Ocean Of Need

❤️ 72 🖤 Nine Miles

15th June Continued...

Jameson sits at the bar, whiskey in hand, his silver hair sparkling under the lights. Mac kisses me then sits at a table in the corner of the bar. He chose this place. It's far enough from The Bay not to know anyone. Far enough from the safe house not to guess where we've been hiding.

I sit beside Jameson. I don't hug him, or kiss the side of his face. Everything is different now. I'm different now.

He slides a margarita in front of me, 'Still like these?'

I nod and light a cigarette, dragging the smoke deep into my lungs. Then slide his gold lighter across the bar to him and say, 'How long have you actually known me, Jameson?'

'All your life,' he says, picking up the lighter and flicking it on. It's his habit. That's why I took it in the first place. Because it annoyed me. Him flicking the flame through out a conversation. He studies my face trying to get a read on me, work out what I can take.

'Just tell me Daddy. I can handle it, whatever it is.'

He smiles a small smile as I finally call him Daddy. 'I worked with your Father. You've already worked that out.'

'The whole time?'

'No. It was a long time ago. I used to keep an eye on things when he was away. Your Mother... she was complicated, but she was always loyal to your Father.'

'You mean when he was screwing Freya?'

'Yeah. Your Mother kicked him out when she found out about her. But she had four kids and was pregnant with you. Your Father didn't make it easy. Eventually she cracked and let him back in.
A few years later a job went wrong and he had to lay low for a while. She thought he was back with Freya. She changed the locks and sacked all the house staff so they couldn't let him back in. I was proud of her for that. She seemed to be doing better on her own. The boys were a bit older and going to school, you were four and at nursery. But your Father was worried. He knew how blue she could get so he stationed me outside the house. I'd watch each day as she walked your brothers to school and you to nursery. She'd spend the day inside then walk back to the school in the afternoon to bring you all home.'

Jameson stares ahead. It's a nine mile stare. I touch his arm, bringing him back to me, 'And then?'

'One morning the boys came out of the house on their own. I thought maybe you were sick and she was looking after you. When she didn't come out to pick the boys up I knew something was wrong.' He turns to me, his eyes asking if I really want him to go on.

'I need to know,' I say quietly.

'I knocked on the door. I thought maybe she'd taken a pill and fallen asleep. Everyone took pills back then. When she didn't answer I went around to the back door and broke it down. I could hear you crying from the kitchen. I made my way up to the nursery. You were in the play pen.'

'The play pen,' I echo. White bars, a soft mat on the floor.

'You had tried to get out of the pen but your hand was trapped in the gate. You were howling.'

I rub my hand, the memory of it coming back.

'When you asked the other day, if you'd been trapped in a cage I realised you must have a memory of that day stuck inside you.' He grips his whiskey tighter.

'I need to know,' I say.

'I freed your hand from the gate, lifted you out. Carried you screaming - Mama, Mama, over and over again as I tore through the house. She wasn't anywhere but I knew she couldn't have left. I'd been watching the house all day. Then I remembered the laundry room next to the kitchen.'

I grip the wooden bar in front of me. I can barely stay in my seat.

'I put you down in the kitchen and opened the door. Her feet were dangling. It took me to my knees. When I opened my eyes you were beside me, wiping my tears. I didn't know if you'd seen her. I whisked you out of there. Jesus, Lilah, if I'd kicked the door down that morning I could have saved her.'

'Oh my God, you loved her.'

'Yes,' he says, anguish washing over his face.

I see it all playing out. Me trapped inside the bars. The poem on the floor. Putting it in my pocket as Jameson wept. My Dad coming home. My brothers. The nights and nights of tears, never discussed in the morning. The teenage years without a Mum to tell me about periods or boys or clothes or any of those normal things. My brothers one by one leaving school and going into the family business without my Mum to stand up and give them a chance to have a different shot at life. Me running...

'You took me in when I was nineteen.'

'I made a promise to your mother's ghost that I would always protect you. When you ran from your family I put myself in your path. If I'd told you who I was then you would have kept running. I wanted to be the person you could run to because she wasn't here. I wanted to fight for you, the real you, not the you everyone expected you to be. That's what she would have done if I had done my job right and she hadn't died. I had no idea what we would turn into. That you would become a daughter to me. You made everything easy because you were so easy to love.'

'My mother's death was not your fault Jameson.'

'Then whose, if not mine?'

'My Father's. And a little bit on Freya. But not you.'

'The thing is I thought I saved you when you left home. The real truth is that you saved me from the guilt of your mother's death. You that saved yourself from your family only to end up in the same business with a different Father. I failed you.'

'No, that's not true. You didn't want me to go into business with you. I made you let me. You didn't have a choice. You were more of a father to me than my own father. You gave me a soft place to land and you protected me. Thank you for that, for putting me through art school, for looking after me for all those years. Now it's time for me to protect myself.' I stand up from the stool and look towards Mac, signalling that it's time to go.

'Lilah,' Jameson calls.

I turn back briefly and say, 'Yes?'

'Is this the end of you and me?'

I smile and start walking. Who knows if it's the end? Life has a funny way of coming back around again.