Someone Else's Son (38 page)

‘It’s not you, it’s me.’ Max stepped out of his father’s grasp. He went into the sitting room. Brody followed his footsteps. ‘It’s just everything that’s fucking going on . . . has always been going on . . .’

Brody heard the squeak of his old chair as Max slumped down.

‘I’m a freak and everything’s a mess and—’

‘Did she dump you?’

There was silence apart from some kids outside playing on the concrete walkway.

‘No.’ Max was vehement.

‘Is she seeing someone else?’

‘Shut up, will you?’

‘But it’s about the girl, right?’ Brody took the further silence as yes. ‘You know, your mother used to make me feel like hanging myself most days.’

‘Then why did you marry her?’

‘Because she was different,’ Brody answered flawlessly. It was what he had adored about Carrie from the start, but ultimately what had driven them apart. Carrie had instigated the divorce – irreconcilable differences, she’d said – and Brody hadn’t put up a fight. He regretted that now but knew he couldn’t struggle against what he couldn’t see. Instead, he’d chosen to punish himself by moving to Westmount. That way, he would be reminded of what he’d lost every single day. He knew the shit was out there but he was too blind to see it. It kept his heart cold.

‘Is your girl . . . different too?’ Brody already knew the answer to this but wanted to hear Max say it.

He didn’t. ‘Why did you and Mum split up? Was it because she got famous?’

Brody laughed. ‘So you think she left the geeky maths prof and his lowly pay cheque for the bright lights of stardom?’

‘It’s occurred to me.’

‘Your mother is and always has been her own woman, Max. She likes to be in control of things and when . . .’ Summing it up was hard, but he wanted Max to have some understanding at least. ‘And if she ever felt she was losing control, she’d freak and ditch. You know, get rid.’

‘So she lost control of you?’

Brody laughed. ‘Maybe,’ he replied, thinking back to the day his vision finally went, when the light went out. ‘My blindness was hard for her too, you know. We were literally living in different worlds.’

Brody tried to see his son, sitting there, thinking, working it all out, but he simply couldn’t. ‘But I’m not blind to what’s going on with you, son, so I suggest you spill all to me over a pizza.’ He reckoned that would at least seal another couple of hours together. He was worried that Max hadn’t been visiting as much as he used to.

‘No thanks, Dad. I have school work.’

Wrong answer, Brody thought. ‘We can talk more.’

Brody sensed it building up, felt the crackle in the air. He waited.

‘Talk?’ Max yelled. Something was kicked. ‘Bit late for talking, isn’t it?’ Max let out a heartbreaking wail and tipped something over – the coffee table, Brody thought. He leapt to his feet and tried to find his son, but he tripped and stumbled backwards. ‘Max, don’t do this . . .’

There was more smashing and swearing and unintelligible growling. For a second, Brody caught hold of Max’s arm and tried to pull him close. He didn’t know what else to do. ‘Please, Max, be reasonable. Please let’s talk. I know there’s been shit in your life . . .’ Something was hurled across the room. ‘I know about those boys—’

‘You don’t know shit! You’re blind and you always have been.’

Footsteps were followed by the door slamming. Max was gone. Brody crunched through the wreckage. He bent down and felt around the floor. He sucked on his finger and tasted blood. Broken glass. He lit a cigarette but couldn’t find the ashtray. Reluctantly, Brody opened a window and flicked his ash outside. He closed his eyes. It was the same. Why didn’t he just go around with them shut?

Brody called the television station and left a message for Carrie to call him. He didn’t have his ex-wife’s number to hand. Several times since they’d divorced, he thought he should have phoned her, that they should have been parents together, but every time he’d put it off. Facing Carrie, acknowledging everything that she’d become, how far from their once happy lives together she’d grown, was incredibly hard. They’d failed each other and neither had ever been prepared to admit that. Except perhaps now.

‘Hello,’ he said into his phone when she rang back. ‘Carrie?’ He barely recognised her monotonous voice. ‘Did the detective call you too?’ A pause. She said nothing. ‘Did you hear about the knife, that it was the one used to kill Max?’

More silence. Then, ‘Brody, will you just come over?’ She was crying.

‘Of course.’ Brody ran through the logistics – how fast he could get Fiona to drive him to Hampstead. ‘I can be with you in about half—’

‘Not London, Brody. I’ll send my driver for you. He will take you to the airport.’

Brody went to airports often, attending conferences all over the world. Fiona was always with him, being his eyes, his carer, getting him through each day with precision. This time, though, he put his trust in Clive, Carrie’s pilot, and allowed himself to be led from the car that had picked him up, through London City Airport security, and out to Carrie’s waiting helicopter. It felt oddly good to be out on his own.

‘Should be a smooth ride, sir,’ the pilot reported. Brody buckled himself in, not caring if it was smooth or if they spun out of the sky and splintered into a million pieces. He heard unfamiliar noises, technical banter between the pilot and the tower, and fifteen minutes later they were in the air.

As they flew, he thought of his son’s short life. Sickness overwhelmed him and it wasn’t from flying. Had neither he nor Carrie realised what they were doing? Max being flown to Denningham for the start of the school term by chopper . . . Max kicking a ball around graffiti-covered Westmount estate . . . Max spending weekends at Carrie’s country house, which he knew would be opulent and lavish . . . Max kipping on the grubby sofa at his place . . . Max attending a thirty-thousand-pound-a-year boarding school . . . Max playing truant from one of the most crime-riddled schools in London . . .

What had they done to their son?

Another car took Brody to Carrie’s country estate. He’d brought nothing with him and had no idea when he would return to London. He only knew that he’d been reacting to a thread of need in his ex-wife’s voice and nothing – not now – would stop him responding. Fiona hadn’t thought travelling without her was a wise idea,
not in your state
, she’d said. But he needed to be alone with Carrie, to reset something inside each of them because he knew, deep down, she would be feeling it too.

 

Carrie lay on the floor. She’d sent all the staff home or to their living quarters and insisted on not being disturbed. A cashmere throw was draped over her legs as she lay stiffly beside the cold, empty grate, remembering how Max used to repeatedly pull the logs out of the basket and build a house with them on the Persian rug. Was the rest of her life to be filled with fragments of pain? Every time she turned a corner or opened a door, would she see Max standing there, eyebrows raised, silently asking her,
why
?

She had insisted that Leah stay in London and prepare for Friday’s show. ‘You’re not thinking straight,’ was all she’d said before Carrie hung up. No one wanted her to go ahead with the Dayna Ray interview; no one except her realised it wasn’t what she wanted to do, rather what she
had
to do.

The old doorbell resounded throughout the downstairs of Charlbury. The dogs barked. There were no footsteps or warm greetings by the staff as Carrie was used to hearing. Slowly, she peeled herself from the floor. The dogs stuck at her ankles as she went through to the hallway, noticing someone had left the morning’s mail on the oak table. She unlocked the heavy old door and pulled it open.

Brody was standing there, filling the space, with the driver standing patiently behind him waiting for further orders. ‘Thanks, Tony. Take the rest of the day off.’ Carrie automatically pulled her lips together which, in better times, would have been a smile and a nod. She turned her attention back to Brody. He looked awful, yet somehow as if he had come to save her. Maybe she wouldn’t let him go. Maybe, if she harboured him here at Charlbury, Max would magically reappear as a little boy and they could do the whole thing again and get it right this time.

‘Come in,’ she said, standing aside. There was a pause and Brody stuck his hand out to his side, found the door and stepped forward, feeling for a step with his foot. ‘Sorry, here,’ she said, taking his hand. His skin was cool, she noticed. Not like it used to be. Brody had always been warm, a furnace to press against in winter as they lay in bed.

‘Thank you.’

No objection, Carrie noted, as Brody allowed himself to be guided through to the snug.

‘You have dogs,’ he stated.

‘Can you smell them?’

‘It’s their claws on the flagstones,’ he said with a small laugh. She wondered how he managed even that.

‘I should light the fire,’ Carrie said, suddenly realising how freezing the house was. Until Brody arrived, it was almost as if she’d enjoyed the discomfort of being cold.

‘Not something I imagined you doing yourself,’ Brody commented. Carrie showed him where to sit and he eased down into the large maroon sofa. ‘Someone like you surely has servants to do that.’

Carrie winced. ‘They’re not servants.’ She screwed up her eyes. She was reining in annoyance. ‘And I’m quite capable of lighting a fire.’ She glared at her ex-husband as he tried to get comfortable in the oversized settee. They were perfect for an evening of sprawling, wine, laughter and movies, but not conducive to sitting on to discuss their dead son. In the end, Brody opted for perching on the edge and leaning on his forearms.

‘There are plenty of logs.’ She threw a pile of kindling on top of a couple of firelighters. The single flame quickly took hold and Carrie carefully placed a couple of dry logs on the stack. Within a few minutes, the grate began to radiate heat. Nothing, Carrie suspected, would warm their hearts.

‘You wanted me to come.’ Brody’s words were accompanied by the crackle of burning logs.

Wanted
me to come. Carrie realised that she’d sounded needy. It was a foreign, wrong feeling. ‘I thought we should be together. There are things to discuss.’

Brody nodded slightly. She saw him swallow. So much to be said, yet she didn’t think any of it would come out.

‘Do you think they’ll find who did it?’ Carrie sat on the matching sofa the other side of the low table. She crossed her ankles.

‘What good will it do if they do?’

‘It’s justice for Max. Someone needs to pay for what happened. Someone needs to go to prison.’

Carrie suddenly turned from freezing to flushed when Brody gave her a look that made her think he could see everything quite clearly. ‘We’re already there,’ he replied.

‘Because . . . because . . .’ She knew what she wanted to say, but it wouldn’t come out right. She felt Max’s stare on the back of her head. Even though she’d asked to sit at another desk, away from any boys, she could sense the tension between them. They’d not spoken all morning. In fact, she wondered if Max had been avoiding her for the last few days. He wasn’t usually like that. Since they’d had sex in the basement, he’d been extra attentive, extra loving, extra thoughtful, as if they really were going out. Now he was suddenly like this and not speaking to her. She didn’t know where she stood.

‘Because they were in love and nobody understood.’ Dayna reddened. It didn’t matter because no one was listening or paying attention to her.

‘Do you really believe that, Dayna? That the pair of them could really have fallen in love in such a short time? Or was it the fact that they shouldn’t have fallen for each other at all, because of their feuding families, that drove them on? You know, being rebellious teenagers and all that.’ Mr Lockhart expected a laugh but none of his pupils were listening so he didn’t get one.

‘Yeah, maybe that. Or maybe it was just because, like, they took one look at each other and that was it. You know, their eyes met and stuff at the ball. Sometimes you can’t help it.’ Dayna recalled staring at Max when he started at Milton Park. She didn’t think he’d noticed her straight away, but she’d noticed him. She felt desperately sad for Romeo and Juliet. She suddenly felt desperately sad for herself and Max. Being in love was impossible.

‘I’d like to believe that’s true, Dayna. As for you lazy lot . . .’ Mr Lockhart banged his book down on the desk. No one looked up. ‘You can start planning your essays over the weekend. The final versions are due by the end of term. Two issues to examine. Firstly, the timescale within the play. Does the acceleration have an impact on the plausibility of Romeo and Juliet’s love for each other and, secondly, I want you to make notes on how you think fate brought the youngsters together.’

Dayna twisted round in her chair and caught Max’s eye. She offered a little smile, but he didn’t return it. As she faced the front again, she frowned, let the smile go. What was wrong with him?

She caught up with him in the canteen. ‘Hey.’

Max was beating his fingers on the tray, waiting for the dinner lady to catch his eye so he could tell her what he wanted. He turned away, angling his back to her, pretending to be interested in the slop in the metal trays. ‘Pie,’ he said. ‘And chips and gravy.’

Dayna raised her hand and was about to place it on Max’s shoulder, hoping a physical connection might get him talking. Something was definitely wrong.

‘Ow!’ Dayna was shoved hard from behind. She stumbled and her tray fell on the floor. The carton of juice exploded, soaking her ankles.

‘Get out the way, emo bitch.’

Stunned but quite used to it, Dayna waited for Max to retaliate or say something or at least help her with the mess on the floor. He did none of these things. Instead, he just shuffled along in the line, allowing the dinner lady to add food to his tray until he finally came to the till to pay. The girl who had shoved Dayna took her place in the queue and sneered down at her as she picked cutlery. Another boy in her year drew up to the girl. He kissed her on the neck.