Chapter 4
Ever since the crash the one wish Robert had in his heart was that there were more good Whites in the world. He would trade ten Lachlan's for one Chrissie.
He did not think he had ever wanted that more than when he got the call to say they had the results of Bex's back scans returned.
It was not looking good. While there was some hope, for there always had to be hope –
It turned out the damage which was caused in the crash was not just to her brain but also to her legs.
And whether she was going to get up and walk anytime soon – or ever again – was still very much in doubt with the doctors.
"Jesus Christ," said Victoria on hearing the news.
"Has she not been through enough lately?" she asked her brother though she knew she did not have to.
If anyone knew what Rebecca had been through of late, then it was the father of her child.
"Does she know yet?" his sister asked him.
"I do not think they are going to ring and tell me without telling her first, do you?" asked Robert.
"Then you are going to have to go and support her through this." Once more he felt as if his sister was telling him things which he already knew.
But there was no point in having a go at her.
He ran a hand down his face for he knew all of this was going to be a lot easier for him to face if he had had a decent nights sleep but Seb did not seem to be very interested in giving him one of those. But maybe after they had been to the doctors that day things were going to get a little easier.
"I think I need to get up to that hospital now, " said Robert.
Victoria nodded her head.
"Do you want me to get the little man ready to go with you?" his sister offered.
"Yeah – thanks Victoria." A minute to compose himself was not going to hurt. And he had a feeling he was going to need a lot of that to get through the day ahead of him, as he had done every day since the crash which had altered all their lives forever.
X x x
Robert had had his moments when he was not sure if he was comfortable going into her room and sitting with Rebecca since the crash, but he did not think he had ever been as nervous as he was right then.
He had a feeling that they were very similar in the fact that they to liked to have control over their own lives and now she had been told that she was never going to walk again. He did not know where she was going to begin to deal with that.
Yet he knew he did have to go in there, for no matter what their past, in a way he was all the family she had left. Lucky was not going to be getting out of the police station any time soon by the sounds of it, so when she turned around and said remember this about Chrissie or remember that about Lawrence, he was all she was going to have, which he did think was a sad state of affairs, he had to be honest.
As he and Seb entered the room, Rebecca seemed as if she was a bit perkier than she had been in a very long time – and he could only take that as a good sign, though it confused him more than anything else.
"There he is," she said with a grin as she saw her son.
"Yeah – here's mummy," he said as he got Seb out of the car seat.
There was no need to dive into the heavy stuff too soon.
"He has been a bit grouchy the last few days – we are off to the doctors after we have been here, just for a quick checkup. But I thought the two of you needed a bit of time together." He said to her gently.
If she was not ready to talk then that was fine. But she had to know she at least had the choice.
But Rebecca did not say much to that at all.
Instead, she just looked at her son as if he was the most amazing thing which she had ever seen which was a feeling he was able to sympathize with. And so instead of trying to get her to face something which she very clearly was not ready too, Robert began to tell Rebecca everything which their son had been up to of late. All the ways he had changed and the things which their baby was learning to do. In his head, he knew that there were a million kids who had learnt to do them before Seb had and when he had been through all of these milestones other children were going to be doing them and achieving what his boy had. But Seb was unique and to him, it seemed as if he was the only one who ever achieved what he had.
During the time he was babbling about there boy though, Robert noticed there was a change in his mother.
She looked different and he was slightly panicked to see she looked pale. He fell silent.
"Rebecca, what is it?" if he had to go and get a nurse, he was ready.
Once more there was a pause.
"Robert, I am so sorry… and I should have told you this a long time ago… but there is a chance he may not be yours…"
Robert felt as if he had lost his hearing. He had to have lost his hearing – or at the very least heard wrong - because this was the event which had turned his whole world upside down. This was the reason he had lost his marriage and the best thing he had ever had.
He had done it all…. Lost it all and done so with the promise that the one good thing which had come out of all this was the fact he got to be a dad.
A dad to his gorgeous lad who made his life worth living when he had thought it was never going to be the case again.
He had a son and he loved his son and Seb was the cornerstone on which he had rebuilt his life.
"What did you say?" he asked, for he knew what he had heard but there was something in him which was never going to allow himself to believe that.
There had to be some kind of sick joke.
And besides anything else, she had said it in such a casual manner, or so it had felt to him. You did not deliver such utterly life-changing news like that.
He was sure you didn't.
"No, he is my son."
"I slept with two men around the same time," Bex stated as fact and to Robert he did not think she had ever been so cold.
For the first time, the thought of all she had lost of late went out of his head as he thought on all he had lost.
This was why he and Aaron had split. This was why their marriage had broken down and now she was saying…
No – no, he was not going to listen to this rubbish. Of course, he was his boy's dad. Rebecca was ill – she was confused. He crossed to the bed and picked the baby out of his mother's arms. "I have got to get Seb to his appointment."
"Did you hear me?" asked Rebecca.
"Oh yes I heard you." but he was going to choose to hear a pack of lies for that was all they were.
"Then where are you going?" Rebecca asked.
She knew she was in no state to take care of Seb herself no matter how much she wanted too. She knew he had been a good father to him. She knew she was being detached and she wasn't even sure how long she was going to want to keep her baby with her either, not in this place. It would be very different if they could go home.
But at that moment she had been compelled to say what she had.
"I am going to take Sebastian to his doctor's appointment," he said to her as if she was an idiot for even asking.
Where else would he be going?
He put Seb back in his car seat, blocking out whatever Rebecca was trying to say to him as he did so and left the room without so much as turning back. Normally he was the first one to say 'goodbye mummy,' from Sebastian. Not that day.
He walked briskly to the car and did not look back.
Once he had got his son strapped into the car Robert looked at the ground and vomited.
The last few days and weeks had been some of the toughest of his life and he was not going to let them end like this. He couldn't do it.
He could not have gone through all of that just to have it end like this.
He did not think he had ever been one to bury his head in the sand and he did not understand why some people did that instead of facing the problems in their lives. He knew he had created more than his fair share but this was not one of them.
And with that knowledge, he did one thing which he never would normally do and he ignored what Rebecca had said.
"Daddy's coming," he soothed gently as he heard Seb cooed from inside the car.
Then he got inside himself and drove calmly to the doctor's surgery. They had the rest of their day to get on with.
He did not treat Seb any differently to the way he had done before his mother had said what she had. His first evaluation of the situation was the one which he believed to be true. Rebecca was not herself and she was saying things that weren't true because she was hurt.
That was the only explanation he thought to himself as they sat in the waiting room. He held his son in his arms and kissed his forehead and carried Seb through to see the doctor when the time came.
"Are you the father?" the doctor asked as if he knew what Robert had just been told.
"Yes, I am Robert Sugden," Robert nodded. No one else during the last few weeks had sat up with Seb during the night when the little man had not been able to sleep for missing his mother.
No one else had given him his bath and his bottle and sung him to sleep.
No one else had shifted there entire life so that their spun around existed around his.
He was sure that made him Sebastian's father in every way which was important.
"Ahh, I have only ever met his mother before," the man said with a smile. "now let's see if we can get to the bottom of whats troubling your son."
Robert nodded, wishing it would be so easy to get to the bottom of his own concerns.
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