Prologue

       Dear Archie,

       On the day you were born, nothing prepared me for the life we would lead together. There was no sense of future in that moment. Only us. And every day since I have wondered if it is ever enough. If I can ever give you all the love required to pave the way.

       Because right from the start I didn’t know what I was up to. And every day since I have questioned everything I’ve ever done.

       I just need you to know that, despite it all, you are loved. You have always been my first love and that is all that should ever matter.

       But I am being a surrogate for all of us. For your auntie and uncle to have a family as complete as ours. I hope that one day you’ll understand why it was so important to do this. And none of it will change the fact that you are my number one.

       Love, Mum x

      ***

       To my unborn child,

       There has not been a day when I haven’t thought about you, but so often you have been a concept. With each of the five miscarriages I had you were more and more unreachable. You had become an impossibility. And yet here you are in this most improbable way.

       I may not be the one holding you, but I want to be more than you could ever imagine. To savour those moments that are ours. And as they get closer I am beginning to believe maybe this is the occasion where nothing goes wrong. The time that you become whole and I get to become your mother.

       There is nothing I want more and yet there is nothing further out of reach.

       I’m counting the days until we meet,

       Rebekah, your mum-to-be xxxx

Chapter 1

      Dawn was thirty-six weeks and two days pregnant with a baby that would never be hers. She knew exactly how far along she was because she was counting. She just couldn’t work out if she was marking off the days until freedom or savouring the remaining hours as a surrogate.

      This evening’s class was for Rebekah’s benefit. Dawn’s sister-in-law was the real mother of the baby she was carrying. Rebekah was the one needing to know what to expect of labour even if she wasn’t going to be going through it herself. Dawn was pretty certain the process of labour hadn’t changed significantly since she last went through it a decade ago, but in some ways this labour had more at stake than her own, so the refresher wasn’t going to hurt.

      And tonight was an opportunity for Rebekah to pretend.

      ‘This is stupid. I can’t believe you managed to get hold of this.’ Rebekah buttoned the maternity shirt she was borrowing over her fake foam bump.

      ‘It was from the props store. They use it for the teen pregnancy talks although I’m not too sure how much good it’s done. It doesn’t really demonstrate the true burden you endure once the baby arrives.’ Triffic. There Dawn goes putting her foot in it again. ‘When you’re a teenager.’ As she had been. Rebekah was in an altogether better position than when Dawn had had Archie at seventeen. She’d really