Chapter 32 #2
“When I was in university, I had a few… dalliances with men. My first crush was a friend of mine, actually.” I laugh fondly, remembering Toby.
Toby, who was entirely and completely straight.
“But then I met your mother, and well, that was it for me. I fell hopelessly in love with her. I was still quite young, nineteen, and your mother just twenty, but we knew. Sometimes you meet someone and they just… feel like they were meant for you, I suppose, and it was the same for her. Everyone, our parents included, thought we were too young, but we knew best. There was never any doubt in either of our minds that it was just us two, forever and always. And then that two became three.”
I remember the day a bundle of perfect pink limbs was placed into my arms, tears running down my face as I looked at my son for the first time.
He’d been crying, loudly, roaring actually.
Like a little lion. Leo is sitting up now, eyes sharply focussed on me telling this story.
“Your mother was the core of our world, the sun we both revolved around—I know you know what I mean when I say this—and I relied so completely on her for so many things that when she… died… It felt like the sun was gone. I was completely in the dark. I’d forgotten how to function by myself, forgot the person I was before her.
I know how this sounds, but it’s how it was.
I distanced myself from you, from our home, from everything that reminded me of her, and threw myself into work.
Work had always been something I’d been quite competent at without your mother, and so I let it fill my days so I didn’t have to look at all the things I was incapable of doing without her.
” This next part would be difficult, but it’s critical I explain this to him.
“I knew almost straightaway that I would never be able to love another woman the way I loved your mother: it was like a door to a specific room had been closed and locked, never to be opened again. I wasn’t actively pursuing men, either; it wasn’t like that.
I had no interest in that at the time. But then I found myself being pursued.
He was younger, attractive, extremely confident, and I was flattered. ”
“Felix,” Leo says.
“Yes, Felix.” I wait for a question or something else from him, but he just nods, and I continue. “Felix was very… determined, and I was very lonely, and he was… well, hard to resist.”
Leo shifts uncomfortably now.
“We continued to see each other for some years, in secret. I was aware of the consequences of someone finding out, how it would look. Felix, for his part, didn’t care if anyone knew, but he respected that I never wanted anyone to find out, and so he agreed to keep it private. And you know what happened next.”
“Someone found out.”
“Adrian Brooke found out.”
Leo’s eyes flash with anger before he asks: “Would you and Felix still be together if not for him?”
“No. We’d ended things by then. Shortly after Nicoló arrived in London.
I could see how Felix felt about him, and I urged him to go after it, to have something real.
” Asher’s words echo across my soul then: I want to be with you, in a relationship.
A real one. I want a future with you. I don’t want to be someone’s arrangement.
“Would you still be with him if not for Nico, then?”
The question makes me pause; it’s not something I’ve ever thought about. “Perhaps, because I was selfish and happy to have him in my life. But I suppose I always knew Felix would eventually find someone who would treat him as he deserved, and I would go back to being… well… alone.”
“How many have there been?” he asks after a moment. I can’t work out the tone until he clarifies: “Young guys half your age?” Disdain.
“Two.” I can see he doesn’t believe me, and I suppose I can’t blame him. “I swear on your mother’s grave, Leo, there have been two people since she died. Both men: Felix and Asher.”
He sits with this a moment, then asks, “Isn’t it… weird? You fucking guys the same age as your son?”
So he’s more unsettled by their ages than their gender. That gives me some hope. “Society would say that it is, yes. It’s why Adrian was able to force me out of my position, under threat of exposure.”
“I’m sure he was the one who sent the email to me…
” Leo muses. At the look on my face, he says, “I got an email just after you left, saying you liked men—younger men. It implied there were a lot of them… That it was being hushed up, but that it’d come out one day.
That it was why you’d resigned and gone to the States. ”
I sit back in horror. “Christ, Leo. Why didn’t you tell me?”
“It wasn’t really a conversation I wanted to have with you, Dad. We barely talked as it was, and when we did, it was about work. I had no clue how to broach something like that with you.”
It occurs to me then: “Was that why you left Whitehall?”
He shrugs. “Partly. Partly because it was terrible and I hated it. I appreciated you getting me the job in the first place, and I didn’t want to let you down, so I stayed. But fuck, Dad, that place is hell.”
I laugh at the passion with which he says it. “I agree.”
He stares at me, unblinking. “So why would you even dream of going back? After that? How they treated you? You really wanna be Prime Minister that badly?”
“No. I don’t.” It feels like a very long breath being exhaled. “I tendered my resignation to Lewis this morning. I’m not going to be Chancellor or Prime Minister, either. I’m leaving politics completely.”
Leo’s mouth drops open. “You’re actually serious?”
“Extremely.”
“Dad, that’s… good. I think that’s really great, honestly. What are you going to do?”
“Heal. Rest. Work on myself.” I look at him resolutely. “Be there for you.” The look on his face is one of vague horror, but then he laughs, and it makes me smile, too. An easy silence settles between us for a while before Leo speaks.
“So the guy in your office last night was Asher?”
I nod.
“He was the same guy in the hospital, right? I recognised him.”
“Yes.”
“And you and him are… together?”
I shake my head. “Not anymore. He ended things this morning.”
“Because of me? Because of what I said to him?” There’s a note of panicked regret in his voice.
“No, son. Because of me, because of things I can’t give him, because of…” I trail off.
“Because of Mum.”
“Partly, yes. But mostly because I’m not fit to give myself to anyone the way I did your mother. It’s a terrifying thought, and I’m not sure I want to do it ever again.”
Leo frowns. “But you can’t be alone for the rest of your life, either. She wouldn’t want that for you.”
“No, you’re right. I don’t think she would.
” And I don’t want to be. I want Asher. I want to be worthy of the love he is offering.
But I need to be able to give him something equal in return.
Not this broken, half-dead thing I’d been carrying around for the last six years.
“But you don’t have to worry about me, cub.
I’m going to be alright.” I give him a smile and move to stand.
Leo follows and then, completely unprovoked, steps forward and throws his arms around me to squeeze me tightly.
“I’m sorry, Dad,” he says, sounding very genuine. “About everything.”
“You’ve nothing to apologise for, Leo. I’m the one who should be sorry. Things are going to be different now, I promise.”
“I believe it,” he says. “We’ll be there for each other, okay? No matter what?”
“No matter what.”
When I pull back, he gives me a beaming smile. “And look, if you want to have a boyfriend who’s like, my age, then cool. Go for it.”
“Well, thanks for the permission, son.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Now. You’re going to tell me everything about this film of yours.
How on earth it happened, what it’s about, what your part is, everything.
” He looks overjoyed and excited as he begins to tell me about how he was approached on Gloucester Road outside a Starbucks by a casting agent right after Sabrina broke up with him.
I love seeing him like this, grey eyes—so like his mother’s—bright and sharp with thrill.
It’s as enthusiastic as I’ve heard him talk about anything for a long time.
It’s not a lead role, but it’s an important one, he tells me, and the producer has another project after this that he thinks Leo would be great for.
He’s auditioning in London for it in a few weeks’ time.
He’s buoyant with hope and anticipation for the future, and it’s impossible not to let a little bit of it seep into me, too.
Things are going to be different now. Things are already different because this is the most Leo and I have spoken in months.
I almost want to call Asher and tell him the news, that the weight of indecision that has been stifling me for weeks has been lifted, and that someday soon, if he’ll still have me, I’ll be able to give him what he wants and needs.
But he deserves to live, now. Love, now, if that’s what he wants.
He is too full of love to be tied to me while I work through this mess. He’ll flourish. He’ll live. He’ll love.
And when we meet again, I will be whole and willing and ready to love him back.