The Baby Gift. Alison Roberts

      The sound was so full of understanding and sympathy it brought tears to Julia’s eyes.

      ‘You won’t believe what I said to him after that kiss.’

      ‘What?’

      ‘I said…’ Julia had to catch her breath to swallow a sob that was determined to escape. ‘I said that he’d have to marry me now because of what Sister Therese used to say at school. Do you remember? About kissing and babies?’

      ‘Oh, no!’ But Anne was laughing. ‘Why do you do it to yourself, hon? Every time. Salt in wounds and all that.’

      ‘It’s the way I deal with stuff. You know that.’

      Her sister’s voice was soft. ‘I know you’re not as tough as you like to make out, Jules. I know how much it can hurt.’

      ‘Better to make jokes than let people feel sorry for me. Or not to tell them and let things go further than is good for anyone involved.’

      ‘Mac’s not Peter.’

      ‘No. I doubt there’s anyone on earth that quite matches my ex-fiancé in the creep stakes.’

      ‘It’s been three years. Maybe it’s time to have a look and see what else is out there. When was the last time you met anyone you were attracted to this much?’

      ‘Three years.’ Julia gave an unamused huff. ‘Tell you what, if I come across any nice widowers with a few motherless children in tow, I’ll pounce, I promise.’

      ‘There are plenty of men who could actually handle adoption. Or surrogacy.’

      ‘Or who would say they can. Where have I heard that before?’ Julia couldn’t help the bitter edge to her voice. ‘And then they’ll turn up two weeks before the wedding and say, “Oops, sorry, babe. I got someone else pregnant and guess what? It is a major after all.”’ Neither could she help the spill of words she’d kept bottled up for so long. ‘“I didn’t realise how amazing being a father was going to be and this is the real thing. I didn’t have to go into some cubicle in a clinic and look at dirty magazines and—”’ Julia stopped abruptly, gave a huge sniff and then cleared her throat. ‘Sorry,’ she added quietly.

      ‘Don’t be. You should have said all this a long time ago instead of brushing it off and putting on such a brave front.’

      ‘I guess I’ve been thinking about it all again, thanks to that kiss. No, actually…’ Julia closed her eyes. ‘I’ve been thinking about it since the first day on the job here. Since I saw who I’d be working with. I’ve thought about it every time I’ve seen him with kids. The way he is with them.’

      She didn’t notice the way her tone softened. ‘He’s a born dad. You should have seen him today. We had this little girl on the train. Carla, her name was. She was only seven and so scared and then I handed her up to Mac and he just has to look at her and she’s smiling. It was—’

      ‘Hey, I think I saw that on the news when I walked past someone’s television this morning,’ Anne interrupted. ‘I haven’t had time to check the papers. I knew it was in the UK somewhere but I didn’t realise you were involved.’

      ‘Yep. It was up between Edinburgh and Inverness. Bang in our patch.’

      ‘I saw someone dangling off the bridge trying to look in the windows of the carriage. It looked horrific. Was that Mac?’

      Julia remembered hearing a helicopter hovering that could well have contained a news crew. ‘It was probably me,’ she admitted. ‘I went down first to assess things.’

      ‘Oh, my God!’Anne groaned. ‘Don’t tell me it was you who climbed inside the carriage to get people out. Good grief, you must have. You were just telling me about that little girl.’

      ‘Someone had to,’ Julia said matter-of-factly. ‘And it’s what I do, remember?’

      ‘How can I forget?’ Julia heard a heavy sigh. ‘I want you home safe and sound, Jules. The sooner the better, thanks.’

      ‘Stop worrying so much.’

      ‘It’s what I do, remember? I’m your big sister. I…miss you, kiddo.’

      ‘I miss you, too.’

      Oh, dear. This conversation was supposed to be picking her up after a miserable day of work when she hadn’t been able to find anything to take her mind off Mac. Or that kiss. Or put a stop to the flashes of desire and hope that always spiralled into hopelessness. Now she was going to be feeling homesick on top of heartsick.

      ‘How are you, anyway?’ she asked brightly. ‘How’s work?’

      ‘Flat out,’ Anne said co-operatively. ‘We had three cases back to back yesterday and they were all complicated. The biggest was an ostium primum atrial septal defect that extended through both AV valves into the ventricular septum.’

      ‘Wow! How did that go?’

      ‘Great. Little Down’s syndrome girl. Very cute. She was awake when I did my rounds in PICU this morning.’

      Julia swallowed. Was the mere mention of a child enough to drag her thoughts back to yesterday? To Mac?

      ‘Any word on that consultancy position?’

      ‘They’re going to advertise it soon. Richards thinks I’ll be a top contender.’

      ‘You’ll get it. Good heavens, you’re going to be a consultant paediatric cardiac surgeon by the time you’re thirty-five. Go, you!’

      ‘I’m not holding my breath. I’ve been working towards this for nearly fifteen years. I can wait as long as it takes.’

      ‘Wait until I get home, anyway. I want to help celebrate.’

      ‘I’ll tell them not to advertise for a couple of months, shall I?’

      ‘You do that.’ Julia was smiling again but something new was being added to the mix of emotions she’d been grappling with. Three months wasn’t very long. She was already halfway through her time here and look how fast it had gone. It would only seem a blink until she was heading home again and then she’d never see Mac again. She’d never know what might have happened if she’d…

      ‘Hey, it’s Saturday on your side of the world.’ Desperation was providing another distraction. ‘You’ve got a night off for once. You and Dave going out on a hot date?’

      ‘I will if you will.’

      Something in her sister’s tone made Julia’s heart sink. ‘Things not going any better, then?’

      ‘Worse if anything,’Anne admitted. ‘I get the feeling he wants me to choose between him and my career. He wants a family. How did life get so mixed up?’

      ‘It’s crazy, isn’t it? You can have kids and don’t want any because you’ve already been a mother to me, and I can’t and…’ Her voice trailed off. It was the biggest dream of all, wasn’t it? A home and family of her own.

      It was Anne’s turn to try and provide distraction. ‘We’ve got each other,’ she said stoutly. ‘And we’ve both got amazing careers. Now, tell me all about this job with the train.’

      ‘It was unreal. It’s been all over the Sunday papers here. I’ll scan the articles and email them to you.’

      ‘Please. But tell me about it first so I won’t have kittens when I see the pictures.’

      ‘OK.’ This was good. Anne’s career was so much part of her, it was inseparable from who she was. Julia needed to be more like that. So passionate about her career that anything else got at least a slightly lower priority. Things like relationships. That ordinary kind of family unit she’d never had herself as a child and could never create for any children of her own.