"Lucy Locket lost her pocket, Kitty Fisher found it; not a penny was there in it, only ribbon round it." -Unknown
She could hear the short gasps and groans from the foot of her bed and she buried herself deeper under the mass of covers that surround...
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"What's wrong with Cameron?" The annoyance she felt carried through the question. She was due in less than two months and still had a mountain of baby names to work through, let alone the hundreds of others she had yet to discover.
Lucy's heart had dropped when she came home two nights ago. The books filled with baby names were scattered around the living room, and she wasn't surprised to find the fifty dollars missing from the 'secret' compartment in the bookshelf. Shirley had bought her one of those false books—the type you can store stuff in—in hopes that Lucy could hide the money from Luke when he came home. It worked for a while, but it was obvious that he had found it.
"Nothing's... wrong with the name," Shirley said, looking up from the book in her lap as the glass of white wine rested lazily between her fingers, "It's just, it's just the meaning of the name isn't the nicest."
Lucy raised her eyebrow, running her hands over her large bump, her hand stopping when she felt her daughter kick against her palm. She was getting impatient... they both were.
"I highly doubt anyone's going to care about what the name means, Shirl," Lucy said, rolling her eyes as Shirley let out a huff, setting down the wine glass and closing the book.
"Jayden's teacher assigned them to look up the origins of their names," Shirley stated, catching Theo and Nell's attention, "It's a very common activity kids do in school and I don't think you want your daughter coming home and asking why her name means 'crooked nose'."
As much as Lucy hated to admit it, Shirley did have a point. It was a tradition in her family for names to have important meanings. For example, her name, Eloise. Eloise Amelie. Her name basically translated to' healthy hard-working God's favor'. Her brother's, Alistair Patrick, meant 'defender of mankind noble'.
"What about Mallory?" Nell voiced, her eyes looking up from the black and white print as she searched for approval from both her sister and Lucy.
Lucy hummed as she searched the meaning on her phone, "Nah, it means 'unfortunate' or 'luckless'."
The silence that followed didn't bother any of them for it was a focused silence. The only sound in the room was either the ruffling of pages or the clinking of wine glasses as they were set down or picked up.
Luke... Lucy's heart dropped, Luke hadn't been able to join them today. She had called earlier that week to ask if he could get his day pass for this specific day—so that he could help pick out his daughter's name—and they granted it to him.
He never showed up.
"What about Matilda?" Lucy asked, her voice soft as Theo, Nell, and Shirley all looked up at her, "It means 'strength' and 'battle'. It's a strong name with a great meaning."
