Hi all! Thanks for all the feedback on Telling Jack, Parts 1 and 2 last week…it really helped me to get through a rough week of dissertation-related meetings and work, etc. Here is a lighter vignette occurring sometime after "Telling Jack"…it actually falls somewhere in the middle of the timespan of another piece I'm planning, but it came to me so clearly I thought it should stand on its own…plus I really like it and wanted to share :) Please let me know if you like it as much as I do!
Betaed by my tireless partner-in-fandom DrinkwaterDrinkwine. Any remaining mistakes are mine. Characters are the property of Kerry Greenwood and Every Cloud Productions. No infringement intended!
"Oof. Goodness. I think we might very well have a footballer on our hands, Jack."
Jack looked up from his position at the end of the window seat, where he'd been concentrating on gently massaging her bare feet. Although it was not yet seven, Phryne already wore her nightclothes and dressing gown, something that occurred more and more often as her pregnancy progressed. Since it was no longer possible to sit with her knees tucked close against her, evenings often found her stretched out in the window seat with her feet in his lap instead. Initially put out at having to forego her preferred perching position, Phryne had warmed to the new arrangement considerably once she realized it essentially required him to give her a nightly foot rub. "Baby's kicking again, is it?"
"Mmm. And rather hard, the scamp." She considered. "You know, you might actually be able to feel it too, now."
Jack placed his hand on her abdomen, and sure enough, a few moments later he felt a small flutter against his palm. A look of wonder came over his face. "Fancy that," he marveled, grinning up at Phryne. "It feels just like a butterfly's wing."
"Well, I can assure you it doesn't feel that way from the inside," Phryne said wryly. "More like a small but very insistent mule." She shifted slightly, making a face.
"Well, as I recall, you have a talent for aiming a well-timed kick yourself, so it's only to be expected." His lips quirked at her answering huff of indignation, and he continued. "I don't suppose I'm meant to take your mention of football as an indication that you think we'll have a boy, am I?" he teased, intentionally baiting her.
Sure enough, her eyes sparked. "You know better than that by now, Jack," she said archly. She rolled her eyes. "Why is it that as soon as a man hears he's going to be a father, all he can think about is having a son with whom he can throw about a ball of some sort. Football, cricket, soccer, even tennis…it doesn't seem to matter, just as long as there's a ball involved."
"I'll have you know I'll be equally happy to introduce a son or daughter to the delights of the sports field, Phryne. But only if you come along as umpire, at the very least."
"Well, naturally," she agreed with an amused chuckle, then sighed, one hand coming up to rub her abdomen. "Still nearly four months to go…I can't believe I'm going to get even more enormous," she finished somewhat mournfully.
Rather unsurprisingly, Phryne found the sartorial challenge of her ever-expanding waistline one of the most frustrating aspects of her pregnancy; her well-tailored wardrobe was not particularly forgiving in that area, despite Dot's excellent skills in alteration. Every garment packed carefully in tissue (and there seemed to be more and more these days) occasioned a small sigh of regret, and though she laughed at herself over it, he knew she was only half in jest. He rather dreaded the day her favorite dressing gown could no longer be persuaded to close; he really should have a word with Dot as to the best establishment for procuring a temporary replacement. Best to be prepared, after all.
While Phryne lamented many of the changes to her body, Jack himself was, as ever with Phryne, endlessly captivated. The lusher breasts, the taut skin of her ever-more-rounded abdomen, even the faint ripples of purplish-red stretch marks all fascinated him. He'd learned to keep his admiration to himself unless directly asked, though, as she abhorred what she insisted were merely "pregnancy platitudes." Hugh Collins had not been so lucky; his brightly offered, "You certainly are glowing these days, miss" over Sunday afternoon tea had been met with narrowed eyes and pursed lips, and not even her gentle amusement at his stuttered, earnest apologies over the ill-considered "compliment" had completely restored her equanimity. The lad had been right, though, Jack mused, she did glow. Although to him, of course, she always had.
Rather than disturb the contented atmosphere of the evening with the possibility of a debate on whether his assurances of her continued desirability were sincere rather than 'besottedly sentimental', Jack once again opted to neatly sidestep the issue. "Speaking of 'nearly four months to go,' I suppose we should start thinking of names, shouldn't we?"
"It's an idea, I suppose," Phryne agreed. "Although I do think you should choose, Jack."
"That's hardly egalitarian, though, is it? What if I were to choose for a boy, and you for a girl perhaps, make it even."
"Oh, the other way round would be much more fun," she countered. "But the other party must be granted the power of veto. I have no intention of having a daughter called Desdemona, for instance, despite your penchant for Shakespeare. Or of naming the poor child Myrtle when she clearly looks like an Elizabeth…although I can't say I'd ever agree to call a child Myrtle under any circumstances whatsoever," she declared.
"Done." He smiled at her, pleased at the playful tone the conversation was taking. "So, any thoughts?"
"Anthony," she replied promptly, her eyes sparking with mischief.
He shifted uncomfortably. "Phryne, I thought we agreed to keep any mention of Antony and Cleopatra restricted to the boudoir," he reproached.
"Oh, but Jack, Tony Robinson has such a nice ring to it, don't you think?" She pouted at the resolute shake of his head. "Very well then, what about you?"
"Well, not Cleopatra, certainly," he asserted wryly. "Hmm." He paused. "Actually, I wouldn't mind Eleanor, perhaps."
"For your Aunt Nell?"
Jack inclined his head in acknowledgement. "Great-aunt, actually. She was rather splendid."
"She was a teacher, wasn't she?"
"Yes. She gave me my collected Shakespeare, you know."
"You never told me that."
"I was nearly eleven," he recounted. "I'd taken a spill from a tree at the start of the summer holidays, and landed quite badly. Broke my collarbone and my right leg, bruised some ribs…"
"Quite a tumble!"
"One for the record books, certainly. I had to spend a good portion of the holidays in bed, a fate that I endured with very bad grace, I might add. Well, one day my aunt came into my room and tossed this giant book onto my bed. Said I should stop driving my poor mother to distraction with my whinging, and get stuck into that instead. 'Any man who doesn't know his Shakespeare isn't one I care to know,'" she said, and that as I had nothing better to do I might as well get a head start. She was rather formidable, and I was terribly restless, so I did as she said."
Phryne regarded him avidly, her eyes as magpie-bright as those of any jay spying a shiny new trinket. For all her pleasure in material things, Jack reflected, it was these confidences, these small intimacies between them that she seemed to treasure most. "And was it love at first soliloquy?"
"Hardly. I wasn't overly keen on books yet then, and I could barely understand one word in ten. I would probably have thrown it against the wall if I hadn't thought I'd catch it from my mother…or if I'd been able to lift it one-handed."
"There must be a "but" here somewhere…"
"But my aunt came several times a week, to talk me through the scenes before we read them aloud. She always let me read the best parts. She made the plays come alive, and soon it seemed as though the book was a great puzzle she and I were decoding."
"Your first case!" Phryne exclaimed delightedly.
"I suppose it was, in a way."
"How utterly marvelous. Did you make it all the way through?"
"Not that summer, but after that it became a weekly tradition for us to sit on the porch and discuss literature after Sunday lunch. Then a few years after she retired she came to live with us. I don't suppose many fifteen year-old boys are glad when their elderly aunt comes to stay, but I was."
"It sounds as though you loved her quite dearly," Phryne offered gently.
"I did. She's the one who backed me up when I wanted to become a policeman. My parents were disappointed I didn't want to try for a scholarship to university after I'd done so well at Melbourne Grammar, but she said they might as well let me if I was so determined, that the police force could use another copper with brains." He chuckled softly at the memory.
"So the people of Victoria have your aunt to thank, then."
"Quite so." He took a sip of the drink that sat on a small table next to him, trying to assuage the sudden ache in his chest. When he looked up again, he found Phryne regarding him with a look of sympathetic understanding.
"She sounds wonderful, Jack. I do wish I could have met her."
"So do I. She would have liked you. She would've thought you were a caution, as she used to say, but she would have liked you. It was a terrible blow when she died, just a few months before I got home from France. I so wanted to tell her…there were times in the trenches, Phryne, where I'm damn near sure it was Shakespeare that saved me, reminded me that there were things beyond the mud, the blood and the rats. Beyond corpses. I wanted to thank her. But I was too late." He sighed, the regret still sharp after so many years.
"Oh, Jack, darling, I'm sure she knew." Her gaze was warm, and wonderfully fond. "One does with you, you know, even when you don't say it aloud…if anyone should know that, I should. And you know I'm always right about these things," she finished airily. She waited until her gave her the smile she'd clearly been aiming for before she continued. "And you're quite right, she certainly deserves a namesake. Eleanor shall top the list of candidates." As she couldn't reach him, she simply blew him a kiss, and then a wicked gleam came into her eyes. "But are you absolutely sure I can't change your mind about 'Anthony?'"
A few specific notes:
I do hope any pregnancy-related details seem plausible...I've had to rely on research and it's still pretty hard to figure out exactly what sensations/symptoms/etc. happen when...
I did refer specifically to "soccer" here; apparently in Australia soccer is referred to as such to distinguish it from Australian Rules football...?
I've always thought in my headcanon that Phryne and Jack might make reference to Antony and Cleopatra in the boudoir...so that's what Phryne is referencing, and why Jack is rather scandalized. :p
Apparently the terms "magpie" and "jay" can be used somewhat interchangeably, which is good, because I kind of fell in love with my phrase. :)
Oh, and the phrase "You're a caution" means something like "you're a scamp," or "you're trouble" (said affectionately). I've seen it in both American and British sources, so I decided to use it…apologies if it seems out of place in Australia.
Again, please let me know if you enjoyed! More pieces are coming, but the next one may take a bit…it requires some research and I do have to attend to the dratted dissertation as well. :p Comments especially help keep my "Phrack-muse" motivated and inspired. :)