Sunday morning started with me waking up with Mima on one side of me and Simon on the other. I made them get up at eight, because I wanted to strip the beds. Simon agreed to do them, and I said I’d make them up later. He did flip the mattresses for me, so I suppose I got a reasonable deal. He did it so easily compared to me, last time I got almost stuck between the mattress and the bed base, when the mattress flipped back on me, knocking me underneath it.

I washed and dressed both Mima and myself, and then after feeding her breakfast–she decided she would be a baby today and needed cajoling into eating. It all took patience and energy, neither of which were in much supply.

I shoved the mix into the bread machine and while the washing machine did the first wash, I pushed the hoover round clearing up the mud from the park and the dog’s feet.

Simon and Tom took Kiki and Mima out with them while they went to get a paper, and Stella sat about the place complaining about back ache. Of course no one had ever suffered like Stella did. I almost mentioned, ‘wait until Puddin’ is born,’ and while it was tempting, I couldn’t do it. She was going to suffer unless she had an epidural, knowing her she had probably arranged one.

I started the dinner, putting the leg of lamb into the pre-warmed oven, I’d rubbed it over with garlic and honey, and added chopped mint to it before shoving it in the oven.

Stella sat watching me work–it was the closest she came to doing any these days, which annoyed me, as I was led to believe that pregnancy is neither an illness nor disability. Then I recalled her abortion and the bleed that followed–maybe she was being sensible, if a little over cautious.

By the time our intrepid explorers returned with a slightly wrinkled version of The Observer, the dinner was well underway and the first wash was in the tumble drier. The second lot was in the washer and I’d also done the vegetables.

“Please don’t walk mud through the house, I’ve only just cleaned in here.”

“Come on, Cathy, it’s raining out here.”

“If you get mud on my carpets, you can jolly well vacuum them, like I had to.”

They entered looking quite sheepish. I took the buggy off them and released Mima from the strap and rain cover. “Hang on, this is a different buggy. Have you got the wrong one?”

I was about to play hell with them when Simon blushing, replied. “The wheel came off the old one and it wouldn’t go back on. We passed a shop which sold them so, I bought us a new one, he’s going to try and repair the old one, so then you’ll have a spare.”

“Oh, okay, pity you didn’t bring it back, I’m quite good at getting wheels on things.”

“He said he thought the bearings had gone or something.”

“So? I’ve changed them on a back wheel of a bike, I’m sure that’s harder.”

“I wouldn’t know, Cathy, all I know is what he told us and I bought a new one. Is that all right?”

“Yes, sweetheart,” I kissed him and he grabbed me and got oil on the white sleeve of my jumper. Some days, I didn’t believe my luck.

Mima had gone to pester Stella, who had nodded off on the couch in the dining room. She woke up in a hurry and complained to me later.

“That little hooligan woke me up, doesn’t she know you should let sleeping gestating women alone?”

“I doubt it, I don’t think I’ve got beyond Genesis in the Gs yet, why? She only wanted you to see her new pushchair.”

“Oh that’s what she was saying, that child needs speech therapy.”

“Yes and you need to shake yourself,” I muttered as I walked away.

“Oh do I now, well perhaps you’ll appreciate how much it hurts when you have one–oh, I forgot, you can’t can you?”

She was very lucky I didn’t have something sharp in my hands, because I would have dissected her on the spot. Instead I flew into the kitchen and slammed the door shut and banged pots and pans around for several minutes.

Because I was making so much noise, I didn’t hear Simon, who’d overheard Stella’s remark, take his sister to task. Tom told me later, that he wiped the floor with her, and she disappeared up the stairs to her room, where she languished for an hour or more. Tom had whipped Jemima away before the tongue lashing started, and they'd gone to wash Kiki’s feet which she thought great fun–a view not shared by the poor spaniel, who is very sensitive about anyone touching her feet.

Simon came in to me and held me while I howled and basted the joint–not quite at the same time. “I can’t stay in the same house as that woman,” I sobbed, while he convinced me that I could.

“She’s so bloody lazy, I’m like some sort of skivvy.”

“I’ve told her to pull her socks up.”

“She can’t, it hurts her back too much,” I did an impromptu mime of an old woman with lumbago.

“She’ll be a bit better in future, or I’ve told her she’ll be out on her ear.”

“Isn’t that Tom’s job, it is his house?”

“Maybe, but could you see him speaking to Stella about it?”

“Not really.”

“Anyway, it’s been done and I shall be watching her.”

“You can’t kick her out, not when she’s pregnant.”

“Why not, she has a luxury suite at the hotel at Southsea, she can use at a moment’s notice. She could go and stay with Dad and Monica, and she has access to the house in Scotland.”

“What about your cottage?”

“I’ve let it temporarily, until end of March.”

“You kept that quiet,” I said feeling rather surprised at the revelation.

“It’s an Australian chap who’s working at the Portsmouth branch, he needed somewhere to live, and I thought I’d try and get some of the cost of the repairs back.”

I wasn’t sure what I thought about someone else living in Simon’s cottage. But then I’d been prepared to let someone live in my parent’s house. Having made it mine again, I couldn’t now, but that’s a different story.

“She called Mima, a hooligan.” I complained.

“Well, she’ll find out the hard way what children are like,” he said hugging me.

“How come she doesn’t seem to faze you?”

“Who? Stella or Mima?”

“Mima, who else?”

“I like kids, besides when it seemed like we were unlikely to have any, I felt a bit sad about it, so I’m making hay while the sun shines.”

“Why don’t you ditch me and marry someone who can give you an heir?”

“Can’t do that.”

“Why? Seems easy enough to me.”

“Well, firstly, I love you: secondly, Henry loves you too and would kill me; then there’s Stella, she loves you too.”

“So why does she keep throwing my one shortcoming in my face, at every opportunity?”

“I think she forgets, then remembers half way through what she’s said, but by then, it’s too late to retract it without loss of face.”

“You mean she thought I could become pregnant before she remembered I can’t: come off it Simon, that won’t do at all.”

“Well, I nearly forget, in fact some days I do forget that you’re not absolutely perfect. I mean you are in so many ways and I love you to bits, which is why I’m keeping you, even with your shortcomings.”

“I reckon it’s ‘cos I know too much.” I said and laughed as he held me.

“Yeah okay, there’s that as well.”

“Come on, I’d better check on Mima, she’s probably torturing that poor dog or that poor old man.”

We went into the lounge, where Tom and Mima were fast asleep together and the dog was lying at Tom’s feet, equally somnolent. I could see Kipling’s Just So Stories open and face down on the sofa beside them. So that’s what they’d been up to. I smiled and put my arm around Simon as we enjoyed watching the sleepers. He kissed me.

“I don’t know which of those three is happiest,” he said quietly to me.

“Nor me, but standing here watching them makes me feel complete, if you understand what I mean.”

“I think I do, our little family.”

“Sometimes, Simon Cameron, I love you so much.” I pulled his face down to mine, and despite the tears which were running down my cheeks I kissed him with a passion. One a moment later he gave back in a kiss to me.