Alex paced back and forth. One step. Turn. One step. Turn.
He wasn't on the pitch. He wasn't in a lecture. He was in the maternity ward.
"Sit down, Professor," Mark said. Mark was sitting on a plastic chair, eating a bag of jelly babies. "You are making me dizzy. And I am already dizzy from eating too much sugar."
"I can't sit," Alex said. "The variables are too high. What if something goes wrong? What if the baby doesn't like football? What if he supports Tottenham?"
"Then we disown him," Mark said calmly, biting the head off a jelly baby. "Just kidding. We will convert him. I will teach him the ways of the pizza."
Rico was there too. He was trying to juggle a rolled-up pair of socks.
"Relax, Alex," Rico said. "Babies are easy. They eat. They sleep. They cry. Like Mark, but smaller."
"Hey!" Mark protested. "I do not cry! Unless I stub my toe. Or run out of cheese."
The door opened.
A nurse walked out. She was smiling.
"Mr. Finch?" she asked.
Alex froze. "Yes?"
