Page 38 of Letting Go of Yesterday
‘You’re telling me you think it’s okay for two men to live together and raise a child?’ Rowan could see the tendons bulging in Michael’s neck and she reached out and took James’s hand, suddenly nowhere near as certain that now was the right time for him to come clean. She needed to tell him that it was okay if he wanted to wait.
‘You don’t have to do this?—’
This time he cut Rowan off. ‘Yes, I do.’
Squeezing her hand once, he let it go and turned towards his father, finally raising his eyes from the ground. When James spoke again, his voice was so low she had to strain to hear. ‘The reason I don’t agree with you is because the divorce is my fault. Rowan had no choice but to end the marriage when she found out I was in a relationship with someone else. His name is Euan and I love him.’
For a moment Michael didn’t speak, his face turning puce and the tendons that had been straining in his neck looking like they might be about to snap.
‘Aren’t you going to say anything?’ There were tears in James’s eyes, even before his father finally answered, spittle flying from the corner of his mouth as he fired the words at his son like bullets.
‘If that’s true, I don’t ever want to see you again. No son of mine would choose to live a life as abhorrent and sinful as that.’
‘It’s not a choice, it’s who I am and it’s not abhorrent. Euan makes me happier than I ever knew it was possible to be. Please, Dad, just try to understand.’ James sounded desperate and a few people standing close to them had already turned to look in their direction. For once Rowan didn’t care. She wanted to hug James and tell him how proud she was of him for finally finding his voice with a man who’d bullied him for years. It was suddenly clear why the James she’d known had disappeared more and more over the past few years: he’d been hiding in plain sight. Now he was standing facing his father and his greatest fear.
‘How dare you take on the role of chaplain when you were living like that. I’m ashamed to even know you, let alone to be your father.’
‘How can you talk to your son like that? You’re supposed to love your children unconditionally and if you were any kind of father?—’
‘Row, don’t.’ James put out a hand to stop her. His voice was weirdly calm, all of a sudden, as if the realisation had hit him that trying to make his father see sense was pointless. ‘Nothing you say will change his mind. Just go, Dad, if that’s what you want. Walk out of my life and don’t look back.’
If Rowan hadn’t already been on her feet she might have stood to applaud James. She’d never have believed he had it in him to stand up to his father like that, but just as James had predicted, Michael was completely unmoved at the prospect of losing his son.
‘Oh don’t worry, I’m going, and when your sin catches up with you and you realise what you’ve done, don’t expect me to pick up the pieces. You’ve made your choice and you can live with the consequences.’ Michael pushed past James, shoving him hard enough for him to almost lose his footing, before disappearing into the crowd as if he’d never been there. If Rowan hadn’t seen the confrontation with her own eyes she wouldn’t have believed that James had finally found the strength to be honest.
‘I’m so sorry he reacted like that, but you were brilliant.’ She tried to hug him, but it felt as though he was made of stone and his voice when he spoke was almost robotic.
‘We both knew how he was going to react.’
‘It doesn’t matter. You heard the way Bella and Tiffany leapt to Jase and Aidan’s defence. Bella’s a great kid and so is Theo, they won’t think any differently of you. You’ve got them and Euan, and that’s all that matters.’
‘Except I don’t think I have got Euan any more.’ The tears that had been threatening to overwhelm James were now falling uncontrollably. ‘I didn’t leave Membory Grange just because of what that man said to me. When I told Euan about what had happened, I said we needed to double down on making sure that no one ever saw us together. He told me he couldn’t keep sneaking around any more and living a lie. He said that he didn’t want to be my dirty little secret, and that if I didn’t want to tell anyone we were together then maybe we shouldn’t be. I couldn’t face being honest, so I just left without telling him. Now he won’t take my calls, and I’ve hurt you and the kids. I’ve messed everything up and everyone would be better off without me. I should just take myself off somewhere and?—’
‘No.’ She put a hand on his chest and then pulled him towards her, holding him tight for a moment. ‘Don’t you even dare to say those words out loud. The children are happier here than I ever thought they would be, but all of that will change if you do something stupid, and nothing your father says is worth that. Believe me.’
‘I just want to go home, but I don’t even know where that is any more.’
‘Right now it’s wherever the kids are, at least until you can get your own place sorted and work out what’s going on with Euan. I’m taking you home with me and I’m not leaving you on your own until I can be certain that you’re okay. Do you hear me?’ She gripped his shoulder until he finally looked at her and nodded. ‘Right, wait here, I’ll only be a few minutes.’
Rushing over to find Bex, she told her friend that James was really unwell and asked her to take the food she’d bought over to Nathan and the boys and explain what had happened. She also asked Bex if she could keep an eye on Theo until one of her parents came to collect him, before letting Tiffany’s parents know she had to leave and checking that they really had offered to let Bella stay over. After that she rang her mum asking if Theo could have a sleepover at her place, using the same excuse about James being ill and telling Katrina that she didn’t want Theo to catch whatever his dad had got. No one had better organisational skills than a headteacher in a crisis and, just as she’d promised, she was back at her husband’s side within five minutes.
James hadn’t moved from the spot where she’d left him and she had to put her arm around his waist to usher him back to their car. She had no idea how Michael had got back to Port Agnes, and she didn’t care. Her only concern right now was stopping James from doing something that would hurt their children a million times more than the break-up could ever do. She just couldn’t allow herself to think about Nathan, or how he might react to what Bex told him about why Rowan had needed to leave. Spending time with Nathan was the only time in years she could remember putting herself first, but right now her happiness had slipped back down to the bottom of her priorities. All she could do was hope it didn’t slip off the list altogether.
21
Nathan had seen Rowan embrace her husband from where he’d been standing waiting with the boys. It was obvious James had been upset, he’d been gesticulating wildly at one point and had slapped the palm of his hand against his forehead several times, before Rowan had pulled him towards her. He couldn’t hear what they were saying, but that didn’t stop him creating his own subtitles for the conversation. James must have been saying what an idiot he’d been, and how he’d do anything to win her back. Rowan would have told him at first that there were no second chances, but then James would have played his trump card and reminded her that being together was best for the kids.
The children were everything to her, that much was obvious, and it was one of the many reasons why he liked Rowan as much as he did. She put children at the centre of every single decision she made. Not just her own children, but all of her pupils too. That was why, when Will had asked Nathan if he had time to fill in the questionnaire that the inspectors had sent out, three days after the firework party, he’d written down every wonderful thing he could think of about Rowan’s leadership and the ethos she was working so hard to embed. He couldn’t allow how hurt he’d been, when she’d sent Bex to talk to him, to affect how he felt about the good things she’d done. None of that changed the fact that Rowan was an excellent headteacher, who had worked tirelessly to make Leo’s transition to using a wheelchair at school as seamless as possible.
When he’d got home on the night of the fireworks party, he’d resisted the urge to text her and ask how her husband was, and he’d refused to allow his thoughts to drift to what Rowan and James might have been doing at that point, or the promises they might be making one another about giving things another try. His prison sentence had taught him some lessons he wanted to forget, but it had also taught him some useful skills that he was determined to hold on to. One of them was the ability to shut down his thoughts if he needed to. When the cell door had first closed behind him, he’d realised that this awful place, filled with desperate screaming voices, would be his home for a minimum of six months. His breath had quickened and he’d wanted to claw at the door, and at his throat. He wasn’t sure how he’d lasted that first night, or the next, but over time he’d learned to send his mind somewhere else, back home to Cornwall and the big skies that seemed to stretch on forever. He’d picture Leo’s laugh, or his mother in the kitchen cooking up a storm, the way she always did when she needed to relieve some stress.
Ever since the fireworks he’d been using that same technique to avoid thinking about Rowan, to stop himself imagining her telling James that she was willing to go back to Membory Grange and give things another try. Her relationship with Nathan had barely begun, and he didn’t really expect to be able to compete with what she and James had. He wished there’d been an opportunity to find out where things might have gone, but what he’d regret even more, if she left Port Agnes, was losing her friendship. Losing Theo would break Leo’s heart too, and he didn’t want to face that possibility until he had to. Eventually, just before midnight, a text message had finally come through from Rowan.
I’m so sorry I had to run out on you and the boys and I know I’ve been doing a lot of that lately. James isn’t in a good place and he needs to stay with me for a bit longer. Can we meet after the inspection is over and James has gone back to Membory Grange to sort things out? I’m not sure how long that will be, but I’ll explain everything properly then. Sorry again and thanks for being so understanding xx
He’d stared at the message for a moment, wondering how to respond. In the end he kept it simple.
Don’t worry about me. You’ve got more than enough to think about right now xx
