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Marie blushes, and I stifle a laugh. He’s such a smoothie. But I love him for it.
“So…” Mum sits back, obviously enjoying her cuddle with Leia. “Tell me all about what happened yesterday. You’re such a naughty boy, James. I can’t believe you sprung a wedding on her, and we hadn’t even met you!”
“I know,” he says guiltily, “I’m so sorry about that. I wanted to grab her before she got away.”
“Aw, that’s so romantic.” Mum sighs. “What did you wear?” she asks me.
“Um… I’d brought a champagne-colored dress for dinner, so I wore that.” I bring a photo up on my phone that Alex took for me. James has his arm around me, and we’re standing by the altar with the mountains behind us. They all look at it and murmur their approval.
“She looked amazing,” James says. “So beautiful.”
I bump his shoulder with mine. He bumps it back.
“It’s a shame you didn’t get married in church,” Dad says.
“Come on, Dad,” I scold, “you know that was never going to happen.”
“You’re not religious?” Dad asks James.
He shakes his head. “We went to church when I was young, but I haven’t been for years.”
“Oh well,” Dad says. “I suppose I can’t have everything. You’ll look after her, though? She’s my girl, and she means everything to me. You’ll understand now you have your own daughter.”
James looks at Leia, and I can see understanding filter through his expression. He’s just starting to get to grips with what it means to be a father. It’s for life—it never goes away.
“Yes, sir,” he says, and that’s it, my father’s convinced.
*
On the way home, I sit quietly, glancing over at James from time to time. He’s driving the Range Rover today, lost in thought.
“Are you okay?” I ask. “That wasn’t too bad, was it?”
He glances at me, smiles, and shakes his head, but his eyes remain preoccupied.
“Thank you for what you’ve done for Rua,” I say. He went through how to work Kare with my parents, explaining how to charge it, and what kind of games it does. “They were very touched.”
“It was my pleasure,” he says. “We’re hoping to get it out to schools and centers by the end of the year.”
We fall quiet again. I clear my throat. “And thanks for offering Dad a job. You didn’t need to do that.”
“He’s a solid worker. We’d be honored to have him.”
“Wow, James, I don’t know how you do that. How do you make everyone feel special?”
“Everyone has something to offer. You just have to look for it.”
He’s so offhand about it—he has no idea how he made my dad feel special.
“How did you know about his awards?” I ask.
“I… ah… made enquiries.” He flicks me a smile.
He sinks into thought again, though, and it’s a few minutes later before I say, “Are you annoyed about something? Did they say something to upset you?”
His eyebrows rise. “No, of course not. They’re lovely people. They gave me a lot to think about, that’s all.” He doesn’t elaborate.
He doesn’t say much more when we get home, and after dinner he excuses himself and disappears into his study, claiming he has work to do. Knowing he’ll be there for the rest of the evening, I bathe and feed Leia and put her to bed, play the guitar for a while, then watch a movie, hoping he might come out and want to join me. He doesn’t though, and around ten I finally go to bed.
