Blooming Women

10. Baby blues party

 A moment later, aching with cold but warmed – metaphorically at least – by hope, Amber was trailing a slim shadow-amongst-shadows through branches which rustled with dead leaves as they passed. It was odd that there was a path through what seemed to be a very thick thicket; the ground was hard and there was a scuff of old vegetation beneath her trainers, but the roots she'd expected to be tripping over failed to catch even a toe as they wound their was out to an open area. Frosted grass crunched as Amber was lead out onto turf, but she could hear no evidence that Hazel was even there, although ice-crisp starlight, deceptively bright after the darkness beneath the trees, showed a slim figure at the end of her arm against the dim whiteness of the ground. Somewhere in the block of darkness ahead there was the chuckle of water: in summer this would be a really nice place to come and sit. In fact, this was probably where Cloud and Garyyy.... Uh. Right. Amber's mind swerved away from that thought.

'My. Isn't this nice?'

We are moving forward Dear – I knew you could do it.

'Thanks for all the help.'

Samantha ignored the 'Not.' implicit in the tone.

I do my best for you, as the Good Lord intended.

'Well could he get me some gloves then? Maybe a hot water bottle?'

Fortunately Hazel brought them to a halt before Samantha could reply.

'Is this all right for your pollination dance?'

'It's great! We'll need a bit of space to try some things out.'

Let go my haaaaaannndddd...

'We won't get pollinated now?'

'Poll...? No! Nononono.It's just practice. It's more a pre-pollination...' she struggled for words.

Ritual, Dear.

'Ritual!' She finished, more gratefully than she'd intended.

'So you do this dance and then...?'

This was a lot more embarrassing than she'd expected; in secondary school, a teacher had given a slightly embarrassed lecture on... On... On 'self pollination', amongst other things; Jessica Martin had asked if what her brother said was true and it sent you blind, and Meera Atwal had stuck her hand up and asked if it was okay to do it until you just needed strong glasses. Everybody had laughed and looked at Evie Grey, who had the thickest, bottle-bottom glasses ever, and now Amber felt a lot like her teacher had looked at that very moment as Evie had smiled her delighted, oval-faced smile and said 'Ooo-er Miss! I've got some catching up to do then,' and the head mistress had had to be called to restore order.

'It's. Supposed to be fun? You have fun, see if there's anybody who likes the same sort of fun—'

And avoid, if they get out of breath easily...

'What if they don't like your pollination dance?'

'There's lots of dances to learn – I like ones you can make up yourself—'

Yes. They mostly consist of jumping up and down around one's handbag; at least we had the waltz. And the tango, of course... Samantha sounded particularly smug.

'I am not teaching her to tango!'

Why ever not?

'Because I don't know how to lead it – and it would be icky! Can you imagine next midsummer around here?'

I imagine the air would be thick with... pollen.

'EWWWWWW.'

'Do I have to talk to myself to do this?'

Amber realised she'd let her internal dialogue spill over again. 'Wha'? No – just. Thinking out loud.' A particularly intense shiver made her curl in on herself. 'And no! I'm not dying, thank you very much.' Although it might be on the cards, at this rate. Thank God my hand is aching lessssss... Oh no. No. When the pain stops, you're starting to freeeeeze.

'Right. This is what we'll do...'

Amber groaned into a basic Jive step again. It wasn't going to stop her feeling wrenchingly cold, but if she didn't keep moving, the chances of losing a finger tip or two was becoming as solid as... ice.

'Back step, that's it...' The thin figure in front of her followed her easily as Amber danced the steps over and over, not so much to teach as to generate warmth.

'Do a bit more with your hips as you... yes, that's it.'

Hips.

Well now... Barely eighteen hours ago, Amber and Cloud had stood in the kitchen at Winston Manor; the house was more a lodge with a big garden than anything remotely manorial and needed a fair bit of work, but Gary Winston, who had grown up in an anonymous row of terraced houses, was enjoying himself. Mostly. Just at this moment, he was hiding in the den listening to Simon and Garfunkel after he'd come upon the pair of them dancing to the classic Jamaican and 2 Tone Ska compilation his mother had given to Cloud. He'd been attracted to the kitchen by the scent of Amber's coffee brewing and had walked in on the two women in happy motion. He'd cast Amber a 'you're being a bad influence' glance as he realised that there was an impromptu blues party getting into swing.

'Cloud, what about the baby?'

Cloud continued her dance, which, rather than being truly mobile was more an eye-popping hip roll with a bit of a shuffle and lots of shoulders which sent her pale blonde ponytail swaying. It had a quality that he would have enjoyed greatly – if Amber hadn't been in the room and doing the same thing: that shunted the whole performance into to-die-from embarrassment.

'It's okay, your Mom showed me this one, hon. She said it's great for a bad back and it knocks those pelvic floor exercises the prenatal women give you into a cocked—'.

'Awright! Awright!'

'...hat.' Cloud finished. 'I can show you later—'

'No! I'm goin'! You're 'is Muvver; your problem!'

Gary turned a flustered tail; you couldn't see the blush beneath the dark skin, but the fact that he'd lapsed into a Wolverhampton accent instead of his usual, careful 'I so wish I worked for the BBC' tones showed that he was distracted.

'It's good for getting pregnant in the first place too — if you do it in front of the right man!' Cloud called after his retreating back. 'Amby can lift weights with her muscles...' the door to the den slammed panickily. 'In her arms!' Cloud finished, and they collapsed into giggles. Amber believed she never giggled, but responses to male embarrassment didn't count, and hearing Cloud say something suggestive was a real treat.

They practised a little more, decided that they shouldn't demonstrate the moves at the party that night in case they set the house on fire, got drinks and began gossiping about Gary.

Eighteen hours later, it was time to see if she could, metaphorically at least, set a small patch of Warwickshire woodland on fire.

'Hazel. Try this...'