Where's this email you're so upset about?”

Sheepishly, I showed him the email disaster.

I love the way he just looks really quickly at something—something which totally freaks me out and bothers me for days—and, as if he's at work, makes a very quick assessment of how important it is, and how much time it deserves, and just deals with it.

“OK. It's just extremely amusing,” he said. “You've corrected the error. Don't give it any more thought. What are all these bags?”

“My packing!” I said proudly.

“Right,” said Mark. “I was thinking, now that you're overdue and with the stairs and everything, maybe we should cut it down a little?”

“Owwwww­wwwww­wwwww­wwww!” Suddenly the worst cramp/spasm/pain I'd ever felt in my life invaded me. “Owwwww­wwwww­wwwww­wwwww­wwwww­wwwww­www!”

“Right, um, jolly good. Ah. I sent my car and driver away. Your car?”

“I left it at Magda's,” I said, panicked.

“Bridget. Stop panicking. I'll call Addison Lee. You have to be calm or—”

“Owwwwwwwww!”

“Oh, my God, oh my God,” gabbled Mark. “It's only two minutes since the last contraction. You're going to give birth in the car!”

“Stop panicking. Owww!”

Mark's phone rang. He looked at it intensely.

“Bloody work!” he suddenly yelled, and threw it out of the window.

“Noooooooo!” I yelled, watching the phone about to hurtle down three stories.

We looked at each other, wild-eyed.

“Use my phone,” I said.

“OK, OK,” said Mark. “Where is it?”

“I don't know!”

“Put your feet up, breathe.” He found the phone, groaned when he got voicemail and put it on speakerphone.

“All our customer service specialists are currently on other calls, as we are currently experiencing heavy delays owing to increased demand.”

“Ambulance?” He dialled 999. “I see, very well. City's gridlocked,” he said, clicking off the phone, just as I was hit by another contraction. “Emergencies only. Apparently, normal childbirth isn't an emergency.”

“Not an emergency?” I yelled. “I feel like I'm about to push an ostrich out of my body. Fuck! Can you get the Popsicles out of the freezer?”

“I'm going to text everyone,” said Mark, fumbling in the freezer. “Someone has to be in the area.”

“Let's get down in the street and see if we can hail a cab,” I said.

“Do we really need all this stuff?”

“Yes! Yes. I have to have tennis balls and the Popsicles.”

Mark half dragged, half carried me to the main road and then went back for the four bags. The traffic really was solid: unmoving, buses, lorries, honking and belching fumes. By some virgin-birth-style miracle, a taxi rounded a side street with its light on. Mark practically threw himself on the bonnet.

“Going somewhere nice?” said the driver, as Mark loaded the bags into the cab. “Owwww!” I yelled, at which the driver looked terrified. “ 'Ere you're not goner give birth in me cab, are you?”

“Suck on this,” said Mark, handing me a Popsicle. “The Queen, by the way, has just arrived at Grafton Underwood village hall.”

“This isn't a Popsicle,” I said. “It's a frozen sausage!”

After twenty minutes of the driver going on and on about just having had his cab cleaned, we'd gone only a quarter of a mile and the contractions were coming every thirty seconds.

“Right. This is hopeless. We're going to have to walk,” said Mark.

“Great, excellent idea, sir, if I may say so, out you get,” said the cabbie, manhandling me out of his cab.

“What about my packing?” I wailed.

“Sod the packing,” said Mark, hauling the four bags into a newsagent's and handing the baffled newsagent twenty quid.

“I'm going to have to carry you!”

He picked me up, like Richard Gere in
An Officer and a Gentleman,
and then stumbled under the weight. “Oh Christ Alive, you're enormous.”

The phone rang. “Hang on, let me put you down a sec. Cleaver!—Cleaver's running from his flat—yes! I'm carrying her! We're just at the junction of the Newcomen Street and the A3.”

We staggered along the street, both groaning, Mark frequently putting me down and clutching his back.

Then Daniel appeared, red-faced, jogging and panting.

“Cleaver,” said Mark, “this is probably the only time in my life I've actually been pleased to see you.”

“Right. Everyone relax. I'll take charge. I'll take the head, you take the feet,” said Daniel, wheezing as if he was about to have a heart attack.

“No, I'll take the head,” said Mark.

“Nope. I started this off and…”

“Will you please. Stop. Squabbliiiii­iiiii­iiiii­ing,” I said, and bit hard into Mark's hand, at which they both let go of my arms and only just caught me.

It ended up with the three of us staggering like some weird push-me-pull-you to the A&E and getting stuck in the revolving door.

Finally we managed to get out of the door and into the hospital. Daniel and Mark staggered to the reception desk, holding me between them like a sack of cheesy potatoes, and dumped me on the reception desk.

“Who's the father?” said the receptionist.

“I'm the father,” said Daniel.

“No,
I'm
the father,” said Mark, just as Dr. Rawlings burst through the doors, pushing a trolley.

“They're both the fathers,” said Dr. Rawlings, as the three of them manhandled me onto the trolley.

This is not, I thought, not for the first time in this sorry saga, how I imagined this moment would be.