She’s smoking.

Knees together, ankles apart, face bright pink and bushy hair tucked behind her ears; she’s sitting in a wheelchair and waiting for the contractions proper to start. Quite honestly, she’s bored. Whoever knew labour could be boring? Painful, yes, but she’s got twenty minutes between that to do whatever she likes. The doctors recommend hot curry and warm massage. Fat chance of either of those unless the hospital have started supplying masseuses and food.

A few people should be on the way. Tam’s been sticking his number up everywhere. Jessie called it when the contractions started but now she’s started to regret that. Jesus, she doesn’t want Tam to be the only one there. She called because she was scared of being alone but if it’s a choice between being alone and her brother seeing her snatch, she’d rather the former.

The October air is chilly. She’s gone outside because the hospital won’t let her smoke. They’ll tut disapprovingly wherever she is, of course, but the baby’s almost out so she can’t really do it any harm now... right? Oh Jesus, I’m going ta be a mam. For the past couple of months Jessie’s been trying to make it real but now it’s a lot more real that she wants.

“Nice costume, petal,” says a nurse, bustling past and smiling. But of course. It’s Halloween, which means Jessie definitely won’t be trick-or-treating, Tam will probably be drunk off his arse somewhere, ditto for Diane. Tats... well, who knows. It might be that a friend of a friend will tell him what’s going on. If Tam is too drunk to come he’s still got Tatter’s number on his phone and won’t that be awkward?

A group of trick-or-treaters runs past. They’re not kids, they’re the drunken college student sort, with all the girls dressed up as ‘slutty insert-costume-here’ and all the guys dressed up as puns. Jessie sighs. There was a time once when she’d have been able to fit into those teeny weeny nurse outfits. She lets her cigarette drop as another wave of contractions hits her, waddles and wheels herself back inside, lets a nurse know that she’s now got less than ten minutes between each groan and readies herself.

William’s on his way.

She should probably take her fishnets and devil horns off if this kid is to have any hope of growing up normal.

There is an argument going on at reception. The dull nurse in the ballooning pink and blue blouse wants to know if Diane is family. Diane believes this is none of her fucking business, and has told her so. The nurse is now disinclined to tell Diane where Jessie is.

It is perhaps Diane's appearance that is actually causing the issue. It usually is. Given as that it's Halloween, she feels justified. Every other girl in the city is running around in an obscenely short skirt, a corset and animals ears. Diane actually feels quite decent.

In honour of it being Halloween, she's a faerie.

Well, actually she looks pretty much like her usual self - clunky black boots, ripped 'nets, too much make-up, chipped black nails, worn off black lip-stick - but she's got a new skirt that's sort of ribbony and gauzy and floaty, and she's got black and silver wings and a little beaded tiara thing. She feels quite happy with the outfit, and she's flaunting her hair. It's recently been chopped off at chin-length and dyed dark red. It actually looks okay.

The nurse doesn't think so. The nurse thinks that Diane looks seedy and grubby and that she'll probably spread germs and bad habits throughout the hospital.

Diane is already ill at ease. She met Jessie in this same hospital and she hadn't liked it that time.

Hospitals give her the creeps and make her mouth go dry so she's a little tense and just about ready to snap at the nurse and threaten to throw a wobbly and make a great deal of loud noise. She suppresses the urge.

"Never mind," she tells the nurse. "I can find my sister all by myself, thanks."

Then she walks off, big black boots clomping on the weirdly clean floors, to find maternity and Jessie.

“Di?”

Quite honestly, of all the people she’s called, Jessie wasn’t expecting Diane to be the first to show. It’s always been Tam. Of course, she’s glad it isn’t this time, but... but. But still. Of all the people in the world Tam is the one Jessie is absolutely 100% certain will be on her side at all times. On her side quite often extends to at her side, but not this time.

She’s not even sure it is Diane. If it is, she’s cut her hair but she’s looking as trampy as ever and Jessie is hit by a wave of affection for her that rather than go con drinks out of horny guys she’s here, ready to hold Jessie’s hand. Assuming that’s what she’s here for, of course.

Jessie’s wearing the sort of thing that looks like it should have a corset. It doesn’t for obvious reasons but there’s still serious structuring going on round the boobs. This is entirely Diane’s fault. The nurse is quite right to beware of her and her corrupting influence. Last Halloween Jessie dressed up for she went as Casper.

She waddles out of the maternity waiting room, where a dozen women are ready to give birth as soon as a room becomes available. She’s trailing glitter and the red of her top and sparkly horns is clashing quite grotesquely with her flushed face. “Hey, DiAAARGHFUCK.” Good thing there was a handrail there. Unexpected contractions can be really quite inconvenient.

There's something about Jessie that's just fantastic, Diane thinks. The contrast between her and her costume, and her costume and the hospital is a beautiful thing.

"I found you," she says, quite proudly. She has sub-par navigational skills and only found the room by following a harassed but completely healthy looking man who she correctly deduced was a father-to-be. She winces sympathetically at Jessie's contraction. This isn't going to be the first pregnancy Diane's sat though, and it probably won't be the last. And it looks fucking horrific every time, causing her to renew her vow never to have kids.

"How are you holding up," she asks, steering Jessie back into the waiting room so that she can sit down in one the uncomfortable chairs. She's been tramping around town in her heels all day and her feet are absolutely bloody killing her. "Cute costume, by the way."

She glances around the room at all the expecting mothers. "So, I just came from my mate's place," she tells Jessie. She'd been flopped on Stephen's couch, in fact, when her mobile rang. She had dropped by and Stephen hadn't been around. He'd probably already been out getting plastered with his uni mates.

"And your boy was there." She waggles her eyebrows in a vaguely suggestive way, though what she's suggesting is unclear. "He's pretty much out for the count, I think. He got in from NS today and from what I could gather he seems to have walked half the way." She shrugs - there's no accounting for men. "And he was dead stoned. He said he would have come except he hates hospitals and if the nurses saw him they'd probably call the socials on you."

"You did," Jessie agrees weakly, wincing and rearranging herself in her chair. Honestly, they could’ve at least got some beds in there. On the other hand, none of them seem quite as far along as Jessie – they all look more bored and less pained. Maybe, she thinks, because it’s her first. Or maybe because she’s in the wrong room entirely but there’s no chance getting a nurse’s attention when she’s on the free births programme and there are sensible middle-class women to attend to.

"Erm. Argh. Not as painful as I was expecting, actually," although she’s clutching her back the whole time and looks like she’s about to scream. “Thanks.” The costume was to answer the door in. The kids will just have to do without their out-of-date candy from the Quebecois house for this year.

"My whaaaargh?" Jessie took her shoes off long ago. They were always more sensible than Diane’s, although still not quite sensible enough to give birth in. She fiddles with her fishnets then slides them down, tugging her knickers down with them. Under normal circumstances this would be embarrassing but after her waters broke in front of a gang of grade-schoolers, Jessie’s past the point of embarrassing. "That bastard! Tell him to get here!" If she’s going to be punching and pinching someone she wants it to be Tatter, not poor Diane.

"Yeah, like I said," Diane says, "I think he's pretty out of it. I thought about dragging 'im over here with me, but I decided against it. It's one thing to have the mum being medicated when she gives birth but I think doing the same for the dad is taking it a bit too far. And he was more or less asleep."

She really had wanted hit the twat with the aforementioned bottle of vodka and possibly yell at him a bit and then take him by the scruff of his scrawny neck and haul him to the hospital, but she'd taken a look at him and had mercy. He was obviously under slept on top of everything else. She also had suspected he would be more then a bit useless at a birth.

Which was kind of her, at least from Tats' point of view. "He also said I should tell you that you're wonderful and that he'll come see you after work tomorrow, if you want him to."

Diane of course can understand why someone might want to sleep with Tatters - although she hasn't yet got the dirt on the Jessie/Tatters relationship, in all its weirdness. But William was definitely an accident, because no one in their right minds would pick Tatters to be their kid's father. He might add to the baby's looks but he practically had 'bad parent' written across his forehead in red sharpie.

"Huh. Well." Wonderful would have to do. "Tell him to AAARGH come or he doesn’t get to have a say in the babby’s name." Tatter always was a bit useless. He was romantic and fun and knew where to get the best drugs and these are all great qualities in a shag; not so much a father.

Jessie has gone very, very pink. She wants to take her top off and probably would if not for the fact it’s the only thing supporting her boobs. "Diane?" This is her whining, wheedling voice. It works on Tam. There’s a bit more to it now, though, that suggests she really, really needs help. It’s a squeaky little girl voice. "Diane, ah think the babby’s coming. Right now, like. Can ye get a nurse?"

"Are you sure you want him having anything to say about the baby's name," Diane wants to know, dubiously. From what she's seen of Tats, he's a nice guy. They've had a couple conversations about Philly, where he's lived briefly, and she's always selling him cigarettes and Smarties.

From what she's seen of him, he also seems like the kind of person who wouldn't feel at all weird about calling his kid Madder, Tazo or Sky Blue.

She takes Jessie's next request seriously, though. One look at the girl's face is enough to show that, yes, a nurse really would be a good idea.

Diane goes to find a nurse. Luckily, they're in a hospital, so nurses aren't very hard to come by. Spotting one of the pastel-coloured, blouse-clad creatures, Diane bears down on her. She is quite imposing. Her chest is imposing. She has broad shoulders and she's over six feet in these boots.

"My sister," she's not risking dumb question right now, "is having a baby, right now," she informs the nurse, in her sternest and most commanding voice. It's been honed on whiny kids and is admirable.

This is the right hospital, wrong wing. "Excuse me, look, sorry," Tam attacks the poor nurse with, "ah wuz alsae lookin’ fer ma own dear sistah." He’s foot-to-foot anxious. This is definitely not how he imagined meeting with Jessie for the wrong time and her sobbing message said only that she was at Saint Joseph’s. He gave her name to the idiot receptionist who said that she was in the maternity wing along with his other sister. He’s drunk, but not drunk enough to be convinced that he has another sister, or that the sister he knows he has should be in the maternity wing. "Ah think tha’ your receptionist dow’there sent me to the wrong fuckin’ place, y’ken?"

Unlike Diana – who he’s consciously shorter than – Tam’s not feeling very intimidating right now. It’s hard to feel intimidating in a skirt. No wonder girls are so quiet most of the time, he thinks, they’ve got this disconcerting breeze round their privates. It’s not a real skirt. It’s really a kilt. On Halloween the two tend to blur into each other, even if you’re dressed as William Wallace for a party.

"Her name’s Jessie, Jessie Joyce, but she miyght be callin’ hersilf Jessie Illsey." He gives the other – girl? – an apologetic grin although it’s half-hearted. His libido’s been dulled by alcohol and worry.

It may be news to Tam that he has two sisters, one of whom is pregnant - but it's also news to Diana that she's got a 'brother'.

"Who the fuck are you, then," she demands. She had come over to Tam with the intention of saving the nurse from what appeared to be some totally plastered student who had probably wandering in looking for free beer, or at least candy corn. And who was wearing a skirt.

Well, a kilt, to be fair to the guy. But still.

"And what the hell d'ya want with Jessie," she adds, glaring down at Tam. Suspicion is rising in her face. "Oh gawd, please don't tell me..." the sentence trails off, ending mentally with 'that you're Jessie's other boy' as Diane is struck by the possibility that there might be two babydaddys wandering about. She's very glad now that she didn't bring Tats.

She has her mobile clutched in one hand, because she was contemplating calling him.

"Ah'm Tam Billy Joyce, an who the fuck’re yuh?" Tam demands aggressively, drawing himself up to full height (not much). He’s swaying a little. This does not make him look like a sensible and mature young man.

"Yeah," he continues, completely misinterpreting Diana's appeal to the gawds. "Thasright, ah'm her bruther." There's something very Jessie-like in his defiant jaw-jutting, his up-and-down appraisal of Diana and most of all the fact he looks like he's just about to fall over.

"Don't you fuck me," Diane says, warningly. She doesn't mean this literally. She's in no position to assess Tam that way at the moment. There are more important issues on her mind (like people who've already been fucked) and anyway, he's too drunk to assess. Though he looks like he might be cute.

She gestures menacingly with her mobile, not feeling much threatened by Tam. He looks like she could blow on him and he might fall over. "Yeah, you're her brother, sure. An' I'm her sister. Possibly she's also the Queen of Sheba."

She looks Tam over again. "What're you meant to be anyway, other then Jessie's 'brother'?"

Unfortunately for the clarity of the situation, Diane's not believing Tam's sibling story. She still rather suspects he's another boyfriend. She's no good at faces, whatsoever.
'

He’s Glaswegian, though. Fucking (both sorts) just comes naturally to him. Especially when drunk. Although right now he’s got a girlfriend, maybe. Possibly. He hasn’t seen her in a while even though he’s living in her house.

"Alright," he says desperately. "But ah really am her bruther, an’ she really did call me, an’ ah really do need to know where she is. William Wallace," he adds as an afterthought. "You?"

He doesn't know Diana. If it takes a conversation with her about costumes to find out where his little sister is, though, he's not adverse to that. She's pleasant enough to look at even if he is drunk and worried.

He's 99% sure Diane's not his sister. There was the 1% chance she was some sister long lost to adoption but no Joyce kid would ever have the genes to get that tall.

Diane considers this.

She contemplates Tam.

"You're also plastered," she tells him. "I'm surprised they even let you in here." Although, it wasn't like the hospital was high-security, and the nurses were pushovers. "Lemme see your mobile, then," she demands. Next she'll probably be asking him to recite the alphabet backwards, tell him Jessie's first word and then walk in a straight line.

"Oh," she glances down at herself. "I'm a faerie."

Her lipstick is almost entirely worn off by now and is only clinging darkly to the edges and she looks kind of tired, but the faerie part should be obvious. The wings are meant to give it away.

Yes, he has a sporran. Of course. Where else would he keep his wallet, phone and keys? It’s not like he has any pockets. He gets out his phone, pushes some buttons, and waves it in Diane’s face. There’s Jessie bawling on speakerphone. "Tam? Tam, it’s me. Ah’m," a hiccupping sob, "sorry. Ah’m sorry. I need yeh. Ah’m at Saint Joseph. Please come." Pause, sniffle, "love you."

The poor nurse has abandoned them so Tam has to rely on the kindness of this strange stranger. It would probably do him well to tone the aggressiveness down a notch. "Good enough?"

Tam had woad on at one point. Now he just looks very, very cold.

In the face of evidence, Diane relents. Her cheeks colour slightly but you can't tell under all the white foundation. "Sorry," she says, "c'mon." She leads Tam down the hall towards the room where they've got Jessie. "It's just, I'm pretending to be her sister too, and she never said nothing about you... Well, if she did I was smashed and didn't hear.... So I really had no idea who you were."

"I'm Diane, anyway," she adds. She is sounding nicer now. "Diane Simmons. And she's fine, Jessie is. I mean. She's having a baby. But she's fine, despite her worrying message leaving. But she does that. Oh, fuck. Your her brother, you know she does that."

Nerves are making Diane babble just slightly.

"She’s having a. Uh." Tam's gone ever so slightly green. It looks worse than it really is because he was already ever so slightly blue. He follows Diane down the hall in a daze. She can't be having a baby. She's a baby herself. A very disturbing baby who swears and smokes and fucks and is really only a baby in the sense of being Tam's baby sister.

He stops outside Jessie's room and sinks to the floor, mumbling. "She's having a babby." He looks up at Diane. "She's having a babby?" She doesn't look very impressed but Tam seems to find the confirmation he needs that yes, his little sister is indeed giving birth right at this very minute.

"Does she know who the father is?" He's trying to annunciate everything in case his accent thickens to the point of incomprehensibility with booze and Scotland. This feels odd. He can't focus on anything properly and he's sweating and cold at the same time.

Turns out Jessie's brother is as much use at the birth as the baby's father would be.

Diane sighs. She wonders why Jessie even bothered calling this (cute) prat. He's obviously not going to help matters. She's revoking everything she said about the men not being on drugs. The men should obviously be on drugs. It's the only thing that will prevent them from tripping everyone else up.

"Yeah," she says, "she's having a baby. A boy. William, I believe." She gestures at Tam's costume. "Very appropriate, all things given. Now, get yourself together, okay? She's hysterical enough without you adding to the mess."

It's just fortunate that Diane has loads of experience with drunken Glaswegians. She can decode their babble. "Erm, I'm not entirely clear about that," she says, going to the evasive route on the father subject. "There's this dude around called Tatter or something, but I dunno."

"William," Tam says softly. "That was our da’s name." Our da, who used to beat about our ma something rotten; but then, she's too young to remember that. It's also Tam's middle name. It's also William Wallace's name and he used to read her stories of William Wallace until she was old enough to read them herself. "Another wee Billy in the family, eh?"

Nothing like perceived betrayal to get a guy on his feet and into drunken fighting stance. "Is he here? I’ll kill him. I’ll knock him right to the fucking ground." Pulling himself up so quickly wasn’t the smartest move as he's now feeling queasier than ever.

"Diane?" Jessie calls weakly from her room, "did you find a nurse? Who're yeh talking to?"

"Ah, I wondered," Diane says. Then Tam gets all... excitable... over Tatters. "Chill, dude," she tells him, warningly. "He's not here anyway. C'mon. If you know him you know he's not about to show up to see his kid being born. But he is your sister's... whatever... so I wouldn't diss him just now."

It's not a charitable remark, but she's just trying to stop Tam from breaking anything. She's actually pretty sure Tatter would have come if he could have gotten his sorry ass out of bed.


"Now shut the fuck up or you're gonna upset your sister," she commands Tam, and then goes into Jessie's room. She hopes Tam will get a handle on himself. " I found your brother," she tells Jessie, "he's plastered. And riled. Don't you know any nice, sober guys?"

"AwrghWHOA." It’s hard to write down onomatopoeically the noise made by a guy who, having not seen his sister in almost a year, is greeted with the sight of her at ten centimetres dilated.

"NooWAAARGH," Jessie replies to Diane, "huff, huff, huff." There should probably be a nurse in here about now. Jessie’s got to the dramatic bit of labour. The waddling around and having contractions is rarely shown but films are keen on showing the heavy breathing, hand grabbing and baby pushing bits. These are the bits Jessie’s at right now – or would be at, if she had a hand to grab. From being able to walk to pushing out a tot in under twenty minutes: impressive.

"It’s OK," Tam mumbles, dazed. "Aam haur fur ye. Relax yerself, wee hen. Dunnae fash." And similar phrases incomprehensible to the Canadian public as he blows cool air over her face, lets her squeeze his hand and tries to avoid looking south of the equator.

Confronted by the combined horror of it all; dramatic reunions, labour and the nasty smell of hospitals - Diane freaks. She takes one look at the scene unfolding before her and rushes for the exit. She left home some six months ago to get away from horrible, soap-esque drama of this sort.

It would however be ignoble simply to run. She does the next best thing. She runs and finds a nurse and makes the nurse run and find a doctor.

Then she lets them go and take off Jessie and then she's standing in the hallway and biting her nails and really desperately wanting a smoke and trying to get up the nerve to go back in when Tatters appears.

Diane looks up and sees him. "Fuck," she says, because it's really starting to look like bad Thursday evening television. She has to remind herself that this sort of thing happens loads, every single day. That's why it's on TV. Cause it's really.

Tatters looks like shit. The black bags under his eyes are incredible, his lids are barely open and he's got something that definitely qualifies as a beard. He looks to have just gotten out of a the shower, because his long hair is dark and clinging damply to the back of his neck and to his denim jacket.

"Your kid's uncle wants you dead," Diane tells him.

Tatter is unimpressed. "He's like this tall," he says, gesturing vaguely. He gives the door a nervous glance, and then confesses to Diane, "I'm terrified to go in there. I don't even know why I'm here, I'm... You go in."

The idea of Tam being with Jessie doesn't soothe him very much. Diane can see that much.

"Fine," she says. "Don't go anywhere."

Then she hurries back to Jessie, 'cause someone needs to hold the poor kid's other hand.