CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
Jamie – Now
It wasn’t five minutes after I watched Avi walk away with Lennox yesterday before my grandparents were in the cottage with me. But everything from my conversation with her was still too raw, so I asked for space from them as well—wanting the opportunity to sift through some of this on my own.
I don’t know how to feel about them knowing this whole time—for the last year at least. At some point we’ll have that conversation, but yesterday wasn’t the day for it… I don’t know if today is that day either.
I still need to call my parents. We’ve talked at least once a week since I got here—mostly to give Dad updates about how Grandad is doing. I can’t even begin to imagine how they’ll react to the news that I’m a father, that they have a grandson who’s ten years old.
How can I have a ten-year-old son?
Did Avi tell him last night? What does he think of all this?
My stomach grumbles violently. I haven’t eaten since breakfast yesterday, and considering it made its reappearance not long after, I’m starving.
Even the shortbread Avi made wasn’t able to tempt me into eating, and I skipped dinner too—not wanting to sit and make small talk with my grandparents but not ready to talk about the important stuff either.
The dining room is quiet when I reach it, with only a few people still sipping their tea or picking at their meals. I’m tempted to sit and order a full Scottish breakfast thanks to the scents of bacon and sausage lingering in the air, but a bowl of porridge is probably a safer option.
I rarely sit in the dining room for meals except dinner, ordering instead with the kitchen staff and taking my meals wherever I want… But chances are Avi is in the kitchen and I’m feeling a bit like a chickenshit at the moment. Unsure if I’m ready to face her.
There’s a small window in the door, so I peek through and do my best to get a good look around. An instant sense of relief overtakes me when I don’t see her. Popping my head inside, I find Grandad sitting at his desk, bent over a ledger of some kind.
“Mornin’,” I say, and he glances up, a cautious smile forming around his lips, eyes crinkling slightly beneath his readers.
“Mornin’, Jameson.” He hefts himself out of his chair to give me a hug and I sink into it, wrapping my arms around him the same way he does with me.
All might not be forgotten, but forgiven? I think I can do that, even if I still don’t understand.
“Can we get you something to eat?” he asks, pulling back and looking me up and down.
“Porridge would be great,” I say, looking over my shoulder at Hamish, who gives me a nod. “Is Avi… Is she here?”
“She’s on her way. Has a few things to check in on this morning and then she’ll be taking Lennox back down to Glasgow.”
“I thought her parents were coming to get him?” I wonder aloud.
My brain conjures every negative scenario in an instant. Her deciding to go back to Glasgow for good. Lennox being angry about me—being angry at me. Lennox being angry with Avi.
“They were, aye. Plans changed,” he says, giving nothing else away.
Everything changed yesterday.
A moment later, a steaming bowl of porridge slides across the desk and I tuck into it with abandon. God, I was hungry. I’ll have to ask Gran if she saved the shortbread from yesterday, because now that I don’t feel so unsettled, I really want some.
“I think I’m going to take my computer into the garden to work for a bit,” I say once I’ve finished my breakfast. What I don’t say is that I want to get out of the kitchen so I’m not sitting here when Avi walks in. I made things awkward enough amongst the staff when I burst in here yesterday.
And I don’t know what to do when I see her. I’m not sure I’m ready to continue our conversation. I don’t have any idea what to think about any of this.
“Sounds like a fine idea. Soak up the sunshine out there before it inevitably rains again.” Grandad nods toward the window where dust particles play in the bright rays shining through.
I sling my messenger bag over my shoulder and head out of the kitchen. The warmth of the sun outside hits me and I turn my face up to greet it, eyes closed, and just breathe. Heather and the damp, earthy smells from the loch waft my way on the breeze, ruffling my hair lightly.
When I open my eyes, it’s to find I’m not alone in the garden.
Nox sits on the tire swing in a pair of jeans tucked into wellies and a wrinkled T-shirt. His rain jacket lies discarded on the bench swing with a book wrapped inside it.
He watches me from his perch, assessing me.
“Hi,” I say in a reserved tone. I’m not entirely sure what the protocol is for talking to my son for the first time. We’ve talked plenty in the past several days, but this is different and we both know it.
“Hi.” He tucks his chin, making his blond hair fall across his face. When he flips his head back to get it out of his eyes, I can’t help but smile because that exact hair flip is a maneuver I’ve perfected over the years and he looked just like me doing it.
It’s this that gives me the confidence to approach him. “Can I sit? Maybe we could, um, talk?” I ask, closing the distance between us and taking up my standard seat on the far end of the bench.
He nods and hops off the tire swing, feet landing with a splat in the small puddle beneath it.
That makes my smile grow slightly wider.
He moves his jacket and book to the center of the swing, like a barrier of protection between us.
He has his hands in his lap, fingers splaying and contracting against his legs.
“So,” he says, looking up and biting his bottom lip. Now, that is a look he got from Avi, through and through. “You’re really my dad?”
He studies me, taking in every inch of my appearance like he wants to prove it to himself one way or another. If anything tells the tale, it’s the green of our irises. I think he knows it because he has yet to fully look me in the eye.
“Yeah… I am.” I try for a neutral tone, wanting to keep the ever-changing range of emotions I’m grappling with from making their way to him. I’m sure he has enough of them on his own.
He nods again, eyes downcast. “Are you mad?” he asks, and my brows draw down in confusion.
Mad? At him?
“Nox,” I say, and he finally—finally—looks at me, our eyes clashing for the first time. I hold that stare, feeling woefully unprepared for any of this but knowing it’s important. “I’m not mad—not about you—okay?”
He nods, eyes shifting away before they’re drawn right back to mine. “Aye, okay. But you are mad at Mum?” he asks, and I want to squirm under his gaze.
“I don’t know exactly.” Honesty seems like the best policy right now, considering. “I’m feeling a lot of things.”
“Yeah, me too. I don’t know if I’m mad at her or just… I don’t know, sad?” His eyes plead with me, as if I hold the answers. And god, I wish I did, but I’m right there with him.
“You can be both. I think I’m both too.”
“You really didn’t know?” The wetness along his bottom lashes hits me in the gut.
“I promise, Nox, I had no idea. I—” I don’t know what to say because the I would have sentences in my head are just sentiments at this point, and not ones I can even say with any semblance of truth.
I have no idea what I would have done had I known.
I’ll never be able to answer that question, because I wasn’t given the chance.
A flare of anger rises in my gut. I guess I am mad. But not at Nox. Not at this boy who’s looking at me with so much hope in his eyes.
The anger deflates and I shift toward him, moving his jacket. The book inside slides out and my brow furrows when I see it’s a copy of Journals of Elsewhere.
“Mum told me that’s your book. It’s been her favorite ever since I can remember.”
I ghost my fingers across the worn dust jacket. Evidence that the book’s been read repeatedly, that it’s been well-loved. Now it’s my eyes that have gone misty and I blink rapidly to clear them. I guess she wasn’t lying when she told me my books were her favorite.
“I always kind of thought maybe she named me after the author.” He taps my first name on the book. “I guess she did.”
“Yeah, I guess so. Have you read them with her?” I ask, wondering if my own son has escaped into the adventures I’ve written. They’re not written for children, but I know a lot of readers have read them with theirs.
“Not yet. She told me we could read this one together this summer though.”
My heart clenches, a deep ache that hurts but also feels good—like pride wrapped in sadness tied up with something else I’m afraid to name.
“That sounds like a great idea,” I say, trying for an even voice.
“You’ll still be here when I get back, right?” he asks, clasping the book to his chest now like it’s a lifeline.
And this is where it all gets complicated. Yes, I’ll be here when he gets back… but for how long? My being here was never meant to be permanent. It was tied to Grandad, and Gran, and how long they needed me here. But that was before—well, all of this.
“Yeah,” I say carefully, “I’ll still be here when you get back. Only a few more weeks of school, right?”
He shrugs. “Aye, I wish I could skip them and stay here.”
“I’m sure your grandparents are looking forward to a few more weeks of having you all to themselves before you move. I bet they’re going to really miss you.”
“I think they’ll come to visit a lot. Wait…” His gaze bounces over to the inn, then to me, and back to the inn… His mind is whirring and I wonder what it is he’s—
“Angus and Aileen are your grandparents?” he finishes.
“Aye, they are.” I can see where this is going.
“So, does that make them my great-grandparents?” he asks with a smile—it’s small but it’s there.
“It does.”
His grin widens and I match it with one of my own. I don’t know how I didn’t see it before, that his toothy grin is exactly like mine was at his age.
I might have no idea what I’m going to do or what happens next, but I do know that this is a moment I’ll never forget.
“Lennox,” Avi says tentatively from the door, drawing our attention. Her eyes are cautious when they meet mine, but they soften as she takes us in—both of us smiling. “Can you come in and help Aileen gather your things from about the inn? Don’t want you to forget anything.”
“Okay.” His tone cools significantly from the excitement over his new great-grandparents and I see Avi register the change as well, her features pinching.
“Hey, Nox,” I call after him as he reaches the door. Avi’s hand finds his shoulder and he shrugs it off. The crestfallen look on her face is like a dagger to the heart. “Try not to get into any more fights, aye?”
He smirks and, with a nod, walks inside, leaving me and Avi in a tense silence.
She closes the door behind her and takes a few steps over to the swing but doesn’t sit. “You two talked?” She bites down on her lip and fiddles with the hem of her open flannel shirt.
“We did. I hope that’s okay,” I say, still not clear on what my place is here.
She nods and laces her hands in front of her. “Of course it’s okay. I just—” She squeezes her eyes shut and shakes her head. “Is he really mad?”
I cock my head and watch her. “I don’t think so. Not really.”
She arches an eyebrow.
“Okay, yeah, he’s mad… but I think it’s more that he doesn’t know how to feel.”
“Are you?” she whispers, and lifts her head to look at me “Mad?”
“I don’t think so. Not really,” I repeat, surprised to feel my lips tip up a little. And with that, there’s a small shift in her features. Relief maybe. “It’s a lot. I don’t really know how to feel right now either.”
“That’s understandable. For you both.” She puffs out a breath.
“I’m getting ready to take Lennox back to my parents.
I think he and I could use a little more time to talk about things.
He wasn’t super receptive to hearing me out last night and he’s been pretty quiet this morning.
” Her fingers continue to fiddle with her shirt and her words get more frantic and clipped.
“But I know you and I have a lot to talk about too. I’m sorry that I’m leaving with things still so—”
“It’s okay, Avi, this is how it should be. He needs you. We can talk when you get back. I’ll be here.”
Those three little words seem to calm her, lift the edge of panic that was pressing down on her.
“I’m only staying tonight, so I’ll be back tomorrow afternoon. I’ve missed too much work already. Your grandad should probably fire me—or just give Hamish the job. He’s a lot less trouble.”
And the panic is back, the concern for her job creating an undercurrent of anxiety beneath everything else.
“Avi,” I say, moving forward on my seat but not moving to reach for her. “Hamish is used to taking over, he did it with Grandad too. And he’d never fire you for needing to be there for Lennox. Things will calm down once he’s up here full-time.”
She exhales and her shoulders sag, relaxing away from her ears. “Aye, you’re right. I don’t know how we ended up with you comforting me, but I just—thank you, Jamie.” She shifts toward me—the pull between us too much to stay apart—and on instinct I stand and pull her into a hug.
I don’t know if she needed it or if I did, or if it’s just the natural way of things between us. Everything feels less daunting with her in my arms. I turn my head just enough to bury my nose in her glowing blonde waves and inhale the floral scent that has always been hers. Just Avi.
I may have no idea what happens now, but I do know that this has always felt right.
With one last tightening of her arms, she releases me and steps back, a glimmer of a tear on her cheek that she swipes away with the back of her hand. “I’ll see you tomorrow then?”
“Tomorrow,” I say with a nod.
After she leaves, the scent of her lingers around me like a memory.
I can’t touch it, but I know it’s there.