Chapter 44
Ethan
Iput Jamie in my bed with me last night.
No way was I letting him out of my sight.
He may no longer be a flight risk, but I don’t want him feeling abandoned for a second.
He slept like a log, the crash of all that emotional devastation and adrenaline wiping him out, but I lay there and stared at him for a long time. A couple of hours, maybe.
Last night crystallised a lot of things for me, but mainly that I can’t let this kid move through life for one more day without understanding what he means to me. I won’t.
I make him pancakes, which he eats at the island. He’s fixated on the PC and has already looked up several YouTube videos on how to isolate the broken parts.
‘I think I might need to replace the GPU and the motherboard,’ he says, wrinkling up his face as if he’s scared to say it out loud.
I nod. ‘That’s okay. Honestly. We can order the new parts as soon as we know for sure. I’ll sit with you while you work it out, if you want.’
He spears a piece of pancake and dunks it in the maple syrup that I had Davide pick up for him. ‘But you said last night that I needed to be taught a lesson.’
He says it so forlornly, so resignedly, that the pain of hearing it almost brings me to my knees. I flinch.
‘I shouldn’t have said that. It was very cruel of me. It’s no excuse, but I was absolutely gutted for you, and I lashed out instead, and I’m thoroughly ashamed of myself. I regret it so much. You were right to be angry and hurt.’
The nod he gives me is small, but if what I just said in any way landed with him then I’m grateful.
Soph was correct last night. My dad never wasted a moment validating me or apologising to me or ruminating on his many, many failings.
And it strikes me that, if fucking up as a parent is a very human crime, making it your kid’s fault is downright evil.
‘I mean it.’ I take a sip of my coffee and twist my body so I’m facing him.
‘Everyone makes mistakes, and my humiliating you over a simple error was absolutely not okay. You need to know that you can mess up and it’ll still be okay.
I’m your dad. If you can’t count on having me on your side, then who can you count on?
Except for your mum. She’s amazing, and I’ve always been grateful that you have her. ’
His face softens. ‘Yeah, she is.’
‘But having one great parent doesn’t make it okay to have one shoddy one, and I’m going to do better, I promise.
’ I make myself press on. There’s a balance, I think, in being a parent.
I’ve already proven how damaging it can be to erect walls, but, while vulnerability is important, I can’t totally fall apart.
It’s crucial that he knows I’m strong enough to handle my own shit.
He needs a parent who thinks they’re a victim just as much as he needs a parent who’s totally walled off, which is not at all.
I should know.
I have one of each.
‘I need you to hear me, mate. Every single problem we’ve had has been down to me, not you.
I have a lot of issues from my own childhood, and I’ve never really tackled them.
But I’m doing a lot of work on myself now, and it’s helping.
Most of the time,’ I add sheepishly, and he gives me a small grin.
‘Grandpa was a nasty piece of work when I was little, a really tricky character, which I think you know, but it’s taken me a long time to work out that that’s on him, and none of it was my fault.
’ I swallow, attempting to lodge the giant lump in my throat.
‘So that’s why I’m going to work so hard to make sure you know none of my shit is your fault.
Absolutely none of it. And I’ll do better. I promise.’
He stares at me, eyes wide, face open and trusting.
‘Okay.’ He stuffs an enormous piece of pancake in his mouth.
His inability to hold a grudge is staggering, and I know we have a long road ahead, but I have no idea what I’ve done to deserve this level of openness from him given my track record. I clear my throat.
‘I don’t want to get heavy, and we should go and run those tests on your PC when you’ve finished your pancakes, but I wanted to say this, so it’s out in the open.
Grandpa really messed me up, and I think I’ve been so worried that I’d mess you up that I’ve tried to stay away too much.
You have such a fantastic mother, so I think I leant on that, but I’ve been scared to get close because I didn’t think I deserved you, really.
I thought I was too broken to be any good to you. ’
He stares at me, growing visibly alarmed, and I press on.
‘I know now that I’m not broken, that I’m strong enough to be the dad you deserve, and I’m going to prove it to you every day.
And I’m sorry from the bottom of my heart for not being around as much as you might have liked, and I need you to know that none of it was to do with how much I love you.
Because I love you more than anyone else in the world.
’ I lean over and ruffle his already tousled hair. ‘Do you hear me?’
‘Yeah,’ he says with all the enthusiasm any teenage boy would muster in the face of emotional diarrhoea from a parent figure.
I chuckle. ‘It’s okay. Sorry for getting weird. But I’m going to show you. We have a lot to catch up on, don’t we?’
‘I suppose.’ He wriggles. ‘Can we go to the driving range this afternoon?’
I sit up straighter. ‘Absolutely. Did you bring that new driver your mum got you?’
He smiles, and it’s a real smile. ‘Yeah. It’s fire.’
‘Great. You can show me what you’ve got.’
‘You sounded very distressed in your text messages,’ Philip says over my computer screen.
He’s out of town for Christmas but has, bless him, readily agreed to an emergency Boxing Day Zoom with me.
Jamie is watching Top Gun: Maverick for the millionth time down in the cinema room after what even I would admit was a highly successful trip to the driving range.
He got on brilliantly with his new driver, and I wasn’t too shabby, either.
I take a deep breath and recount the story as efficiently as I can: my high hopes; the successful build; Jamie’s fatal error; my nasty meltdown; the car chase; my rescue of him. My heart rate is ratcheting up even as I relive it.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Philip says faintly. ‘It sounds like you gentlemen have had quite the time of it. That must have been very upsetting for both of you.’
‘Yeah.’ I wipe my palms along my jogging bottoms. ‘You can say that again.’
‘How is Jamie doing, first of all?’
‘He seems okay. He slept well last night, which is more than I can say for myself. He seems encouraged by the fact that we’re sorting his PC out.
And he was worried about my telling his mum, but I know she’ll be far more furious with me than him.
’ I let out a shaky little laugh. ‘I have to say, the more I learn about this stuff, the more paranoid I get that every instance like this is going to cause deep and lasting trauma for him.’
He pauses and looks downwards. He’s probably tapping his specs on his knee, out of sight.
‘That’s a valid concern, and that’s very possibly a protective paternal part talking.
You do have one, you know, Ethan. I hear it a lot when you speak.
Your Papa Bear part, for want of a better term, is always going to be extremely protective of your child.
I think our parenting parts tend to be some of the most ferocious I’ve encountered in my years of practice.
‘All of which to say is that Jamie’s lucky that he has a father with those parts.
It’s not clear to me that your father did, from what I’ve heard.
So you are not your father, and Jamie is not you.
You’re doing the work, and he has access to a wealth of resources to help him process all of these experiences when he’s ready.
But, more importantly, he is gaining more and more access every day to his father’s Self Leadership, and that’s a beautiful thing. ’
I screw up my face. I’ve heard Philip talk about the Self, that higher piece of us that’s not a part, but I’m not sure about the Leadership bit. Soph referred to the Self in Mustique as divine energy, which made me want to run for the hills. That’s far too woo-woo for my liking.
My confusion must be evident, because he carries on.
‘Think of the Self as your wisest boardroom member, the one who sees the big picture, who can think long term, who doesn’t panic or lash out.
Your parts can be more like reactive junior execs who have a short-term agenda.
Self will listen to them, but he’s not ruled by them. He leads from an adult, centred place.’
‘I’m not sure that describes my parenting style recently,’ I quip without humour, but he shakes his head.
‘It’s a journey. And what you have to know is that your Self is always there.
Sometimes it just gets drowned out by the noisier voices.
But as your parts learn to trust you more, you’ll access that Self Leadership more and more easily.
But first, do you want to tell me how you’re feeling?
Any observations you want to share? It’s absolutely to be expected that you’d still be very shaken up after what you’ve been through. ’
This is what I’ve come to expect and appreciate from Philip.
It’s why I messaged him. He’s someone I can unload on with no guilt of overburdening him, no fear of judgement.
More than anything, he makes it acceptable for me to have all my feelings.
He makes them all feel normal, I suppose.
And being made to feel normal when you’re second-guessing every fucking thing about yourself is seriously underrated.