Frederick showed them the bedroom. He was proud of the furniture he had put together too. He wanted to show his sister he had succeeded at being independent. Anna Margaret could understand that. There would not have been a lot of independence in his life otherwise. He had always had to do what others wanted and there had been staff to take care of the difficult or mundane things. He had always had money and he had never had to work for it. First he had got his own apartment, with its kitchen and washing machine, which had been one step, but even there people had done things for him. Now, in his own house, he was even more independent. And the baby was something else he had done - almost on his own.
Isabelle murmured her appreciation for the room. "Nice. Simple. Not overdone."
"It's not done yet, but it won't be overdone," Frederick assured her.
"Toys. There will be toys. Anna Margaret got a gift card."
"Nice gesture," he agreed. "But there's plenty of time to buy toys. If we need to buy any at all. We might get presents."
"I had a look at your wedding gifts," said Isabelle.
"Anything interesting?"
"I'll leave that to you to decide."
"Did you unwrap them?" Anna Margaret did not know how it worked.
"No, they are all unwrapped and checked for safety," Isabelle explained. "And then displayed for you to decide what you want to do with them. Someone will write back to the senders, so you don't have to do that."
"But do you also expect baby things?"
"Even more. If the public ever comes to know about the babies, that is."
"We need to do up a room as well," said Philip. "But since Florian has moved into Frederick's flat, we have one. Well, he sleeps there. He hasn't cooked a single meal for himself yet, I think. Maybe we should send him to my parents for a few weeks. Even Isabelle learned to cook there."
"Hush," said Isabelle. "It's not my favourite activity."
Frederick took the clothes out of the closet. "Look!"
Isabelle guffawed. "All set for mini Frederick."
He beamed. "But maybe he won't look like me. I hope not."
"Have you thought of a name yet?"
"Yes," said Frederick.
"No," said Anna Margaret at the same time.
"It doesn't mean I have one," Frederick explained. "It means I've thought about it. But we'll let you know if we beat you to it. Unless you have a name already."
"Yes, we do, as a matter of fact, but I'm not telling you yet. You wouldn't pick it, so it doesn't matter."
"Ludovic."
"Really. It's not awful, but you won't be able to guess. Or maybe you will, but you won't want to use it yourself."
"I won't seriously try to guess," he reassured her.
"Did you really think of a name?" Anna Margaret wondered when their guests had left. "Are there any traditions you have to follow there?"
"No. You missed the outcry over Florian, I suppose?"
She worked out how old she must have been at the time of Florian's birth. "I think I was studying abroad, because I don't remember it much. What about it?"
"It was a not an established princely name. People had expected Albert or Henri. They fell over themselves linking it to Florence and wondering why Florence of all people, the royal by marriage only. And then came Murielle, which couldn't be linked to anyone, so that was a complete mystery to them. We're considered to be a very unimaginative bunch of people, really. There's only a short list of names we're supposed to choose from."
"Are you expected to give a child several names?"
"Do you mean like Anna Margaret?"
She snorted. "And then two more to be really classy."
"You married me. You know I have four."
Yes, she had looked at that document when she had signed it during their wedding. "That's what I meant. Are you expected to give him four names and are you supposed to name him after people?"
"It's not in the law, so no."
"But personally you would go for..." Not four, she hoped. She could not come up with four, unless they took his father's and grandfather's names, but she did not think he would want to do that.
"I don't know. We can't use all the good ones up in one go."
Anna Margaret gave him a warning look. She did not yet know if there was ever going to be more than one go. "It's not likely we'll go for six boys. And you wouldn't go for something really rebellious, would you?"
"No. I wouldn't want to call him Storm or something. It needs to sound good and that doesn't. Prince Storm." Frederick shook his head.
"Prince?"
Frederick gave her a look. "Yes, what did you think he'd be? There has not been a change in the law. This is a dead end when it comes to succession - although you never know - but titles are a different matter."
"I knew there was a possibility, but I hadn't thought of him with a prefix, just a title." To her there was a difference.
"Well, it needs to sound good with that prefix. Prince Storm and Prince Hercules are out."
Anna Margaret shuddered at the awfulness. "Sorry, darling. Those would have been out even without a prefix. I'd like something more normal."
"We'll think of something normal. Baptism?"
"No."
"Now that could be more of a problem," Frederick said thoughtfully. "In conservative circles. I wonder what Isabelle will do."
"Will she force you?"
"No, of course not. I wondered what she will do herself, since when her other children were born she wasn't given a choice. But a baptism is typically an occasion to invite a lot of prominent people, so maybe she'll just pretend it has some meaning as a gesture to the public, who can then watch hats and dresses."
"But you don't want it?"
"It has no meaning to me."
That was a relief. She would certainly not want to do it just so the public could watch hats and dresses. "But can you get away with not doing anything?"
"No engagement, no public wedding, no public baptism? I'll post a picture of the baby in his favourite outfit on social media instead."
"But I wouldn't want Isabelle to feel obliged to do it to her son because you're not doing it." She had no idea how much of an expectation it was.
Frederick did not care. "I doubt she would feel that kind of pressure, because she'll probably have excellent arguments to explain her decision, whatever it will be."
"I never thought I'd have to consider this issue," said Anna Margaret.
"There will be more. Will he make public appearances, and so forth?"
"What did I get myself into by sleeping with you?" she wondered. Sometimes it dazzled her. She had only seen the simple things.
"I knew what I was getting into - and I think you can handle it."
"But you didn't go over all this when we conceived this child?" He had not thought this far, she was sure of that. He was teasing her.
"I can think enormously fast," he said seriously.
"Right."
"It has been drilled into me from when I was eighteen and by then Isabelle had had one or two babies as well. I had every faith in my ability to explain it to you and your ability to deal with it."
"Of course. You'd hardly have thought 'Stop the snogging! She's against baptism!'"
"There wouldn't have been a lot of good reasons to warrant a stop, no," he agreed with a laugh. "We'll sort it out. I'll explain why we're not doing that to Storm."
"It would be an announcement. You hate them."
Frederick kissed her. "Don't worry."
She would not. It would be fun to have this child with him, but that was a really undignified thought.
During the past few months Anna Margaret had politely refused most invitations to informal dinners and parties, because they tended to run on too late and, quite selfishly, she had preferred to spend time with Frederick. People had accepted it, because they assumed she was always very busy and no one really knew her evening schedule anyway. Turning down invitations from the same people twice had been a little more difficult, but sometimes she had had a really good excuse.
At the moment she was still as ambivalent about late activities as earlier in her pregnancy, but they still had George's wedding coming up. Luckily that started early in the day. They had the morning for their regular things, but directly after lunch Anna Margaret pulled on the dress she had borrowed from Isabelle. It was good that both of her winter coats still closed, because the weather had taken a turn for the worse.
Frederick chose a suit with a tie in a colour close to that of her dress. She was surprised at his effort, which made him laugh.
First there was going to be a ceremony, followed by a reception, dinner and finally a party. She had been sure they would give the party a miss, so she had indicated that a few weeks ago, but so far the dinner had seemed doable. They had to eat anyway.
The ceremony was in the town hall of a small town half an hour away and the reception was close to that, but dinner and the party were in a location just outside that town. They drove there and parked. Joel was a TV presenter, of course, but Anna Margaret hoped that did not mean that the guests' every move would be in the tabloids. When she got out of the car, however, no one paid any attention to them other than a man walking his dog.
A young man with a name tag greeted them inside the town hall, checked their invitation and his list, and showed them to the large room where the ceremony was going to take place and to the cloakroom. This was not a way they could have done it, Anna Margaret reflected, because anything this size would have drawn the press, but it was interesting to imagine what their own wedding would have looked like here.
There were a few faces she recognised from George's engagement party or from television, but most people near them were strangers. She did not mind. George's mother came to say hello, but she wondered if Joel's family had ever accepted the relationship.
When it began, it turned out not all of them had. She did at least not see any older people on the side where Joel's family were supposed to sit. There were only younger people, who might be siblings or friends. It would have been painful to leave those chairs empty. She wondered if they had been invited and they had not come, or if they had never been invited at all. In either case she felt for poor Joel and she was glad some people were there for him.
Storm kicked in the middle of the - pretty fun - ceremony. He had not done that before. Her hand went to her stomach, as if that would entice him to do it again. They should change ridiculous working titles every week, or she might get used to thinking of him as Storm and that was something she definitely did not want. She definitely did want to let Frederick feel the baby kick, but this was not a good place. It was too exposed.
The ceremony was touching, or maybe Anna Margaret was touched more easily by things these days. It had been funny as well, so there had been enough occasions to laugh. Outside, after the ceremony, there were suddenly cameras. She had expected them sooner, so she was not really surprised. They were photographers only, so they were relatively harmless. Everyone had to wait outside to let the newlyweds walk out, so they took up a spot.
Inside nobody had spoken to her except George's mum, but perhaps outside she was less daunting to approach. It was cold and snowflakes were falling down. It might make for pretty pictures if the rose petals mingled with the snow.
"Thunder kicked," she whispered at Frederick when they had taken a few steps back.
"Thunder?"
"We need to rotate names before they stick."
One of the photographers had taken a picture of them - probably several - but she was used to that happening somewhere in her peripheral vision. Captions for work photos were usually boring. Here, they might write something that contained a reference to her own wedding. That was all she was about this week in the media.
A fancy car pulled up at the end of the walkway for the married couple to get into.
"It's freezing," said an older man near them. "I hope they hurry."
"Why don't you wait inside, or better yet, already walk to the reception?" she suggested. "Unless you really want to see this?"
The old man lowered his voice. "We'll have to spend more time outside later, I've been told. I want to go in and have a schnapps."
Anna Margaret was more in favour of walking than standing in the cold herself. "Then let's go."
"What about your prince?"
"He'll come if he wants to." She pulled Frederick's coat.
"Where are you going?" he asked.
"We are already going to walk. Are you coming?"
"Go right ahead. It won't be long now. I'll take a picture and catch up later. I know it's cold, but we can't all leave."
That was true. There were supposed to be people there when the couple came out. The planner had planned it that way. "OK." She consulted the map on her invitation. "That way, I think."
"So you are George's boss, are you?"
"Yes and you are George's..." She assumed, at least, that he belonged to George's side of the family.
"Grandfather. On his mother's side."
"Nice to meet you."
"Likewise, likewise. Everybody is always asking more about you than about his job."
"Even after the first time? I didn't know I continued to be so interesting. It's not as if I have weekly fits of ridiculousness." She thought she never had them.
"Oh, no! Not weekly! Ha ha, joking!"
They crossed the street and turned right. "I couldn't imagine what it would be."
"No, you seem to be pretty normal."
"Thank you."
"Or George doesn't tell us. He didn't tell us about the prince either. He only confirmed it when we had all read about it."
They turned into a side street. It was one-way. No wonder they were supposed to walk to the venue. "It was also not that exciting," said Anna Margaret.
"Not? He was the king."
She shrugged, wishing she had a hat. The melting snowflakes felt cold on her head.
"But he's not jealous. He lets you walk away with other men."
She suppressed a comment about his age. Of course Frederick would not mind this. She doubted he would even mind her walking away with a younger man. He could trust her.
"I hope they have a schnapps," he said. "Or something to warm me up."
"What did you think of the ceremony?"
"Very nice, very nice. It was a good speaker. But of course Joel will know some of those more theatrical types."
"Joel's nice." She would not call him a theatrical type and the speaker had not been one either - not really - although perhaps it depended on what you were used to. Some parts of the day might be a little over the top to George's older relatives.
"A very nice boy," George's grandfather agreed. "Is this where we go? Those balloons?"
That was one of the things that might be over the top, she reflected with a smile. They entered the conference centre and one of George and Joel's friends was already there to show them the way. The young woman looked a little surprised, however, to see them first. "Grandpa?"
"It's cold outside!"
"It is! But we had expected George and Joel to come first, so they can take up a position in the room to receive everyone. I don't mind if you go in already, but stay to the side."
"Do they have schnapps for me and my friend?"
"Oh, no schnapps for me!" Anna Margaret said quickly. "But maybe we should get rid of our coats first? Let's find the cloakroom."
She hung up her coat and then found a seat to the side, as the young woman had asked. George's grandfather ordered a schnapps and a coke from a waitress who did not seem ready yet, but who was nevertheless willing to bring them something to drink.
"Brilliant," said the old man. "Now we can just sit and watch everyone come in and queue and we shall already have our drink. Why do you drink cola? You're young but not that young. You should have a distinguished drink."
"You should meet my grandmother-in-law."
"Who's that?"
"Or are you married?" She had not yet wondered about a wife.
"I'm a widower. I don't think my late wife would have let me go for a schnapps. Do you let your prince?"
"Er...I've never seen him drink schnapps. He doesn't drink at all, actually. An occasional beer, but I think it might even have been non-alcoholic." She had not felt the urge to check. She watched as the staff prepared the room for the imminent guests by straightening chairs and setting out trays with snacks. The waitress who had brought them drinks also set a tray on their table. She checked what was on it, but it looked safe enough to eat and she was starving. Already.
After a few minutes George and Joel came in. George made a little detour past her table. "Did Grandpa kidnap you, Madam?"
"I volunteered to accompany him," she said, standing up. If she congratulated them now, she would not have to queue. It was not that she could not queue - she was not that pregnant - but if she could avoid it, she would. Of course if Frederick decided to join the line, she might too. He was not here yet. "Congratulations. It was a lovely ceremony. Very...er...can I say entertaining? I don't know if it was supposed to be entertaining."
"Thank you. We liked it too."
"But we hoped we would," said Joel. "I'm very happy you could make it. You got married too last week. Congratulations. Where is your husband?"
"He's probably walking here right now."
"He let you go with Grandpa?" George chimed in.
"Sure, why not?"
George and Joel took up their spots at the end of the room and she sat down again, wondering when Frederick would make it. He would walk faster than some of the their guests, but he would not run ahead of everybody.
Finally when some people had already come in, she saw him. She half rose from her chair to wave at him.
Frederick handed her his phone as he sat down beside her. "There. Look up what you missed."
She checked the short video. "Nice." She took another snack. It would be some time until dinner and she did not even know how much she would be getting there.
"So...Thunder?"
"He's not done it again," she said regretfully. "I don't think he'll do it if I ask. I'm sure the frequency will increase so that at some point you can catch him."
Frederick watched the line that was forming in front of the couple. "Of course there are people who leave after the reception. We should let them go first. We'll talk to the couple later."
"I just talked to them very briefly."
"We should sign the book."
"Which book?"
"As we came in, we were told there was a book in which we could leave a personal message." He looked around. "I'm not sure where. Maybe just outside, so people see it when they leave."
"A guestbook. I don't want to be the first. Everyone would read it."
"That's the idea, yes. You don't have to sign with your name. If you wrote a recognisable message you could simply sign You Know Who."
"Except if they see me write."
"Then do it now. When everyone is inside. No one will leave yet."
It was a lovely book. It would not do to cross out words. This had to be right immediately. Anna Margaret picked up the pen, which was chained to the book with a silver chain.
"Or you could write on a page in the middle," Frederick suggested.
She contemplated doing it, but in some way she would feel incredibly silly if she did that. No, she would go on the second page. Someone had already beaten them to it. If she left blank pages in between, people might think they had to do that too.
Dear George and Joel,
We wish you all the happiness in your married life.
George, you were there when I met my husband.
Yes, I have to thank you for not talking her out of that 6am run. That changed our lives.
And now we're even writing messages together. Hoping you will have similar fun,
You Know Who
and You Also Know Who
Anna Margaret critically judged their handwritings. They wrote neatly enough, although she never managed to write really elegantly without effort. Someone had that skill, others forever wrote like schoolgirls.
But it had worked - they had been alone when they had signed the book.
"I'm so hungry," she whispered to Frederick as they returned to the main hall. She looked for the most accessible plate of snacks. Unfortunately she would have to sit or stand at a table with others, but they might wonder why she ate so much.
Frederick guided her by pushing her in the back towards one of the standing tables. Apparently he had not only looked at the plates because when Anna Margaret tore her eyes away from the blocks of cheese she found she had met at least one of the persons standing at the table before. It was Clara, who hosted Time For Coffee.
"Sorry," Anna Margaret apologised with a confused smile. "I hadn't seen you. I was looking at the snacks." She shook hands with Clara and the man with her, who was introduced as her partner. Anna Margaret introduced Frederick as hers.
"But you were on my show," said Clara. "I remember that."
Anna Margaret decided she could now safely eat some cheese. Frederick would have to answer if her mouth was full. She realised there had to be people from her office here somewhere, but that she had been too focused on food. Eventually she spotted them somewhere behind her. Frederick would not have recognised them, so he would not have thought to take her there. "Sorry, people I work with. I wondered where they were."
"I mean, people George works with," Anna Margaret corrected herself. "We have some overlap, but I don't work with all of them directly myself. Do you still work with Joel?"
"Sometimes. He's our regular stand-in. They appreciated his getting you for the show. They're always asking him if he can't get you again."
"I appreciate the fact that he's never asked me," Anna Margaret said with a smile. At least Joel would not do anything to get ahead. She approved of that. "Is there anything new to talk about?"
Frederick nudged her. "You got married."
"Yes, but how is that exciting to someone else?"
"You'd be surprised." He took out his phone. "Florian posted this picture of us and it had 1400 likes the last time I checked."
"I don't think Clara's programme would be happy with only 1400 viewers. But what do you mean, Florian posted a picture? Is he on social media?" Did his mother let him? She would expect there to be rules. They might have someone post updates for them, just like Frederick used to have, but letting young people manage their own official account was asking for trouble.
"Everyone is on social media except you. He was there, he took a picture and he waited a few days but then he posted it online." He looked it up.
"People like that because it's somewhat artsy, not because it's us in it," she decided after studying it. The light was great. She wondered if Isabelle had known about this in advance. It had seemed a strange location for a wedding until now. It could be a coincidence, or either Isabelle or Florian were brilliant planners.
"It has comments."
"I'm staying away from comments. They bring out the worst in me. I'd want to reply and I shouldn't." She handed back the phone and watched as he showed it to Clara and her husband. Although she was kissing in the photo, she felt little embarrassment. You could hardly see it was her anyway.
"That's the dress you're wearing in the family photos." Clara appeared to have studied them well.
"Yes, it was the same morning."
"I suppose you got lots of people asking you why you married in private."
She picked a glass of juice off a tray that a waitress carried around. "Oh, all week. I don't think we could have done it differently. While it's nice to attend this type of wedding, in practice we could not have done it like this ourselves. It would have turned out public anyway. Even now I saw photographers outside. There would have been even more if we had done it this way."
"But your family," Clara said to Frederick, "didn't they want a say in it?"
"They did," he smiled. "My sister had a say in it."
"Really?"
"The whole family is fine with my preferences except my grandmother. I got quite a speech from her last week. You should invite her for a chat - monologue, by the way. No need to ask anything. She will talk. It will be entertaining."
Anna Margaret was appalled. "No!"
Frederick laughed. "What do you think she will say?"
"She likes to stir things up." She did not think it was a good idea to let her appear on a talkshow. "Do you work in television as well?" she asked Clara's partner.
"No, I work for the town."
She was sure she had seen his face before. It must have been in a work-related setting then, but 'for the town' was very vague. It led her to think it was either not something that sounded good compared to the jobs of the others at the table, or something he felt she ought to know.
"Ha, I know where," Frederick said surprisingly.
"How can you know?" she wondered.
"One of my previous jobs...it didn't last long but I did pay attention now and then. Oh and it's in your line of work in some way."
Clara's partner seemed to think it funny as well.
Anna Margaret felt a bit left out, but she never begrudged people an innocent joke at her expense. She merely smiled graciously instead of demanding to be clued in and ate another block of cheese.
"There's a girl looking at you and looking lost," said Frederick. "Do you know her?"
"It's one of the interns," answered Anna Margaret, looking in the direction he indicated.
"She looks as if she doesn't know anybody."
"That's possible. She only just started." She beckoned the girl, who looked alarmed but who approached nevertheless. "Hi. Did you only just arrive?"
"No, I went to the toilet and when I came back they were gone." The girl looked around wildly.
"They are -" Anna Margaret looked towards where she had last seen them. "They were there. I...have no idea where they went. They were there a few minutes ago. They can't have left yet."
"No, we still have to give the gift," said the girl.
"They might be signing the book," Frederick suggested and pointed. "It's out the other door."
"Oh, thank you. I'll have a look there."
"That's how I would look if you left the room without me," he commented as the girl hurried there.
"Seriously." She wondered if he was implying she should on no account leave him alone at this reception, but she was sure he would manage. It was immensely frustrating to be told it would be all right, she knew, especially when someone had no confidence in this matter, but she did not think that was still the case here. It might be so for Julia the intern and he might simply be showing he understood - or explaining how awful it really was to have this condition.
"Seriously," he confirmed. "At least nowadays they invented phones to mask our utter despair."
She patted his arm. "I'll take you with me if I go to the toilet, all right?"
"Very nice of you. She's not coming back. I might have been right. I couldn't imagine what they'd be doing otherwise. She looked a bit afraid to approach you."
"She's only been there for like two weeks. They always stay out of my way in the first weeks. I'm not sure why." She made some comments about the town and the venue, which led to some more conversation. See, it was easy.
"The queue is getting shorter," Clara's partner said to her after a while. "Shall we?"
Anna Margaret supposed they were not staying for dinner. She would wait a bit herself because they had plenty of time. "Nice man," she said to Frederick when the couple had left them. "But do tell me what I'm supposed to know him from."
"I don't know if you are, but he's a mayor."
"A mayor? Really?" She studied his back. "Now that you mention it. Not from my party, obviously."
"I hope not," Frederick commented. "Because you're probably obliged to recognise them."
"Yes and luckily I think I do! We have gatherings and annual conferences. And half of them go to parties at my parents' house."
"We've never been."
"No, sorry. I declined the last two or three times. I know it's just down the street, but it was too late for me and too alcohol-centred." She checked her phone. "I think there's one invitation I've yet to respond to. It's when I get back from China, so I'll have to give a response before I leave. You tell me. Drinks again, but they know we're pregnant now. It would be easier to go without drinking."
"We could give it a try. I could always put you to bed earlier and test the baby monitor."
"Funny. Let's join George's grandfather." She pulled Frederick with her when she saw two vacant chairs at George's grandfather's table. She would like to sit down. "How was your schnapps, sir?" she asked. When she had left him he had not yet finished, but now he had.
"Thank you for asking. I'm not driving, so I'm letting it sink in and then I'll have another at the dinner party. I'll be dancing like mad tonight."
"Dancing! You're staying for the party?" She was amazed. She had been expecting only young people to stay for that.
"You're not?"
"No, I like to go to bed early."
"A prime minister? I always hear they work late."
While that might have been the case with some of her predecessors, she had always walked home at a decent hour if there were no meetings. "I start very early."
"I'm surprised you're so boring. Don't you dance?"
"I can't remember when I danced last."
"And His Royal Highness?" When Frederick was with them in person he did apparently not dare to speak of him as 'your prince'.
"A few months ago with my sister."
"Your sister!"
"She made me."
"But you don't dance either?"
"Not really."
"Not even together?"
They looked at each other. "Er...no?" said Anna Margaret.
"But we'll go running at seven tomorrow morning," Frederick commented. "Together."
"At seven!" George's grandfather shuddered.
"Or maybe eight if we're lazy."
"Why so early?"
"I want to go shopping in Maastricht," Anna Margaret explained.
"That's a bit far."
"But it's open on Sundays."
"Awful. I heard that the city is open on Sundays as well nowadays." The old man shook his head at this despicable development.
"Yes, some things are, but I can't go there. At least abroad no one will know me." She wondered if Isabelle would like to come. It was even more important for her sister-in-law to be able to shop in peace.
Frederick had wondered for about two seconds if he wanted to come shopping after Isabelle said she would come, but then he had declined the invitation. On Sunday morning it was therefore only Anna Margaret and Isabelle who took their places in the car. They had chosen to be driven, not knowing how tired they might be afterwards.
"What do you need?" Isabelle asked.
"Shirts, I think. If you buy them online you never know how they will look."
"It's good that I'm with you and not with Frederick. I don't know how critical he would be."
"Not much."
"I need some new ones for next week. At home I can simply wash them very quickly and alternate them, but I won't be able to have anything laundered in China. We're only staying everywhere for one night."
"Don't you fit anything anymore?" Isabelle studied Anna Margaret critically. "I'll take your word for it, but I don't see it from here."
Anna Margaret held her fingers a few centimetres apart. "If my buttons need to cover this more distance, they still struggle. What about you?"
"I can always find something in any shop for myself or the children, so I have no particular list."
"But you can't be seen in clothes you wore thirteen years ago." Not only would someone have documented them - there were nutcases like that - but they would look outdated.
Isabelle gave that a confident shrug. "I don't have those anymore anyway, except dresses for special occasions. You don't give those away to staff. Still, what someone is wearing during her fifth child is not that interesting. I doubt anyone took note of it, so if I still have something I could still wear it."
It turned out they were not the only shoppers, even though it was cold. Anna Margaret had never been shopping with a 'tail', but Isabelle had two women with her, who did not attract any attention among other women looking at maternity wear. Even bored-looking men might not have looked out of place. But at any rate they simply followed unobtrusively and Anna Margaret only noticed them because they had been in the car with them.
When they were having a cup of tea after the first shop - it was some time since they had left home, after all - Isabelle sighed. "I'm beginning to have my doubts about the clinic."
"Why? I thought you were happy with it. The privacy and everything."
"Yes, they do that well, but...they don't seem to take into account that I've already borne five children."
"What do you mean?"
"I was having babies when my doctor was in primary school. I don't think she ever sees many unproblematic pregnancies, because they are with the midwives, so she's always expecting problems. The fact that I have experience doesn't seem to count for much. She is focusing too much on my age, but the risk is much less if it's not an older mother's first child."
Anna Margaret listened. She had never investigated the matter more deeply herself than sometimes reading articles in the paper that mentioned how it was not a good thing that women had their children later these days.
"I have the feeling she's doing a lot of things 'just to be safe' when they're not really necessary," Isabelle went on. "I'm not sure it's because of who I am or because of how old I am. Or both."
"Or because of money."
"That's not an easy thing to bring up in conversation, but it did cross my mind. Let's to be safe, subject her to a lot of tests and hospitalisations, and make money while we're doing so. They would never have to admit the measures were unnecessary, because obviously I'm in a high-risk category, objectively speaking."
"Do you have a team of doctors there or just one?"
"Just one who does the boring things - the youngest, probably - but I know she confers with the head of the department, who was already there during my other pregnancies, although he wasn't the head then. I saw him only on my first visit. Of course after the birth all the credit will go to him. That's how it goes. There are always more high-ranking people present at the birth than you've ever seen before. Well, they try. I managed to bring down that number a little more every time."
"So..." Evidently she was not entirely satisfied, but what options did she think she had? Anna Margaret could only think of switching hospitals completely.
"I'd like to get a second opinion. But I don't know where. I don't know anything about public health services."
Anna Margaret checked her schedule on her phone. "I have an appointment next Monday. When I get back from China. Maybe bring your file and come with me?"
"What do you mean, bring my file?"
"I have an envelope with my file in it. Well, a sort of card. They mark my progress on it. I always have to carry it with me in case something happens, but I haven't begun to do so yet because...well, I don't expect anything to happen and it's in my work bag so I don't forget to take it to actual appointments."
"I don't have anything. Except photos I took with my phone of the results when she was out of the room."
"You..." Anna Margaret bit her lip as she imagined that happening. "Bring that."
The nice thing about sitting here was that no one could follow them if they came close enough. There would also be very few people who would recognise them. They would see her first, thought Anna Margaret, since Isabelle was wearing glasses. "Do you usually wear contacts?" she asked.
"No, these are just glass. I have reading glasses, though."
"I know." She had seen those.
"It's purely a disguise. Because of the type of shops we go to." Outside she had also worn a woollen hat. Nobody would find that odd; it was cold.
Anna Margaret reviewed her purchases. A light pink blouse and a white shirt that would go well with a business suit. They had not had suitable trousers, so she would still have to look for one or two she could grow into. Isabelle had not yet bought anything. Anna Margaret wondered if she had a more expensive taste than had been available in the first shop they had come across. "Don't you need clothes?"
"I do."
"But you didn't buy anything."
"No. I heard people talk when you were trying on the shirts. We're not the only ones who drove all this way here to go shopping."
"Did they recognise us?"
"No. I'll have a look at clothes in the next shop. If they follow the same route they should be out of that shop by then. Unless our entire country has a great need to shop on Sundays and they are all here, but I didn't see that many of our number plates."
"Oh I thought the shop might not have been expensive enough."
"I don't care," Isabelle assured her. "As long as it's nice and good quality."
After finishing their tea they continued down the street, once stopping to decide on how to tackle the extended shopping area. Towards the end of the street they encountered a small shop with children's clothing. Even Isabelle got something there, but Anna Margaret was sure that was mostly because she had been urged to do so.
They crossed the river and got some baby basics on the other side as well as the trousers Anna Margaret was still looking for. She was pleased to notice that Isabelle finally seemed to get into the shopping mood. First there had been some hesitation, but once she had got some things for the baby she got the hang of it.
In the end they had a more or less complete maternity wardrobe and Anna Margaret was pleased that Isabelle had pointed out the existence of nursing bras and shirts to her, because she had never heard of them before. There were other items on which she had taken notes so she could order them online. It was hard to carry it all back across town as it was, after all, but at least they would not have to do anything anymore in the car and they could rest.
"I've spent more in these past months than I've done in the rest of my life," said Anna Margaret. And she knew there would be lots more to buy in the next few weeks.
"Just wait until they start secondary school or university," Isabelle smiled. "At least the stuff you got now could be used for every next child."
"I was going to say I'll be nearly thirty-eight when this one comes along, but of course that's not a valid argument for you anymore now."
"Apparently not. But you make enough money."
"Yes," Anna Margaret sighed. "I could probably afford it."
"And if you can't, you let us know."
"No. I can't do that if I feel objections to giving my sister large gifts simply because I'm expected to on account of my higher income."
"The key word is being expected to. But it's all academic. You won't need money. Unless Frederick decides to build a five-star hotel next to his rowing course, but I doubt it. Philip has his expenses in hand."
"Philip?"
"What did you think he does all day? He manages our money. If after you've bought everything you have some money left he can manage it for you as well."
Frederick took her to the airport on Monday. The government plane was not suitable for far trips to China, so she would be taking a regular flight and not even a direct one at that. She was expected to arrive on Tuesday morning. Frederick dropped off at the VIP service where the travelling party were supposed to present themselves.
He would pick her up again on Sunday. She wondered what he would do in the meantime, but he said he did not yet know. Soon she was among her colleagues and staff. As soon as they got off the plane their programme would start, so these spare moments were supposed to be used to prepare themselves. Fortunately the fast reader could get it all done before bedtime.
Anna Margaret was nevertheless exhausted when she was woken the next morning. Before they were picked up they would first get the opportunity to refresh themselves and have some breakfast in the VIP lounge. It would be awful to start the day in the clothes she had slept in.
On the return trip she slept better because she was more tired. They had to change planes twice, once in China and once in Europe and she changed into fresh clothes for that last hour. Although she had had two hours off for shopping, like on a school trip, she had not bought any clothes for herself in China. Her interpreter had shown her a few amazing shopping areas, but she had chosen to stick to two small baby items because they took up less room in her luggage.
Of course instead of the plush panda she could have squeezed in some other things, but the panda had been pretty much inevitable in the area they had visited. Half of her group now went home with pandas of varying sizes, although Patrick had said she had now outed herself as being pregnant. She did not know about that. Nobody else had said anything about it.
Due to the time difference she had not exchanged many messages with Frederick, so she was very pleased to see him. He had taken his mother to Germany in her absence and he had only just returned the night before himself.
"What did you think, if I'm alone I might as well go?" she asked, hooking her arm through his. She had already known, of course, because he had messaged her about it.
"They're family. I have to visit them sometimes. They were sorry I didn't bring you."
"But they're not close relatives, aren't they?" It would be something like aunts and uncles and cousins. She could not imagine them to be enormously interested in her.
"We stayed with my mother's sister and all her children came to dinner. Not on the same day, but they all came."
"How old are they?"
"Around my age. It's a younger sister of my mother's. Most of them have small children."
"Did you get some practice playing with them?"
"Only a little bit. But I took pictures of all of them so you will know who they are if you see them. They invited me for Christmas, but I had to say I wasn't sure you'd like to sit in the car for that long by then."
"Ah, so they know."
"Well, the cousin who invited me does."
"I bought a plush panda, so it seems some more people know now as well because apparently I would not have bought it otherwise. And Isabelle is no closer to announcing the news?"
"I didn't talk to her about it this week. But we have some socialising to catch up on."
Anna Margaret was amazed. "You?" She wondered if he wanted to do this himself, or if he felt other people expected it of him.
"Well, it's true," he defended himself. "We haven't received any people at home either because we were busy."
And she was always busy on work days, so that most of their time together and the time they had to work on the house had been during the weekend, and they had consequently kept this time free. She had always thought he preferred it that way as well. "What do you propose?"
"A dinner party in December at our place?"
It was December. "For whom?"
"We'll have to think about that."
"And who's cooking?"
"You could help me."
Anna Margaret made a sound that approximated a snort.
"You could."
"How many people?" She was sure she could not. He had had that barbecue at the Palace, but he had had food brought in then. If he was thinking of the same number of people now he would have to do the same.
"Have you never entertained?"
"For about four people at most."
"So we could do eight?"
Anna Margaret had passed the time of her appointment on to Isabelle. It was now up to her to find a way to get there unnoticed. Isabelle did not seem to think so, however, because an hour before the appointment she presented herself in Anna Margaret's office.
"Er..." said the latter, taken aback because she had not expected the visit. "They're not making house calls, you know. Now I have to smuggle you across town."
"If you can smuggle yourself across town I'm sure you can smuggle me."
"That depends on how you arrived here. Fancy car and police outriders?" Now she had never seen such a thing, but one never knew. The distance was also too short for an entire convoy, but maybe Isabelle had arrived from somewhere else.
"No, very low-key. I don't know if you noticed, but it's snowing. Everyone is hidden under hats and scarves."
"All right. Then we might make it unseen." Anna Margaret wondered if Isabelle realised they would go on foot. "But people know you are here."
"Yes. It's surprisingly impossible to get into this building without identifying yourself."
"That's to prevent undesirable elements from bothering me."
"It would help to have someone at the desk who actually recognises well-known people."
Anna Margaret thought it might help if well-known people were actually recognisable and not hidden under scarves and hats, but she did not know how Isabelle had come in. "Maybe it was the same guy who told Frederick to wait because he had been running and he didn't have any ID on him."
"Frederick," said his sister, as if this was to be expected of him.
"He didn't mind. But you did carry some ID?" She was curious about that - and about what was on it.
"Of course. When do you leave?"
"In forty-five minutes." She eyed her work. "Would you like something to drink?"
"No, thank you. Can I just walk around all these rooms here?" Isabelle gestured around.
"And unnerve everyone by looking over their shoulders? Be my guest."
"I won't look at what they're doing. I need to see how much room you've got here."
"For what?"
Isabelle waved at her. "Work on. I'll tell you later."
"That's a good way to stay incognito."
"There are more important things than that." Isabelle deposited her outdoor clothes on the couch and left the room, leaving Anna Margaret a little baffled.
When it was time to leave, Isabelle had still not returned. Anna Margaret peered out of the door, to check whether she needed to pick up that coat and look for her, but she saw her sister-in-law chatting to George. They seemed to be having a good time. She would never have thought it of George, who still addressed her formally.
"We need to go," she announced.
"Thank you for the tea, George. It was very kind of you." Isabelle fetched her coat and joined Anna Margaret. "Are you taking a back door?"
"Yes. It's shorter too."
Anna Margaret noticed that two security types followed them. She wondered if they were not more noticeable with them than without, but she could hardly say they were not needed if she was ultimately responsible for Isabelle's safety.
She left the building through a side door. People watching - from where, though? - would only see two bundled-up women walking. Nobody would see who they were. People working here might know her coat, but they would not know her companion.
"I suppose the days when I could simply move around without anyone going with me will never return," Isabelle commented with a hint of sadness in her voice. "What sort of world will our children grow up in?"
"I...don't want to think about that much. At least I'm in a position to influence it a bit. For a bit. I won't be in this position for years."
"And while you are, you must make use of it. I examined the layout of the building and -"
"Don't tell me you have an app as well," she interrupted, although she had no idea what the app and the layout of the building had to do with their children's future.
"I do. Frederick put it on my phone ages ago."
"What did you use it for?"
"To map your workplace," Isabelle said cryptically.
"Why would you want to?"
Isabelle looked at her as if that was obvious.
Anna Margaret felt clueless. "Sorry, I don't see it. Is my desk in the wrong place?" She had moved it from where it had been before. Or rather, she had asked for strong men to move it to a place where the light was better, even if it then did not make it look to visitors as if she dominated the room. She had also made the room less brown. It had cost some money, but she had justified it by having to spend long days here. She could, however, not justify another overhaul of the office.
"It may be. I looked at who you could most easily move in order to make room for the baby's room."
"Baby's room? At my office?"
"Yes. While you could put it next to your desk, you may not get much work done. There's this nice little niche off the anteroom that might be suitable. There's now a reading corner, but that might move to the corridor. I don't think many people read there anyway."
"Suitable for..."
"A playpen if you need to be elsewhere."
"And why..." Anna Margaret inquired carefully. She did not want to offend and ask why Isabelle seemed to want to reorganise her workplace. "...would you be looking at these things?"
"Well, I was thinking we need to make our time-consuming engagement asynchronous, so that I can take your son when you're busy and you can take mine when I am. I think it would be better for them if they were together, rather than each of them alone. It wouldn't be every day, but sometimes only. Assuming, of course, that mine is delivered without problems."
"Ah." She needed some time to process that, but she was not really given it.
"It may, of course, be more work for you to have two babies at work than one. It may not work out in practice. I mean, you can have one in your lap while you read, but hardly two. And you will almost certainly need someone to look at the baby or babies if you have a meeting."
"But you would actually trust me - or my office - with your son?" The idea of the queen's son being kept in a niche of George's room was faintly hilarious. It was not what people would expect.
"Why not? Would you not trust me with yours?"
"I would."
"And you need a fridge in your room to keep the milk cold. At least you have your own office."
"And you have thought about this?"
"Someone should." Isabelle implied that Anna Margaret had not.
Which was not entirely true, although she had certainly not considered it in as much depth as her sister-in-law. She had had vague notions of putting a cot by her desk and looking into it now and then, but she had not yet thought of what would happen if she received people who found the presence of small creatures disturbing.
"I'll whip something up in the app," said Isabelle, "and print it out. Assuming this app is user-friendly. Frederick says it is, but I'm not as savvy as he is."
"Does he know what you needed it for?" If so he had not told her.
"No, I've had it for a while. I never saw any use for it until I got to your office and it suddenly struck me."
As they had been talking, they had covered a good deal of the distance. Anna Margaret always chose the last appointment of the day, so there would be fewer people in the waiting room. She had done the same this time. It meant that it was an hour at which some people were already leaving work and the streets were pretty crowded for this kind of weather. But they had hats pulled down low and scarves pulled up high.
"I used to live here," Anna Margaret gestured to the right,
"That's a very ordinary building."
"It is, but it served my purpose. I didn't need anything bigger. And it was close to work."
"A lot of your colleagues have bigger houses."
She knew; she had been to a few. "A lot of them have bigger countries as well."
"But it would have been difficult to invite people."
"There are restaurants to take them to."
"But in your new house you can receive people."
"You've been talking to Frederick, haven't you? He wants us to cook for eight people." Or so he had said. He might increase the number if she said yes to eight. What difference could two more make, right?
"Poor dear. Order in?"
"I'd hate to admit defeat."
"You can't excel in everything. I couldn't do it either," said Isabelle, implying perhaps unwittingly that she excelled at a lot of other things. "Not a three-course dinner for eight, anyway. Although three courses won't be too complicated if you have cans of soup and -"
"Cans?" Anna Margaret was amused. Surely the queen did not serve canned soup?
"It's a lot quicker than making soup from scratch, which I would never attempt in a million years."
"Do you ever attempt to cook at all? I really have no idea."
"There was a time that I tried, but it may be too much information as to why I got distracted and why the food got burnt, and why every single time I try again I must be reminded of this. Anyway, I wouldn't ever try to cook if I had guests. The children will eat simple food. They don't care. Florian should learn, but he avoids cooking. He either eats with us or at the university. I'd say the quality of my cooking will be about equal to large-scale meals provision, though."
"He could be bored on his own."
"He was the one who liked the idea of moving into Frederick's apartment."
"Maybe you should invite yourself to dinner. Oh, this is where we go in." Anna Margaret walked to the door and went inside.
"Here? This looks like a house."
She supposed it had once been a house, so that was why it still looked like one from the outside. She nodded at the woman behind the reception desk and proceeded to the waiting room. There was no one there. "Sit here," she said. "I have to get myself weighed."
"Weighed. Oh my goodness. What for?"
Anna Margaret took off her coat. "Don't you have to do that?"
"I said no thanks. I weigh myself at home. Not too often. But it's nobody's business how much I weigh."
"Hmm." She went back to reception with her card, so her weight could be noted down. It was nobody's business how much she weighed either, but nobody was told except people who might draw important conclusions from it. Then again, if this was Isabelle's sixth longer pregnancy she might well be able to draw conclusions from her weight gain or loss herself.
She did not like this weight gain either, as it had again increased a tiny bit since last time, but it happened to everyone here. The assistant saw it every day she worked. She took the card back to Isabelle, who was still in her coat. "It's hot here. Take it off. It wouldn't be considered odd for you to be here. We're now related. A lot of people come with a relative."
"True." Isabelle removed her coat. "But dear me, do they really weigh everyone in public?"
"It's not as if they yell my weight across the waiting room. Did you hear anything?"
"No."
"So it's just me and the assistant who know. And the midwives when they look at the card."
Isabelle picked up some leaflets from a rack and put them in the pocket of her coat. She seemed to find her foray into the public health system rather interesting.
It was Maya who called them in. Anna Margaret had seen Maya once before. She should; she would never know who was on duty the moment she went into labour, so it was useful to have seen them all at least once before. "I brought my sister-in-law," she said.
"Welcome," said Maya, who did not seem to know who she was greeting. Or perhaps someone announced as s sister-in-law should be treated like any other sister-in-law.
First she did all the usual things to Anna Margaret and Isabelle watched. After this Isabelle asked about the possibility of a consultation and she explained why.
Maya looked as if she could not decide what surprised her most: that this was actually the queen or that she appeared to be pregnant. "Are you...pregnant?"
"Things apparently still worked," answered Isabelle. "But I should like you to examine me in an unbiased way and tell me if you see any risks. Without wondering if it'll be the end of your career if this pregnancy goes wrong. I simply cannot shake off that suspicion when it comes to the clinic."
"Do you have a card? They don't always provide them in hospitals."
"Anna Margaret told be about her card. It was the first I ever heard of one. So no, I don't. I have a photo of the file on my phone." She gave it to Maya.
Maya squinted at it. "Can you email that to me so I could see it on a big screen?" She wrote down her email address.
Isabelle sent it.
"Thanks. I'll have a look at it when it comes in. I'll do your blood pressure first." With one hand she opened her email and waited. "Your blood pressure is fine today." She looked at her computer screen. "But these are your previous values, as far as I can tell."
"I was hospitalised because of them two weeks ago."
Maya traced the figures for two weeks ago with her finger. Anna Margaret suspected that Isabelle would like Maya to say the figures were all fine. She could see them, but they had never meant anything to her. She had always forgotten in which range they ought to be by the time of the next visit - by the time they moved onto another subject, really. She hoped for Isabelle's sake that Maya really did not consider them worrisome, since Isabelle was determined to prove the private hospital wrong.
"I wouldn't have gone so far as to advise that," Maya said eventually, "but I would have monitored you more often."
"I can measure myself at home. It's always much lower there. Until Philip hid the damn thing."
Isabelle had been checked out and although there was no record of how she had been before, she had been considered fine. She had paid for the consultation in cash, not wanting to register at the practice. After this she had walked with Anna Margaret back to the office.
"I may now have to find someone to break the news," she said.
Anna Margaret wondered why one visit had made such a difference. Surely Maya had not looked at anything that was not covered during Isabelle's regular visits? "Who or what were you thinking of?"
"I'm going to have to write it down. Say, I'd do it, what would I say, how would people react? Say you'd do it, what would you say, how would people react? And then for everybody I could think of and then make the best choice. Suppose Frederick did it, he would look annoyed and say 'so yes, my sister and my wife are pregnant.' And then everyone would be waiting for the rest, but he wouldn't know what else to say."
That might happen, Anna Margaret agreed, unless he was coached. "And how would I do it? I'm curious."
"I can't decide. Either you'd be all girly or you'd be overly business-like because you didn't want to appear too girly."
Anna Margaret considered that. She had never been girly while making announcements, not even when she had said she was in a relationship with Frederick. "I have no idea. By the way, are you operating on the premise that whoever announces it, announces both pregnancies?"
"I was. You could hardly announce yours and not know I'd have a similar announcement to make."
"The public always suspects politicians of knowing far more than they let on anyway. I doubt anyone would be surprised if I neglected to mention something I already knew. But rationally thinking I agree with you. Who, by the way, is your replacement? Do you have maternity leave? I could at least announce that for health reasons I'll be taking some leave. But I wouldn't go on television for that. Do we have to? Wouldn't Facebook suffice?"
"Facebook. Seriously."
"There's an official account, I've been told."
"And there are unofficial accounts." Isabelle paused. "If our official account posted that we were pregnant, the public would think we got hacked."
"You could have them post that one picture of the two of us during the photo session, with a good text to go with it."
"You know, people's idea of a good text differs somewhat. You have no idea what rubbish I see on my timeline. And it's all written by relatives."
"Timeline?" Anna Margaret nearly had a fit of hysteric laughter, but she was in the street, so she suppressed the urge.
"My Facebook timeline. My private Facebook timeline? Oh for god's sake, Anna Margaret, get yourself into the twenty-first century. Get yourself an account, befriend me, and judge for yourself whether you think someone in the family should be trusted with announcing this news."
It was beginning to be quite normal, walking through town with the king or queen. They were quite normal people, of course. Or so they thought. "What sort of texts would they come up with?" Anna Margaret supposed those would also be quite normal texts.
"I don't know. I only know it might not be suitable. But you think we won't have to go on TV?"
"I go on TV for some things, but not for everything. I don't always decide that myself. I wouldn't go for this. This is private. Did you announce your other pregnancies on TV?"
"No, but I wasn't the queen."
"I don't think it happens anywhere. It's faster to reach everyone through other channels. Assuming you think they have to know at all."
"They think they have to know," Isabelle corrected. "Although it might be a little odd if suddenly I appeared somewhere with a child, so they'd have a point. But she who doesn't do social media, says social media?"
"I don't personally do it. It's being done for me. I have no time."
"Or so you think. I'd add you. Unless you'd indiscriminately add every citizen and they would all see through my anonymised name."
"Which is?"
"I'll tell you when you sign up."
The next day she had a meeting with Louis to discuss which parts of her work he would take over during her maternity leave. The new thing was that their assistants were now present as well to note it all down. The pregnancy might be new to them.
"I have twelve weeks to go. I cannot say how the situation will develop," Anna Margaret said with a shrug. "But I do think it likely that I won't be completely absent in a few weeks."
"Are you aiming for a reduction in hours?"
"I think it would be wise first to reduce my work visits to leave more time for other matters." Usually she had one or two per week, but they also required preparation and briefing in advance. It would give her several hours if she skipped that. She usually enjoyed them, but they did take up a lot of time. "Of course I've already got some planned and I can still do those, but it would be best not to plan any new trips out of the office. Unless some sort of catastrophe happened, of course." And she could always plan last-minute ones if she felt up to it.
Her assistant Kristina noted this down and checked her schedule. "They should be blocked in six weeks' time?" she asked.
"Preferably."
"There's a period already blocked for flights?"
"George probably did that."
"I wonder why I never noticed."
"So." Anna Margaret had made a note herself. "I'll reduce the number of work visits. I could either use that time to prepare which work should be transferred or to go home if I need it. There is no official provision for pregnant ministers, which is both a good and a bad thing. But we'll evaluate that afterwards."
"I had looked that up," Louis confessed.
"So it allows me some flexibility. I'm entitled to being sick on full pay up to certain number of weeks. I'll have to look into that, but I doubt I'll reach the maximum. I don't plan to, at any rate. I don't plan to sit at home on full pay when I could just as easily come in and work. But since it will be on full pay, it actually doesn't matter money-wise how much I'll work. It will only matter workload-wise."
"But you don't know how you'll feel," said her assistant.
"No, I don't. So without an official maternity leave provision, there is nothing I could predict about my absence. I don't expect to become completely incapacitated, but you never know. I have been advised to take the baby to work some days." She kept an eye on Louis' face but he did not react. "As I'm in my office for a good part of the day and many meetings could be transferred to my office as well."
"There is a day care centre over at Health," Kristina offered helpfully.
"I don't need one; I have a husband. But in the first weeks it might be best to keep it with me as much as possible, so I could either stay home and skype, or I could come to the office and put the baby in a corner."
Louis gave this a funny look.
"What else?" Anna Margaret inquired.
"Nothing, nothing."
"I've had a list drawn up of all my tasks and responsibilities and I've already marked them according to their priority." She passed the photocopied list around. "It includes the frequency and the commitment in hours per week, on average."
"Women in Politics Work group?" Louis read up.
"Check the priority," she advised. "Although you're free to make it your top priority if you so desire. But there are several things like that. We could simply skip them. When it comes to the important things, I'd prefer not to travel to Brussels anymore in the last two weeks and any further is out of the question because I won't be allowed to fly, so those will be your things for certain."
"I don't suppose you could plan your labour so we know precisely when these two last weeks will be?"
"Louis, do you have children? Of course I can't."
"Make a schedule in which you start reducing your workload at eight weeks before your due date. First the work visits, for example. The next week something more. People need to know where they stand. I see your point of view, but it would be unworkable to wait each morning and see if you're fit enough to do your duties."
"I understand that and I did plan to go over this with you once a week to plan the week ahead. I think you're making more of this than there really is, because it would simply be the way it was when I was in China, except then twice or three times as long. I'll be in town. I can be emailed. I can be phoned. I could come over with the exception of one or two days."
"But you could have serious complications," said Kristina.
"Yes, I could die too. Louis could be run over by a bus tomorrow as well."
The others sighed.
"You managed China and other trips. This will only be a bit longer."
"This is a life-changing event," Kristina tried. "It does things to women, I've heard."
" Apparently pregnancies do things to women as well, so we can all conclude that I'm not a woman," Anna Margaret retorted. "So that I'll be just the same as before."
In the evening she had the drinks at her parents' house that she had not turned down. She was not really looking forward to it, but some degree of socialising with them could not be put off forever. It worried her slightly - or more than slightly if she was honest - that they might bring up her pregnancy, but her father at least might know how to be discreet.
She had hoisted herself into a dress after work and had a quick dinner with Frederick. She did not know how he felt. He had been the one to say they could give it a try, after all, and he seemed calm enough as they walked there.
"Just a few drinks," he said, squeezing her hand.
"Not too many, or I'll be up all night peeing. I think he's pressing down on my bladder."
"That's a good thing."
"No."
"It means he's growing. But get a drink you don't like. Then you won't drink of it."
"You didn't bring the baby monitor, did you?"
"No. There's no way I'm going to stay there alone."
She went into her parents' door. It was open to allow all the guests to come in or perhaps someone had just arrived who had not closed the door behind them. Her mother could be the perfect hostess. She greeted them warmly, although she did not take too many liberties with Frederick. There were other people still in the hall. If this was like other times, there would be about twenty people in all. Behind her, the next ones could already be seen, so her mother could not ask her anything personal.
She moved into the sitting room with Frederick. Some furniture had been moved aside so there was more room to stand. As always, a few waiters or waitresses had been hired to allow her parents to mingle with the guests. One such young man offered them a drink. She took a glass of water and then s
Anna Margaret felt it was some sort of duty to greet her sister before she talked to anyone else in the room and to inquire how she was doing. She carried her glass over to the couch and sat down, leaving a place for Frederick. "Hi Irene, how are you?"
Irene was not sitting very elegantly. "Fine, considering."
She could not remember how far Irene was, but her pregnancy probably had something to do with why she was not completely fine. "Four months?"
"Something like that. It gets hard." She eyed Anna Margaret suspiciously. "Mum told me you seem to be pregnant."
Of course as long as she did not wear maternity clothes with a colourful belt around her belly there must always be some doubt, Anna Margaret conceded. Personally she thought such belts came in once one had grown to balloon size, not before. "Yes, apparently."
"Is that a publicity stunt?"
It continued to be interesting. "How?"
"Do you have elections coming up?"
"Being pregnant is an advantage?" She would never have thought it.
"It could make you look more feminine - softer."
"Oh. Where's Nick, by the way?" She could not imagine he had been allowed to stay home. He would have been needed in some capacity. Either to drive the car or to fetch drinks.
"He's getting me some ice cream."
"Oh." All cliches would come true in this case. It was best not to say anything about it. She pulled the corners of her mouth into something that resembled a polite smile.
"And you don't seriously think I'm capable of getting her pregnant?" Frederick cut in. He sounded friendly, but since Anna Margaret had never known him to be fond of small-talk she seriously doubted that he had good intentions.
Irene looked a little taken aback by his interruption. "Well, it's just that she always seems to know how to get attention. She's got a talent for it, you could say."
"She has a lot of talents. That's why I got her pregnant."
"Oh look," said Anna Margaret, who felt she should step away from this conversation immediately or something very bad was going to happen. "It's our chairman. Of the party," she added for Frederick's benefit. She had no idea if he knew they had a chairman and who it was. "I should say hello."
"Of course," he said and stood up with her.
"Mathieu," she said, approaching the chairman. "Nice to see you. I don't think you've met Frederick yet, at least not in this capacity?"
Once the introductions to Mathieu and his wife were made, she wondered if she should tell him she was pregnant, but on second thought she decided he had nothing to do with the day to day running of the country. It would be nice of her to tell him, but unnecessary. Since they were acquaintances only, she decided not to tell him just yet. Although if he guessed, for some reason, she would not deny it. If she had now been in the position that she might be put forward for something, it would have been different. In such a case it would not be appreciated if she held back any information. But by now she had had the job for a while. There was nothing Mathieu could change.
Mathieu and his wife Cecilia were rather curious about Frederick, she could tell, perhaps because he was not too talkative. She did not think he was especially silent, but they might think otherwise. When he was taken away by her father - what on earth for? - Cecilia dared to speak about him.
"He seems a bit quiet," she said. "But your parents did say that."
"Yes, he's always a bit quiet," Anna Margaret replied. "They mentioned him then?" She could not really be surprised about that.
"Yes. We had already heard about him from your parents, of course," said Mathieu.
"It takes some getting used to, of course, such a son-in-law," said Cecilia.
"A quiet one?" Anna Margaret wondered.
"No, a prince. And all the rumours."
"I don't read those."
"Nobody knew if it was serious."
"That must have been such a strain on my parents," Anna Margaret said understandingly. "Throwing away my entire professional future over a man."
"Well, to be honest your father wasn't the only one in the party who was afraid of that," said Mathieu. "Several people were wondering what on earth you were doing. Luckily it was just before the summer and everyone went on a break."
"I know. Some dared to make inquiries. Directly or indirectly." She gave that a shrug. "It only goes to show that sexism is still rampant."
"Sexism?"
"Yup, sexism. But people seemed to have got over the shock." There might be a greater shock still to come, but she did not mention that. "When they saw it didn't affect my work."
"The opposition doesn't always care if it does."
"I'm glad we're still fairly decent in this country." She glanced around to see where her father had taken Frederick, but they were out of sight. "I wonder where my father went."
"He probably has a computer problem. That's what I always ask my sons or sons-in-law to look at."
"Could be. I doubt my mother would know how to fix that. Or my sister. My brother-in-law maybe, but he's been sent out to get ice cream." She frowned. She did not think they could be having a conversation Frederick enjoyed. Her father was still too formal.
"I heard your sister's pregnant," said Cecilia.
"There's no way of getting around that," Anna Margaret nodded. She looked at the couch, where Irene Louise was still pretending to go into premature labour if her ice cream did not arrive soon. She had sat up a little straighter, however, to speak to someone. "If someone doesn't notice, she's bound to tell them."
"Will you be attending the Christmas dinner?" Mathieu asked. Apparently talking about pregnant women was not his thing.
"I think I had about a dozen invitations for Christmas dinners at the last count. I cannot go to them all, but I haven't decided yet. Time and location will probably be deciding factors. And my weight," she said jokingly. "I don't think I'd be happy if I had to sit through six in a week. But there were still invitations coming in - even two balls! - so I was still waiting to decide. I can't remember if it was this bad last year. I doubt it."
"You came to the party's dinner last year."
"Yes, I thought I might have. But thanks for reminding me that I should look at all the invitations and respond to them this week. Christmas is too soon. Where is the dinner this year?"
"We got a chateau in France."
"Oh." Anna Margaret clicked her tongue. She supposed they might have exhausted all the local scenic locations, but France did not sound good. "If I've got a simultaneous even in town I'll prefer that." That would be at least an hour shorter, but probably more. She hoped they would not wonder why. By the time the dinner took place they would undoubtedly know why she could not make it, if she did not go. Isabelle could not suck in that belly forever and neither could she.
"Of course your schedule is always very busy," Cecilia nodded.
"I can say no to the social events and I have. We haven't really been to many in the last six months. Of course were busy moving into our new house and fixing it up."
"You did that yourselves?" They looked impressed.
"Some. Painting. Not the heavy things. But still. I didn't want to give up my weekends to attend some meaningless event. Not that they were all meaningless, but I had more meaningful things to do, I mean."
"You live in this street now, don't you?"
"That was a coincidence," she stressed. "I didn't do that on purpose. If anything, it was a strike against the house." Her parents appeared to have talked about a lot of things, including the house, but she had not yet discovered if they had also talked about her pregnancy.
"It could be useful to be so near."
She faked a smile. Did they know or did they not? "If their computer is broken."
"Your sister would like to live nearer, I heard."
"Oh, for babysitting purposes?"
"Yes. Your mother would like to do that, she said. Would you like to babysit your niece or nephew? Not that you have a lot of time for it."
Anna Margaret noted that apparently it was not yet really known what it was going to be, even if weeks ago her sister had decided it was going to be a boy. Or they did know and they had not disclosed it to others. "I don't think they would trust me with it." There. If they knew, they would contradict her, would they not?
Fortunately Frederick appeared again, as people only seemed to want to talk about things she would rather not talk about. "Back," he announced superfluously.
"What was it?"
"Patronage."
"Do you do that?"
"I have about a hundred, but they weren't looking for me in particular. My sister has bred a whole load of possible patrons all coming of age this decade."
Anna Margaret made an indistinct noise. The poor kids. But then again, they might like it and it might be expected of them to connect their name to something. "But a hundred."
"I don't know, really. It doesn't take me much time and if it makes those people happy..." He shrugged. "But I'm not taking on new ones unless I feel a special connection."
"Well, hello," said her father, who evidently first handled business before he greeted his relatives. "It's good to see you finally."
"You know why I didn't come before," she defended herself.
"Have you finished all the rooms?"
"Not exactly, but we're no longer painting or putting together furniture every weekend. A book case takes us half a day, sorry," she said for the benefit of the other people listening.
"That's because of your shelving system," said Frederick. "But I think we have one more bookcase to go."
Because he looked straight at her she gathered there was a special meaning behind his words. It was not just any bookcase. She smiled. "Oh, that one. That will take less time." They did not have any books for it yet, but there would undoubtedly be some. And it could hold toys too.
"Now about Christmas..." said her father.
"Party or family?" She wondered why everyone suddenly wanted to speak to her about Christmas. Granted, it was December, but there were other things to take care of first.
"Family."
"Not sure that will be fun. Can we talk about it later?"
"I agree with you, because Irene has already indicated that it will be too much for her to come and prepare a dish, so we probably won't be doing anything."
Anna Margaret was tired of it all. In three weeks Irene would not even be five months pregnant yet, yet it would already be impossible to sit through an informal Christmas dinner where everyone would be allowed to leave the table at any point. Even not bringing a dish would be negotiable, so that did not have to be a reason. "I'm sure she'd magically be capable if I hosted it somewhere impressive - which I won't do," she added quickly in case someone would think that an excellent plan.
Frederick clearly did not. "Thank you. That is someone I have no intention of inviting with all her fake pregnancy symptoms and nasty jealousy."
Anna Margaret's father looked surprised.
There were other people still standing with them, so Anna Margaret did not want to go into the issue too deeply or even at all. She felt Frederick's hand on her hip and she sipped her water. She was surprised he had said it, but not that he had been feeling it. She supposed he must have been seriously annoyed by her sister. Of course she had been too, but she knew from experience which effect different types of reactions had and so she often no longer reacted at all.
"I'm not going to cook some pregnancy-proof dinner," said Frederick.
"You would cook?" asked his father-in-law.
"For a small group of people, yes. But I will ask for help." He squeezed Anna Margaret's hip.
"Maybe you'll get it." She smiled and excused herself with a gesture. There were other people she knew. She was not planning on staying long, so she should at least try to speak to a few.
She looked for Frederick when she was ready to leave. "Are you all right?" she asked. He had been on his own for a while. Without her, that was. He had of course not been completely alone.
"Yes. Although your father did later ask me about your sister, so I told him."
She could imagine what he had said. "What did he say to that?" She had not spoken to her father afterwards.
"He had to admit that it got worse after me. Before me it was apparently all right?"
"Not as noticeable," she corrected. "But there's nothing she can do about that except suck it up, because I'm not going to get rid of you because you outshine Nick." She looked for her mother to say goodbye. "Where's my mum?"
"Over there."
"Mum, we're leaving."
"Already?" she asked predictably. "You haven't even seen everyone yet."
"I've tried," Anna Margaret replied, although she could have said the purpose of this party was not for her to see everyone. Not entirely, anyway. "Early start tomorrow, you know."
"You shouldn't still go running. It can't be good."
There were people nearby, so Anna Margaret did not want to discuss her pregnancy and what she could or could not do. "I'm fine."
She did not bother to say goodbye to Irene Louise, who for all her complaints did not seem tired enough to leave the party. Perhaps the ice cream had given her a boost.
It had been dark when they had arrived, but it looked even darker outside now. The cold air made her yawn too. "Maybe I'll sleep in tomorrow." Nobody except Frederick would consider that sleeping in, but it would still mean fifteen to thirty minutes longer in bed.
He did not mind. "Whatever you want."
"Did my sister ever get her ice cream?"
"Yes. Don't ever try that with me."
"No?" she teased.
"I'd show you the way to the nearest supermarket unless you had broken your leg or something." A taxi slowly passed them. "What's that?"
"Ordered by people who had something to drink, I suppose." She looked over her shoulder. "Yes, it stops at my parents' house. It wasn't looking for us. We're not leaving that early then, if others are leaving too. I must have talked too long. I'm sorry. Were you really bored?"
Frederick took his time answering. "I am capable of letting you know when I've had enough. And that would probably be after one extension on my part. So if I've not yet said anything..."
"All right. Yes, I noticed you're capable of speaking up when you've had enough," she said in a meaningful voice.
"Sorry. I couldn't resist. I don't know what those other people thought of it."
She tried to remember who had been standing with them. "Mathieu and Cecilia?"
"The woman spoke to me later, but that was about my niece."
"Why would she speak to you about your niece?" Anna Margaret wondered as he opened their front door.
"I wondered the same. Her concern seemed legitimate, but still. I'm not going to discuss my family with someone too much. I said I would send Isabelle a message. Apparently they didn't show up at the parent-teacher conference, so this woman, who apparently teaches Charlotte, wondered if she could send them a message or if you couldn't ask the queen why she hadn't shown up."
"Were they too busy to go?"
"Either that or Charlotte doesn't pass on information."
"Is there any reason why she would not?"
"She's not doing well this year. Some very bad marks. Which could be due to Isabelle's new position, or her pregnancy - although I didn't comment on either thing to the woman. I only said I might know."
"What if it is her position?" Anna Margaret asked. "Would you feel guilty if that was the reason for her bad marks?" She would almost feel guilty herself. The decisions they had made did not only affect themselves but they rippled outwards. Although she had not affected Isabelle's getting pregnant, she might have played a role in Frederick's decision to abdicate. It might just have pushed him over the edge.
"Yes. Not that there's anything I could change. But I don't think they got so much more attention since the summer. Not so much that it would lead someone to fail all her classes except English. So I don't think it was me." Frederick sounded a little relieved.
"Oi. So you think it was the pregnancy?"
"Given that she was the one who threw up over the news of getting a little brother or sister, I strongly suspect they need to look for an explanation in that area, yes."
"But Charlotte didn't know until recently."
"She could have sensed something. Worries. Unexplained doctor 's appointments. So I'll send Isabelle a message to contact the teacher."
"And was Cecilia hoping you'd actually tell her something or was this enough?"
"Oh, she wasn't probing. I usually know when people are." He paused. "But I was reminded a bit of my own school days when she said some of the other teachers had said that Charlotte was probably merely stupid and that there was nothing going on. The fact that this teacher seemed to think there was something going on was actually a point in her favour."
"Would Charlotte like it if you discussed her?"
"You know, if Isabelle and Philip can't make it, or if they have too many children in school at once, they are in the habit of asking the grandmother or uncle to go," Frederick said in amusement. "I have been, in the days when they could not split themselves in five. They have it easier these days."
"So actually if they could not make it they would have asked you to go."
"Yes. Of course now they're all in bed and I didn't want to ruin her sleep by messaging her this evening, so I'll do that tomorrow."
They had got to the bathroom and she undressed. It was time she went to bed as well. "I need to take lessons in family relations from your family."
"Even though you'd cede control of your own life?" he asked teasingly.
"It only feels that way sometimes. At other times I think it's wonderful how your family trust each other." She would never ask her parents or sisters to go to her child's school. She could not imagine it.
"Either that or we have no other option than to rely on ourselves."
In the morning she was meeting the queen. She had counted on sitting down with a cup of coffee, but it was not to be.
Isabelle met her with her coat on and by the door, as if she was ready to leave. "For time and planning purposes, we need to take a trip."
"How?" Anna Margaret wondered what time and planning purposes were exactly. She had wondered if she should ask if Isabelle had received Frederick's message yet, but she decided it was none of her business.
Isabelle decided otherwise. "To school."
"Does this have anything to do with Frederick talking to one of Charlotte's teachers last night?"
"Yes." Isabelle pushed her back out of the door. "We are on a tight schedule."
"Why? How? You knew you were meeting me and we could theoretically have a lot to discuss."
"Theoretically. And we still do. We'll talk in the car."
"Oh. Do you have coffee in the car?" She felt she might need that coffee this morning. Not too much, naturally. Just one or two cups would do to get her started.
"No. Not even a champagne bar. It's a very plain car."
"And at this school, what am I going to do? Or will we be done by then?" She had no idea where the school was, but it was a given that if they were going by car they would get stuck in the slow-moving morning traffic.
Isabelle fastened her seatbelt. "Document one, please."
"You're even faster than Frederick in his best form," Anna Margaret commented when all documents had been signed most expeditiously. She was not unfamiliar with efficient work and she had to admit she preferred it over those much longer meetings in which Isabelle's father had always given his irrelevant opinion. The signing had, after all, over the years become a mere formality.
"I'll catch up next week," Isabelle promised.
"So what do I do now? Are you going to drop me off at a bus stop?"
"A bus stop?"
"Considering that we're effectively done."
"No, no. Maybe you can have some coffee there and on the way back I can ask you some questions that I've put off for the time being. About the euro, nothing personal."
Anna Margaret held up her hands. Of course it would go as Isabelle dictated. She wondered why she was even trying to think for herself here.
The car pulled up in front of the school. It was so close to the door that not many people would be able to see who got out. Most of the children would be in their classrooms anyway. Cecilia waited for them inside the doors, but she came out to greet them.
"Anna Margaret would like some coffee," said Isabelle when they had been greeted.
"Of course. Come on up to the staff room." It was likely that Cecilia had already been told that the meeting could only take place if Anna Margaret was brought over as well, because she did not display any surprise.
The staff room was not completely deserted; there were two teachers slowly starting the day in one of the corners. They did look a bit surprised by the high visitors and Anna Margaret noted that her presence was apparently more curious than Isabelle's. It was curious to herself as well, she remarked silently to herself.
Cecilia got her some coffee and she sat down at a table where she could read. Cecilia and Isabelle would undoubtedly sit elsewhere.
"Anna Margaret? Could you come over?" Isabelle called.
Anna Margaret had just installed her laptop so she could read a few things, but that was not the only reason why she was reluctant to be involved. "I only know about dysfunctional families," she answered. She would rather stay out of other people's family business, because she had nothing sensible to add.
"I need to ask you something."
"But it's not my family."
"Yes, it is."
Anna Margaret decided her reluctance stemmed in part from the fear that getting involved in their family business had consequences. The involvement would be reciprocated. "But if I do that, you will do it to me. Someone will stick their nose into my business at all times."
"We're already doing that," Isabelle said matter-of-factly. "I need an objective look - and Frederick might have told you what he thought. Because I think he tells you things."
"He did." She thought the other two teachers were too near. If she was going to say anything she would have to walk over.
"Do you think he was right?"
All right, blast it, she would walk over. She left her coat and her laptop. "He said it was your health," she said, not sitting down. She was going to return in a second. She was not good at this family business. Most of the time she preferred to stay out of things and keep it more superficial. In her own family of course that had led to trouble.
"But how could Charlotte know? We didn't tell her until recently."
"Frederick's guess is that she picked something up anyway. I have no opinion on it," she said, in case she was asked to give it. "But Frederick thought it was very plausible." And she made to return to where she had been sitting.
"It could be." Isabelle pondered it.
Anna Margaret returned her attention to her laptop, but found it difficult to focus. That was exactly why she should not get involved in such things, she told herself in annoyance. After a while she saw Cecilia walk to a phone and make a call.
"Charlotte will be coming up," Isabelle announced, standing beside her. "What's your schedule?"
"As if I could do anything about it."
"Not in the best of moods today, are you?"
"Well, you practically abducted me and you're forcing me to give my opinion on things I'm not qualified to give an opinion on." She took care not to speak too loudly.
"Did you have a short night?"
Anna Margaret scrolled through the document she was trying to read. She wondered if Charlotte had had the same problems - trying to read something and finding it impossible to make sense of the words. She did not know if she was crabby because of the shorter night or because her coffee had not kicked in yet, or maybe because she was here against her will. She checked the time. There was still a while until her next appointment, although it was a bit inconsiderate of Isabelle to have abducted her in this manner.
"I didn't want to do this alone, but Philip had to go to the bank. He still sometimes thinks teenage girls are aliens, but at least he would have known what I wanted."
There were lots of people who would have been a better stand-in than she, Anna Margaret thought. She stayed where she was, although it was more a question of principle than anything else. "You'll be fine."
It had taken Isabelle fifteen minutes to speak to Charlotte. They had done so in front of Cecilia, which had made Anna Margaret wondered how much about Isabelle's health had been revealed. Just when she was contemplating catching a bus, the conversation seemed to be over.
"Done," Isabelle said curtly as she walked to the door. Charlotte had already escaped.
Anna Margaret had seen the signs and was already busy sliding her laptop back into her bag. She had to hurry to catch up, wondering if she was going to be forced to catch a bus anyway. Of course if she asked how it had gone, she would be told she could have joined in, so she did not.
"I don't think we lost much time," said Isabelle. "Although really you could tell anyone it was my fault if you were late to something and they would all accept the excuse."
"Well..." It was not really other people's reactions that were her problem, but the fact that she had had no say in being abducted.
"Well what?"
"I don't know. From not involving close family in your...er...things," she said for Cecilia's benefit, "you went to involving innocent bystanders."
"Innocent bystanders?" Isabelle exclaimed. "Do you call yourself an innocent bystander?"
"I'd like to be."
"Too late, you're producing one of their cousins now."
"Oh!" Anna Margaret exclaimed. Apparently it was all right to reveal her pregnancy. She did not doubt that Cecilia knew what this meant. It might even have been revealed to her before, although she could not quickly see why. But she was being too nice, she decided. "And here I was, trying to be discreet about your condition."
Isabelle stopped in her tracks. "Er... well..."
Anna Margaret stopped as well. She had no experience with cat fights herself, but she wondered if Isabelle was the type.
"I suppose," Isabelle said with some resignation, "that it sounds a lot better than making me sound terminally ill or on the brink of a divorce. Although your sitting with us could have prevented that impression from being given."
Anna Margaret guffawed. "You won't let that go, will you?"
Isabelle turned to Cecilia, who clearly did not know whether to move away or to stay with them. "Tell me, you thought I must have cancer or something like that, didn't you?"
"It was one of the things that crossed my mind, Madam," Cecilia admitted, although she still looked as if she had no idea what the situation really was. "Divorce is also a frequently disruptive factor for our students."
"For a teenager this seems to be far worse."
"Not Aurelie," Anna Margaret reminded her.
"See? That's why you needed to sit in. Maybe you can take the girls to the cinema during the Christmas holidays again. Under the circumstances I don't think I should ground her for not passing me important notes from school. Of course she will have a lot of schoolwork to catch up on."
"I'll see if I have time."
"I trust," Isabelle said to Cecilia, "that the particulars of a student's home life is not considered something to be freely shared with colleagues. In this case I'd rather you didn't. Not yet. If you have to discuss her with other teachers, just say the issue has been resolved and that she will be put to work in the next few weeks."
"Of course, Madam," Cecilia nodded.
"And my sister-in-law is still resisting assimilation, but we keep trying."
Anna Margaret raised her eyebrows.
"I'll be in touch," Isabelle said to Cecilia, shaking her hand.
Anna Margaret shook her hand too. "Thanks for the coffee."
"I see why a dinner all the way in France wasn't so appealing."
She gave that a wan smile. "Obviously I don't do well with evening parties anymore."
Isabelle put an arm around her. "Come sister, or else your critics will say you're my lapdog."
"Or your critics will say you're desperate to become a princess. Little do they know!" Isabelle said in the car.
"I have no particular -"
"We know," Isabelle reassured her. "But we like you anyway."
She did not doubt that, really. "Even if I refuse to - if I insist on minding my own business?"
"You'll come around. We're nice. Although I think that woman thinks we are very odd," said Isabelle. "Did she get it or not, do you think?"
"She got the reference to me."
"I did perhaps not think that through very much before I spoke, although I don't know how else I could have explained why you can't not be one of us. You're quite stubborn. Which is your job's fault, of course. You can't be seen to drop everything because of some teenage angst."
No, she supposed not.
"But we didn't waste any time. Of course I forced you to come, so for some people that equals forcing you to increase our allowance to two million per year. Do I get an increase if I have another child, by the way?"
"That's likely."
"And Frederick too. Oh, brace yourself, sweetie. Someone is bound to say you got pregnant so he could have more money."
She was not much later when she got to her office than if she had had her meeting at the Palace. Isabelle's car had dropped her off there and secretly she was glad she had not had to walk. It was cold this morning. She hoped her fitness was not already declining. There was still so much time to go and December was a busy month socially.
She survived until lunch and although she had never set any time aside for it specifically, just taking it the way it came, she now always made sure to eat something at regular intervals. She ate something in the restaurant - Frederick would say she should bring something from home, but taking her lunchbox there was taking it just a little too far, she thought - and spoke to a few people, and then it was time to get into the car for a work visit.
When she felt like sleeping she wondered if it was a good or a bad thing not to have too many of them anymore. On the one hand she might be able to doze off in the car, but on the other hand she would not be at her brightest. She checked the speech she was to give; fortunately she had it on paper and it had been written a while ago. They never left that until the last moment. If she was too tired to think she would at least be able to follow it to the letter, something she did not do if she was particularly alert.
Because she was going to a diploma ceremony, she might have to talk to a few graduates afterwards. They were supposed to be sharp and she would not get away with dull questions. That might pose a problem, but at least she could always try to let them talk.
"Madam, we're arriving in two minutes," someone said when she had half fallen asleep and she had had a succession of strange thoughts.
Anna Margaret sat up straight. It would not do to wake up only on arrival. Luckily she did not have the type of hair that became a mess, but she brushed it down with her fingers anyway. She was to be one of the first in the hall - before the students and their families anyway - and hopefully she could squeeze in a visit to the toilet as well.
Before the ceremony and after the drinks. It was not always comfortable to have a growing baby pressing down on your bladder and to have a job in which people did not seem to pee at all. It had been rather new to her staff in any case.
After the birth she might need to have them schedule in or requests even more breaks. She wondered what they would say to that.
Anna Margaret arrived home to find Frederick had not cooked. She stopped herself from asking why not - he was under no obligation whatsoever, of course, and asking him would make it sound as if it was his job. She found him hanging listlessly on the couch, watching a TV programme he was not normally interested in.
"Broadening your horizons?" she asked, because it sounded a lot better than what she was really thinking.
"I was feeling a bit sick."
"Want to eat?" She supposed she had to do the cooking now. He was not really responsive.
"No, I don't think so."
She wondered what to do with him. He did look a little pale and if he did not have an appetite either it was probably real. She cooked herself a quick meal, running a bath in the meantime. Then she ate, checked the living room and went upstairs. Frederick had gone there before her and she found him in the bath. "Hey, that's my bath," she protested.
"Oh." But he made no move to get out or make room.
She groaned and brushed her teeth first. "Darling, I really believe you are unwell, but it was my bath and if you stay in too long the water will be cold." She did not know what to do if he was behaving so strangely.
Frederick did not seem to think this bad at all at first, but then he got out and shivered. "I thought you had filled it for me."
"I would have told you. Go to bed," she advised kindly and tried the water. She wondered if she should have done it for him, but she had been tired and hungry, and if he could still watch stupid television he was not helpless. She should be nicer, she realised, but she was tired.
Frederick was not asleep when she came to bed, but he was buried under some extra covers and unwilling to hug. "It hurts," he said, although he did not really push her away.
He had not been ill before during their relationship and this was her first time experiencing a sick man up close. She had no idea what to do or how she could be of help. "Have you taken something?"
Frederick merely groaned.
Anna Margaret decided he was old enough to know what to do and that if he did not ask her to do anything he was probably still fine.
She stared at the ceiling in the dark and wondered if he needed special care tomorrow during the day - whatever that special care might be. If he was sick, should she stay home? It had never occurred to her that she might have to do so some time. But if she did not, she would feel a little heartless - depending on how ill he was. He had taken care of her as well when she had felt sick, so some reciprocation might be in order, even expected.
She also wondered what she might need to do. Make breakfast, maybe? She could do that before she went to work, supposing she could go to work. He did not look too bad now. If he was the same tomorrow she could go to work without feeling guilty. She would only have to reckon with having to cook.
During the night Anna Margaret had already felt a little worse when she woke - which she had at the time ascribed to not having slept well due to Frederick's tossing and turning - but when her alarm went off she was really unprepared to leave the bed. Her head hurt, her throat was beginning to feel sore and her body was simply opposed to moving. She gave a little whine.
Frederick seemed to have been woken by her alarm as well. Clearly he had not set his own, or he would have been up already. "What is it?"
"I don't want to go to work."
"Then don't."
"But..." She tried to get up to go to the bathroom. She would have to do that even if she stayed home. It felt awful. She could hardly put one foot in front of the other and she was shivering.
When she returned to the bed, Frederick touched her. "Are you staying home?"
She realised she had not even been able to finish her thought because she had been focusing on getting her limbs to work. She did not want to go to work, she had been thinking. It was not the first time she had been ill, of course, and usually in about eight out of ten cases she ended up going to work after all. She sat on the bed - getting back under the covers would almost certainly mean she was never going to come out again - and pondered if this was one of those eight cases.
"Stay home. It won't go away yet. I've had it since yesterday lunch time," said Frederick.
Anna Margaret started at the beginning and went over what she might or might not be able to do. Getting dressed, while not comfortable and almost certainly very slow, would be manageable if she chose simple clothes. Eventually. Walking to work was an impossibility. She glanced back at Frederick. He would not be able to drive her either. There were other ways to get there, but she could not think of any that did not involve walking at least some of the distance.
"Come."
"I'll have to -"
"Call in sick."
She hesitated. It was so tempting.
"You can always go if you feel better later."
"But I can't just stay home if I need more sleep." What kind of work ethic was that?
"You'd rather collapse at work."
She rather feared she would, if she went. She looked at her phone.
"Or get up and try to read your email over breakfast and then decide."
"Breakfast," she mumbled. The mere thought of eating put her off. But she could try what he suggested, although she thought she knew what the outcome would be.
She got up and walked to the stairs, sitting down and descending like that because she did not trust her legs. As she was going down, she vaguely realised this was a ridiculous venture. There was no way she could do this at work. Before she got halfway she had gone back to her bedroom.
Frederick did not stir and the room was in darkness. She fumbled for her phone and sent off a message. Then she crawled back into bed.
Frederick had got up at some point, but she had hardly noticed. When she regained full awareness it was 10:36. She considered getting up, but it would be cold. After trying to sleep some more she gave up after half an hour and tried to walk. It was not much better than earlier that morning. She went to the bathroom and reached for the paracetamol.
But perhaps she was not allowed to take it because she was pregnant. She would have to look that up. She stuck the strip in the pocket of her bathrobe.
Frederick was downstairs and she went down the same way she had tried before. She found Frederick on the couch, rolled into a blanket and watching television.
"Tea?" he asked gesturing at the teapot. "With honey?"
"I'm not hungry."
"Drink something."
She noticed he had already had a cup for her. "I was wondering if I could take paracetamol."
One arm protruded from the blanket to start up his laptop. It was directly next to the remote control and their phones. Everything was within reach, so he would have to move as little as possible.
Anna Margaret wished she had a blanket as well, but she had no idea if they even had two in the house. She sat down and poured some hot water into her cup. Holding that would at least warm her up a bit.
"Yes, you can take it," Frederick informed her.
She pushed a pill out of the strip and tested the water. It must have been there for a while, because it was no longer very hot. But then, he had been up for at least half an hour, probably far longer.
"Give me one." He took one too and then leant back. "And now what? We sit and wait till we get better."
"That's my phone." She suddenly remembered she had left her next to her bed and now it was here.
"I took it, in case it rang."
"Did it?"
"Three or four times," Frederick said indifferently.
"Who?"
"I didn't feel like asking them too much. I said we were ill and could they please phone your office, thanks."
"And that was that?" She would have at least tried to remember their names.
"Well, I hung up, so..."
"You hung up."
"If they were still trying to get somewhere, yes. I'm ill too. I don't want to play secretary. I want to watch TV."
Anna Margaret gave Fireman Sam a dubious look. It was possible, of course, that Sam was more interesting than whoever had called - although she supposed that if anyone had called an hour ago they might have been competing with Postman Pat rather than Fireman Sam.
"I don't want intellectual shows when I'm ill. I just want something I could follow without paying attention."
"What would you have been doing instead? Today, I mean."
"I watch this every day. Kidding. I was supposed to see a wood-processing plant. Seriously. I get ill on the only day of actual work and it's entirely coincidental."
"You don't sound too ill now." He was making long sentences with long words. She was not sure she could do it.
"I can manage a few bursts of energy. After lunch I'm going back to bed."
Anna Margaret wriggled herself under the blanket and tried to muster up some interest in what Fireman Sam was up to.
Predictably they missed lunch. Frederick had first turned off the sound and then they had closed their eyes. Anna Margaret was woken by the sound of the doorbell. She dragged herself to the door. Through the little window she could see it was Isabelle, so she opened the door.
"I heard Frederick was ill," said Isabelle. She was carrying a bag. "And you don't seem to be all that well either."
"No." She shivered in her bathrobe when the cold outside air hit her.
Isabelle took off her woollen hat and scarf. "Where were you? Not upstairs in bed. It didn't take you that long to open the door."
"On the couch."
"All right, go back. Let me do my thing."
Anna Margaret hesitated. "And what is your thing?" She could not even come close to imagining it.
"You'll see."
Because she did not feel like standing around in the cold hall or wherever else Isabelle was going to do her thing, she dutifully returned to the living room. Frederick was awake. "It's Isabelle," she said. "I don't know why."
"Oh, someone must have told her."
"You."
"No."
"Why would she come to see how you were? Aren't you my responsibility?" She felt a little miffed, but she did not know if she had a right.
"Do you think so?"
"Well, if you were half dying I wouldn't go to work," she said defensively. "And if I haven't asked for help, then maybe we don't need it?"
Frederick pulled her under the blanket. "Just...let it happen. I'm sure it's not a criticism of your abilities. She was probably just in the neighbourhood."
"She lives in the neighbourhood," Anna Margaret muttered in protest, but she gave in. She did not feel well enough to get worked up about it. Maybe she should simply enjoy someone helping them out.
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