The Baby Group by Rowan Coleman

due round with little Henry. If there’s someone else there she’s far less likely to bully me into cleaning!’
    Natalie smiled at her second unlikely new friend of the day.
    â€˜If you’re sure,’ she said, looking at the address.
    â€˜Positive. We can start our own renegade baby group!’
    â€˜She was in a proper bad mood once you left,’ Tiffany said, appearing at Natalie’s side as the class turned outside. ‘I thought I was the one who was always in trouble. That was well funny.’
    Meg smiled brightly at the young girl.
    â€˜That’s a lovely baby,’ she said to Tiffany. ‘How long have you been looking after her?’
    â€˜Since she was born,’ Tiffany said, immediately defensive. ‘I’m her mum.’
    â€˜Oh dear.’ Meg looked mortified. ‘I’m so sorry. I thought you were her nanny . . . you look far too . . . slim to have had a baby!’
    Hastily Natalie introduced Tiffany and Meg to each other. ‘I only just met Tiff tonight too,’ Natalie told Meg, wanting to put Tiffany at her ease. ‘She’s my electrician’s apprentice’s girlfriend and current motherhood guru.’
    â€˜Oh how lovely!’ Meg seemed to have a boundless enthusiasm for pretty much anything. ‘Well, Tiffany, come round tomorrow to mine for coffee. Natalie’s got the address. I’d love to have you if you don’t mind a messy house – you’d be very welcome.’
    Tiffany chewed her lip as she looked at the two older women whose worlds were so utterly different from her own.
    â€˜I don’t know . . .’ she said. Her confidence and composure seemed to wane briefly and her soft, not yet adult features looked uncertain. Natalie had to resist the compulsion to hug her. That was another new thing that had started to happen since Freddie’s birth: maternal urges. Of course, Natalie had expected them to come with maternity, but she hadn’t expected them to extend past her own baby. Still, somehow she thought Tiffany wouldn’t appreciate being mothered just then.
    â€˜Come on.’ Natalie found herself coaxing the teenager. ‘You may as well. You said I need a baby group, and Meg’s had four kids so she must know something useful.’ Still Tiffany hesitated. ‘You can come round to mine with Gary in the morning and we’ll go together if you like.’
    Natalie was not sure why she was quite so keen to get Tiffany to come with her, except that perhaps for the first time in what seemed like ages Tiffany made her feel like a grown-up again. Not because she was so young, but because she didn’t treat her as if at the same time as giving birth to Freddie she had also delivered her brain.
    â€˜Well, OK then,’ Tiffany said, eventually. ‘It’s not much fun being stuck in the flat on my own all day I suppose, and I did promise Gary I wouldn’t go out in the van with him again.’
    â€˜Excellent,’ Meg said, and without warning she kissed Natalie on both cheeks and enveloped both Tiffany and Jordan in a surprisingly affectionate hug that made Jordan squeal with delight.
    â€˜I’d better get back,’ she said happily over her shoulder as she hurried away. ‘My husband hates being left alone with the kids for too long – they drive him utterly mad!’
    â€˜She’s a bit weird,’ Tiffany said frankly as they watched Meg rush off into the night.
    â€˜Yes,’ Natalie agreed. ‘But sort of wonderful too.’
    All the lights were blazing when they got back to the house, and the radiator in the hallway was creaking and clanking into life. Gary Fisher emerged from the basement just as Natalie shut the front door behind her and Tiffany.
    â€˜Learn anything?’ he asked her.
    â€˜Not a thing,’ Natalie said. ‘But Tiffany did.’
    Gary nodded, his forehead wrinkling with an