Page 103 of From Now On

‘Yes. Surviving, lad. Not living. Existing. I got by with eating scraps, leftovers from the chippy. No one knew me. It was Fingers who had friends here and he… well, he’s gone too. I was the only one left, Charlie. Theonlyone. That had to mean something, didn’t it? What if…’

‘What?’

‘You wouldn’t understand.’

‘Like I understand any of this?’ Charlie forces a hollow laugh because he knows the occasion calls for it. ‘Try me.’

‘I thought what if I’d been spared to… to…’ He nods towards his guitar.

‘To make it as a musician?’ Charlie is incredulous Bo has even thought this.

‘I had a chance once—’ Bo begins.

‘To be in the James Patrick Ensemble, I know. But you gave it up because Mum was your dream but now she’s gone—’

‘I only have nightmares.’

‘You should have come home.’

‘I thought you’d all blame me. I blamed myself.’

‘Mum once told me that accidents happen. It’s what you do afterwards that counts.’

What will Charlie do after this? Whether it was an accident meeting Bo, fate, it has given him his life back. Freed him from the responsibility of Nina and Duke. Perhaps he’ll go to New York after all, take Pippa. He’s found it so hard being a substitute parent and yet, for some reason, the thought of leaving Nina and Duke is crushing.

‘Charlie, how can I explain to Nina and Duke when I don’t even understand? I don’t know why I survived. Why I—’

‘Perhaps you weresparedto bring up your children?’

Instead, Charlie had felt obliged to step in and now that his time with them is coming to an abrupt end he doesn’t think it is obligation that has kept him there. There is a part of him that wishes he had never walked into the Crow’s Nest. Never found out the truth.

‘How are they?’

‘Do you care?’

‘Of course I do. I never meant to—’

‘Abandon them—’

‘Stay away this long. Are they happy?’ Bo’s voice is level but his tone is brittle, as though he might snap as easily as one of the strings on his guitar.

‘Happy? They think both of their parents are dead.’

‘You know what I mean. I… I thought I’d mess it up. I knew you’d be better at raising them than me.’

‘How did you know I’d stick around?’

‘Because you’re a good lad.’

‘Then you don’t know me at all because when they needed me, at the very worst time of their life, I left them too. I’d say like father like son, but you’re not my father, are you?’

‘Where are they? Who—’

‘Violet took them but then I went back to look after them because I made a promise to Mum on New Year’s Eve that I’d look after them. I couldn’t leave them. I know what it’s like to be left. You decided you weren’t cut out for parenting like my dad wasn’t cut out for parenting. He left me. You left me.’ Charlie’s voice thins until he feels it crack. ‘You could have come home but you made a choice not to.’

‘It’s not the same,’ Bo reaches out to touch Charlie’s shoulder but Charlie shrugs him off. ‘This isn’t because of them. Because of you. Your dad didn’t leave because of you neither.’

In front of Charlie is the crashing ocean but all he can hear is his dad smashing through the glass table; here there’s the darkening sky but all he can see is the blood pouring from his wrist.

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