‘Is that right?’ He was still smiling but his eyes were guarded. He turned his attention from her to me as we stopped an arm’s length away. The smile slowly faded as he stared at me. Brown eyes meeting brown eyes. Could he see himself in me? Could he see my mum? ‘And who are you?’ His voice turned thinner, reedy and unsure.
Noelle looked up at me. I needed her for moral support. I couldn’t deny that – but I couldn’t leave her to do all this while I stood there mute.
‘I’m Stephen.’ I found my voice, though it was hoarse.
‘Stephen?’
‘Stephen,’ I said more firmly. ‘Your son.’
‘Stevie?’ he whispered again, looking me up and down. His hand went to his mouth. ‘You’re little Stevie,’ he mumbled through it. His eyes shone suddenly with tears and he fumbled behind him, collapsing heavily onto one of the steps.
That remark I made about him having a heart attack came back to me, but he looked well enough, and I couldn’t bring myself to ask him if he was okay. He was shocked.
I was a nasty shock.
‘Look at you.’ He shook his head, both hands up on his face now, pressing at his cheeks. ‘You’re all grown up.’
‘That happens when thirty years pass.’
‘How did you find me?’
‘Does it matter? Were you trying to hide?’ I couldn’t seem to stop the harsh retorts.
‘No. No. I just wondered. It’s been so long. I’ve moved a lot.’
‘Don’t we know it,’ Noelle muttered.
‘Is this your wife? Are you married? Do you have kids? Do you live over here too?’ He kept blinking, like I might disappear if he concentrated hard enough.
‘No, I still live in London. I’m working here at the moment. This is my friend Noelle.’ It didn’t feel enough to describe her as just a friend but I couldn’t call her my girlfriend either, could I? Not without her perhaps getting the wrong idea. ‘I’m not married and don’t have kids.’ I concentrated on speaking calmly. I needed more control than this. I didn’t want drama. I just wanted to pass on the information and get a couple of answers and then be on my way. ‘Is there any chance we could go inside to talk? Or meet up at a later date? I won’t take up much of your time.’
I caught the worried look Noelle threw me out of the corner of her eye, but I was done looking vulnerable. She knew how I really felt – but I didn’t wanthimto know that. Perhaps it was letting him off the hook. Maybe if I showed how upset I was, he’d feel more guilt, and didn’t he deserve to feel guilty? But equally, I didn’t want him to feel like he was important. He’d ceased being important when he chose to leave me behind.
‘Oh. Oh.’ He nodded and dragged himself back up to his feet. He seemed to have aged an extra five years in the time since I told him who I was. He looked over his shoulder and seemed to deliberate. When he spoke again, his voice was hushed. ‘Okay. Sure. You can come in. Just – my wife – she’s not very well and…I never told her about you. You see, she couldn’t have kids; we tried but it never happened, so I didn’t want to upset her…’
It was a triple blow. I was his dirty secret. Even standing in front of him, he wanted to keep me a secret and he’d remarried with the intention of starting another family. I’d known that was likely. But to hear it and have him pretend I wasn’t his…
‘I won’t say anything,’ I replied coldly. ‘Five minutes and you will never have to see me again.’
I was raging on Stephen’s behalf. He’d gone rigid. His jaw set like it’d been wired that way, even as he spoke so calmly and politely to his awful, awful father. Or maybe I was judging the man too harshly.
No. Nope. I didn’t think I was. He’d walked away from his son and then got married to someone and never eventoldher? And instead of grovelling at Stephen’s feet he had the audacity to ask him to keep up the pretence with his new wife. I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to keep my mouth shut if she asked who we were – but if Stephen was happy to go along with it, then it wasn’t my place. I wondered if he had some more of that wire so I could fix up my own flabbergasted maw.
My anger abated when we went inside. The air was stuffy and smelled of sickness, that uncomfortable mix of medicine and body fluids that couldn’t quite be covered up by cleaning products.
Trevor pointed us towards his sitting room as he went to a door at the back of the house. There was a large armchair, with an oxygen machine next to it. We took the small sofa facing the TV. There was the murmur of voices from a room at the back of the house and the snick of the door closing before Trevor appeared again.
‘Can I get you a drink?’
Stephen and I both shook our heads. Trevor hovered for a moment and then perched on the arm of the big chair. It was such a Stephen thing to do, that it weirded me out.
I’d expected the physical similarities though and you really could see that he was Stephen’s dad. No wonder that ex-girlfriend had recognised him in Stephen. His eyes were just the same and despite the lines the shape of his face was similar too. He had a bigger nose though and his lips had thinned, but you could see he would’ve been a knockout when he was younger. He looked like he’d lived his life to the max, smoking and drinking, that ravaged, wrung-out look of an ancient rock star all over him. Stephen wasn’t going to look like that. He ate well and exercised, he didn’t smoke or overindulge with drink often that I’d noticed. That was something I could immediately see was totally different between them.
Oh, and I didn’t believe for a second that Stephen could walk away from his own child.
It was silent in the room and I stole a glance at Stephen. He was staring at his father, maybe noticing all those things too. The silence stretched out. Was this some kind of power display? Forcing his father to speak first. If he was, it succeeded.
‘I expect you want answers.’ Trevor linked his hands before him and looked down at the floor like a kid being chastised.
