Bridget Jones's Baby: The Diaries (Bridget Jones 4)
“Now, Jones, you are not to worry. I’m going to take care of everything.”
“You are?” I said suspiciously, letting him in.
“Of course, Jones. May not have been perfect in the past, but when the chips are down: perfect gentleman.”
“OK,” I said, brightening, as he flung himself down on the sofa in his immaculate suit.
“Christ, Jones, is this chocolate?” he said, pulling out something he’d just sat on.
“Sorry about that.”
“So, as I say, just tell me where to meet you and I’ll come along and support and pay for the whole thing.”
“WHAT?”
“You’re not going to keep it, are you? Christ, Jones, sorry. I just assumed in this situation…”
“OK, that’s
it! Out!” I said, pushing him towards the door. “Oh, actually, there’s one more thing, Daniel. The baby might not be yours.”
“I’m sorry?”
“She might not be yours. She might be Mark Darcy’s.”
Daniel took a moment to digest this, then, with a flicker in his eye, said, “Who was first, him or me?”
“Daniel! This actually is more important than you winning your centuries-old public school row with Mark Darcy.”
“Jones, Jones, Jones. I’m sorry. You’re right.” He came back into the flat, sighed dramatically, then made a show of composing himself.
“I want to do this: be there for you, new man, come to the scan, whatever.”
“You are so never going to turn up to a scan.”
“I am.”
“You’re not.”
“I AM.”
“You so aren’t. You’ll have a date with some eighteen-year-old lingerie model and flake on me.”
“I am going to come to the scan.”
“So don’t believe you.”
“I bloody well am. I’m coming to the scan of my child and you can’t stop me. Right, Jones, I have to go. I’ve got a…got a…”
“Date?”
“No, no, no: publishing meeting. Text me when and where and I’ll be there with a gown and rubber gloves.”
—
8.10 p.m. Sat down, staring crazily into space with one eye closed and the other open. Was this just about rivalry with Mark Darcy, or did Daniel actually want to be a father?
Thought back to when I was dating (i.e., being permanently messed around by) Daniel and when my old friend Jude (now a hotshot banker in New York) was being messed around by Vile Richard, and Shazzer started ranting about “Emotional Fuckwittage,” which, she claimed, was spreading like wildfire amongst men in their thirties.