Page 77 of The Book Swap
“Then you shouldn’t have been born,” she spit. “Your father turned down a tour that year. A whole record deal for an album, to look after you.”
Swallowing, I fixed my eyes ahead of me.
“That isn’t true,” I said to Mum, needing it not to be. Her jaw locked. She was saying the worst things imaginable, and she knew it. She didn’t care. “It was to look after you.”
I could hardly see the signs as I drove past a cemetery on the right, and onto the hospital. Bonnie and I always commented on how cruel it was. To put a cemetery so close to a hospital, that you had to drive right by it on the way. She used to laugh about it. She found humor in everything, right up to the end.
“And then, after all of it, you shouted at him and now he’s in hospital.”
“I didn’t shout.”
“You may as well have.”
Anger ripped through me, and the words came flying out of my mouth before I could stop them.
“If you hadn’t torn apart the entire house so Dad was living in ruins, he might not have been so stressed,” I shouted, seeing a parking space ahead and slamming the car into it. I shouldn’t have shouted. I knew it wasn’t my mum speaking, but she was trying to blame it all on me. “Dad had to look after me, because you couldn’t. There’s just as much chance you did this to him.”
Someone started beeping their horn and I got out of the car, slamming the door shut. Then I looked up, and there was Erin, and all the leftover anger I had because of Mum transferred onto her.
I can’t think about it. Not now. Not while I sit and wait for news of Dad.
All I can think about is whether Mum’s right. If I could have caused this somehow. If my pushing Dad about his gigs was opening old wounds. Breaking his heart. But earlier, he said the opposite. That it was the best decision he made. He’s made peace with it all; there’s only one person who hasn’t. Me.
Wiping at my eyes, I glance over to the receptionist, who’s whispering to another employee, looking in my direction. I can see her mouthing, “Gareth Parr,” as her colleague mouths back, “‘Do You Know Me?’”
I’ve never understood how Dad could let it go, because I couldn’t. I let that one chapter of my book hang over me for years. I was never going to give up on it, even though it’s obvious I should have. That the moment I did, better things happened to me. Dad said the same today. He hasn’t just accepted his choice; he’s happy with it, and I know that means I have to be too.
We get odd updates throughout the night, as we wait on those rock-hard plastic chairs. He’s in critical care. They’re doing all they can. They’ll be out when there’s more news.
Eventually, at some point the next day, in between chasing Mum around the waiting room and lying her down on the chairs, my brother appears.
“I just spoke to reception. Someone’s coming soon.”
It feels so good, to have someone else sharing the burden. Mum’s asleep on me, and I gently lower her down onto the seat I was sitting on, standing to hug Elliot.
“Thanks for coming.”
“Of course. What happened?”
I tell him. I start with the carpets, and the table in the garden. Me climbing the tree. Mum shouting. The ambulance. The drive with Mum. I tell him everything.
“Did you really shout at him?” Elliot asks, his voice low as we both watch Mum.
Shaking my head, I look toward the doors, desperate for a doctor to walk through and tell us something. Tell us Dad’s okay.
“I didn’t, I swear. I just told him he should go on the tour, and I’d—”
“Why wouldn’t you let that go?”
“Because he deserves to live the life he was going to, before I came along.”
Elliot nods toward the next chairs over, and lowers himself onto one.
“He gave that life up long before you were born. He gave it up the day he moved to Frome. You do know Dad didn’t want to be a pop star? He was glad to meet Mum and have an excuse not to do it.”
“I know he says that, but I don’t believe he means it.”
“Of course you don’t.” Elliot rests his head against the wall, glancing toward the double doors and back again. “Because you only have one measure for success, and being a father doesn’t count.”