Free After the Party by Lisa Jewell Page B

mean by The One?”
    â€œI mean, the one you marry, the one you have a family with.”
    Smith laughed, scoffing at him. “A family?” he repeated.
    â€œYeah, you know, kids, children, genetic offspring.”
    â€œNo way.”
    Ralph frowned. “Why not? You’re forty-one, mate.”
    â€œYeah. I’m forty-one and I’ve got a fucking amazing life. What the fuck would I want to go and have kids for?”
    Ralph paused. He picked up another little crab and ate it. What could he say to that? That was exactly how he’d felt seven years ago when Jem had first started talking about having kids. Life was good. It didn’t need improving, it didn’t need changing, it didn’t, in fact, need anything, let alone helpless, needy, extremely short human beings who depended on you for everything and woke you up when you were sleeping and didn’t sleeplate and didn’t want to do anything that wasn’t their idea and didn’t know how to use a toilet and didn’t understand anything whatsoever about the world or how it worked. He knew exactly why Smith would balk at the suggestion.
    But then . . . it would be odd to get to the end of your days without having done something as fundamental and basic and utterly human as procreating. It would be like dying without having read a book or gone for a swim or eaten an orange or trimmed your toenails or had an argument or fallen in love. It would be like having not lived at all.
    Ralph gulped. He found the thought alarming and he certainly wouldn’t share it with Smith. It would mean nothing to him, it would sound smug and trite and it would make Smith even more determined never to cross to the other side. It was exactly the sort of sentiment that had put Ralph off the idea of kids for so long. And it was exactly the reason why he had had no desire to have another baby after the arrival of the precious and remarkable Scarlett.
    One child was enough for him. He was a dad. He was a parent. He’d crossed over, and he’d loved it. And it wasn’t that he didn’t love Blake, it was just that he couldn’t quite see the point of him, beyond taking his life back to the same stage it was at four years ago, without any of the thrill of new beginnings.
    He shrugged. “Fair enough, I suppose. I can’t say I was that wild about the idea myself, but now, you know. What I do think is this: depending on your outlook, having kids is either much better than it looks, or much worse.”
    â€œAnd your outlook was?”
    â€œLet’s just say, I’ve been pleasantly surprised.”
    â€œFamily man, eh?”
    â€œThrough and through.” Ralph laughed, knowing that this was far from the truth, unless the definition of a family man wasa man who spent his whole life smoking in a garret, who had changed only two of his new son’s nappies since his birth, hadn’t taken his daughter to the playground for over a month and was currently eating soft-shell crab five and a half thousand miles away from his partner, daughter and four-month-old baby.
    â€œSo, you’ve got two now?”
    Ralph could tell Smith was just being polite. He had no interest in Ralph’s kids, not in a belligerent way, just in the same way you might have no interest in a friend’s rare stamp collection. “Yup,” he said, “Scarlett and little Blake.”
    â€œGreat names.”
    â€œThanks.”
    â€œAny more?”
    Ralph snorted. “No. Way. No no no no no. I am done.”
    Smith smiled knowingly. “Anyway, cheers.” He raised his empty glass to Ralph’s and clinked it lightly. “Great to see you.”
    â€œGreat to see you too.”
    â€œAnd how is . . .” Ralph could sense Smith forcing out the words, “little Jem?”
    â€œOh, she’s fine, you know. Jem is always fine.”
    â€œGood. What’s she up to?”
    â€œYou know,