A/N
This chapter has been, to express politely, a bit of a naughty bugger. And then my computer decided to misbehave too, hence the late posting. Sorry, lovelies. The good news is I only have to show you guys the shiny, finished version ;-)
A thousand thank yous to the incredible Trip who put so much time and effort into this chapter. Thank you to my fabulous Yankee cheerleaders - Heather and Lady V. And thank you to Discordia81 for helping me fix what turned out to be an embarrassingly simple IT problem! Discordia81 just began posting a new story and the premise and prologue are brilliant - Lose The One You Love. Check it out.
The "West End" in the context of this chapter means Theatreland, London's equivalent of New York's Broadway.
EPOV
"Ed, stop it."
Nobody scowls quite like my sister. Negative emotions always look alien on her usually sunny face, giving glares and scowls superpowers.
I scowl back, continuing to wring my hands and tap my foot in agitation. Suddenly her bony little fist makes contact with my thigh.
"Ow! What the fuck, Ali?"
Alien glare. "I said, stop it. You're driving me mental."
"Well, forgive me for being a little agitated," I growl.
"Don't you think I'm angry and anxious too? But you need to calm down." She lowers her voice. "You're freaking out the other passengers."
I take a cursory glance around the train carriage where the odd glance is indeed being thrown in our direction; some curious, some nervous, some irritated. I feel a little unhinged. I turn away and try to take a deep breath.
More contact with my thigh, this time in the form of a gentle squeeze from Bella's hand. Then she slides her fingers into my hair and it calms me a little. I close my eyes and lean into her touch.
"Everything's going to be fine," she says softly. I'm not entirely sure I believe those words, but her touch is reassuring.
I wrap my arm tightly around her shoulders, pulling her closer.
"Thank you for coming," I whisper into her hair.
"Of course."
I glance up at Alice who is eyeing us curiously, her mouth twisted somewhere between a grimace and a smile. I suppose I look the same way when I see her and Jasper getting all smoochy. You always want your siblings to be happy but it doesn't mean you enjoy seeing them with their hands all over somebody.
Not that I give a fuck right now, I'm just so glad Bella's here. I don't think anyone has ever been able to calm me or comfort me the way she does, and I'm fairly certain I have the same effect on her. Thanks to our earlier conversation, I feel like I can relax a little now regarding our future. For the last couple of weeks, the idea that she might not want to stay in England with me has been niggling like a splinter in my mind. At the beginning of our relationship, I was so afraid she would bolt, that she would leave to protect herself after deciding there was no way I could accept her situation. I had also worried that maybe she would realise she didn't want me after all; my past, my lifestyle, my crazy mood swings.
But she is staying, with me, and in England at least for the foreseeable future. Now there are only technicalities to sort out. I can't see any reason why Aro wouldn't extend her contract, especially after his apparent acceptance of our relationship, but I won't be able to fully relax until he's agreed and the ink is dry. Failing that, she can find another company to sponsor her work permit. The bottom line is she wants to stay, so the rest is just paperwork.
Of course, if for some reason she can't stay at Volturi or find work elsewhere, there is another way she could improve her chances of staying in the UK...
I have to halt that thought though, which lately, is surfacing more and more frequently. Much as the idea is surprisingly appealing to me - especially considering I never thought I could ever want that again after what happened with Tanya - it has only been a few months. Not to mention the small fact that Bella still isn't even divorced.
I grit my teeth and force dark images of Bella's ex to the back of my mind. My limbs are already buzzing with rage aimed at my father, throw that fuck Jacob into the mix and I'm worried I'll explode like an atom bomb.
"I'm still not sure your mom will want me there," Bella murmurs.
Alice gives me a pointed look. I think she's pissed off that I'm bringing an outsider into our family's personal business. Again, I can't bring myself to care. I have no idea if my sister realises this but Bella and I are the real thing, for good. She is my family, or at least one day she will be.
"Don't be silly, Sweetheart. She won't mind at all."
I'm not lying, I know how Mum feels about Bella; she calls me weekly to ask about her, to invite us to dinner. Plus, she needs all the support she can get right now and I know Bella will be able to help comfort her.
The thought of my mother, of her voice when I called her after I spoke to Alice - broken, resigned, terribly sad - makes my chest ache, and when I think about the person who caused it my knees start bouncing again in agitation.
"I still can't believe he fucking did this."
"We don't know if he did anything," Alice says quietly.
My head snaps up. "Are you seriously defending him?"
Alice rolls her eyes. "No. I don't know! All I'm saying is we don't know that he did anything wrong, or what happened at all really. It seems like it was a pack-bags-ask-questions later type thing."
"Well, can you blame her?"
Alice shushes me, looking around the train anxiously.
I can't bring myself to care about social niceties like keeping my voice down on a train and not airing our dirty laundry in public. All I care about is the bare fact that Mum has kicked Dad out of their marital home, apparently for good, because of something he did. Or...didn't do. Fuck, I don't know, we just have to speak to her. The rational part of my mind knows Alice is right, Mum didn't seem able to disclose much on the phone so we don't actually know whose fault this whole thing is. But I do know my father - he can be cold, distant and selfish and I can find no doubt in my mind that he must be the cause of this.
The hour journey that usually flies by seems to take forever but eventually we're piling out of a cab outside of my childhood home. It's full dark now, the street lamps casting a slightly eerie glow on the old house catch the flaky paint and broken guttering, the crumbling stone wall and battered front door and, as usual, I'm filled with guilt. I should be here, I should be fixing things if he can't be bothered. I can't help remembering how this house used to look, modest of course but bright and well-kept. The years show on the building, just as they show on the faces of my parents. Has their marriage gone the same way as their house, left to become shabby and desolate through lack of attention? This house could easily be brought back to brightness but can my mum and dad?
My throat feels tight as the roller coaster of the day's emotions catch up to me in one long breath - anxiety over Bella leaving, relief, happiness, excitement, shock, anger and back to anxiety. Thinking the last thing Alice or Mum need is for me to fall apart like a selfish child, I grit my teeth and drag in a gulp of air.
I unlock the door with the familiar key and we shuffle awkwardly into the tiny hallway.
"Mum?" I call out, not wishing to startle her.
She doesn't respond and when we eventually find her in the living room she's sitting on the edge of the couch, staring blankly at the unused fireplace while the telly plays quietly to itself.
"Mum," I say again, softly.
She looks up slowly, and seems surprised to see us there.
"Oh hello loves." She pauses, looking confused. "I didn't hear you come in."
She stares for another second before shaking herself a little and standing up, smiling a false smile.
"Come in from that hallway. Let's get you a drink. Tea? What about some dinner? Have you eaten anything?" She's rambling a little, seemingly slipping into the comfortable role of hostess but her eyes are haunted and tired. She looks at Bella for the first time.
"Bella, so good to see you. Are you well?"
"Mum," I say imploringly, putting a reassuring hand on her shoulder. "Relax, okay? We're here to take care of you."
She looks up at me and her eyes well up with tears. I pull her in towards me and hug her tight. She has always been slender and petite but she seems even slimmer than usual.
We drink tea and Alice asks Mum when she last ate something. She can't remember so Alice and Bella knock up some dinner from the mishmash of food they find in the kitchen.
We watch encouragingly while Mum slowly makes her way through a bowl of pasta before giving up halfway through and saying she's had enough. Half is better than nothing I guess.
Dishes cleared and TV long ago turned off we sit and wait for her to talk. She gets that far away look on her face again before Alice grabs her hand and squeezes.
"Tell us, Mum. What happened?"
"Have you spoken to Dad?" Mum asks a little suddenly. I shake my head, no way could I trust myself to even try to call him until I knew what had happened.
"I tried his mobile a couple of times," Alice says. "But it just went to voicemail."
"Do you know where he is?" I ask, desperate not to care but unable to fight the sudden anxiety to at least know that the selfish old git is all right.
Mum nods. "He's at Peter and Charlotte's. He's texted me a few times but...I haven't replied."
My dad's brother and his wife live in Brighton. As his only real relatives outside of us it makes sense that he would go there. It crosses my mind that he didn't bother to come to mine or Alice's in London. It's no surprise that he wouldn't seek solace with me but I'm surprised he didn't go to my sister. That pretty much confirms that whatever's happened, he's ashamed of himself.
"What happened?" Alice asks again, a little more frustrated.
I watch my mother take a deep breath. "So much, love. And nothing at all."
Her answer is irritatingly cryptic and the three of us sit and wait as patiently as we can.
"He's hardly been here," she finally says, sadly.
"The last few weeks?" I ask.
She looks at me. "The last few years, Eddie."
I know only too well what she means. Even when we were children he was always consumed with his music, his own self-importance. It could be days between decent conversations, but for important family stuff he would usually make a point of being there, at least physically even if his mind was still in a concert hall somewhere. Holidays, Christmas, family gatherings and school open evenings he'd make an appearance. But without Alice and I to give him reason to spend time as a father, a husband, not as a failed musician, then I guess he even let that go too.
"I've tried," Mum says. "I really have. I start conversations, I suggest trips we can take, hobbies we can enjoy together but he gives nothing back. He says yes to appease me but nothing ever comes to fruition."
She begins to cry and Alice wraps her arm around her.
"When he comes home from work he has dinner and then nine times out of ten he disappears into that blasted music room. I watch telly alone, or do a crossword, and then climb into bed without him."
She chokes on a sob. "I love him, I do. Or I did. But this isn't a marriage. You shouldn't feel lonely in a marriage."
She gives over to tears for a minute while Alice holds her close. Unable to hold back any longer I crouch down in front of them both and wrap my arms around them too.
Eventually Mum gets herself together enough to speak.
"I started my own hobbies as you know. I go to bingo on a Wednesday, down the Labour Club on a Friday night. On the odd occasion I could get your father to come he would be so sullen I knew he didn't want to be there."
I sit back on the floor and watch my mother, usually so strong and cheerful, miserable and alone. Alongside the sadness I feel for her, fire smoulders in my belly at the thought that he did this, he has made her feel this way. I have always questioned his abilities as a father, but it seems he's nothing but a shitty husband too.
Bella leans down from her chair behind me and wraps her arms tightly around my shoulders, placing a soft kiss on my temple. For once her touch has the opposite effect to the usual jump-start to my heart, it steadies it instead.
I watch closely as Mum swallows hard, dropping her gaze to her hands which tear up tissue in her lap.
"And then there was that girl."
The room feels instantly colder and my body goes rigid, and even Bella's touch will not soothe my racing, raging heart.
"What girl?" I growl.
"A young girl started coming for piano lessons. I guess she is early twenties, a uni student maybe. I thought nothing of it, you know how many of Dad's pupils come through that front door. Anyway, it seemed she was here all the time. I could hear them through the wall, every day less and less piano and more and more talking. And laughing."
She looks up and her expression has changed from desolation to fury.
"The bloody laughing and giggling, constantly. Dad was laughing, too." Her breath catches harshly. "I can't remember the last time I made your father laugh."
Alice looks like she wants to be sick. Bella's hands are tense on my shoulders.
"What happened?" I grit out in a voice I barely recognise.
Mum takes a deep shaky breath.
"The truth is I don't know. But..."
"But what, Mum?" Alice whispers.
"One night I came home and he was with her in the music room - that bastard music room that I want to burn- and when I peeked through the gap in the door they were close. Sharing the piano stool, only not in the same reserved way he usually does when he's teaching certain things, but close, bodies touching, heads close together - whispering and...laughing."
"Did you confront them?" Bella asks, making me jump.
Mum shakes her head. "No, I'm too much of a coward I suppose. I just snuck upstairs and got out his suitcase, filled it and waited for his little friend to leave. I'm not sure he even knew I was home, or cared even, but he was certainly surprised to see his bag packed in the hall."
I've heard enough. I drag myself off the floor and out of the room. I push the back door open so hard it slams against the wall, and pace back and forth between the worn garden furniture, literally vibrating as I wait for the anger to subside. But it doesn't, it burns on and on, like fire under my skin and behind my eyes.
I drag in deep breaths of sea air but it doesn't help. The smell of the sea is the smell of home and right now home is him. I pace and grip my hair, pulling hard until I can focus on the pain and not on the toxic emotions rushing through me.
How could he do this? I knew he was distant and distracted and selfish, I knew he resented me, but her? I never considered, that he could ever not love her.
Suddenly exhausted, I collapse down on the rusty garden swing. The strong breeze whips around me and I drag in deep breaths.
"Hey." Her gentle accent carries on the breeze and somehow wraps around my chest.
"Hi."
She sits beside me silently, gently unclamping my gripped fingers and taking my left hand in her lap, surrounding it with both of hers.
"Is she okay?"
Bella nods. "I think so. She's going to bed, Alice is upstairs with her."
I shake my head. "I shouldn't have stormed out like that."
I feel her shoulders shrug. "You're angry."
I can only nod.
"How could he do this to her?" I whisper. "How could he hurt her like this?"
Bella doesn't speak, just lets go of my hand with one of hers and traces it through my somewhat sweaty hair softly, comfortingly.
I take a shaky breath. "Christ, I'm 29 years old. I shouldn't be freaking out this much about my parents splitting up!"
"That's bollocks." Bella says, to make me smile. It works. I turn my head towards her and she strokes her fingertips over my jaw.
"You don't have to be a child to be hurt by this, Edward."
We slip back into silence, almost unconsciously using our legs to swing the seat gently back and forth.
"What was your dad like?"
I've never asked Bella directly about her father before, afraid it would be too painful, but sometimes she brings him up in conversation and I think maybe she wants to talk about him.
I watch her face in the half-light as she gazes off into the garden, but I don't think that's what she's seeing.
"A little strict when I was small," she starts. "God-fearing. Serious, quiet, matter-of-fact. Without a mom I felt like I couldn't talk to him about some things which sucked but I..."
Pause.
"What?"
"I knew he loved me."
I'm struck by sudden envy. I've never been entirely sure if my father really loved me, or if I was just his project, his prodigy.
"When I grew up we got closer. He and I were similar in a lot of ways - private, a little shy. I think he just wanted me to be happy, only his vision of what might lead to that wasn't always quite the same as mine."
"Jake." I murmur, his name always tastes bitter on my tongue.
She nods. "Yeah. All he wanted was for me to be a good wife, a good Christian wife. And to have children; he often talked about being a Grandpa."
I watch her jaw tighten and her eyes glaze. This is another subject we have never discussed. Between Bella's condition and my past, the subject of children feels too painful to even broach right now. Since that day with Tanya at the clinic I barely let my mind even toy with the idea.
I watch her shake herself. "But everything changed when I left Jake. My father had loved him like his own since he was a kid, but when I finally told him what had been going on; the things he'd said and done, how unhappy I'd been, Charlie's loyalty was unfaltering. I'd been worried he wouldn't believe me but I shouldn't have, he was loyal to the core and never doubted a single word. I trusted him in a way I'd never trusted anyone else," she glances at me with a small smile. "Until recently."
"Anyway, I'm glad we had that time, albeit too short, just me, him and the truth."
"He loved you," I say simply.
"Yes."
Bella's father wanted her to be happy, just as my father claims the same, except mine only thought I could be happy the way he wanted and didn't care at all what I wanted out of life. That's the difference and that difference hurts.
I'm assaulted at once with every moment where Dad's form of "encouragement" felt like criticism, his praise like a bribe. Days when I would bring home a picture I'd drawn, or a good school report or a football trophy, and all I wanted was to please him. And he was pleased, but never in the same way. His face was never as happy as it was when I played a new piano piece perfectly for the first time. In the end I stopped bothering to share any other achievements with him.
I can live with that. I have for a long time. We're never going to be close the way Bella was with her dad at the end. The way I am with Mum and Alice. And that's fine. What's not fine is him hurting Mum.
"Edward..." Bella's soft voice brings me back to her and I'm humiliated when I realise she's brushing a tear away from my face.
"Shit," I hastily pull away and drag my hand over my eyes and cheeks.
"Stop it." She grabs my wrists, leans over and kisses me, my lips and my stupid, salty cheeks.
"Crazy Brit, afraid of crying," she murmurs, smiling gently.
"I'm fine, Bella, it's fine."
But she pulls me into her arms and I can't resist, I can never resist the feel of holding her. I bury my face in her neck and just the smell of her is enough to coax a few more ridiculous tears out of me.
"Never good enough," I mumble, hating how weak I sound. "I just wanted him to be...happy with me."
She shushes and cuddles me tighter and tells me she loves me. Eventually I get myself together and pull back, embarrassed.
"The only thing that ever made him proud was my music and in the end I had to stop playing. I knew that one day the music wouldn't be good enough either, and I didn't think I could stand to see him disappointed in me for that too."
I pause, take a deep breath.
"Aren't father's supposed to love their sons unconditionally or something?"
"Edward." Her tone is strong and determined. "He does love you."
I clench my jaw. "Thanks, but I really don't think so. And, Jesus, apparently he doesn't even love Mum!"
"Do you not think that maybe the reason he pushed you like he did is because he loved you? I mean, yes, his methods were unfair and unbalanced but if he didn't care he wouldn't have bothered at all, right?"
"I don't know. Maybe."
"Don't you want to find out?"
I don't answer.
Bella sighs. "Your father is alive, baby, and capable of giving you answers if you ask the right questions. You should take advantage of that."
She could be right. Although the way I feel right now if I see him I'll be too angry to be rational.
"It's late," I say, standing. "Let's go to bed. We'll decide what we're doing in the morning."
Bella takes my hand and we go back inside and we creep up the stairs. The house is quiet but I hear Alice's voice, talking quietly on the phone from her old room, presumably to Jasper.
"I'm just going to check on Mum," I say, leaving Bella in my bedroom.
Mum is sleeping; she looks small and older than I remember. I drop a kiss on her forehead and go back to my room where Bella has already crawled under the sheets. I remove my clothes and climb in beside her. She turns and curls into my arms, somehow making everything better.
It takes me a long time to go to sleep, despite the comfort of Bella's body against mine. This room evokes so many memories, good and bad. I eventually drift off to sleep feeling like I'm floating between two lands, my parents and this house on one side, my beautiful girlfriend and our still uncertain path on the other. My past and my future combined.
I'm in a huge concert hall, packed to the rafters. There is no orchestra, no conductor, only me and my piano. There's a hush over the crowd, not a single person lets out a breath, they simply wait. I stare down at the keys and go over the familiar notes in my mind one final time. I settle my hands on the smooth ivory, comforted by the feel of it. I close my eyes.
When I open them the audience has disappeared. There is nothing but rows and rows of empty seats leading up to the highest, grandest ceiling I've ever seen. My breath quickens. Then I hear a throat being cleared. Shielding my eyes against the bright lights I squint up to the highest point, and there he is. My father. I feel like a sitting duck, staring up at a hunter cocking his rifle.
"Play." His voice is stern and too close and when I blink he is no longer in the gods but in the front row, leaning forward eagerly on his elbows, his expression fierce.
I look back at the keys and my mind is blank, I can't remember the piece, a single note.
As my stomach starts to fill with panic, I hear a heavy door creak open and look to my left to see Bella, Mum and Alice walk in, apprehension written all over their faces. A door creaks on the other side, startling me, and a girl I've never seen before enters. She is young and beautiful and stares at my father like she knows him, even the parts I've never seen.
My father's eyes never leave me and when he speaks again his voice is hard.
"Don't make any mistakes, Ed."
I awaken with a jolt, heart racing and sweaty, with Bella's body wrapped tightly around mine. I breathe in the scent of her hair until my heart slows a little.
Then the events of last night flood back to me and the rage hasn't diminished, in fact my dream seems to have only added fuel to the fire.
Bella murmurs my name and stirs. She disentangles herself enough that I can reach over and look at the time on my phone; 6:03am.
"Edward," she mumbles again, opening beautiful, bleary eyes.
"Yeah, I'm awake."
She stares at my face. "What is it?"
I bend my lips to hers and kiss her softly.
"I'm going to Brighton."
She blinks, pauses, then nods.
"What will you say to him?"
I pull myself to sit on the edge of the bed, scrub a hand over my scruffy jaw and ridiculous hair.
"I don't know. But I'm not leaving there without the truth."
I feel Bella's small hand on my back.
"Do you want me to come?"
Yes. I want you with me everywhere. To keep me grounded and sane and from doing something stupid.
"No. I...I need..." Pause. "This needs to be just me and him."
The bed shifts and Bella sits beside me.
"I'll go back to the office then, handle everything."
For a moment I'd forgotten it was Monday morning. I dip my head and rest my cheek against hers.
"Thank you." My mind instantly fills with my working schedule. "Shit! I have a client meeting with BRC today, and I promised the Wit/Lock shortlist report."
"Hey," Bella grabs my hand. "I said I'll handle it. They'll just have to understand. It's only a day or two."
I smile, grateful once again to whichever force dropped this woman into my life.
"Thank you." I pull her closer. "Did I ever tell you how awesome my PA is?"
"Don't make me jealous," she grins. "She's not going to steal you away, is she?"
I smirk. "Can't promise anything." I place a kiss on her neck. "You're both pretty hot."
We shower and dress quickly and quietly. I write a note for Mum and Alice. When I poke my head around the doorframe my mum is still sleeping soundly. We creep along the landing.
"Where are you going?"
"Fuck!" I jump about a foot in the air. "Bloody hell, Alice!" I hiss.
She leans against her bedroom doorway, hair sticking out and sleep still in her eyes.
"You going to work?"
I shake my head.
"You're going to Peter and Charlotte's?"
I sigh. "Yes."
"I'm coming with you," she says determined and confirming what I feared she'd say.
"No, you're not."
"What do you mean 'no'?" She whisper/growls.
"This is between me and him."
"He's my dad too, Ed. Don't you think I want to know what the hell happened as well?"
She glares at me and I glare back. I'm instantly thrown back to our childhood and the endless bickering we would have on this very landing.
"Sis, come on. I'm going alone and you need to stay here and take care of Mum."
I see her hesitate and I know she just realised Mum needs her more.
"I'm not happy about this. I still think we should speak to him together."
I offer a tired smirk. "Don't make me pull out the older sibling card."
Alice snorts quietly. "Yeah right, since when has that ever worked."
She's right of course. My sister's persuasive and determined nature got her snarled up in many of my adolescent capers.
I put my hand on her shoulder. "Stay here, make sure Mum's okay and I'll call you tonight, all right?"
Reluctantly, her blue eyes soften and she nods.
"All right."
"Thank you," I kiss her forehead. "I'm taking the Volvo, you and Mum can use your old shitheap, yes?"
We grin, remembering our teenage car banter.
"Yeah." She grabs me in a quick, tight hug. "See ya later."
Alice and Bella whisper their goodbyes and we head down stairs.
"Ed?" Alice calls me back.
I look up.
"What are you going to...do to him?"
I grit my teeth. "Ain't decided yet."
Alice frowns. "Don't be a dickhead."
"I'll try to resist. Bye."
I drive Bella to the station and park up so we can have a proper goodbye. I lean against the closed passenger door and cuddle her closely to my chest.
"I'll call Aro at nine." I tell her. "And call me from the office if you need anything."
I feel her nod. It's only a day or two, but I feel anxious and reluctant to let her go.
She steps back but keeps her hands on my waist. I give her a long, soft kiss, at the end sucking her bottom lip between mine, something of a signature with us, and she smiles.
"I love you."
I kiss her again. "I love you more. Will you be okay?"
She rolls her eyes. "Of course."
"Don't walk from the tube if it's dark, and keep your deadbolt on."
She laughs. "Yes, Dad."
But somehow her joke isn't particularly funny to either of us.
"Drive safe," she says, and when we see her train pulling in we realise she really has to go. I watch her disappear into the station before I drive away, feeling somehow emptier than before.
Without Bella's grounding calmness, it quickly becomes obvious how angry I still feel. As I drive out of town and slip onto the A127 I can already feel the rage from last night reigniting from the smouldering embers in my belly. My old car rattles along and I can't help thinking back to all the times Dad and I rowed before I would storm off and drive around. But everything that went on between my father and I pales in comparison to the white-hot fury I feel when I think of that girl. If he did betray Mum I honestly don't know what I'll do; I thought he was a lot of things over the years but never an adulterer. But I suppose it's not too much of a stretch, after all has he not been cheating on all of us with music all these years?
The Monday morning rush hour is not helping to ease my mood. This was a fucking stupid idea and I now have to add irritation with myself to the mix. It's stop/start all the way to the motorway and the M25 is even worse of course. About halfway there, I realise I've been thoughtlessly switching lanes and hammering the speed limit between tailbacks. Definitely not abiding by Bella's request to "drive safe."
I try to take a few steadying breaths and pay more attention to the road. The last thing I want to do is give Dad the satisfaction of writing my car off on the way to confronting him. Unfortunately, no amount of deep breathing seems to be working. It's as if the further I get from Bella's influence the more my anger builds. If it turns out he has been fucking some slaggy student, I can't be held accountable for my actions.
By the time I enter Sussex, my heart is racing and I'm desperate to see him, hear what he has to say. I eventually reach my aunt and uncle's place and practically launch myself out of the driver's seat.
I thump loudly on their door and my uncle answers. When he sees me, his face - a darker, younger version of Dad's - breaks into a familiar smile.
"Eddie!"
"Peter. Is he here?" I grit out through clenched teeth.
Before I've finished the sentence a broken, ghostly version of my dad appears in the doorway. He looks hopeful, like maybe my being here means I'm here for him. What a ridiculous notion.
"Hello, Son."
Son.
It's the wrong word. Son implies family, implies a bond we don't have, a father he's never been and a husbandly duty he isn't fulfilling.
Son is absolutely, categorically the wrong word. And do you know when I realise this? At the moment my clenched fist makes contact with my father's surprised face.
In terms of Southern English coastal towns, Brighton could be described as Southend's cooler, better-looking - dare I say - camper, younger brother. As I look out from Peter and Charlotte's balcony even the sea looks shinier here. During the summer holidays from uni, me, Tanya and our mates would troop down here for "lost weekends" of clubbing, drinking and smoking weed. We'd often crash at Peter and Charlotte's, who would keep the worst of the truth from Mum and Dad. Peter is almost ten years younger than Dad and yet I still look up to him more readily. He and Charlotte run their own PR company and have become extremely wealthy from it. Their house is enormous and right on the seafront, Peter drives a Beemer and they go on cruises and rent villas in the Med. Dad can't stand it; the miserable, communist bastard.
"Feeling calmer?" My aunt stands beside me, following my gaze out to sea.
I throw her a sarcastic smirk. "Oh yeah, Char, this camomile tea has transported me into a positively Zen-like state."
She scowls but I know she's hiding a smile. "Watch your lip, young man, you're not too old to get a clip round the ear you know."
"How you gonna reach?" I grin, teasing. She doesn't have more than two inches on Alice, and most of that's in her perm.
She laughs, pushing a blonde curl off her forehead.
"Bloody hell, Ed," she mutters, shaking her head.
"I know, I know. I'm a cheeky sod but you can't help loving me."
She snorts. "Yeah, something like that."
Her face turns more serious. "Now, are you going to go in there and talk to each other like grown adults or do I need to get Pete to referee?"
I swallow, guilt rising up and taking hold in a corner of my chest. I know I'm a shit for hitting him but I'm still fairly certain he deserved it.
"Yeah," I murmur and Charlotte takes me through to the lounge. Before I go in she grabs my sleeve and hisses in my ear.
"He's in a right old state, Ed."
I stare at the door handle.
"Yeah well, so he should be."
I open the door and my aunt disappears down the hall.
Dad is sitting in the armchair in the corner of the room, hunched over and clutching his head. I watch him fist his hair anxiously and my hands itch, knowing I get that trait from him.
"Alright?" I mumble, hating that it's not only a greeting this time, I want to make sure he's okay.
He looks up and I look at him properly for the first time. Bloodshot, tired eyes, almost grey skin, several days worth of beard and - now - a rapidly swelling cheek.
"You look a mess," I tell him needlessly.
He nods. I sit opposite him and silence stretches on between us. When he eventually speaks his voice shakes a little.
"How's Mum?"
Why lie? I'm not going to let him off the hook that easily.
"About as good as you."
He nods again. "She won't talk to me."
"Well can you blame her?" I growl, my fists clenching again.
Dad shakes his head sadly and croaks. "No."
This isn't how I expected this to go. I didn't expect him to look so lost, so fallen. I've never seen him like this and it unnerves me.
There's more silence. I don't know what he expects me to say but I don't have any answers for him, any comfort. He did this to himself. He did this to her.
I do have a question though. A question that ended in me punching my own dad.
"Did you fuck someone else?" My voice comes out cold, emotionless.
He looks at me with his tired eyes and I stare back, unyielding.
"What?"
I clench my jaw. "Don't even think about messing me about. Did you fuck her?"
He flinches and part of me knows he wants to chastise me for my language, which given the circumstances is truly ludicrous. He stares at his hands, fiddles with the edge of a cushion.
Eventually he looks back up, looks me straight in the eye.
"No."
Relief pounds through my veins but I ignore it. I'm almost afraid to ask the next question.
"Did you want to?"
I know the answer instantly. I see the shadow of it cross his face, a shadow of intent if not action, a shadow of what could have been.
"Right," I say, even though he hasn't answered me with words.
His head is back in his hands and it's not until I notice his shoulders gently shaking that I realise he's crying.
My dad is crying.
I have never, in 29 years, seen this man shed a single tear. I've seen anger and disappointment, yes; delight and satisfaction, occasionally; whiny, self-righteousness, often, but this much sadness, this much sheer grief, not once. For a moment I'm stunned into silence, and then he speaks, every other word punctuated with a lonely sob.
"I'm so sorry, Edward."
He hasn't called me Edward since I was a little kid.
"Oh God, I messed up, so bloody badly. I...I can't...she can't leave me. This can't be over. I didn't mean any of it."
He raises his head and he looks angry, at himself I guess. "I fucked up, Eddie. And not just with your mum."
When his eyes meet mine my heart races.
"I'm so sorry for everything."
I feel like he's looking at me for the very first time. He stares, appraising me through tear-filled eyes. Instinctually I want to comfort him, despite everything he is still my dad. I want to say something, give him a lifeline, maybe even a hug - we haven't been physically affectionate in more than 20 years.
But I can't. Anger is still coursing through me and although I pity him I can't help thinking he brought it all on himself. He's hurt Mum, he's ignored me, and I can't forget it. Not right now.
He searches my expression and I try to keep my face impassive. Eventually, he whispers.
"You're not going to forgive me."
I run a hand through my hair, stopping halfway through when I see Dad do the same.
I look at him.
"Tell me everything."
There comes a point in every child's life when you stop seeing your parents as...parents, infallible heroes who are capable of fixing everything from grazed knees to playground bullies, and start to see them as people instead. I have to say, I thought this day had come with my father many years ago when I realised his relentless form of "encouragement" and complete disregard for other things in life that made me happy, meant he wasn't what a father truly should be and I soon stopped respecting him. But I realise now I hadn't seen him as a person even then, just a bastard.
When he starts telling me about how crazy he and mum were for each other when they first met, about his auditions in the West End, about the life he had before me, I can actually see him in my mind as someone other than my dad, other than a bastard. I see him as just a bloke.
"She was a real stunner, Eddie. She still is, of course. But she really did something to me back then. I was a cocky little shit, only really cared about music, and girls were just for casual fun - "
He looks at me pointedly.
"I guess sometimes the apple doesn't fall far from the tree," he mutters, taking a sip from the tea Charlotte silently brought in a few minutes ago.
"Really, Dad?" I scowl. "You're going to make this one of those 'lets bond over how similar we really are' moments?"
He flinches slightly.
"Just carry on," I grumble.
"She'd come to productions sometimes, at the end when the actors would always gesture to the band for applause your mum would squeal and shout as loud as she could."
He grins, remembering. "I used to play for her at her house, you remember that old upright Nan and Grandad used to have?"
I nod.
"It was never tuned but I didn't care. I composed for her, played for her. She loved sitting with me on that piano stool. Or at least she used to." His eyes fill with sadness and resentment.
"There's more to life than the bloody piano, Dad," I say, tightly, words I've said many times before. "Mum knows that, it's a shame you don't."
He glances at me and then apparently chooses to ignore what I've said and carries on with the story.
"The show had finished its stint in London and we were about to go on tour. Things were getting serious between Mum and me. She wanted us to get a place together, get married. I loved her, God, so much, I wanted to be with her for good but I wanted my career too. I asked her if she'd wait until after the tour, and she said she would. I asked if she'd go on tour with us but you know how your mum is, she's a homebody, she didn't want to live out of suitcases for the best part of a year. But she said she'd wait."
He takes a deep, somewhat shaky breath, and I get the impression I'm about to find out something new. I knew Dad played in the West End but I hadn't known he toured.
"A week before we were due to leave your mum told me she was pregnant."
My heart starts pounding quickly. This couldn't have been me. They were already married when they had me.
Dad looks anywhere but my face. "I'm ashamed to admit this but I was furious at first. I told her she'd done it on purpose to trap me, keep me home with her. I knew deep down this wasn't true, we'd been careless several times, I just didn't want to believe it I guess."
My heart races but I stay silent. Who was this baby?
"She told me I should still go, the baby would only be a few months old when I got back, we could start afresh from there. This tour would have been a really big deal, a great opportunity for me to get discovered and offered more work.
"I thought about it, I really wanted to go. But your mum was young, and her parents weren't being overly supportive."
He stares at the wall, smiling slightly.
"Plus, this gorgeous bird, way out of my league, was having my kid. I figured I had to grow up, do the right thing. So I stayed."
"Who was the baby?" I ask evenly, although the answer is obvious.
He finally looks at me.
"You."
"Why did you never tell me that's the way it happened?"
He shrugs. "No child wants to hear they were...unplanned."
"But you're telling me now?"
He swallows hard. "You wanted the truth."
I nod. I did. I do.
"What happened next?"
"It was hard; we were absolutely skint. Mum had a rough pregnancy; she was really sick and had to give up work. We had a tiny flat but it was still bloody expensive. I got some factory work to pay the bills and I had to increase my hours when your mum gave up, so I didn't get to go to as many auditions."
My breath comes a little faster. My dad, selfish, greedy, self-involved, gave something up - for me.
"When you were born it got a little tougher. I was working all day and gigging at night, leaving your mum all alone in that flat. She was miserable and took it out on me, said I was never there. I was trying to get my music back on track, despite that initial show I hadn't been as visible for a few months and I'd lost my way in, auditions weren't going well. My performance was slipping, I was so bloody tired that I simply wasn't good enough anymore to compete with the more experienced pianists."
I can't help thinking about Tanya, wondering if this is how my life would have been - shitty job after shitty job and a woman indoors resenting me.
"Some friends of friends had offered me some tutoring work. I took it to make ends meet and found I quite enjoyed it. Word spread and I got more work, your mum was happier because I was home more. Eventually, I started night classes to get my teaching qualifications and when I got that first job at the school me and your mum could finally relax a bit. This was the eighties of course and Thatcher had everyone's balls in her clenched fist but we were doing okay then, we had our heads above water and it was better."
The guilt that had previously taken residence in my chest, spreads all the way through me.
"No wonder you fucking hated me."
He meets my eyes, shocked.
"Hated you? Ed, don't be ridiculous."
"Well you gave up your dream for Mum and me so I can finally understand the resentment."
Despite my words I can hear the edge of insincerity in my voice. I believe what I'm saying but at the same time I don't. The little boy inside me still wants him to love me unconditionally.
"Edward." The use of my full name again makes me cringe.
"Son." His voice is soft but determined. He puts his hand on my arm until I look up.
"I could never, ever hate you. You are what made it all worth it. After those 14-hour days the only thing that kept me going was the thought of coming home to that little lad of mine." He smiles genuinely. "With your tufts of silly hair that was nothing like mine and a cheeky grin that was. I lived for you, Ed. We both did."
I swallow the lump that suddenly rises in my throat.
"And the first day you tapped on those piano keys, so gently and carefully despite being little more than a toddler, I couldn't stop grinning for the rest of the day. I was already talking about how great you were going to be, wondering how we were going to afford your extra tuition." He chuckles lightly. "Mum thought I was crazy."
"Jesus, you were so good. So much better than I could have ever hoped to be."
I shake my head. "I wasn't, Dad. I'm okay, I can play, but the genius you talk of was mainly in your head. You wanted me to be the best, but that doesn't mean I was."
He frowns. "Well this is where we've always disagreed."
I shrug.
"Your sister tells me you've bought a piano," he says quietly.
"My sister has a big mouth."
"You're playing again?"
I stare at him. "For fun, Dad. For pleasure, nothing else."
He nods.
"So...you said you didn't hold it against me and Mum but..."
He stares at his hands and they shake a little. "I know. I guess, as the years went by, I did get a little angry, I missed performing. I got a bit obsessed with the idea that I might have made it. But it was okay, because I had you. You'd make it instead. But you didn't want to and...well, that made it worse I guess."
I decide to be honest too. "I'm sorry but...I'm never going to be like you. I...I never wanted that."
"I didn't want you to be either!" he exclaims. "I wanted you to be better. Do you think I wanted you to end up like me? Lonely and resentful."
I fly out of my seat, furious.
"Well I'm so sorry we were all such a bloody disappointment to you!" I explode, storming across the room. "I'm sorry we robbed you of your dream and that mum trapped you into marrying her and that your kids could never live up to the high expectations to set us!"
"It wasn't like that! I wanted you to have everything I didn't!"
"Everything you didn't have because of us!"
"Ed...Ed, please, I'm sorry." His voice dissolves into sobs again. "I've been so stupid, so blind. You're it...you and Mum and Alice...you're all I've ever achieved in life."
"And that achievement isn't enough." I snarl.
"No! Fuck, this is all coming out wrong." He drags in a breath. "You are the best thing I've achieved. You're absolutely bloody everything to me, and I was too stubborn and stupid to see it."
All the energy leaves my body at once and I collapse down on the sofa.
"I just wanted you to be happy," he whispers.
A hundred conversations run through my mind, a hundred nights when I thought I wasn't good enough, years of building resentment and many, many rows.
"And I just wanted you to let me."
He nods, understanding me for perhaps the very first time.
"I see that now."
I don't want to talk about us anymore, him and me. This isn't about us. It isn't about his failings as a father, it's about his failings as a husband.
"So who was this girl?"
The guilt writes its story across his face. "I've been a classic fool," he murmurs, taking a deep breath. "Her name is Rebecca. She...she reminded me of your mum."
I snort, disbelieving.
"Nice excuse, Pops."
"I mean it. When I play she looks at me like your mum used to. She was interested in me, in music. Mum hasn't been interested in that stuff for years."
"That's because Mum isn't a miserable sod who's stuck in the past."
Dad clenches his jaw. "I know. I deserve that. Anyway, Rebecca flattered me I guess. Reminded me of the young pianist who listened to your mum whooping from the back of the theatre. She made me feel like I was...worth something."
How did he become like this? How was it that music was all that defined him? Is it the rejection of music that defines me? How can he not see what has been staring him in the face all this time? A wife and daughter who love him. A son who needed him to be more than he was. How can he be so blind?
Then my thoughts are stopped in their tracks, halted by a pair of chocolate eyes and a gentle, shy smile. And I realise, haven't we all been blind at one time or another? Bella was blind to the sort of man Jacob was, blind to all the ways he was hurting her and all the ways she was hurting herself. I was blind to what was happening between Tanya and Tyler, even though in hindsight the clues were laid out like Hansel's breadcrumbs. I was blind to what I needed afterwards, thinking I could find it through sex with strangers and a hard day's work. Jasper was blind to how much Maria was destroying his confidence, his personality, day by day.
And my parents have been blind to how lonely the other was feeling.
The truth is we all make mistakes, I've made more than my share, but we have a choice. Do we let those and the mistakes others make that affect us, define us? Or is it what we do afterwards that matters? Every man is made up of the sum of his parts, but which parts do we give more weight to; the painful ones or the ones that make us feel loved? That's the choice. With Bella in my life, I'm beginning to make mine. Maybe Dad should do the same.
"Dad." He looks over at me. "You have always been worth something to Mum. That's what this is really all about. She misses you."
"Since I left?" he asks, hopefully, stupidly.
"She's missed you for years, and not just the pianist, but you. Whatever it was that made her want to be with you in the first place, that's what she misses. Show her him and you're golden."
"I don't know if it's as simple as that, Ed. Things haven't been right for a while."
"So fix them!" I toss up my hands in frustration.
"That's pretty easy for you to say. You've been in love for all of five minutes."
I stare at him, wide-eyed.
"Oh please, you think I don't notice anything? It was written all over your soppy mush when you first brought her home."
A smile slips onto my face without permission.
"My point is," he continues, "when you've been together for 30 years things are a lot less straightforward."
I shrug. "So start at the beginning, see how it pans out."
He frowns, fighting a smile. "When did my promiscuous son become such a relationship guru?"
"When did my hard-nosed dad become such an emotional wreck?" I tease.
"Bloody women," he mutters and we laugh, despite everything.
"So, go on then, what's your suggestion, oh wise one?"
"Talk to her."
"She won't answer my calls or texts; I've been trying for days. She said if I turn up back at the house she'll cut my bollocks off."
I laugh.
"Cheers," he rolls his eyes.
"Look," I tell him. "I'll call her. Then she'll talk to you, okay? And you tell her exactly what you just told me."
He nods, seriously. I stand up and reach in my pocket for my phone, he stops me and looks me dead in the eye.
"I never would have actually done it. Played away, I mean. Betrayed your mum."
All misplaced humour gone, I stare back just as hard. "You did betray her, Dad. By not being there, by the way you've treated her." I pull out my phone. "Now, you work your arse off until she believes you're ready to treat her better, all right?"
I dial and she answers, a previously happy woman broken by a man who broke his promises; broken by years of uncertainty and loneliness; broken by the sum of her parts, and hopefully ready to be put back together. She asks if Dad and I have talked and I tell her yes. I don't tell her it's the most honest, open conversation we've ever had, I just ask her to listen.
I pass the phone to Dad and we exchange a pointed look. I close the door behind me as he speaks, quiet and honest and ready.
"Esme...it's me."
A/N
Hope you enjoyed it, guys. I'll confess I may continue to be a little off schedule for the next chapter too. It's my birthday tomorrow and I have a week off work which means no commuting and no writing time. BUT the next chapter is half drafted already so I guess we'll see.
There is now a Facebook group for my stories - if you want to join us for a chat you can search for "Amber's Notebook" or use this address (removing the spaces and replacing the * with .): www*facebook*com / groups / 157793751023901/
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Thank you for reading, I can't wait to hear what you think of this little father/son journey.
Amber x