Not long before the end of visiting time, Mum asked if we’d chosen a name for him. He was back in his crib by then and we all looked at him as if he was going to answer the question for us. In the end, his mum answered for him.
‘Simon,’ she said.
‘But...’ I think the word popped out without Mum realising it because she didn’t continue with the sentence straight away. We all looked at her to see what was coming next and she tried to cover it up with, ‘where does that come from?’
‘Nowhere really,’ Michelle said, ‘we just like it.’
And that was the end of that.
We didn’t mention that exchange until the following afternoon when we were alone. I had a fair idea what Mum had wanted to say and Michelle had worked it out too. Although I’d never known anyone who called him anything but Bob, obviously my father had been christened Robert after his father and grandfather before him. The baby’s biological father had been called Robert after his father etc., etc. so maybe Mum had assumed that Robert’s son would bear that name. Let me tell you, Michelle would have called that child Julie before she called him Robert.
‘Was your mum all right about the name?’ Michelle asked.
‘She was fine,’ I said which wasn’t a lie, but as we’d walked back to the car park she had asked me again where the name had come from. I didn’t tell Michelle that, though.
How would I have felt if Michelle had said she wanted to call him Robert? I would have been gutted but it was never an issue because she had told me early on that she planned on calling the baby Simon if it was a boy. Had it been a girl she would have called her Hannah.
Back in the eighties it wasn’t like it is now when you can be in and out the same day that your baby is born. Mothers of first babies spent the best part of a week in hospital, which gave me plenty of time to get everything perfect for when I brought Michelle and Simon home.
Four weeks to the day after we were married, we brought our baby home. Our neighbours that we barely knew came to the door as we pulled up in the car.
‘You all right, love?’ the woman, Janice asked. Michelle said that she was fine. Janice said that she and her husband Keith would see us later, ‘after you’ve settled in like.’
We went to register the birth a couple of days later and the plan had been to do it together but the weather had other ideas. It had been overcast when we left the house but by the time we got into town it was belting it down with rain and blowing a gale. I stayed in the car with the baby while Michelle went into the register office alone.
I watched Michelle walk away and then turned my attention back to Simon who I was cradling in the crook of my left arm. This was the first time that we’d actually been alone together and it was a special moment. It was time for a man to man chat.
It went something like this: ‘Hello, little fella, I’m your daddy and I’m going to look after you. I am going to look after you for ever and I promise that I will always be there for you.’
I think that was when I lowered my head and kissed him. He smelled of a mixture of soap and baby powder. ‘I’m your daddy and I love you,’ I told him again, just in case he hadn’t understood me the first time. He fell asleep in my arms and I watched the rain roll down the windscreen. I was smiling.
My mind was miles away and Michelle startled me when she climbed back into the car. She leaned over and kissed me. ‘Let’s go home,’ she said and by the time that I’d parked the car outside our house the sun was shining.
When we were in the house Michelle took Simon’s outer layers off and put him down in his cot. He didn’t so much as open an eye during the whole process. We left the room and I closed the door carefully behind us. Michelle asked if I’d like a coffee and I said that I would. She took a brown envelope from her bag and placed it in a drawer along with lots of other stuff that we didn’t know what to do with. ‘It’s not the real one,’ she said. ‘When we get the real one, that one’s getting burned.’
We got the real one after we’d jumped through various hoops for almost ten months. Even though everyone who loved him thought of him as an Ellis, Simon had officially been a Jenkins. In the August after he was born he became Simon Ellis and in the space that had previously had the word ‘Unknown’ written in it, his father was listed as Thomas Ellis: me. I had legally adopted him. Even though I’d acted the part for almost a year I was now the legal father of Robert’s son.
Michelle was true to her word and, when we got home, she rummaged through the drawer, pulled out the brown envelope, held it over the sink and set fire to it. She dropped it and once it was entirely gone she turned on the tap and washed the ashes away.
I was holding Simon during this process and he bounced up and down in my arms as he watched the flames. He slapped me across the face with his flailing hands and giggled. He seemed as happy as we were.
Our parents had known what was happening that day and Michelle’s dad, who I was now calling by his first name, Davy, had suggested a celebration but Cathryn, his wife, had said that might not be such a good idea. I realised that she’d been thinking of my Mum’s feelings and I thanked her for that. Mum was still missing Robert and there was no need to rub her nose in it.
Anyway, we wanted to celebrate as a threesome.
When I say ‘celebrate’ I mean we wanted to just spend some time together as our own family unit, I did however speak to my dad about it a few days later. It was a Saturday and Michelle had gone shopping with her mum and taken Simon with her. They were looking for a birthday present for Michelle’s grandma, as I recall. Anyway, I was at a loose end so I’d asked my dad if he wanted to go for a pint and he didn’t need asking twice.
He went to the bar when we got there, and I found a table. He carried the beers back to the table and set them down before sitting on the stool beside me. Our shoulders were touching. We didn’t say anything to each other for the first few minutes, preferring instead to sip our beer in silence. Then Dad set his glass on the table and started fiddling with it. He held it at the bottom and twisted it from side to side. I had a feeling he had something on his mind.
‘It was a good thing that you did, son,’ he said without taking his eyes off the glass.
I knew what he was talking about, but I didn’t say anything, not because I didn’t know what to say but because I didn’t think it needed saying.
‘I’m proud of you, Tom,’ he lifted the glass to his mouth and added, ‘which is more than I can say for your brother,’ before he took a large gulp of his beer. After he’d put the glass back down he said it again. ‘It was a good thing that you did.’
‘Not really,’ I told him. ‘I only did what I wanted to do.’
‘Yes, but it’s not everyone who would take on another man’s child.’ He’d obviously taken some air in as he drank his beer because he was fighting to control a burp as he spoke.
‘Yes, well, he’s not another man’s child now, is he?’ I said it a bit more harshly than I’d meant to and I mouthed the word ‘sorry’, but Dad shook his head to say it wasn’t necessary.
‘You are happy though, aren’t you?’ He tossed his head back and emptied the contents of his glass.
I smiled and said, ‘I’m married to Michelle,’ before emptying my own glass.
Dad smiled. ‘Good point,’ he admitted as he picked the glasses up and made his way back to the bar. I started to protest that it was my round but he was away before I got the words out of my mouth. I watched him as he stood at the bar. He was chatting casually to the man beside him as he waited his turn to be served. I’d always had a good relationship with my dad and I hoped that I would have a similar one with my son.
My son, I said it again in my head just because I liked the sound of it.
As Dad came back from the bar I told him that it was my turn next and he made a noise that more or less told me to shut up. As he put a glass in front of me I asked how my mum was.
‘Much the same,’ he said as he sat down. ‘She’s happy for y
ou, though,’ he said between sips, ‘and she’s happy about you adopting Simon.’
I knew she would be, because as long as ‘Father unknown’ remained on Simon’s birth certificate she was probably scared that her grandson would be snatched away from her. There was no denying that she loved Simon and, now that I was listed as his father, she would always be his grandma regardless of what happened between Michelle and me.
ROBERT
That first Christmas was a bit weird.
Normally I’d spend most of the time between the 23rd of December until the day after New Year half cut, starting with the ‘works do’ that always began about ten minutes after we closed the garage for the Christmas break and finished after we’d brought in the New Year.
I’d been with Michelle the year before, but that hadn’t stopped me from having my fair share of alcohol. Well, I was off work so why not make the most of it?
That first Christmas after I left home it was just the opposite. I spent most of the time working and barely had a drink at all. On Christmas Day, I was at the pub before ten so that I could set the bar up. We weren’t doing food or anything, but Gloria had said that there would be more than enough in for a lunch-time pint to make it worth opening. I’d had my doubts, but it turned out that Gloria knew what she was talking about: the first customer came in before I’d even got back to the bar after opening the door.
Soon the place was half full of men trying to get away from the cooking of the Christmas dinner. I can’t remember who said it now, but the place was in uproar when someone said that ‘the wife’s had the bloody Brussels on since before breakfast!’ Someone else said they’d come to get away from the kids and another that they’d escaped before the in-laws turned up. There was a camaraderie about them.
I enjoyed that shift because they were all in a good mood, which made them generous: most of them put a pint for me behind the bar.
I went home to my own Christmas dinner after closing time. Remember, this was back in the days when pubs were only open for a few hours in the afternoon and then again in the evening so I was back at Tanya’s flat by quarter to four and the bird was on the table shortly after that. We didn’t have a turkey, it seemed a bit pointless just for the two of us and to be honest I’m not that keen on it anyway. I think we had chicken.
As we sat there opposite each other, wearing the paper hats that had come out of the crackers Tanya had insisted we pulled, I couldn’t help thinking back to all the Christmases that had gone before, the one’s where we had opened presents after breakfast and Mum made enough food to feed an army. I tried not to dwell on it, because that wouldn’t have been fair on Tanya who had made an effort to make a nice meal and create a festive atmosphere. We’d decided to open our presents after we’d eaten the Christmas pudding.
I think I bought her some perfume and she got me a jumper. The meal had been nice, but I’ve got to say that I wasn’t exactly full of Christmas cheer. I think that was when I missed my family the most. I didn’t miss them enough to ring them, though.
I was working New Year’s Eve too, so Tanya came with me and sat at the end of the bar. There were lots of girls in that night and more than one of them gave me the eye, if you know what I mean, but I was sure to make Tanya the first person I kissed at midnight. We both knew that I wasn’t faithful to her, but I wasn’t going to rub it in her face: despite what you might think I’m not a complete bastard.
She helped me clear up after the punters had all gone home. ‘Made any resolutions?’ she asked as she gathered glasses.
‘No,’ I looked up from the table that I was wiping. ‘What’s the point? I don’t smoke, I’m not overweight and I don’t drink much these days.’
She laughed at that. Tanya had a lovely laugh and her face sort of creased up into a ball. I got the feeling there was something else she wanted to say to me but she couldn’t bring herself to get whatever it was off her chest. A couple of times I noticed her open her mouth as though she was going to say something, but she stopped herself when she realised I was looking at her and forced a smile onto her face.
Once I had locked up, we walked the short distance home. It wasn’t far and I thanked God for that because it was freezing; a frost was forming and we could see our breath as we spoke. Not that we spoke about anything much, not while we were walking home anyway. That was saved until we were back in the flat.
Tanya opened a bottle of whisky and poured some in a glass that she handed to me. She poured some into a second glass and I couldn’t help noticing that she’d poured herself a healthier measure than she had given me.
She held the glass up in a toast and said, ‘Happy New Year, Rob.’
I held my glass up too and said, ‘Happy New Year, Tanya.’
She was acting oddly so I wasn’t surprised when she said, ‘We need to talk.’
‘Sounds serious,’ I tried to make it light-hearted.
She didn’t laugh or even smile. She just looked at me and nodded towards the empty chair opposite the one that she had lowered herself into. She set the whisky bottle on the coffee table between us.
Do you know what went through my mind? I thought shit, she’s pregnant. I sat and waited.
I didn’t have to wait long. Just long enough to drain half the whisky she had left.
‘I’ve made a resolution,’ she said eventually.
‘OK,’ I stretched the word out in that way you do when you really want to say what the hell are you talking about?
‘Yes,’ she emptied the glass, picked up the bottle and poured herself another generous measure. She looked at the glass for a couple of seconds before she looked up and said, ‘I’ve resolved to put myself first this year.’
Call me stupid if you like but I didn’t know what she was getting at so I said, ‘Good idea.’
‘I’m not going to put up with second best anymore,’ she said, ‘and I’m not going to put up with being second best.’
That was when the penny dropped. I reached over, pulled the bottle towards me and refilled the glass that I hadn’t yet emptied. I wasn’t a massive whisky fan back then, but any port in a storm.
‘I know what you’ve been doing, Rob,’ she said, ‘and I’m not prepared to put up with it anymore.’ She made a noise that sounded like a laugh, ‘I know we’re no Romeo and Juliet but I thought that we had something.’ She drained her glass again but she didn’t refill it this time. She put the glass on the table and looked at me. ‘I’m going to bed now,’ she said slowly, ‘and I don’t expect you to be here when I get up in the morning.’
She walked towards the bedroom and opened the door. She started to go in but stopped short and turned around again. ‘I don’t hate you Rob, it’s just that I’m too long in the tooth to be lying in bed at night waiting for you to come home from shagging whoever the hell it is you’ve been with. We just need different things, that’s all.’
I can still see her there, silhouetted against the dim light inside the bedroom with her head turned looking at me over her shoulder.
‘I’ll still talk to you if I see you in the street,’ she said as she leaned down to pick up something that had been sitting on the bedroom floor. It was the bag that I had brought with me when I left home. By the sound it made, it was already packed.
‘Make sure that you put your key through the door after you’ve locked it.’ She closed the bedroom door behind her.
I looked at the door until the light that seeped between the frame and the hinges was switched off. I sat back in the chair and considered my options. About half an hour later I was back in the pub, or rather in the flat above it. Gloria and Phil had lived there but it had been empty since they’d buggered off to Tenerife. Gloria had said that it was mine if I wanted it and I realised that she had probably seen this day coming.
I thought about moving on after Tanya threw me out, you know, throwing my bag in the back of the car and setting off into the sunset, but in the end, I decided to stay where I was.
I had a job th
at I was actually starting to enjoy and somewhere to live that cost me next to nothing in rent. I liked being Rob and other people liked Rob too. Well, maybe not Tanya at that point, but that wasn’t reason enough to start again.
I’m kidding about Tanya, by the way. I think she was pretty much OK with me right from the start. She popped into the pub the Saturday after New Year to drop off some stuff that I’d not taken with me. I saw her come in and she sort of smiled at me so I figured she hadn’t come for a row. She found herself a spot at the end of the bar and, after I’d finished with the person I was serving, I joined her. I asked her if she was all right and she said that she was.
‘Can I get you a drink?’ I asked.
‘Yes, and make it a double,’ she said without hesitation.
I placed a double Bell’s in front of her and said, ‘It’s on me.’
She actually said, ‘Thanks,’ but I could tell that what she really wanted to say was that it was the least that I could do. She took a sip of her drink and then deposited the carrier bag she was carrying on the bar. ‘Thought you might want these,’ she said.
I thanked her and put the bag under the counter without looking at what was in it. I’d realised that I was missing a shirt and some underwear so I didn’t need to look. I didn’t know whether to feel pleased that I had one of my favourite shirts and pair of Y-fronts returned, or disappointed that Tanya had wanted every trace of me out of her flat as soon as possible.
I didn’t dwell on it.
By the time Tanya left, two double whiskies later, we’d agreed that it had been fun and we would remain friends.
TOM
I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t think of Robert from time to time, and there was one time when I couldn’t help but laugh. I wasn’t laughing at him though, but at myself and the way I’d been during all the years that we grew up together when I was striving to be like him: when I’d wanted to be confident like him; when I’d wanted to be popular like him – essentially, when I had wanted to be him. I laughed because I realised that I was now living his life, or at least the one that he could have been living. And do you know what? It felt amazing.
Not My Brother's Keeper Page 9