the abrupt cancellation of Dove Suite’s worldwide tour in support of their fourth album, Beads. Jenkins confirmed the rationale for the touring hiatus: “Starting our family has meant shifting priorities for the time being. But I’m sure we’ll get back out on the road before too long.”
Jenkins admitted the couple was erring on the side of caution. “I’m sure we could go on tour and everything would be fine, but honestly it’s just easier this way. I don’t think we could live with ourselves if we took any unnecessary chances.”
According to Jenkins, the baby is due in November.
Aslet was not available for comment.
EMMA
SEPTEMBER 2020
Emma slipped her hand into her pocket and pulled out her phone. Reflexively, she snapped a photo of the half-deserted terminal and sent it to her sister. Surprise upside of terrifying worldwide epidemic: no epic lineups to get through airport security !
She and Stu and their bandmates were waiting in a newly designated pre-screening area, as six ceiling-mounted monitors tuned to the same news network flashed synchronously high above. In a couple of hours they would be flying into Canada by special dispensation to headline an ARAMIS benefit concert in Vancouver.
It was only a few weeks ago that Emma was lying on the couch in front of the television saying, “ARAMIS sounds like something nice to catch. Much less disgusting than swine flu.”
Stu was on the rug, playing with an old theremin he’d found at the Salvation Army and repaired with the help of how-to guides on the internet. “They should name all the flu variants the way they do hurricanes.” His hand cut through the air above the theremin and a hypnotic sound thrummed across the room. “They’re like the chorus of a song, the way they come around every year. It would sound like a much friendlier way to die, getting killed off by Flu Henrietta or Flu Kevin.”
Back then, she’d laughed. Now she checked her phone for a response from Domenica, though the time difference made it unlikely. Her sister had moved halfway around the world and married a man named Ahmad, who was actual oil royalty from the U.A.E., and with whom she had two little girls, Aliya and Leila. Emma and Dom communicated mainly via text—or, more frequently these days, highly staged photos annotated with emoji reactions.
“Looking up baby names?” asked Jesse. “I nominate Jessica.”
Ben shook his head. “Way too eighties.”
“This may come as a shock,” said Emma, “but you guys actually don’t get a vote on this.”
Stu grinned and leaned over to place a gentle palm on her belly. “How are you feeling?” he asked. “What did the doctor say?” Stu was tender, careful with her these days. The baby was precious cargo and Emma was the courier, the protective packaging. She was the Styrofoam peanuts. No matter how close they were, the baby was between them now.
“The baby is fine,” said Emma. At least, the baby had been fine at last week’s appointment. But this morning, while Stu assumed she was enduring the clinic’s usual battery of tests, the premier tattoo artist in Texas had looked at her stomach like it was a dude who had cut in front of him in line.
“Absolutely no way,” he’d said from behind the counter, and he shook his head so minutely it was as though he didn’t want to give her anything—not a tattoo, not an apology, not an inch. “It’s just too risky for the baby,” he said, crossing his arms. Each one sported a forked-tongued scaly dragon licking its way down the back of his hand. “You’ve got the risk of preterm labour. Risk of infection. And pregnant women’s skin is different. More elastic. It holds more water. So there’s a question of the quality of the tattoo. Stretch marks. Scarring.”
Emma suspected that tattoo artists liked saying no because they were the last people on Earth that anybody expected to have limits. Especially tattoo artists with tattoos on their faces. Yet she had apparently found a line that this leather-wrapped, forehead-pierced professional with two symmetrical cheek tattoos and a handlebar moustache was unwilling to cross. And then the baby had kicked up its feet into her side, as if in celebration of her disappointment.
Emma knew it was a morbid streak inherited from her mother that made her want to follow through on major life decisions before heading out on a journey. During the years her family had sailed around the world, at every port of call her mother had