But that was then, and this was now, and Calli was no longer twenty-something but thirty-five, and for the past few months she had often found herself thinking about her aunt’s words and wondering how those eggs of hers were holding up. Everyone around her seemed to be having babies; several of her friends had embarked on their second pregnancies and whereas a year or two ago she had never entertained such an idea for herself, she now found it had begun to preoccupy her. Perhaps, she thought, it was time to have a conversation with James: see how he felt about the subject instead of brooding over it on her own.
‘I am not going to say that you should have a baby,’ Eleni, Calli’s mother, had said to her a few years earlier when the subject of having a family came up. ‘It’s up to you to decide and something you do because you want to, not because you have to, or because anyone else pushes you into it. It’s your decision, Calli mou, but I won’t say that a grandchild wouldn’t be wonderful!’
‘How do you know that you want to, or that the time is right, Mum?’ Calli asked, looking at her mother for answers.
‘I don’t know, you just do!’ Eleni replied. ‘For some people the time is never right – there’s always something to get in the way. Maybe you are one of those women, with your career and busy life. But if you discovered yourself pregnant and you felt happy about it, then I would say that’s when you know that you want to and that the time is right for you . . . I certainly did when you came along without my planning it.’
‘The thought terrifies me,’ the young woman had replied.
But of late Calli’s feelings had become confused. There was a shift, not only in the way she felt, but in her body too. In the past she’d given her friends’ babies a wide berth, making the appropriate noises of approval but keeping her distance. Recently she had felt a softening in her heart whenever someone handed her a baby to hold. Could it be, she wondered, that the overused cliché, her biological clock was starting to tick, applied to her too now, as it had for so many of her friends? She began to observe herself with interest. She became aware that this assignment for the Sunday magazine was having a significant effect on her and had brought to the surface some uneasy feelings.
While sitting in front of her computer reviewing pictures of those young fathers and listening to the interviews she had recorded of them, she began to consider her own life: in comparison, it felt rather empty. She and James, she realized, had been living a life of convenience, a life of indulgence with no adversities or great responsibilities. In contrast to what those teenage boys and their girls were having to deal with, the two of them could be described by some as narcissistic and superficial. It was quite a harsh discovery, but for the first time in years she was finding herself questioning her choice of lifestyle for the future. She hadn’t really given it too much thought; she went along with a lot of what James wanted. She knew she was something of a people-pleaser, and James needed a lot of pleasing, but she didn’t really mind – they got on pretty well most of the time.
That evening she stopped working earlier than usual and decided to make dinner. She didn’t always bother to cook. If she was working until James came home, then more often than not they would go out to eat. There were so many cool places where they lived or they’d order in – why not? They could afford it and they were free to do as they pleased. Tonight, she wanted to be at home, she wanted them to be able to talk. She decided the time had come for a serious conversation. She needed James’s full attention and she wanted him to be in a super good mood. She would cook something simple like baked fish and salad which was quick and easy to prepare but she would spend longer making his favourite dessert, the one Susan, his mum, made for him that always brought a smile to his face. She was going to make a crème caramel following her mother-in-law’s recipe, which Calli had to admit was pretty good.