Peer Pressure Read Free

thought it had been a joke. Not a very funny one at that.
    What rattled her more than anything was the sense that she had been left behind in some way, that women of her age were still out there clubbing and dating, having casual sex and throwing Ann Summers parties. She had tried meeting people in the past. The three that had seen the inside of her bedroom were more a means to an end, essentially a way to scratch an itch.
    She was still a young woman in her prime and, unlike many women of her age, not a slave to her own biological clock. Indeed, once Jodie had appeared in her life, she had taken the clock and thrown it against the bedroom wall without even considering the snooze button.
    First of all there was Will, whom she had met through her Mum and Dad.
    He was nice. He was tall.
    He was unemployed.
    But on that particular night, nice and tall won her over. He wasn’t even that bad a lover and yet the evening felt sort of sullied by the fact that Katy had to pay for his taxi home in the morning.
    It turned out that the dole only extended as far as two courses at Pizza Express these days.
    Oh and a pack of three condoms, although Katy suspected he had had those on him before they had even made it to the restaurant.
    Then there was Steven. He was more promising. A handsome, mature student, studying law at Aberdeen University, he had been an accountant for a Solicitor’s firm, before deciding to try and advance his career. Now, with only one year of study left and the promise of a position of importance at his firm, he seemed not only like a real gentleman, but a great catch for any single woman. It was just that, well, he had a rather strange habit in the bedroom. He liked to swear, a lot. Not the best of kinks when you have a teenage daughter trying to sleep or, God forbid, listen to what you were up to.
    The third and most recent attempt had been Charles who, despite being charming, wealthy and impressively endowed, did decide post coitus, to pop to the bathroom without putting any clothes back on. Jodie was on her way back from the kitchen with a cup of tea, when they had bumped into each other. Katy had heard that he was healing well, although not interested in a second date.
    All of which had led Katy to the conclusion that perhaps this was it: a two bedroom house, office job and Saturday’s with her sky plus box. Yet she never felt sorry for herself, or her situation. She wasn’t the first, nor would she be the last to have had a child at such a young age. And she was also aware that many of those women, in similar circumstances to her own, were shadows of the girls they had once been, that they hadn’t been given the opportunities or help that she had had. Above all, Katy understood the warmth and security of a loving family and a good home, two things she had been blessed with thanks to her own Mum and Dad, who had managed to secure her a house following her divorce from Tom. And if Katy had any life plan whatsoever at this point, it was to make sure that Jodie would never have to struggle like she had, that she would be there for her no matter what happened.
    That included pregnancy, something she had thought long and hard about, especially by the time Jodie had come of age and started taking an interest in boys. In fact, she had spent so much time thinking about it that she had come up with solutions to any number of scenarios that Jodie might eventually have thrown at her.
    Jodie would often grill her about such scenarios, trying to get a rise out of her.
    “Mum, what if I told you I’d started smoking?”
    “Well, I would just have to give your photo to every tobacco seller in Aberdeen. And yes, that includes the supermarkets!”
    “Mum, what if I told you I’d started smoking crack?”
    “Well, I would just have to kill your dealer.”
    Jodie would then go for broke, trying not to smile.
    “Mum, what if I told you I was pregnant?”
    “Well, I’d just have to kill you!”
    This would be followed