The Family Friend by C. MacDonald (love story novels in english txt) 📕

nothing to improve her situation but she’s grown up in a household where it’s the prescribed balm for almost any ill so she goes about rinsing a mug that’s been left on the counter. Bobby’s half-drunk bottle rests on the side. She squeezes her left breast. It feels flaccid, less pumped up than it would have done at this time a couple of weeks ago. She’d found it so amazing that, after a few painful weeks to begin with, her body instinctively learned her son’s eating habits and moderated her milk supply to suit him. Her phone buzzes in her pocket and it reminds her that she’s chosen to interrupt this amazing natural process. She’s chosen to rely on Amanda, on sporadic pumping and a little bit of formula to feed her baby. She’s chosen to invite the world into their lives. She’s chosen to hide threatening behaviour from her husband, for what? Her phone buzzes again, and again shortly afterwards. For that, she thinks to herself. For the dopamine hit of a thin plastic block of computer chips buzzing in her pocket incessantly. She takes the phone out and looks at the dark mirrored tile in its tan leather case. The thirty-four new notifications don’t have their normal effect. She feels the device’s insubstantiality in her hand and thinks about how easy it would be to casually drop it in the washing-up bowl, to cram it down the waste disposal unit and listen to it being macerated. Instead she blackens the screen, and just for a moment, she hates it, hates it for how much she needs it.

She picks up Bobby’s half-finished bottle, takes the lid off and puts it in the microwave for a few seconds. It beeps that it’s finished just as Amanda rounds the corner into the kitchen clutching her son in his monochrome sleepsuit. She spots Erin putting the bottle on the kitchen surface and slamming the microwave door.

‘Don’t you normally breastfeed him to sleep?’

‘Thought I’d have backup in case he doesn’t want to have a go on these puppies again.’ Erin points to her chest.

‘I can do it,’ she offers, ‘if you have stuff you need to take care of?’

‘No, I want to, thanks.’ Amanda smiles and hands Bobby over into Erin’s arms. As his little hands grip the flesh on her forearm she’s struck by how ape-like babies look as they swing from the safety of one adult’s arms to another’s.

‘Are you sure you’re calm enough?’

‘Sorry?’

‘I’m so so sorry, Erin.’ Her inflection goes up in that way Australians sometimes do. ‘I really thought you’d told him.’

‘It’s fine,’ Erin says, holding Bobby’s gaze, ‘I should have. Not your fault.’

‘And, I wasn’t earwigging, the other week. You had your agent on speakerphone. I couldn’t help hearing.’

‘It’s fine. Honestly. I fucked up.’

‘Let me give him the bottle,’ Amanda says, clutching her wrist. ‘Go and do a meditation, or listen to some minimal techno, or whatever you do to relax. Spend some time on your social media or whatever.’ She glances down to the phone in Erin’s other hand. ‘I feel so awful about this.’

‘Raf’ll get over it.’ Erin picks up the bottle that feels too hot in her hands. Bobby grabs towards it, so she squeezes it into her jeans pocket, the heat searing her bum through the denim, and heads towards his nursery. ‘Go out,’ she says to Amanda as she gets to the corridor down to Bobby’s room. ‘I deserve to do some time in solitary with Sir Screechalot.’ Amanda stands bathed in the orange light from under the kitchen cupboards. Her arms are crossed in front of her midriff and she seems coiled in a way Erin’s not seen before. She looks concerned. Erin doesn’t know why but she feels bad for her, bad to have put her in the middle of this situation. ‘Honestly, don’t worry. This is my fault,’ she tells her.

‘I hope he can forgive you,’ she says, with the dawn of a smile.

‘Thanks,’ Erin says, turning Bobby as he grapples over her shoulder to try and get to the bottle before heading into his room. She knows that the video makes her look bad, she knows that not telling the father of her child about something like this is thoughtless, but she hadn’t even considered the fact that he might not forgive her.

She gets the bottle out of her pocket once she’s darkened Bobby’s room and sits in the #gifted ergonomic beanbag chair next to his cot. Bobby’s nursery is by far the most beautiful room in the house. Bouji Mumma Boutique had sent her loads of amazing stuff, prints, a rug with a hand-stitched elephant on it and a tepee decorated with Mondrian patterns. She’s about to get a boob out to see if he’ll accept it, but he’s crawling across her lap to the bottle so she decides not to bother. Erin squirts some of the bottle onto her hand, it still feels hot but probably just about OK. She adjusts herself in the chair to get comfortable, knowing that to avoid any screaming, and she really can’t handle any now, she might have to stay in the chair for half an hour with him sleeping on her once he’s finished. She licks up the milk resting on the flesh between her index finger and thumb.

It’s sweet. She’s tasted her breast milk before and it’s always a little sweet but this tastes like cake icing. As Bobby gets over her legs and reaches for it, she puts it up, out of his reach. She puts her tongue on the hole in the bottle and squirts more out. It’s insanely sweet and there’s another taste, almost medicinal.

‘Baaa.’ Bobby calls out a warning of a tantrum at the bottle being withheld from him. Erin blinks, unable to make sense of what she can taste. The room feels too dark all of a sudden and she clicks a lamp on next to her, causing Bobby to shield his eyes from