Page 108 of An Unholy Affair
He huffed. ‘She’s been so weird since Dad died.’
‘What, as in being nice?’
‘Yeah, but it’s other stuff. She’s been watching CBeebies.’
‘Seriously?’
‘Yep.’
‘Well, she can watch it with Betsy, then. It does my head in.’
‘Em, if you need us to get out of your hair, you need to say. Okay?’
She patted his hand. ‘I will, but to be honest, it’s cool if you stay a few days. Steph’s stressed out with this muppet client of hers, so if you and Mum can help out with Betsy, that would be amazing.’
‘No worries.’ He smiled at his sister, but he was already counting how many days it would be before he was back with Eveline. He stood. ‘Em, can I show you something?’
‘This sounds interesting.’
‘Maybe. Hang on a sec.’ He went to his room and returned with an envelope, closing his sister’s bedroom door behind him.
‘The plot thickens! What have you got there?’
He handed it to her. ‘Take a look.’
She opened it. ‘Oh, these are those photos you found in the loft of Dad and his friend. Didn’t he die?’
‘Yeah, Mum said it was when they were about twenty.’
His sister flicked through them. ‘What am I meant to be looking at?’
Jack cleared his throat. ‘I chatted to Mum about him earlier. She said that they were closer than brothers growing up, and that Dad was different before Will died. Happier.’
‘O-kay. And?’
‘Well, every photo is of either Dad or him taken at the same spot. Look, here’s one of Dad taken by the river, and this one is of Will in the same place. So they took photos of each other. There’s only one of them actually together—the one they took by turning the camera around.’
Emily rifled through until she found it. Will was holding the camera and grinning down the lens. His father was looking at his friend.
Jack held his breath as his sister stared at the photo, then went back through all the others.
‘Oh,’ she said softly. ‘Do you think…’
‘We can never know for sure, but if you look at the way they’re looking at each other in the photos, and how cut up Dad was about his death…’
‘Not to mention the rabid homophobia.’ Emily lay her head back on the pillows and exhaled a long breath. ‘Holy shit, Jack.’ She stared at him. ‘Holy fucking shit! You think Dad wasgay?’
He shrugged. ‘Like I said, we’ll never know, but it kind of explains him and Mum being in separate bedrooms all our lives, and the obsession with me doing “manly” stuff.’
His sister snorted with laughter, then suddenly teared up.
Jack passed her a box of tissues.
‘Thank you. It’s mainly hormones, but if Dad was hiding who he really was the whole of his adult life, then it’s just so fucking sad. What a waste of a life.’
‘He did produce us.’
Emily blew her nose and gazed down at Alfie. ‘Yeah, and if he hadn’t, then Betsy and this little poppet wouldn’t be here.’
