Page 46 of Better in Black
“It was about a year ago. It was late at night and he wouldn’t sleep…we didn’t know what to do with him. He liked watching the roulette wheels spin.”
Alastair continued to stare at Thomas, speechless.
“He was only a tiny baby,” Thomas said, feebly.
“He’s still only a tiny baby!” Alastair roared, and this time passersby definitely took interest.
“We have to go,” Thomas said, eyeing the pedestrians. “Come on.” He began to hurry Alastair down the street, away from people. “We didn’t tell you because we thought you’d be angry.”
“You were right!” Alastair cried. He leapt out into the street in front of a passing cab, which screeched to a halt to avoid trampling him. “Soho!” he shouted at the driver, who turned to Thomas, clearly upset.
Thomas sighed and took his wallet out again.
—
There was nothing to do now but wait for the cab to bring them to Berwick Street. As green trees and gray buildings flashed past the window, Thomas sat back in his seat, allowing himself to take a breath for the first time in what seemed like years.
A small noise from Alastair made him turn. Alastair, he realized, had stopped yelling at the driver, had stopped shaking with impatience or looking as if he wanted to stamp his foot. He was sitting very quietly with his lovely face hidden in his hands, hisloose dark hair falling over his fingers. And Thomas felt his heart lurch, because an Alastair who was yelling or running around was not an Alastair who was despairing, but an Alastair who sat sunk in silence was something he had not seen in a long time.
“Sweetheart,” Thomas said—what did it matter, the driver couldn’t hear them, and Thomas didn’t care if he did—and he pulled Alastair close to him, his hands stroking up Alastair’s back. Alastair buried his face in Thomas’s shoulder and Thomas whispered endearments and love words until Alastair at last sat up, his eyes shining darkly.
“I love you,” he said.
“I know.” Thomas knotted his fingers into Alastair’s. With his thumb he rubbed soothing circles into Alastair’s palm. “We’ll get through this. We always do.”
“It’s just—” Alastair looked down and away, as he often did when he had to say something difficult. “It’s not just the horribleness of perhaps losing Zachary. Although it is mostly that. But it’s also that—”
“He’s rather horrible,” said Thomas. “I know. But it doesn’t mean the real Zachary will grow up like that.”
“Won’t he?” Alastair looked haunted. “How do we know?”
“You won’t let him,” said Thomas firmly. “Nor Cordelia. Nor Sona.”
“He reminds me of someone,” said Alastair, in a hollow voice.
Now Thomas looked at him in surprise. Did he mean Elias? Elias had been a drunk, and often cruel, but this grown-up Zachary was neither of those things. Rather he was stuffy and arrogant and selfish.
“Who he makes me think of, I suppose,” Thomas said, “is Bridgestock.”
There was a long silence. Alastair continued to stare at the back of the cab driver’s head.
“He’s not like Bridgestock,” Alastair said eventually, in that same hollow voice. “Do you know what I was like, when I was Zachary’s age? When my father got those toy soldiers, started teaching me military strategy with them?”
Thomas was silent.
“I don’t know either,” Alastair said. “I don’t remember. But I remember being a little older than that—perhaps three or four—and sitting quietly, patiently, as my father moved soldiers around and lectured. I understood maybe ten percent of what he said.
“But I understood something else by then—understood it one hundred percent. Who I was supposed to be, in his eyes. Who he intended me to be. Who he would find it admirable for me to be.”
Thomas waited.
“And I remember being ten or eleven,” Alastair went on, “and knowing I wasn’t like the other children my age, but also knowing that was a positive quality in me. They were little stupid babies, with no responsibility. I had responsibilities. When my father drank down all the whisky, I had to replace it before my mother or sister noticed. When he was sick from drink, I had to be the one to make excuses for him. I wrote letters for him, put money aside so he couldn’t spend it on drink and gambling. I knew how to pay bills when I was eleven. Cordelia was still a child playing with toys, cosseted by our parents. All I wanted was to be an adult, or what I thought an adult should be. Some mix of my father and people in books and the sort of men my father drank with and spent time with. Arrogant, selfish, self-interested men.”
The carriage slowed. “This is as far as I can take you, gents,” the driver called back.
They got out on Berwick Street, and the cab clattered away. The Hell Ruelle was down a narrow back lane. At its front door, Alastairturned and looked at Thomas with tired, distant eyes. “Zachary isn’t like my father and he isn’t like Bridgestock. He’s like me, in a way. He’s the man I wanted to be—he’s the man I was going to be—when I was eleven.”
Worried, Thomas followed him inside.
