Page 6 of Vengeance is Mine

‘When you were a child, I wanted to protect you. There was a lot of ill feeling around here about what Dominic did. There still is. I thought if I told you and you told a friend at school… Kids can be so cruel. I didn’t want you being bullied.’

I nodded. ‘I can understand that.’

My mum’s face softened.

‘How did you meet him?’ I asked.

‘At a party. We didn’t go to the same school. It was Lizzie Denham’s eighteenth. I met Dominic, and we had a few drinks and a laugh and arranged to meet up that weekend for a date.’

I smiled as I saw the brightness return to my mum’s eyes as she remembered a time that was obviously special to her.

I’ve often wondered why Mum never married or even had a boyfriend. She met the odd bloke, and a couple of them were incredibly odd, but nothing ever went beyond a few dates. She always said she’d been on her own too long and was used to doing her own thing. I can certainly understand that. I may only be twenty-one, but I’ve been on enough dates to know, more often than not, men can be complete tossers – mentioning no names, Neil Whitaker.

‘How long did you go out together for?’

‘About a year.’

‘What was he like?’

It was a while before Mum answered. It looked like she was struggling to find the right words. ‘He was… lovely.’ She gave a painful smile.

‘Lovely. Is that it?’

‘No. He was… sweet and kind and funny, but… he could be a bit overbearing at times.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘Remember Melanie Pritchard? Had the shop next to me, sold all that crap jewellery?’ I nodded. ‘Remember her husband? He was always phoning her asking what time she was shutting, what time she’d be home, where she was going, who she was meeting. Well, Dominic was a bit like that. He was… clingy.’

‘Maybe he really liked you?’

‘Maybe.’ She shrugged.

‘Did Nan and Grandad meet him?’

‘Yes. They got on well with him.’

‘So, what happened?’

‘We were only eighteen. I was about to go to university. He didn’t know what he wanted to do. He wasn’t very academic, if I remember correctly. Anyway, people kept telling me not to have a boyfriend when I went to uni, as it wouldn’t last and one of us would end up getting hurt. Also, I was planning on going to Sheffield, and I know it’s not far, but I didn’t want to do the whole long-distance thing. So we decided to end it.’

‘How did he take it?’

Mum took a deep breath. ‘He cried. A lot. I cried too.’

‘He cried?’ I was surprised.

‘Yes. He told me… he told me he loved me.’

‘But you didn’t feel the same way?’

‘No.’

‘Why not?’

‘I can’t believe I’m telling you this. He was my first boyfriend. I didn’t know what love was. I liked him, obviously. But love? No. I didn’t love him.’

‘Had I already been conceived at that point?’

---