Chapter 10

"Granny Maisy can I go in to garden and play?" Katie asked. Running in to the kitchen at her grandmothers Irish home, in her dungarees and blue top, smiling. She didn't have a garden at home and she wanted to make the most of the time she had in her Gran's in the week she had with her.

"Not for long darling, I want to go in yer town terday but till we go, ok." said her father as he sat in his old house where he had been raised with his other three brothers.

It was good to be home, he had missed it. He didn't understand how much till he got back.

Watching her only grand daughter run out to play Maisy sighed.

"She has grown up so much. Even since the last picture. I can't believe that she is going to be five next year. Then again I don't believe the boys were twenty two in July. It doesn't seem so long since I was walking in to the army barracks. Elizabeth laid up, you running about after them, all three."

"It doesn't. I remember getting the news in Hong Kong that I was father to two boys. Never cried so much. Never drunk so much." he laughed.

"We were all very proud. Still are. There good lads, your two" she said proudly smiling at the thought of her precious grand sons.

"I know. They try there best, all we ever asked." He sighed in despair. Maybe that was true o dandy but he still despaired in Steve at times.

"You have three wonderful kids. There mothers has a good heart too." she said.

"I know, she beautiful our Elizabeth. I loved her some thing rotten." he sighed as he drunk his tea"

"Loved, you say it as if you don't still love her." she leagued.

He opened his month too protest.

"Don't lie to me son. You know that you never could. Even when you tried to tell me it wasn't you who hide your fathers slippers it didn't work." she sighed.

"He gave me a bloody good hiding with em when I owned up didn't he?" Jim nodded.

"He was a good man your father. I miss him very much." How could she say that?

Jim remembered when he saw his father hit his mother for the first time. He had been furious. He had fought back. He had put his own sons through that anger. That pain. And he had never wanted them to feel it. Yet he had brought it on them.

"I know. I miss her. She ent even dead." he sighed.

"What happened between you two. Together for so long. Raised a wonderful family."

"That was her doing. I was never there for her when we had the boys. All her doing."

"Then what happened son. Why isn't she here with her daughter and husband?" she asked.

"Because I - I was too much my fathers son, so I was." he sighed as he drunk his tea. He had been the biggest fool.

"Oh James - tell me you didn't hit her." Said a shocked Masiy.

"I wish I could. But you know what my temper can be like." he told her. But he knew it was no excuse. There was no excuse for what he had done. At the route of it all he had been the one, who had broken his family, and now Katie was wetting the bed every night, and the boys were in the house with out there mother. He had got it so wrong.

"Your father should have hit you harder boy. You never ever hit a woman. You know that was how I raised you." She told her son horrified. Her eyes strayed to the little innocent flower in the garden. What was she going to think of him when she got older? For her, it was all my daddy the hero, she thought the world of her father but what about when she understood the full extent of the truth?

"Ma I know. But I was so angry. Blinding by bloody rage. Then when I tried to talk to her. She was too scared to even talk to Me." he sighed. "Tried to take my Katie from me. I couldn't have that." she sighed.

"She is her mother."

"And I am her father. And I know what they say about the bond of a mother with their child but what about a father. Ma, who was it who held her in their arms when she nearly died. It was me. It was me all the time up with her in the night, standing over her crib when she was in hospital." he sighed as he held his head in his hands trying to shake the awful memories from his head.

"And how do you think she feels, not knowing if she is ok." she asked.

"Ma of course she is ok. She's with her daddy, so she is. I am not gonna let nothing happen to her."

"Oh and I suppose Elizabeth would when she has devoted her life to raising your kids."

"Ma- "

"James, she loves you and she loves your kids," she sighed. "She has made a lot of mistakes. But so have you. And a four year old girl needs both her mummy and daddy. Baby, just try. Don't give up. That women is the love of your life, you have told me enough times." she reminded him. "you have been through to much together. Don't give up."

-

Jim sat on the bear garden of a pub he had found watching his daughter play on the swings.

She had grown so much since that little girl who had been in the incubator.

She was a proper little girl now. And she had thoughts, real feelings and she could put them in to words and tell him how she felt.

And maybe he and Liz should be listening to them he thought as he watched her.

He hadn't been doing a lot of that,.

It had just been a case of Liz and him both wanting sole custody and not caring what she wanted, she had been used as a weapon. And that had been wrong. She hadn't deserved it.

She smiled at him innocently as she enjoyed her spring break, doing all the stuff she wasn't allowed to when she was at home. She respected and loved him, and he knew it. And that was what made what he had done so awful.

She had been staying up later, getting up later, swimming every day (or at least playing in the little pool) swimming wasn't exactly mastered yet.

But they were going to get there. They were. He was determined of that. He was going teach her. And start being the father she deserved.

Of course she wasn't sleeping right thorough the night.

She was still wetting half way through. Every night now, she'd get up, find the spare bottoms and top that had been laid out for her the night before and crawl in to his bed with him where she'd sleep till morning came.

He was worried. She had never done this before the separation. Maybe it was the worry he was causing her. Maybe he had to try and make the best of a bad situation.

Maybe try and get back with Liz...

Butt he didn't want to make it work if Liz wasn't happy with it and at that moment he knew she was not going to take him back. It was harsh, but Katie was just going to have to get used to her mummy and daddy not being together any more.

Jim and Katie were home.

Liz was in the house and she had been waiting most of the day with anticipation for she knew she was going to get to take her daughter for the night.

As Jim and she came through the door he wasn't shocked to see the state of the house.

He always knew it was going tot be like this when he had left his twins in the house.

"Welcome home you two." said Liz as she came out the kitchen.

"Mummy!" said Katie as she ran to her.

"Hello sweet heart, did you have a good time with daddy?" she asked with less fear than she had when she had looked at Jim last time.

"Yeah we did loads," she said to her as Katie settled on as her mother picked her up.

"I took loads of photos so you can see what we got up too!" he said to her.

"Good." she smiled as she held her daughter. "Why don't you go and get some bits together for tonight." she said to her daughter unable to wait to take her home.

"Alright." Katei said as she run up to her room. Liz was going to have to check she had every thing but Katherine could get the basics on her own.

And then suddenly Jim was alone with Elizabeth for the first time in a long time.

"I have to talk you " he said. He had been thinking a lot on what his mum had said to him. He didn't want to give her up. "To tell you what a fool I have been" he tried to explain. "I need you." he sighed.

"Oh Jim." she said as she shook he head.

It was a nice to think that they might get back together. But that was all it was. A thought. She couldn't tale him back. Not after what he did to her.

"You can't do it, can you?" he asked in despair.

Gently she shook her head.

"We have been together since we were sixteen Jim. We need to play the field; we need to live different lives. We're always going to care for each and we will always have the kids but you can not ask me to come back. You know I can't."

His pride was hurt. And as much as he knew he shouldn't do what he did next. He couldn't help himself.

"Well perhaps you should go then." he said to her.

"Well I cant, not with out Katie." she told him.

"She's has a few long days. She needs her own bed."

"No Jim." Elizabeth said to him seriously. She had been so looking forward to having her daughter for the night. "You can't."

"Get out Liz." he said to her angrily. He had tried to say sorry. She had had no right to knock her back.

"Not with out my daughter, you are not keeping her when you are in this kind of mood." she said and what he did next caught her off guard.

Taking her by the arm he through her out of the house.

"Jim please, just let me have her don't do this!" she begged as he opened the door and through her out before shutting it.

"Katie!" she said as she looked up to the house. "Katie!"

Katie ran down stairs when she heard the commotion.

"Dad, where's mum?" Katie had been exciting about seeing her mum despite the fact that she had had a great time with her dad.

-

Steve and Andy didn't believe it. There dad had been home two minutes and he had had a fight with there mum already. That had to be a record, even for them. Trying to ignore that fact and just welcome there sister home, they smiled through there concern at the parents ever rocky relationship.

"So how was our Gran," they asked.

"She isn't very well lads." said there father. Though Maisy had been able to conceal it as much as she had been able to from her grand daughter, her son had seen the spirit which had been so large when she had been young grow smaller day by day. And it had hurt him so much.

He knew he wasn't going to get much more time with her.

And that made him think, he couldn't take the time his kids had with there mum away. Liz wasn't always going to be there.

So going upstairs he got his daughters sleeping stuff together and took her to her own mother.

"I am sorry for what I did and said earlier. You didn't deserve it Liz. I just have to learn to deal with the fact we're not together any more." he said to her.

"Thank you Jim. I know that took a lot for you to say. Thank you for bringing her."

"I shouldn't have kept her in the first place. I knew it was wrong. I didn't want to hurt you. Never. And if I did, then I am so sorry. It was never what I wanted."

"I know darling. I know."

-

Jim got back to the house and he had to say now he was relieved of being a father he was going to have a nice quiet night.

But how ever when he got there he saw he wasn't going to get that.

Tears were falling down both his sons faces.

"Dad its Gran - she's gone."

-

"I am so sorry Jim." Said Liz as he delivered the bad news to her.

It was the next day and Jim sat in the flat Liz and Deirdre shared with his wife. The events of the previous night had been forgotten, his cruelty of her yet again, forgotten.

"Its ok. I don't want Katie to come back to Ireland with me though. Funeral is no place for a little girl like her. But I have to tell her." he sighed.

Katie was in the room she shared with her mum when she was there for now but it wasn't going to last and Jim knew it. She'd hear his voice and come out. Then she'd have to know.

"I can do it if you want. You need to deal with your own grief." she said as she hugged him. She knew it was slightly unfair to hold him right now. She didn't want to give him the right idea, but she had to hold him. He felt so alone and she knew it.

Just because she didn't want to be with him, didn't mean she didn't care, because she really did. She was always going to be there for him.

"I have to be there for her and the boys. I am their father." he sighed.

"And I am there mother and I am still your wife." she said to him.

"for now." he pointed out.

She nodded.

"Why don't we have a talk. Katie happy enough playing for now and I think we need it. Or we can just sit,. What ever you want. Just don't go when you need some one." she begged. She knew he did.

He sat back on her sofa and nodded, but by the time she got back with the mugs of coffee, he was asleep.