JULIET WAS SULKING AS they walked around the furniture shop. There were ten beds lined up and each one looked more comfortable than the next. Marjorie just wanted to fall into one of them and stay there. Her ankles, stomach, vagina and arse screamed, all saying the same thing: get this kid out of me! She was used to everything hurting but the pain was sharper and more intense. She’d experienced Braxton Hicks contractions on and off the previous day, so she didn’t panic – she had looked them up, she was fine, they just made her shit state a little shitier. She was experiencing an escalation of Braxton Hicks at that very moment. She sat on the bed. Jane, the young, tall shop assistant with an attitude like she was God’s gift to the universe, approached her for the third time in ten minutes.

‘Still OK?’

‘I’m fine. I promise I won’t give birth on the bed.’

‘I hope not – that’s our most expensive one.’

‘Good to know. Any chance of a glass of water?’ Marjorie said.

‘This is a furniture shop.’

‘There’s a water dispenser just by the counter.’

Jane mumbled something as she walked away. Marjorie moved to the next bed and waited for her water. A sullen Juliet appeared and sat next to her.

‘Well?’

‘Whatever.’

‘Oh great, there’s a Peppa Pig bunk in the sale.’

‘LOL,’ Juliet said.

‘I’m doing my best, Juliet.’

‘Me too.’

‘Well, that’s a lie.’

‘No it’s not.’

‘You’ve been a bitch to me since you got back. We used to be best pals.’

‘We were never best pals – you were my mother’s pal and she’s dead.’

‘I was your pal and well you know it. I’m still your pal.’

The woman appeared with a glass of water. ‘Anything else I can do, your majesty?’

‘You’ve a really bad attitude,’ Marjorie said.

‘I’m not the pregnant lady who’s been sitting on showroom furniture for an hour with no intention of buying anything.’

‘How wrong you are, Jane, and please check and see if the white sleigh bed, double, is available with the matching dressers.’

‘No problem,’ she said, and she walked away.

‘The sleigh bed never dates, it’s a classic,’ Marjorie said, and Juliet nodded.

‘I miss you,’ Marjorie said. ‘I’m having this baby and your mother’s not here and you are being mean to me.’

‘I’m not being mean to you,’ Juliet said.

‘You won’t talk to me, you sulk and give me shit every time I try to talk to you. What did I do?’

‘You took Davey away,’ Juliet said.

Jane appeared with a set of forms in her hand. ‘Yes, that’s fine, we have everything in stock.’

‘Go away, Jane.’