The following morning Adrian answered a knock at his front door. He was expecting a postal delivery or a local politician but instead he found a beautiful blonde.
“Carrie,” he said, his eyes taking in the statuesque lines of her, the warmth in her eyes, her scruffy red car double-parked in the street with its hazards flashing. “Do you want to . . . ?”
“No”—she gestured at the car—“I’m in a terrible rush. I just, er, the children—they wrote their letters. Here.” She pulled them from her handbag. “One from Cat, from Pearl, one from Luke and this one is Beau’s. Otis was still working on his when I left.” She shrugged.
Adrian took them from her and smiled. “Thank you,” he said.
Caroline craned her neck to check her car and then turned back to Adrian. “Listen,” she said, “we should talk. You and I. What are you doing tonight?”
“Nothing,” he replied.
“Can you meet me for a drink? At the Albion? Seven thirty?”
Adrian smiled uncertainly. He could not begin to imagine what Caroline might want to say to him. But he knew that his entire future rested on it. “Sure,” he said. “I can be there.”
A horn sounded in the road behind them and Caroline turned anxiously. “Got to go,” she said. “I’ll see you later.”
He watched her dash towards her car, wave apologetically at the driver of the waiting car, strap herself in quickly and speed away. And then he took the letters into his flat and he opened them.
Dear Dad,
First of all I want to say that I’m not perfect either. I’ve spent a lot of my life blaming you for my shortcomings, but I think a lot of that was because I felt like everyone was just letting you get away with it. Like I was the only one who could see the truth. But no, it’s not your fault that I’m doing nothing with my life. It’s not your fault that I have nothing important in my life and no focus. You did everything you could, you paid for my education and I do appreciate that so much, especially as you didn’t pay for anyone else’s. I know you and Mum thought I’d be prime minister by now! And I’m aware that I’ve let you down, but I’m young still. Hopefully there’s still lots of time left to make you both proud of me.
As for what you can do for me now? Well, first of all I hope you’ll forgive me. It was shit what you did: leaving me and Cat and Mum down in Hove when we all needed you so much. But if Mum can forgive you, then I can be a bigger person and try to forgive you, too. I’ve been waiting for fourteen years for you to say sorry and you finally did. So now it’s just onwards and upwards, I hope.
I also think you should move out of that flat. You’re only forty-eight but since Maya died you’ve aged about ten years. You need a fresh start. You’re an architect, for God’s sake, living in a crap conversion with no light and no space! That place is dragging you down.
I also need you to not have any more children. Seriously. You always said it would be “another person to love.” But I don’t agree. I think it would be another person to take you away from us, especially the small ones. Don’t do it. You’ve got five totally amazing children. Enough. Stop. Move on.
But mostly I’d like us to try and be friends, instead of two spoilt boys sharing a house.
I really love you, Dad. I’m glad we’re getting a chance to start over.
Yours, always,
Luke
Dear Dad,
I know you said not to talk about the e-mails. But I have to talk about the e-mails. If I don’t talk about the e-mails I’m going to end up in a nuthouse. It was me, Dad. I know you probably already know that. That woman in the pub probably told you because I’m pretty sure Maya worked it out that night. She saw a Skype chat that me and Otis were having. It wasn’t very nice. She probably put two and two together.
Dad, when I saw those e-mails again after all that time I actually couldn’t believe I’d written them. They looked like they’d been written by a psychopath, by someone evil and twisted. I felt like there must have been some monster living inside me. I hated myself. I still hate myself. I truly can’t believe I was capable of such a thing.
The last year and a half has been like pure torture. When I heard about Maya I was on my way to work and I literally threw up into my own hands on the bus. I thought I’d murdered her. Christ. I wish I could explain how I was feeling, what made me do it, but it’s hard.
I was so angry with you when you left Caroline. If you’d had any idea how hard I worked to accept you leaving Mum, leaving us, how hard it was to carry on loving you when my heart was broken. I couldn’t have done it without Mum. She was so forgiving. So gentle. I totally took my cues from her. I couldn’t let my anger out, for her sake, so I focused instead on being a part of your new family. I never blamed Caroline and I made her a friend. And I loved each and every one of those babies as if they were fully my own flesh and blood. I took the “if you can’t beat them join them” approach. AND THEN YOU FUCKING LEFT!!! I wanted to kill you!! I hated you! Much more than I did when you left us. And then I met Maya and she was so sweet and so young and so bleugh. I just totally didn’t get it. You know, you left Caroline—for that. Sorry, that makes me sound like such a bitch. Clearly I am a bitch. But I wasn’t the only one. Nobody understood what was going on. The children said things to me that they couldn’t say to you. And I just thought that maybe for the sake of all the children I could get her to leave. I thought I was doing it for everyone, you know, for the greater good. Nobody knew I was sending them. Not even Otis.
I don’t really feel I’m in any position to ask you to do or be anything, apart from forgiving. I know that woman in the pub said that Maya didn’t kill herself, but really, how can she know? How can anyone know, apart from Maya herself? I’ll take it with me always and forever. I just wanted her to disappear. I was an idiot. I have learned. I am a better person. I just hope that one day you’ll be able to look at me again the way you always have done, like I’m the loveliest girl in the world. But I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t.
I love you, Daddy. Please come home.
Your Cat xxxx
Dear Dad,
I haven’t written my letter yet. I’ll give it to you soon.
Love,
Otis x
I want you to be happy again. I want you to cut your hair. I want you to go on a date with Mummy. I want you to get rid of Paul Wilson. I want you to do my homework with me. I want you to sleep in Mummy’s bedroom. I want you to stop buying me ice skates for my birthday and buy me something surprising that you thought of yourself. I want you to have a fat tummy again. I want to be part of a normal family, like we used to be. I want you to have tomato soup and bread with me all the time, not just once a week. I want you to be downstairs in the mornings. I want to tell you all my dreams, always, until I’m too old to tell my daddy about my dreams.
I love you,
Pearl
Dear Daddy,
I want you to come home. And tickle my feet. Please.
Love from,
Beau