Free Tattoos & Teacups by Anna Martin

stripped again and sat tentatively down on the bed. I took his arm and pulled him back down onto his bed and sort of found a way to snuggle into him.
    “Are you sure about this?” Chris asked as his fingers tentatively combed through my hair.
    “Yeah. Shut up and go to sleep.”
    “Okay. Night, Rob.”
    “Good night, Chris.”

Chapter 5

    T HE next morning brought grey sunlight washed out by the rain and a warm body in my arms for the first time in years. Chris was snoring softly, facing away from the window, probably not yet woken by the fact that my body was shielding his from the light. I hadn’t bothered to draw the curtains before we’d fallen into bed last night.
    My movement seemed to disturb him, though, and as I listened to his deep breathing lighten, he turned to rest his face against my chest. I kissed his forehead.
    There were plenty of things I should have been doing on a Saturday morning. My routine was to wake early, as I did during the week, and start to go through my lecture plans and check through papers that needed to be marked. I needed to return a book to the library and find a suitable birthday gift for my mother. I really should have called her and accepted or declined her invitation to lunch the following day; I hadn’t responded yet. By midafternoon I’d usually be working on marking essays or planning lectures, freeing up my Sunday for whatever it was that I wanted to do.
    Chris sighed heavily in his sleep and rolled over, pressing his chest full-length against my back, slinging a leg over my hips and an arm around my waist, effectively trapping me in bed. I took his hand and held it tight to my chest.
    It can wait , I thought vaguely before drifting back to sleep.
     
     
    S ETTING up the meeting between Chloe and Chris proved slightly more difficult than I had initially anticipated. My access to Chloe was limited; Lu and I were still on good terms, but Chloe had a whole host of extracurricular activities that filled her weekends and evenings, and she lived nearly an hour away. Not that Chris understood this. He asked me nearly every time we spoke if I’d called Luisa yet, what the progress was, when I’d see Chloe again.
    Finally, a few weeks after the first (disastrous) conversation, the opportunity arose for me to spend a Sunday with my daughter. Not that it was a perfect arrangement for any of us. Far from it. Chris often had a gig on a Saturday night, working well into the early hours of the morning. And I had work to prepare for the week ahead. And Chloe would have a cheerleading competition the day before, meaning she’d likely be tired too.
    I knocked on the front door of Luisa’s house and was greeted by her husband.
    “Hi,” I said to Mike.
    “Hey, Robert,” he said, shaking my hand and welcoming me in. “Lu is in bed. The pregnancy is taking its toll on her now.”
    “How much longer does she have left?” I asked. Dates had never stuck in my head.
    “Two weeks,” he said, thumping the door twice. “Knock on wood.”
    “She’ll be fine. She’s a trooper,” I opined. He tilted his head to one side and gave me a bland smile.
    “Chloe?” I called up the stairs.
    “Coming!” she yelled back.
    Mike and I made small talk as she banged about in her room for a few more minutes, then appeared at the top of the stairs wearing the tightest pair of jeans I had ever seen—they looked like she’d painted them on her skinny legs—and a loose, torn tank top. Her hair was scraped into a ponytail; the curls bounced down her back as she bounced down the stairs.
    I gave Mike a look that clearly said, Do you let her out of the house looking like that ?
    He replied with an equally silent It’s not worth the argument .
    “You’ll need a jumper or something, honey,” I told her. “It’s chilly out.”
    “Dad,” she whined. “No one says ‘jumper’.”
    “Sweater. Cardigan. Hoodie. Coat, jacket, fleece. Bloody poncho, Chlo, just put something on.”
    She rolled her