21) Daddy's Back
Little Carmel stole Ricky's heart right away and he was really devastated by how his own reactions to his brother's decease had deprived him of seeing his own daughter grow up from being a beautiful little baby to the golden haired toddler that had smiled and wobbled to him the moment she laid eyes on him. He'd then told Myra proudly that she instinctively must know who her daddy was, but that moment was ruined when Tina'd come running towards him, shouting 'Matty! Matty!', and he'd realised that it was his brother who really had been Carmel's daddy for those first years of her life. So Ricky decided there and then that he'd better start behaving like a real father to his daughter.
Myra wasn't over the moon to have Ricky back in her life, but she respected his rights as Carmel's father and understood how he was trying to make up for the way he'd treated her and Marty. He even made an effort to get closer to Myra's other daughters.
She still missed Marty more than she'd have thought possible, even more than she'd missed Michael after he died. It was a different kind of regret, however. Michael had been her first love and lover, but Marty had been a friend, a real equal and a partner, even through his illness. So having Ricky back felt kind of like Marty was still there, especially when she saw his tall, blond figure approaching her home, but in a way it also made her miss her friend all the more.
One day, a month after Marty's funeral, Myra was called into a meeting with Jacqui's teacher. Her eldest daughter was doing rather well with the school work as such; learning didn't seem to be any problem for her. On the contrary, it seemed to come so easy to her that she was getting kind of bored at school and had started acting up, and the teacher was always contacting Myra, claiming Jacqui was leading three boys in her class astray, creating constant trouble, both in the class room and on the school ground. The reason for this meeting was that they were suspected of having stolen things from their school mates' coats and jackets.
Myra felt very patronised at the meeting and told the teacher, she'd talk to Jacqui and get to the bottom of things. On their way home from school, she asked her oldest daughter whether this was true and she finally told her that they'd taken two pounds from one girl's coat and a five pound note from somebody else's jacket, because they'd wanted to by some chocolate. All the way home, Mercedes, who'd also started school, kept giving her older sister dirty looks and acted all high and mighty. Still, Myra didn't have the energy to tell either one of her daughters off, she was too preoccupied with the realisation of how her financial difficulties were affecting her daughters.
When she came home, the mail had arrived and she picked it up and put it on her kitchen table. At first, she thought she wasn't in the mood to open any of it as it only seemed to be 'Bills! Bills! Bills!', but thinking to herself that she might as well get it over and done with, she sighed and sat down at the table with a cup of tea.
Half an hour later, Ricky arrived at her house and Mercy opened the door to let him in. When he asked where Myra was, Mercy only pointed to her mother's bedroom and then gone into her own room to continue combing the hair of her only barbie doll. When Ricky entered the bedroom, he saw Myra lying in her bed sobbing and as he walked slowly towards her, he asked kindly what was wrong. She didn't reply, and instead she simply handed him a letter, addressed to Mr Martin Boalin. It was his benefits check.
Looking up at Ricky, Myra then whispered, "They don't even know he's dead!", before she burst into tears again. Taking her into his arms, Ricky tried his best to sooth her pain and sorrow, and he told her he'd deal with it so there wouldn't be any more letters like this. Hearing this, Myra finally stopped crying and just held on to Ricky and looked into his eyes – the eyes that reminded her so much of her best friend – and before she knew it, they were kissing and tearing at each other's clothes.