Free The Secret Ingredient by Dianne Blacklock Page B

to do with it.’
    â€˜You feel that strongly?’
    Jess nodded. ‘Look at Donna, she’s constantly on a short leash, everything revolves around Max. And don’t get me wrong, that’s great for her and Toby, if that’s what they want. But I enjoy my freedom too much . . . staying out late, sleeping in late, going out for a coffee because I feel like a coffee, not because it fits around the sleep cycle of a three-year-old.’ She shrugged. ‘Maybe I’m just selfish, I don’t know.’
    â€˜It’s not selfish to know what you want,’ said Andie. ‘It’s smart. You know, the catchcry these days is that you can have it all, but you can’t. Something or someone always misses out. I could probably guilt or harass Ross into having a baby with me, and then he’d be unhappy. I do really want a baby, but a lot of women really want babies and can’t have them. Either they don’t have a partner, or they have fertility issues . . . For Ross and me it’s a timing problem. It isn’t his fault, and he’s always been one hundred per cent honest about it.’
    â€˜I suppose,’ Jess muttered.
    â€˜The thing is, I could spend the next part of my life feeling sad and bereft that I can’t have a baby, or I can get on with my life, and do the next best thing. Fulfil a dream I’ve had since I was a girl.’
    â€˜Fair enough, but I’m still wondering how you talked Ross into it.’
    â€˜I didn’t have to, he jumped at the idea. He was so enthusiastic, I was shocked, to be honest,’ said Andie. ‘Apparently he got talking to Joanna after everyone had left, and she really stood up for me, according to Ross.’
    Jess frowned. ‘Why did she have to stand up for you?’
    Andie had felt slightly uncomfortable about that at first, but she was rather pleased that Joanna had stood up for her, the way Ross explained it. He was so worried about her that he’d ended up confiding in Joanna after everyone had left. He said she told him that she had come to realise what a mistake she had made giving up her career for the family, even going so far as to suggest, according to Ross, that perhaps she’d stagnated a bit, as a housewife, and that she’d never felt so fulfilled as she did now. Ross said he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it all the way home, how much Andie had given up for him, how essentially selfish it had been for him to expect her to fit in around his life and his work.
    â€˜But you do know what being a chef means,’ Andie had said to him. ‘We’ll hardly see each other.’
    â€˜Maybe it’s time I started fitting in around you,’ he had returned. ‘I could go to the office a little later some mornings, we could have breakfast together. We could make Sundays our exclusive day for each other. We can make it work, Andie.’
    Jess had filled a plate with antipasto as she spoke and she set it down in front of Andie.
    â€˜Thanks, it looks wonderful,’ she said, gazing at the glistening olives, the wedge of creamy brie, the red bell peppers stuffed with mascarpone, her favourite. ‘I know I shouldn’t complain, I get to work around food everyday, but it’s not the same. Sometimes I feel . . . I don’t know, like an artist surrounded by all these gorgeous tubes of paint, every colour I can imagine, but I never get to paint, I’m too busy sorting and selling the tubes. I look at all the produce as it comes in, as I’m spooning it out into the dishes, or slicing it up, and all the time I’m thinking of the possibilities. Customers tell me what they’re going to cook, or what they did cook, and I’m envious . . . but what am I going to do? How much can I cook for Ross and me? It’s frustrating.’
    â€˜So you’re going off to become a Picasso in the kitchen?’ said Jess, smearing some cheese onto a