Gray Quinn's Baby(25)

'Do you have family who can care for the baby while you work?'

'No, but what about childcare?'

'Childcare!' Nancy exclaimed. 'What planet are you living on? And  without money to support yourself you're going to be in a real bind,  Magenta. You have no idea what's ahead of you, do you?' Nancy demanded,  staring her in the eyes. 'If you did, you wouldn't want this baby.'

'Nancy, no, stop it. I can't believe you mean that.'

'You'll be finished in advertising,' Nancy said in a calm voice that  really frightened Magenta. 'And all the men here will have a field day.'

'Then we won't tell them.'

'Not even Quinn?'

'I'll choose my time.'

Nancy laughed, but it was a hollow sound. 'Yes, you do that,' she agreed.

'And as for being finished … '

'It's not you, Magenta,' Nancy was quick to say. 'It's what everyone will think of you.'

'And what will you think of me?'

'I'm sorry you even have to ask that question,' Nancy told her, meeting  Magenta's stare. 'My feelings won't change-and I'll help you all I can.  You just can't expect Quinn is going to step in, or that he'll even  acknowledge the baby is his. He only has your word for that. I'm sorry,  Magenta, but that's the truth and I'd rather I say it than you hear it  from someone else … '

Of course-no DNA tests, no proof. No help of any kind for single mothers  in the sixties-that was what Nancy was telling her. How had women  managed? Magenta felt as bad as she had ever felt in her life-not for  herself, but for all those women who had been treated so shabbily. 'And  what if I don't care what people think? What if I make a go of it?'                       
       
           



       

Nancy said nothing, which was an answer in itself.

Magenta shook her head. 'I'm not ready to have this conversation,' she  admitted. 'It's too soon. I'm still getting over the thrill of  discovering I'm pregnant. I hadn't thought of it as a problem, or  anything remotely close. I'm sorry, Nancy, I shouldn't have burdened you  with this.'

'Who else can you confide in?' Nancy pointed out with her usual  pragmatism. 'Don't worry about me. It's you I'm worried about. You  should take some time off work, try to come up with a plan. I'll help  you.'

'I don't want to take time off work-I'm pregnant, not ill.'

'But when you start to show?'

In the sixties, that would be her cue to feel ashamed, Magenta presumed,  imagining the reaction from the men in the office. But would she even  be here that long, or would she wake up long before then? Uncertainty  hit her like an avalanche. What could she count on in this strange,  disjointed world?

Sensing her desperation, Nancy gave her a hug.

'I'm all right,' Magenta insisted, pulling herself together. She would  have to be. There was some irony in the fact that she had researched  most things about the sixties except for this. But, if Nancy's concern  was anything to go by, impending motherhood must have been a nightmare  prospect for a single woman in the sixties.

But that was no reason to give up. She had a baby to fight for now, and  if people were as narrow-minded as Nancy suggested then she'd find a way  to start up her own ad agency-working from home, if she had to. She  would make this work and support her child whatever it took.

But then another, bigger problem hit her: would she still be pregnant in  the real world? And, if the answer to that was no, did she want to wake  up?

Maternal instinct was a formidable force, she realised as Nancy  continued to offer advice. 'Some women have no alternative but to have  an abortion or give their child away.'

'Then I feel sorry for their unimaginable plight, but I'm not one of  them.' Discovering first-hand what it had been like to exist in an era  where the single mother had been stigmatised made Magenta long to be  able to go into battle for each and every one of them.

'And when some men find out you're pregnant,' Nancy went on, 'they'll assume you're easy meat.'

'Then they'll soon learn they're wrong. I'm sorry, Nancy-I don't mean to  have a go at you. It's just that this is all so new to me. But don't  worry; I will sort it out. And I'm going make a start right now by  telling Quinn.'

'Good idea,' Nancy agreed. 'You should before you pass out, or you're sick on someone's shoes.'

Magenta managed to wrestle up a smile for her friend at the door. 'I'll try not to be sick on your shoes.'

'That's all I ask,' Nancy said, playing the same game with a faint smile in return.



Quinn was packing up his things when Magenta knocked on his office door  and walked in. Before she had found out about the baby, they had agreed  to meet in town for something to eat, but events were moving too fast to  wait for that.

'Hey,' he said, looking up. 'Hungry already?'

She stood for a moment just drinking him in. Quinn had announced that  the last day before the holidays would be a dress-down day. No one did  casual better than he did and, in faded jeans and a leather jacket left  open over a close-fitting top, he looked amazing. But it wasn't Quinn's  physical features that drew her; that was the least of it. It was the  warmth in his eyes and the curve of his mouth. She wanted to frame that  and remember it, as if tomorrow was coming round a lot faster than she  wanted it to, and then everything would change.

'Well, come on,' he said. 'Spit it out. I know that look.' Still leaning  over the desk, he gave her the Quinn smile, the one with warmth, fun  and trust in it.

She took a breath and began. 'I know I told you I was on the pill.' She  didn't need to say anything else. Quinn's face had already changed.  Frown lines had deepened between his eyes. 'I know it was only that one  time … ' she went on.

'When circumstances overcame us?' Quinn straightened up.

That's one way of putting it, Magenta thought as anxiety started to  build inside her. She couldn't read Quinn. She didn't have a clue what  he was thinking. 'You're pregnant?'

'Yes, I am.' They had grown so close, yet suddenly Quinn was like a  stranger standing in judgement on her. 'I don't want anything from you.'                       
       
           



       

'Why not?'

That was the one question she hadn't anticipated. 'Because I can manage this on my own.'

'So, you're cutting me out?'

'I just don't want to be dependent on anyone.'

'Sounds to me like I'm going to be a father but you'd prefer I didn't interfere.'

'I'm sorry if it came out that way, it's not what I meant.'

'How do I know that?'

'You'll just have to take my word for it.'

'Like I took your word for the fact that you were on the pill?'

'Aren't we both equally responsible?' Now she was getting mad.

'Well, of course we are, Magenta, and I'm happy to accept full responsibility. I only wish you could be as straight with me.'

'I am being straight with you.'

'Are you? I feel like I don't know you-like you're hiding something.'

'I can explain.'

But she couldn't. How could she explain what she couldn't understand?  How could she tell Quinn that this was a dream and that she might wake  up at any moment to find out that none of it was happening?

Quinn's sound of exasperation forced her to refocus. 'Why don't you tell me what's really on your mind, Magenta?'

Quinn was waiting for answers and she had none. This is a dream, she  wanted to blurt out. I'm locked in a dream and I can't get back. 'The  pregnancy was a shock to me,' was the best she could manage.

'A shock to you?' Quinn queried. 'This is a baby we're talking about.  How can you talk about the creation of a child as a shock and expect me  to be reassured?'

'Because I can handle it.'

'You can handle it,' Quinn repeated angrily. 'This is my child too,  Magenta. Do you seriously expect me to take a back seat and leave every  decision to you?'

She hadn't factored Quinn wanting a child into her thinking. She hadn't thought about shared responsibility at all.

'What gives you the right to do this on your own?'

She knew no other way. Since forever it had been Dad and her-the two of  them. She had been raised in a single-parent family. 'I love my baby,'  she said simply. 'And I never intended to hurt you.' Some things were  impossible to lie about or to hide.





CHAPTER SEVENTEEN




IT WAS the first time Magenta had heard Quinn so impassioned on any  subject. He would fight for his family and stand firm as a rock in the  face of any difficult decision. Under any normal circumstances, that was  just the kind of father she would want for her child. But she couldn't  make any promises to Quinn in this strange world of imagination and  dreams.

'Have you nothing to say?' he said sharply. 'Why is that, Magenta? Have  you got what you came for?' he said suspiciously. 'Are you planning to  leave now and take our child?'

'Please don't make this ugly Quinn.'

'It is what it is,' he rapped. 'A woman I thought I could trust-a woman I  care about-cannot be honest with me. What am I supposed to think? That  you're a single woman who has always longed for a child, maybe? Who  knows what lengths you'd go to?'