She continued to smile broadly when she turned back to Jenny.

‘This might make you laugh. There’s a rumour going around that you’re going to write a column about being a mother.’

Word travelled fast. Jenny folded her arms. ‘Actually, that’s true.’ Lucy’s smug smile was unbearable. ‘Of course, it requires an experienced journalist to take the mundane and make it interesting.’

Lucy nodded. ‘Of course. Of course. But babies? Will you have enough to write about to keep a column going? Don’t they just lie there doing nothing?’

Jenny had had much the same thought herself at the antenatal class. But she didn’t need to have enough to keep the column going for very long; just long enough to prove to Eva that she could carry on writing after she’d had the baby. As soon as she was ready, she would swoop back in and take back ‘Girl About Town’ from under Lucy’s pert little nose.

‘Oh, yes. You’d be surprised.’

Lucy lifted her gaze over Jenny’s shoulder and towards the door. ‘Speaking of surprises…’

‘Jenny!!!!’ They all came in together: Brian, Maureen, even Eva. One of the girls from advertising was almost completely obscured by helium balloons emblazoned with nappy pins and storks.

‘Did you know about this?’ Jenny hissed under her breath at Lucy.

‘Of course! You didn’t think I actually needed your help, did you?’ Lucy leaned back on her stool as if she were getting ready to enjoy the show.

In bed that night, Dan was moaning about going back to the antenatal class. ‘After last week, you said it was a waste of time. You promised we didn’t have to go back.’

Jenny stopped fighting with her maternity pillow and turned on him. ‘That was before my lunch with Lucy. I need something juicy to get this blog going, and I haven’t got a clue where else to get it.’

She didn’t say that she was starting to worry that there was no such thing as juicy material in the maternity sphere. There had to be an angle. Ruth’s story about peeing on her shoes whilst taking a pregnancy test was mildly amusing, but it wasn’t going to have Eva begging for Jenny’s return.

Dan got out of bed and helped her to fit the long, sausage-shaped pillow under her bump. ‘Haven’t we got to watch a video of a birth tomorrow? I am not looking forward to that.’ He pulled the quilt over her.

Now that she was wrapped around the pillow, she wouldn’t be moving again any time soon. ‘Well, you’ll have the live performance to deal with soon, so you’d better get used to the idea.’ Actually, Jenny wasn’t desperate to watch it, either; she’d never even made it through an episode of Casualty with her eyes open – and that blood was fake.

‘What did you think of the other couples?’

Dan shrugged. ‘They seemed all right.’

‘Didn’t you think the women were all rather…’ She searched for the word. ‘Mum-ish?’

Dan laughed. ‘What did you expect? You’re one of them now, Jen, don’t forget. Can we go to sleep? I need at least eight hours if you’re forcing me to watch one human being emerging from another tomorrow.’ He gave her a goodnight peck on the lips and turned over with a long sigh.

One of them? Did he think she was going to change into some kind of matronly stereotype the minute she gave birth?

The more Jenny thought about writing the blog, the more she realised what a good idea she’d had. She’d show everyone how you could have a baby and a life.

Now she was still, the baby began its nightly exercises. She felt a small bump move across her abdomen. Was that a hand or a foot? It still filled her with wonder that there was a tiny human being in there. She wrapped her arms around her stomach. ‘Hello, baby,’ she whispered.