Chapter 39

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Julian

I stoodbefore Michael as he held the letter in his hand, and my stomach rolled over. He was suited, fresh from the office, in the same style I’d been wearing myself for years, but he was a lot more muscular than I was. I was still gaunt in comparison, and I felt it. For a fleeting moment I was a shell again, fragile before his stare. Instinct. But no. I wasn’t a shell anymore. I was the total opposite.

And that was down to my princess. The girl looking between us with nervous eyes.

“I’ll, um, nip down and see Mum and Tom,” she said, and I held out a hand to her, ready to ask her to stay, but she shook her head, pre-empting me. “I’ll be back when you’re ready. Just call.”

She dashed off to grab her bag and phone, and I stood aside to let Michael in. It felt surreal to have him in this place, so at odds with every other environment we’d shared in our lives.

“I’ll see you later,” Rosie said, squeezing my hand before she went. I pulled her in to kiss her head as she passed me by, and my brother looked away.

In disgust. Pain. Shock. Maybe a combination of all three. He’d only ever seen me with Katreya, and our token, public facing gestures.

“I’ll see you later, sweetheart,” I said to Rosie, and she was off, closing the door behind her after a token wave to my brother.

Part of me wanted to grab hold of Michael and hug him tight. The emotion was already choking me, but Michael had never been an affectionate man, and neither had I. Any far off dreams I’d had of sobbing in beautiful reunion were already fading as the dawning reality kicked in. Michael was still Michael, and I was still me.

He was trying to stay composed, and I knew it. He was silent as I led the way into the living room. His jaw was still gritted as he looked around the place, scathing, no doubt still in disbelief. The decor of the apartment was most certainly a lot more grand than it had been on my arrival, but it was a droplet of extravagance in a world Michael had never known.

“Would you like a drink?” I asked him.

“A whisky, you mean? I’m sure you’ve got plenty. But no, thank you. I’m driving.”

We really had been separated a long time.

“I was thinking a coffee, actually. I have your favourite.”

“Not going to be downing the shots yourself, then? You really are full of surprises, aren’t you? If only we’d have known about them sooner. Honesty would have been the best policy.”

I stood still, shoulders tall as I kept my eyes on his. I saw my previous self standing there, guarded by a thick wall of ego, untouched. I’d thought I was so happy, such a success and a partygoer, with my seedy habits under the surface. I wondered if Michael had any of his own.

“I’m not going to be downing shots,” I said. “I haven’t been drinking. Not for a while. I’m sure I said that in the letter.”

“And I’m supposed to believe you? After everything else you’ve been telling us for years?”

I tried to make light of it. “I prefer a glass of champagne to five straight shots of whisky these days. You can believe me on that, I assure you.”

“Well. Things really have changed in that case, haven’t they?”

“Quite.” I pointed to the kitchen, beckoning him to follow me, but he cleared his throat and folded his arms, still clutching the letter tight.

“Some things haven’t changed in the slightest though, have they? What a sweet little thing that was that just skipped away. Another sleezy conquest. Shame I didn’t give you prior warning I was coming. You could have thrown her out before I arrived.”

His words pissed me off, even through the pain and the shame of what I’d done to him, and to my life in Oxford. Had he not seen the tenderness in the way I’d held her tight and kissed her head? Seemingly not.

“Rosie isn’t a sleezy conquest,” I told him. “She’s the very opposite.”

“What is she, then? The love of your life?”

“You said honesty is the best policy, so I’ll hold to that.” I paused. “Yes, she is.”

He rubbed his forehead. “Jesus Christ, man. I wish you could hear yourself. You really are out of your fucking mind.”

I could hear myself loud and clear, actually, and I was speaking the greatest truth I’d ever told him, but I couldn’t hold any judgement over him for misbelieving me. I hadn’t exactly done much to instil confidence. My dreams of open arms and understanding were shrivelling away. I thought I’d bared my soul in the letters, but maybe my soul wasn’t quite what they’d taken from it.

“Let’s get those drinks,” I said.

I went through to the kitchen and my brother followed me. I took mugs down and put the kettle on, my stomach still rolling.

“Have you any idea how frantic we’ve been? We’ve been looking for you, you know?” he said. “Have you any idea how terrified we’ve all been for you?”

No, I hadn’t. His words made me stop what I was doing, searching his stare.

“Looking for me?”

His expression darkened, and his jaw changed, trembling. And my brother – the strongest, most steel hearted man I’d ever known – looked as though he was going to break down before my eyes.

“We thought you’d have gone somewhere we knew, to someone who knew us, or used your passport, or your fucking business account card, or anything. ANYTHING. But there was nothing! You didn’t leave a single fucking trace!”

His hurt was rooting its way through anger, and I didn’t blame him. I didn’t blame him at all.

“I didn’t think I’d need to leave a trace,” I told him. “After all I’d done, I wasn’t planning on staying around.”

He held up the letter. “Yes. I know. You made that plain. Sitting here, plotting your own demise. Would you have truly done it? Ended your life alone here, with a pile of pills and a bottle of whisky?”

“I think you can tell that from my letter, yes.”

He looked at it, as though it was some trusted holy document, shaking his head. “I’m still struggling to believe it. You were ready to say your goodbyes and write your whole life off, just like that?”

“I didn’t have anything left to live for. I thought it would be in everyone’s interest if I did.”

“I can assure you it wouldn’t have been.”

I continued making the coffee, but he stormed on over at that, grabbing my arm and turning me to face him.

“We were worried fucking sick, Julian! Worried sick! You really think we wanted you dead? Seriously? For fuck’s sake man, you’re fucking INSANE!”

I felt my own hurt welling up in a fresh round of shame.

“I wanted me dead. I thought I deserved it.”

His eyes were both angry and hurt at the same time under heavy brows.

“Because you’re ill, Julian! You need help! We all know it. Katreya knows it, Grace and Ryan know it. I do. You have serious mental health problems, and you’re an alcoholic. You’ve broken down! We just didn’t know it. It’s been happening for years, right before our eyes, but we didn’t see it. We didn’t fucking know.”

“Yes, it had, and I kept it very well hidden.”

“We found the stash of whisky bottles. Katreya saw the full extent of your perversions.”

“Exactly. So I left. I didn’t expect anyone’s forgiveness. I only had myself to blame.”

“NO!” Michael said. “That’s NOT true. We wouldn’t have blamed you if we’d known you were ill. You’ve done some despicable things, Julian, but you’re not a bad man. We can hate the actions, yes, but we can’t hate you.”

I didn’t know quite what to say to that. At one point, I’d have believed him. I’d have dropped at his feet and given my thanks, overcome by the truth in his words.

Some of it was correct. I had been an alcoholic and hidden it. I had been fucking college girls behind everyone’s back, and a lot of them. I had buckled under the weight of the truth when it had been discovered.

“I had broken down, yes,” I told him. “When I threw some things into a suitcase I was on the brink, ready to leap off a bridge. I didn’t dare hope there was anything more. But then, slowly, I got back to my feet. I looked inside, and found what I’d been missing.”

He pulled a face at me, as though I was talking nonsense.

“You sound like a wannabe zen master. Is there a wacko New Age club around here when people aren’t crack smoking?”

“Hey, stop it with that!” I said, surprised at the fire in me. “I’m not a wannabe zen master, and this place might seem like a cesspit to you, as it did to me, but that isn’t quite the case. Not all of it.”

He scoffed. “That just confirms it. You really have lost your mind.”

I wanted to shake him and hug him, both at the same time, desperate for my brother to see the truth in my words, as well as my truth in the letter.

“I’d broken down, Michael. I know that.”

“HAVE, Julian. HAVE,” he interrupted. “You’re not any better! That much is clear based on the girl who just left this place. Whisky or not. You’re still ill.” His tone changed. His jaw trembled again. Finally, the core of the emotion rose to the surface. “We would have helped, if we’d known, but we didn’t. Everyone was angry, nobody understood, but we get it now. You’re sick. You have problems. You need professional help. And we’ll be here for you, all of us.”

I put my hand on his arm, wishing I was still the man who’d have curled up and taken on any conditions to get back to my family. But I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t sacrifice the girl downstairs for another pack of lies.

“That’s not what I said in the letter, is it? I didn’t say I have problems. I said I’m sorry. I admit, I’ve done some appalling things, and I’ve hurt people more than deserves forgiveness, but that’s what I’m asking for. Forgiveness.”

“And what we’re offering you is HELP.”

The kettle boiled, but I didn’t make the coffee, just stared at him.

“Help?”

“YES!” he said. “HELP!” He put the letter down on the side, and held out his hands in a gesture of care that choked me up. “Come with me, now. Come with me and leave this shit hole behind, and we’ll get you sorted, or we’ll try. We can put you into therapy and rehab, and Katreya says she’ll have you back, with an awful lot of conditions, albeit, but it’s a start. That shows how much you mean to us, doesn’t it? That shows how much we care.”

Yes, it did. Again, I was choked up. I had to battle to speak.

“I’m very honoured, truly. But I don’t need rehab, or a therapy ward, Michael. And Katreya definitely doesn’t want me back, she never wanted me in the first place.”

“Stop it!” he said. “Stop it and listen to me. You’re ill. You just don’t know it. You’re very, very ill!”

I gestured to the letter on the worktop. “Have you read that? Really?”

“Yes, of course I have. I’ve read every word a hundred times over, but that’s your version of reality, it’s not taking into account illness, or mental health problems, or how they are most likely a hell of a lot more impactful than you wanting to fuck your students. Alcoholism is a great thing to admit to, it really is. We always struggled to get you to see that, but in the other areas, the sexual deviances… you’re still under an illusion. You clearly don’t have the capacity for restraint, but we can help with that. Professionals can help with that.”

My brother was trying to be kind. It was nice to see. His eyes were the same colour as mine and I could read his expressions like my own. He seemed even bigger than me now, in the boxed in space of the kitchen. I was lithe in comparison to the bulk of him, but once upon a time we’d been a couple of boisterous youngsters, battling on the rugby field at high school.

He cared about me. Despite the circumstances. It was more than words could say, and more than I could have ever hoped for.

“Come with me, please,” he said again. “Just grab a few things and come with me. We have somewhere lined up that can take you, if you’ll sign yourself in. A residential rehabilitation facility. Katreya has found you the best, I swear. They’ll be able to fix things.”

It would have been so easy to buckle, and promise anything, and agree to any conditions in the world to go along with him, and see Grace, and Ryan, and Emily. Even Katreya. My old home, and our dog, and my old life. Everything I ever stood for. But I couldn’t do it under the pretence of another round of lies. I reminded myself of that again as I looked at him.

“I don’t need fixing,” I told him. “I need forgiveness.”

“YOU NEED FIXING, JULIAN! You need HELP!”

“Help from what?” I asked. “From Rosie, you mean? The woman I live with?”

He put his hands in his hair at that.

“Woman? You call that girl a woman?! She’s barely fucking legal!”

“That’s very true, yes. But she’s a woman, and I love her.”

“Love her.” He closed his eyes and cursed under his breath. “So, you won’t accept you have predatory sexual urges and need help? Please see some fucking sense, will you? We’re all behind you. I had to virtually beg Grace and Ryan to stay away from this visit, because I didn’t know what the hell state you’d be in, and it’s damn well good I did. Or they’d have seen that poor little girl running away from you, too.”

I raised my eyebrows. “Running away?!”

“Yes, running away. She was running back to her mother, wasn’t she? Where did you find her? On her way back from high school?”

“No. Of course not! And she wasn’t running, I can assure you!”

“Let’s see if the rehab centre agrees with you. Just get your things and come with me. I have the car outside. We’ll get you booked in, and get your assessment done, and when you’re up to it, after some treatment, we’ll get Grace and Ryan to see you, and we can work things through, slowly, and they’ll be there. We’re all behind you, no matter how fucked up things have been.”

I was shaking my head as I finally poured our coffees.

“Well?” he pushed. “Are you coming? I don’t want a fucking drink with you, Jules, I want you in the car on the way out of this shit tip. I have no idea why you even came here. It’s a disgusting place. I’d have thought you’d have at least picked somewhere vaguely habitable for you to end your days in.”

“It’s considerably more habitable than it was when I moved in here, believe me. I keyed in a random postcode actually, and it came up with Worcester. I chose the cheapest place that I could find.”

“You don’t know what you’re doing, I swear. Will you trust me, please? Trust me that you’re ill?”

I sighed at that. I thought my words in the letter had been clear, and real, and conveyed the truth, but the truth can always be misread, and twisted.

I couldn’t blame him, either. They wanted excuses, and reasons beyond my control, clutching at straws at how I could be rehabilitated and turned back into the facade of Julian they’d all come to know. But I didn’t want that. Not now. Maybe a few months ago, but not now.

“I’m not a predator,” I told him, calmly. “My alcohol addiction is easing off, and yes, I’ll happily take therapy for that, but when it comes to upping and leaving and checking myself into rehab for depravity with women, I’m sorry, but that isn’t an illness. Not for me. My past is full of mistakes on that front, and I take full responsibility for them, but I am not sick. I am perfectly aware of what I am doing, and always have been. My crimes have been morality based, in the fact that I acted very out of turn, but I am not a criminal in the eyes of the law.”

I watched his expression turn to rage.

“YOU PREYED ON GRACE’S FRIENDS! BEHIND KAYREYA’S BACK! Your WIFE’S back!”

I didn’t rise to his shouting.

“I fucked plenty of girls behind Katreya’s back, yes, and I shouldn’t have done it. I’m very sorry. It’s a regret I’ll have to live with for the rest of my life, but Katreya and I were estranged, and I didn’t prey on anyone. I fucked them.”

He turned away from me, his hands back in his hair.

“FUCK. JUST –” He fisted his hands as he swung back around. “JULIAN!”

I didn’t have anything to say. I waited until he regained some semblance of calm, and let him continue.

“I didn’t come here to fight. I came here to help. That’s what we need to do for you now. HELP.”

“Thank you. I’m grateful beyond words. And I’ll take that help, and I’ll love that help, and I’ll appreciate that help more than you could ever imagine. But it has to be help in the right areas.”

He looked up at the ceiling. “What you’re really saying is that you won’t stop fucking teenagers.”

My heart pounded. My senses were on riot, wishing to God almighty that he could get so much as a glimpse into my soul.

“That’s not what I’m saying at all,” I told him. “What I’m saying is that I won’t stop loving Rosie.”

His eyes narrowed. “Rosie? The girl downstairs? This denial is all about her?”

“I love Rosie. It’s not denial, it’s the opposite. It’s the truth.”

“You can’t love a teenager!”

“I can love a young woman.”

“As if.” He shook his head. “Fucking hell. She’s just another seedy fixation, like the others. You saw her, you snared her, now you can’t let go of her pussy. Do you scrawl marker pen all over her? Call her derogatory names as you film her on camera?”

“That’s none of your business.”

That did it for him, he stood taller, pointing a finger.

“It is exactly my business, because it says it all. She’s another one of your dirty little treasures, and unless you get therapy, you aren’t going to change at all.”

“You’re wrong,” I told him. “I’ve already changed.”

His lip trembled.

“You haven’t changed, Jules, but we want you to. All of us. Please.”

My legs almost buckled under the weight of turning this down, but I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t lie anymore and I couldn’t leave her behind. What is the point of life if people won’t love you as you are, only the person they want you to be?

“I’m not leaving Rosie,” I told him simply. “I’ll do anything else you want. I’ll take alcohol therapy, and lie detection tests, and whatever else you want me to do, but I’m not leaving Rosie. I love her too much.”

He sucked in a breath, and nodded. He knew me well enough to know my answer was resolute.

“I’ll let Grace and Ryan know. I’ll tell them you’re not coming back, because you prefer another girl.”

That stabbed me in the heart.

“IT’S NOT LIKE THAT!”

“It is like that,” he said, and a tear fell down his face. “Please, to God, let us know if you change your mind, and please, to God, come back to us when you see sense, rather than holing up here and planning to kill yourself. We’ll all be waiting with open arms.”

But those arms wouldn’t be wide enough.

I could feel my soul shattering as he walked away from me over to the front door.

“Michael, please…” I called after him, but he held his hand up, firm.

“You know where we are,” he said. “Just a shame we didn’t know where you were, or this may never have happened in the first place. People can scream in anger, but we never stopped loving you.”

Just as I’d never stop loving Rosie.

I couldn’t stand to say goodbye, so I didn’t. I held my weight as steady as I could, leaning against the wall as he closed the door. And then I cried. My God, how I cried.

My heart was torn open, all over again, but I couldn’t do it. I didn’t want to bury myself for the sake of another round of living a lie.

I wouldn’t leave Rosie. Not ever.

If love is as unconditional as they claimed, then they would have to love her alongside me. Or not at all.