[28 May 2010]

So far my attempts to reconcile with Graham have failed, and though I don't intend to give up so quickly, nor so easily, I fear that no progress will be made until he decides to stop laying the blame for his own actions on my shoulders and take responsibility for himself. I'm not thinking of myself here - I can take anything he throws at me, and if I thought for one moment that it would help him if I shouldered it all, I'd do it in a heartbeat. But though I have admitted to my failings as a father and apologised for them, I refuse to take the blame for every one of his bad choices in life, or for the part his mother and step-father have played. He's almost twenty seven years old for Christ's sake! No longer a child, but a man and he needs to start acting like one. I can't tell him this, of course, but thankfully his sister does, if the conversation between them I overheard the other day is anything to go by. I hope he listens to her for his sake. He needs to start acting from the best part of himself and build some self-respect if he's to get anywhere in this life, something, I admit, is often easier said than done.

As to Ruth, she's slowly on the mend and I enjoy every moment I spend with her. Her mother has to go back to Exeter on Sunday, so I offered to take some leave from work to help her out, starting Monday, and much to my great delight, she jumped at the chance to spend more time with me. Tonight, she even asked me if I'd stay with her at her place for the entire time, so I will be sleeping at Ruth's from the day after tomorrow.

I've wanted this for so long, the opportunity to spend time with Ruth away from work, talking, laughing, doing things together, holding each other close, sharing our lives. I find myself wondering if I am tempting fate by being so happy. It's surely too good to last. I should tell her the truth and yet I fear that she'll never forgive me, especially since she has no memories of me, of us from before. All she has is one week, and if I tell her the truth now, she'll never understand and will never trust me again. I need time to show her how much I love her and that we were always meant to be together. And yet time might be the one thing I do not have. Her memory could come back any day now, and though, when it does, she might understand why I lied to her, she'll quite possibly never forgive me. So I need to time this just right – tell her too soon and she walks away, dismissing me as a perverted stalker type and calling the police, or leave it too late and she sees it as a betrayal of the worst kind. So much depends on timing that I cannot help but worry when I consider that it's never been one of my fortes. I can only hope that, for once in my life, I will get it right.