Page 15 of Dominate
“Blimey,” Freya croaks, her eyes welling with tears.
“But she was definitely human enough to get pregnant. Gareth was the result of our wild and overexcited passion.”
“Too much information,” Gareth murmurs, but Vaughn keeps on going like he’s in another world.
“At first, I thought it would be hard to have a baby. My football schedule was hectic and we had only just met. I knew I wasn’t ready to be a father, but she was never afraid. She accepted the surprise like it was her destiny that she knew was coming all along. Her confidence made me feel brave.
“With every baby she gave me, I grew more and more in love with her. She took everything so wonderfully in stride, too. It was miraculous. Even the twins didn’t shake her. By the time Booker was born, I had only fallen more in love with her. But, by that point,loveseemed like a word that wasn’t enough to describe what we shared together. What we had between us was ten times bigger than a feeling. More massive than a sentiment. We had a family.”
The entire table waits on bated breath for what Vaughn will say next. One glance at Gareth and Vi tells me this isn’t a story they’ve heard countless times over the breakfast table. They both look stunned into silence.
I have to admit I’m feeling stunned as well. After everything Gareth told me about his father, this is nothing I would have expected from him. He’s cracked open that hard outer shell from the hospital and exposed a part of himself that I don’t think he shows very often. Maybe it’s because he’s back in Manchester for the first time in years. Maybe it’s because no one’s ever been brave enough to flat out ask him these questions. Whatever it is, I get the feeling it’s having a major effect on Gareth.
“I remember a bit of when you two were happy like that,” Gareth states out of nowhere, his voice low and brow pensive.
Vi turns her watery, surprised eyes to him. “You remember those times?” She whispers the question but we all hear it.
“In the Manchester flat, yeah.” He nods woodenly, his eyes darkened like he’s haunted by the happy memories.
She shakes her head sadly. “I can’t remember the Manchester flat. My memories only include the London house. That was, of course, when Mum was sick.”
Vaughn clears his throat and looks down at his plate, a shameful posture hunching his shoulders. “Things were different in London.”
“Dad—” Vi begins to soothe, but Vaughn cuts her off.
“In Manchester, things were happy. Warm. I remember I couldn’t wait to get back home after travelling for matches because I missed the madness of our Manchester flat. One of you was always crying, or fighting, or needing something. It was chaos all the time. Your mother and I had to divide and conquer because she refused to ever hire an au pair. I bloody well loved every minute of it.”
Gareth pulls his lip into his mouth and seemingly selects a spot on the table to stare at while his thoughts most likely drift to memories he’s long since forgotten.
“The hotels our team stayed at for away matches were lonely. I’d have a room all to myself when I was so used to having a kid tucked up between me and your mother at night. So quiet, too…A lot like those hospitals.”
Vi sniffs softly but Vaughn keeps going, clearly needing to get these words out so much that he doesn’t even notice the tears streaming down his daughter’s face.
“The hospital you were in last night is where I found out your mother was truly sick and not just run down from chasing after five kids. They told us there was nothing they could do for her and that our best bet would be to make her last days comfortable.”
Vaughn inhales deeply and begins shaking his head back and forth. “That light she had—that magic, that sparkle—was being sucked out of her body. Like taking a colourful photo and turning it black and white.”
Vi’s voice is garbled when she says, “How awful, Dad. I can’t imagine how hard that must have been for the two of you.” She reaches out to touch his hand, but Vaughn recoils away from her.
“Vilma made peace with her diagnosis, but I certainly didn’t. I couldn’t get over the fact that the happy life we created was mocking me everywhere I looked. I couldn’t enjoy the sounds of you kids fighting. Hell, I couldn’t even play football anymore. I hated the pitch. I’d see the place she always sat for my home games and picture it empty. The image killed me. She was the root of our family. She held us all up. She was our magic, and I did not want to do this life without her.
“So I started taking her to other hospitals. Different doctors. I think we saw every doctor here in Manchester three times before I quit playing for Manchester United and forced her to move to the London house. I forced her to try surgeries that never resulted in what we wanted. I forced her to take medication that made her feel horrible. I forced her to keep fighting when all she wanted to do was go to the bloody beach.”
Vaughn’s voice cracks and he brings his fist to his mouth to bite down on his knuckle. I look around the table through watery eyes and see everyone else is crying, too. I even see a tear slip down Gareth’s cheek, and it takes everything in me to not go over and hold him. I can so easily picture him as a little boy living through that horror at about the same age Sophia is now. It’s everything I went through with Sophia but reversed. How would all of that look through a child’s eyes? When you’re young, your parents are supposed to be strong and protective. Not sick and crumbling.
Vi’s wobbly voice breaks the silence. “What do you mean a beach, Dad? What beach are you talking about?”
Vaughn looks up at her tear-stricken face and it cuts straight through him. He bows his head in shame. “Vilma wanted to go to a warm beach. She wanted to put her toes in the sand and watch you kids play so she could pass on with happy family memories. It was such a simple request, but I was selfish. I wasn’t ready to lose the love of my life—my best friend. That’s why I begged her to fight with everything she had left to give. In the end, we all lost.
“If only I’d taken her to the bloody beach,” he mumbles and rubs his hand over his forehead. “Maybe that light would have come back in her eyes before she died, and I could have remembered how she always was in the beginning. Not what I turned her into at the end.”
The table grows quiet again, the faint sounds of Vi’s running nose narrating the heavy emotion in the room. I can hear Vaughn swallowing his pain down, burying a knot that probably lives in his stomach permanently. The same knot that Gareth has for completely different reasons. It’s no wonder this family is so pained by the loss of their mother. The entire story was a nightmare that these five children had to live through.
“Her light was still there in the end, you know,” Gareth husks, his voice raw with pain. He aggressively swipes at moisture under his nose and adds through clenched teeth, “That light was there for me. I saw it every time I was with her. I even saw it when she died. And despite everything, she loved you, even at the end, Dad. She still completely loved you.”
Vaughn’s red-rimmed eyes pin Gareth with a knowing look. “I didn’t deserve it,” he croaks.
Gareth nods woodenly. “But that light was there all the same.”
