She has done no A-level revision for the past two weeks. Every time she has opened a book the words have dissolved in front of her eyes. She has sat on her bed, hour after hour, imagining the A grades she has been predicted in English, History, and French flipping like letters on a train station noticeboard, replaced by Bs and then Cs, until they land, decisively, on Ds. She has felt her future sliding from her grasp: all her ambitions slipping through her fingers, like grains of sand on a windswept beach.

“You’ll be fine, Auds. This time next year you’ll be two terms into an English degree at UCL and all this worry about your exams will be a distant memory. Trust me, I’ve been there. I wouldn’t be able to tell you a single question I answered in my A-levels now.” Edward continues to talk, presenting her with platitudes of support and encouragement she hasn’t requested but feels she should be grateful for nonetheless.

His voice fades in her ears, as if a sound engineer has remixed the volumes so that she can no longer hear him above the white noise of a busy pub on a Saturday night.

This time next year.

She tries to imagine it, but can’t. She cannot visualize herself with a baby, cannot imagine where she might be living, or with whom. She cannot picture a version of her life that doesn’t involve Senate House library, lectures on the Bloomsbury Group, tutorials in Chaucer, Shakespeare, Austen, Dickens, Eliot, Hardy, Waugh.

“I need to talk to you about something.” She has interrupted him without realizing he was still speaking.

A microscopic twitch hovers at the corner of Edward’s mouth. At first she thinks it is irritation. They have only been going out for eleven months and she has not yet learned the full repertoire of his facial expressions. But then he frowns and she sees that she is mistaken: it is not irritation but fear. She realizes that he thinks she’s about to end their relationship and is surprised by how distraught he seems.

Words scramble from her mouth, like unruly children piling out of a classroom as the bell rings. “There’s no easy way to say this so I’m just going to come out and say it. I’m pregnant. About nine weeks, the doctor thinks. I’m sorry, I know it’s the last thing either of us wants.”

Her lips part in preparation for another apology but she forces herself to close them. It is true that she is sorry, but it should not be her apologizing. It has been his responsibility, after all. She has trusted him to buy them, put them on properly, withdraw ensuring that nothing escapes.

Edward is shaking his head and Audrey cannot tell whether it is in disbelief, horror, or denial.

“Say something. I need you to say something.” She does not know what she wants him to say, only that his silence is suffocating.

“Sorry. It’s just a lot to take in. How are you feeling? I mean, are you OK?”