The Epilogue

The last day of the trial felt like the longest day of my life. Well, the whole trial had taken almost three years. Three bloody years I’d never get back.

Had it been worth it? Sometimes I wondered. Because any outcome would always have been bittersweet.

We lost Cam on a bleak winter’s day as he finally gave up his fight. Turns out no lawsuit in the world could save you when your lungs just simply wouldn’t play ball. The five of us carrying his coffin down the aisle of a cold, empty church, the press outside waiting like hungry hyenas as we stood around staring at a photograph in a frame. A photo of a man that looked nothing like the boy I’d once known. The guy the world would remember as Cork from Blitz, when he’d been nothing but Cam all along. A man called Cam.

Me? I stood there and tried to make sense of the last decade.

I didn’t want to cry, but I had. Held his mother’s hand as she said her goodbyes.

Life was cruel. Cold. Bleak. I still didn’t understand it.

I tried to remember the good times, because there had been so many good times. Highs that now blended into lows. Times when I had laughed more than I’d ever laughed.

Pride.

There had been a lot of that too. Things we’d done. The small things. And of course, the big ones.

You win some. You lose some. But we’d seemingly won them all. Until we hadn’t. Things weren’t supposed to end like this.

Cork, What the fuck, Cork? Those were the only words I could think as I placed my palm on the hard wood of his coffin, wondering if he’d ever known how cool I’d always thought he was. Had he been happy at the end? Or had he felt sad? Had he felt the same anger I did? Because this wasn’t fair. He said he’d made his peace. How many people had lived the life we all had? It didn’t matter now. He’d lived. Hard and fast. At full speed, always.

No lawsuit could change that. No more platinum-selling albums. No money in the world.

A year later, we were back in another cold room. A packed courtroom, wearing the same fancy suits. My hair was tied back in a tidy ponytail as a judge read out the verdict. The people in the dock were just people. People whose lives had been ripped apart just as ours had been.

I had no more anger. No more tears. Barely any feelings standing there between Josh and Lee. A more grown-up Lee with a beard growing on his chin. We’d never been allowed facial hair, not when we were still a band. We were a different kind of band now. Musa, Josh, Bash, Lee and me.

And still, life rolled on.

Ups and downs. Highs and lows. Learning how to separate The Dieter from who I really was. He didn’t really exist, but I did. We all did.

Had I grown up? I smiled, standing there. I doubted it. In a way, perhaps yes. Life did that to you.

I’d said it, and Reuben had agreed. If we’d learnt anything in our stupid lives, it was that whatever happened today, it wouldn’t change a thing. We’d still go back home. Make dinner. Fall into bed. And in the morning, we’d make a cup of tea and simply move on.

It helped thinking like that. Keeping things small and simple. Not worrying too much.

Which was easier said than done when you were me.

Perhaps standing here smiling wasn’t quite the done thing, but when I looked over at Musa, he was smiling too. He turned to me and mouthed the words I knew he would say.

For Cam.

For Cam,I mouthed back. Because who else would it be for? Would a massive win here change my life? No. Not really. Would it bring grief? I doubted any win or even payout would help Cam’s mum feel any better about anything. It wouldn’t help me feel any better either. It might just bring more fear, more anguish, more things I honestly couldn’t be bothered to understand.

I was just me. A man. A husband. A father. A son. Someone who did a bit of acting, nothing that had won me any life-changing awards, but I had worked pretty steadily. I also wrote songs, and the five of us had somehow found a way back to where we could cooperate. Working together, doing what we did best. Creating greatness. My lyrics were still stupid. Josh’s beats were still weird. Lee’s songs were still too dark. So was his sense of humour, but we’d made our peace. Had it out. I’d let him hurl abuse at me and I’d taken it like a man. Stood there until we were both just laughing. Now we wrote and produced new artists, put songs out for tender. Josh and I flew out to the States a few times a year, wrote songs for some big names. Mostly wrote songs for small ones. Catchy little backwards tunes that made me happy.

I still couldn’t play an instrument, but Lee wrote the best bridges. Musa had written a musical. He still insisted on playing his creations to me, over and over, asking for my advice and opinion. Churning over small words that would never make a difference. Small things that would never be important.

I still cringed hearing our old songs on the radio. Simple tunes with lyrics I would never understand, and I’d written them. God knows what I’d been thinking back then. They still made me smile.

But nothing made me smile more than glancing back to the galleries, where Reuben was stood, wearing the suit that I loved him in. The one that showed off his shoulders. The shade of grey that just brought out his eyes. My Reuben.

He’d stayed. Of course he had. We still lived in the same house. He still worked that door, with his dad. And we’d made Stewart move in with us, because. Well. I was a charming bastard, apparently, and had Reuben’s dad twisted round my pretty little fingers. Also, I’d pretty much bullied Stewart into accepting the flat downstairs. Bought him a car and all that. I mean, he had free parking. In central London. Couldn’t argue with that, could he? In the end, the kids had been the final draw, and I wasn’t talking about myself and Reubs.

Our kids lived in that house too. Our very own baby cot in the corner of our bedroom. How lucky were we?

I knew how lucky I was. I truly did. Despite still being hopeless with money and not understanding a thing about how to actually run a business. Or manage my life.

Not that I had to. I had Michelle to manage most work things. And when things had eventually become too much at home, I’d called Agnes, because we’d kept in touch and I trusted her. Made her an offer she’d have been stupid to refuse. Well. More stupid than me. What did I know? So now she spent her mornings in our kitchen sorting out our schedules and answering my emails and paying our bills and swearing under her breath when I once again asked if she could babysit.

She never minded. Which made me a dick. But, whatever. It was something we laughed about. Laughter was good. And for what I paid her… Gah. I hope I was paying her. I think she actually paid herself.

I had to shake myself out of my daydreams, as the judge in front of us still droned on.

This day had been a long time coming, but it didn’t matter. I wanted it over and done with. Gone. I wasn’t even listening as the lawyers presented their final tirades of big words. They felt more threatening than ever, and the faces on the other side of the courtroom looked as blank as ours.

Like they’d given up. Same as we had.

Because this trial had never really been about rights and wrongs. Or money, for that matter. It had been all about humanity and greed. I nodded my head hearing our lawyer say those words. We were all human. And this pathetic, absolute mess? I had no anger left. None. Just the overwhelming feeling of wanting to get out of here.

I wasn’t The Dieter. Not here. Here, I was just me, and I’d had enough. I was on the brink of doing something stupid, like walking out of here. I was fidgeting, and Lee put his hand on my arm.

“Just hang on,” he whispered.

I was grateful. I wasn’t sure how much more I could take.

Trust.

I thought about that word. I also thought about the word love. A word I’d written so many songs about without even understanding what it meant. Bloody love.

I knew what it meant now. It meant a crying baby falling asleep against my chest. It meant talking down a distressed little boy who still had no concept of why he was living in our house. Why his little sister sometimes just wouldn’t stop crying. It meant falling asleep with Reuben’s arm around my chest. It meant smiling and laughing and being a family.

We were fostering, but we’d been approved to adopt the two little people who held a vice-like grip on my soul, so it was just a waiting game now. Another round of court dates. Meetings with social workers and support workers and therapists and liaison officers…I still didn’t understand half of those words.

I understood the important parts, though. The words that mattered.

Like the first hugs. The little smiles. The way Reuben and I would collapse on top of our bed in the evenings. He sometimes cried with exhaustion, my Reuben. I didn’t blame him; I wanted to cry too. But then he’d curl up on my chest and things would just right themselves.

I just had to be patient. Let life just happen. Tag along for the ride.

Take those deep breaths, like I did when we finally put an end to the shitshow that had been Blitz. We didn’t even cheer over our massive win, or clap or make a scene. Instead we all shook hands and walked away. I didn’t even look back. Because there was nothing to look back at. Just a future ahead of me that I couldn’t wait to get back to.

A future that was right there back home, where I threw myself on the sofa, accepted our daughter into my arms. She wriggled around like she always did before settling against my chest.

“She refused to nap again,” Agnes huffed. “Had her lunch, though. She really hates carrot. Seriously, guys, let’s move on to something else.”

“Peas were a hit,” I said, grabbing a blanket off the floor and covering us up. I was cold. Tired. I could actually do with a nap myself. “I’m going to be all responsible and pop her in her cot as soon as she’s asleep,” I said. I knew these things. It was funny how much I actually knew about being a dad. Fuck me.

“You do that.” Agnes snorted. “I’m off then. Going to take this as a bonus afternoon off and go to the gym. Treat myself to some time away from this madhouse.”

“Thank you, Agnes,” Reuben said politely. “What would we do without you?”

The answer to that question was Agnes sticking her tongue out at him. The truth? We wouldn’t do much without Agnes. But there you have it. I had good people around me now. People I liked. Trusted.

“Reuben?” our son asked as Reubs took a seat next to me and lifted our little boy up onto his lap. “Are you going to be home all day now?”

“All day,” he confirmed, stroking his hair.

“Tell me about why I have to live in this house again?”

Our beautiful little boy, who looked a little bit like Reuben. Perhaps it was just my imagination playing tricks on me. Maybe it was just the hair. Or how cute he was. That little cheeky smile.

“Well, you and your sister—you have to live in this house because it’s full of magic. A special kind of magic that’s called family. You know what family is?”

He giggled. He’d heard this story a million times, but it still seemed to make him happy.

“I know.” He grinned. “But tell me.”

“Family is when you have people around you who love you. People who keep you safe and feed you when you’re hungry and wash your clothes and take you to nursery. Nursery is really good, because you get to see all your friends. And then your family pick you up again and you come home. And you’re safe. And happy.”

“Sometimes people are not happy.”

“Of course.” Reuben leant over, placed a kiss on top of his head.

Our little boy. My stomach churned over the fact that we still hadn’t had this finalised. Their forever home. They were our kids now, and I would fight for them with everything I had because it didn’t matter that I had money in the bank. Apparently loads of money. I couldn’t buy this. This. Right here.

“But remember what I told you? If you’re ever sad or scared or hurt, you have to find your family and they will give you a hug and kiss it all better. Okay?”

“Okay,” he said. “But what about the magic?”

He laughed, my Reuben. And I laughed too, because Reuben kept changing this part of the story.

Like we kept evolving. Learning. Growing. Figuring this shit out.

“There are dragons in the loft,” he whispered. “Big dragons, and they keep an eye out for us all at night. Make sure no monsters turn up. They blow away anything bad with their fire breaths. And sometimes, you know, when you hear thunder? That’s just the dragons blowing their noses.”

I had to snort at that, and my son stared at me in disgust. Yeah. I might be the songwriter here, but goddamn, Reuben. He needed to write that book. We could at least have one book on our bookshelf. Whatever.

Dragons or not, this was our home, and as I sat there, I felt a weird mix of high and relief. At least the court case was over. We could move on.

We didn’t even talk about it because there were so many more things in life to talk about. There was a lot to laugh about. Things like the fact that I still didn’t have a driver’s licence. If I needed a driver, Stewart would take me in his car. He even dressed up and all that. Wore a suit and tie. Dark glasses. It made me laugh.

Reuben still only cooked bacon sandwiches. Or plain pasta with butter.

We still had three empty bookshelves in our living room. Well, they didn’t house any books, but they were full of photographs and trinkets and toys. A few old awards gathered dust on the top shelf.

Reuben kept telling me to get them down so he could dust them. I kept forgetting. Because they weren’t important. Not like the drawings that covered our fridge. Or the ridiculous number of shoes that littered our hallway.

I also laughed every time I suggested to Reuben to let me fuck him. That would never happen, he insisted. I still held out hope. Because, well. Hope was a good thing. Not that it mattered. We didn’t have much time for sex these days anyway, and I still preferred to suck his dick and watch him get all desperate.

Desperation. Another thing that made my gorgeous husband laugh. Married? Me? Graham Smith? Yup. We had the rings to prove it. And no, we hadn’t got arrested in Vegas. Despite Reuben’s worries about his criminal record hampering our attempts to get him a tourist-visa-ESTA-thingy. Turned out that hadn’t been an issue after all. Some juvenile record that had expired years ago. Another thing that had made Reuben sob like a baby.

The things that put scars on our souls for no reason at all.

I wanted to put that line in a song lyric. I didn’t even have to say that sentence out loud for him to get what I was on about. He just reached out and took my hand. Held it. Rolled his eyes at me.

Dragons?I mouthed.

“Dragons. And no, you can’t use that for a song lyric.”

I would, and he’d laugh.

Which was when Stewart came stomping up the stairs, slamming the door open like a big roaring dinosaur, waking our daughter and setting her off wailing.

“Stewart!” I barked.

“Is nobody going to make an old man a cuppa here? I drive you all the way round London, and not even a cup of tea in return. What’s the world coming to?”

“Stewart!” our son shouted. “Do the dinosaur thing!”

“I’ll make you a cuppa.” Reuben sighed, trying to get up from the sofa. He could barely move, as exhausted as me, as he lifted up my hand and kissed my fingers.

“I’m not going to say it,” he said softly.

“I know,” I replied. “Not gonna say it either.”

“Dinosaur!” Our son. And Stewart, stomping around, back in his shirt and tie and pretending to be some kind of dinosaur with our son up on his back while our daughter wailed. Overtired, just like me.

Everything was back to normal. This normal. Our normal.

This here? This was my life. And I just smiled, thinking. Yes. I love it.

Trust me. I really did.