Page 72 of Forever, Maybe

Chapter fifty-five

O ne week later

“So, how are you? Ready to go? Excited?” The Asda buyer’s Leeds accent punched the ‘ci’ in excited .

Daniel wedged the phone against his shoulder, scanning the spreadsheet she’d emailed—the one detailing exactly where his products would be stocked in every Asda across Scotland next week.

“Aye, sure,” he said, aware his tone suggested the opposite. “Means a lot. Always wanted to see my stuff in a supermarket.”

A sniff down the line. “We loved your products. Your passion. Producers like you are our lifeblood.”

Lie-ff blud.

“Best of luck. We’ll check in two weeks from now. Once we’ve got the sales figures.”

Daniel thanked her again. They exchanged the usual small talk—the weather, weekend plans, family wellbeing (he kept it to a curt good, thanks )—before he hung up.

He skimmed the spreadsheet again. One column for products. Another for quantities. A third listing every shop they’d hit. He could scroll to the bottom, tally the numbers, marvel at the projected income and tell himself: Daniel Murray, you are a roaring success.

Funny how hollow it felt. Like sprinting up a mountain in search of the golden fleece, only to find a moth-eaten, piss-scented sheepskin rug.

He closed the spreadsheet and clicked onto the Scottish Post website—his fourth or fifth check-in of the day.

Still nothing. No feature on Stuffed! . No call from Dougie, the crime reporter.

Maybe Jennifer Frazer’s threats had been just that—empty.

Or the editor had decided his story wasn’t worth it.

Not when Brexit and its fallout for Scottish businesses made for juicier headlines.

Holly—today’s outfit a dark green blouse and matching pleated skirt—poked her head around the office door, waving his phone.

“Your brother just rang.”

Daniel took it with a nod of thanks and hit re-call .

“You called?” Mark rarely got in touch unless he wanted something.

“Aye. How are you?”

God. Things must be bad if Mark was asking about his wellbeing. Daniel didn’t bother with the truth.

“Fine. What do you want?”

“Just wondered if ye fancied a drink? It’s, eh… my birthday.”

Daniel clenched his teeth, mouthing shit. Splitting up with his wife had meant losing the one person who handled the social admin—remembering birthdays, sending cards, making sure he didn’t come across as an arse. He and his siblings didn’t do gifts, but they usually managed a card or text.

“Aye.” He glanced at the clock. Five o’clock. “If you’re near the office, we could go now.”

Mark was, as it turned out.

Daniel grabbed his jacket, telling a startled Holly he was done for the day.

Outside, Mark leaned against the St Vincent Street shop wall, one foot up, head down, scrolling his phone.

From this angle, it was easy to see why Nell had initially mistaken Ryan for her soon-to-be ex-husband’s son.

The brothers shared the same jutting forehead, Roman nose and the dark hair shorn around their ears and at the back.

Like Daniel, Mark’s teenage skin had been ruined by acne—so much so he’d once used a peroxide gel so strong it turned his face beetroot and made his skin peel. Now, his complexion was smooth, lightly tanned, as if none of it had ever happened.

Daniel tapped his arm. Mark looked up, scowling.

“Tricia’s no’ speaking to me.”

“Did she no’ get you a present then?”

“No! She didnae. And she didnae even phone me this morning to say happy birthday!”

Daniel shot him a sidelong glance. The plaintive tone made him sound like a seven-year-old.

He hadn’t daubed Mark in. When he’d eventually reached Nell, he had explained that while Ryan wasn’t his son (and looked like him because he was his nephew), he could have been because he’d ended up in bed with another woman whilst in Amsterdam.

She had listened without a word, then hung up on him the second he finished.

Then, when his mother called her—trying to convince her that marriage counselling with Father Reilly was the answer, and that, really, poor, sweet Nell was perfectly entitled to feel aggrieved about what happened in Amsterdam—she dropped Mark right in it.

Daniel had only heard the story from his brother’s side, but apparently, all hell broke loose the minute Nell spilled the beans.

The favourite son was summoned. Their mother was waiting, a Silk Cut in one hand despite the doctor’s warnings, and words pouring out of her mouth that she would never use in polite company.

You little shit! I remember wee Mhari Colquhoun. You have not paid a penny towards that child! My eldest grandchild! Get out of my sight, you wicked, wicked boy!

Mark scowled. “Nell should’ve kept her big gob shut,” he muttered. “Bet you’re glad you ditched the stupid cow.”

Daniel’s fingers curled into a fist before he could stop them. Mark deserved little, if any, sympathy. But he swallowed his irritation and nudged him in the ribs.

“Happy birthday. What are you now—thirty-eight? Thirty-nine? The big four-o?”

Mark gave a grudging smirk. “Fuck off. Thirty-five. And you’re buying.”

He nodded towards Murdo’s, an Irish bar just down the street.

At five o’clock on a Wednesday, it wasn’t busy—just the usual crowd of middle-aged and old men who had nowhere else to be.

Some after-work drinkers, most just drinkers, their maroon faces betraying a lifetime of bad habits and bad decisions.

They sat hunched at the bar, nursing pints with whisky chasers or rum and coke.

A pre-six-o’clock-news game show droned from the TV, half the men watching, the other half staring blankly into space or at the racing pages of crumpled newspapers. None of them wore wedding rings.

“Jesus, can we go somewhere else?” Daniel asked.

Mark nodded quickly, perhaps seeing the same bleak future. Without a word, they pivoted and walked out, unnoticed by the clientele, whose eyes remained glued to The Chase.

“The Counting House?” Mark suggested, naming the nearest big chain pub.

Daniel bared his teeth, ready to argue. Chain pubs—behemoths that steamrolled into towns, undercutting local businesses with bulk-buying power and dirt-cheap prices—didn’t deserve the custom of small, independent business owners.

But it was Mark’s birthday. And unlike Murdo’s, The Counting House attracted office workers—the kind who drank in large, boisterous groups. Mark, no doubt, was already scanning for boozed-up women to help ease the sting of maternal rejection.

Unlike Murdo’s, this place was packed. Another converted bank, its grandeur betrayed by Greco-Roman statues straining to hold up the ceiling, it swarmed with suits.

A dense crowd pressed against the central bar under the vast atrium, twenty-pound notes brandished in the air like offerings to overworked bar staff.

“What do you want?” barked a bartender—a wiry young guy with a bolt through his left eyebrow and a dark-red goatee hugging his chin.

“Pint o’ Stella,” Mark said, already drifting away in search of a table.

Daniel watched as he zigzagged through the crowd, clearly altering course the moment he spotted a group of women working their way through several bottles of white wine.

“And whatever non-alcoholic beer you’ve got,” Daniel said. The bartender grunted and turned to grab a bottle.

For the weeks after the split, he’d drowned himself in booze, but oblivion only postponed the misery. It didn’t erase it. So he was back to teetotalism—no fanfare, no lectures, just a quiet decision.

By the time he waded through the crush of bodies, Mark had secured a table—strategically placed so he faced the group of women. He’d taken out his phone, peering at the screen with exaggerated focus before setting it down and flashing a guileless smile at one of them.

Daniel dropped into the chair opposite, setting down his bottle of BrewDog Nanny State. If he had to drink in a chain pub, at least he could have a Scottish-brewed alcohol-free craft beer.

He clinked his bottle against Mark’s glass. “Cheers. Happy birthday.”

Mark tried to meet his eyes, but his attention kept drifting. At the neighbouring table, a blonde with hair cascading to her waist was failing—rather obviously—to not look at him.

And Mark, of course, was failing just as obviously to not look back.

“Did you know Ryan’s working for me?” Daniel asked, watching Mark carefully as he reluctantly tore his attention away from the blonde.

“No.” His brother’s glare was instant. “If this is you being all Mr Big Man, throwing money at the kid ’cause you think I can’t afford to—”

Daniel shook his head. “I’m not being Mr Big Man. Ryan applied before I even knew who he was. Turns out he’s a hard wee worker, so I kept him on.”

What he didn’t add—and where, perhaps, Mark’s accusation had some merit—was that he’d spent time with Ryan this past week.

Talked to him. Liked him. The lad shrugged off questions about his future, but Daniel knew from experience that there was no better education than hands-on work.

Still, Glasgow Caledonian University offered a part-time business management degree.

If he liked the idea, he could put Ryan through college.

Best to wait before mentioning that, though. Who knew what his own finances would look like in a few months?

“So, what’s the story wi’ Ryan’s mum?” he asked, eyes still on Mark, who groaned but refocused.

“I was at school wi’ her. We shagged. She said she was on the pill. She got pregnant. She telt me after she’d had the wean. I wouldnae ha’ wanted her to have it.”

Spat out like a Twitter bio. One hundred and forty characters or fewer.

As Mark’s gaze drifted again, Daniel reached out and grabbed his chin. “That’s it? Seriously?”

Mark jerked away. “Aye. Fucking seriously . ” His voice was sharp now.

At the next table, the blonde and her friend were staring, one nudging the other with her elbow.

“That’s it ,” Mark repeated.

“But what about Ryan? Don’t you think—”

Mark’s eyes, which had once again wandered past Daniel’s shoulder, snapped back to him. Hard. Uncompromising.

Daniel exhaled.

Right.

“Oh, what? I should’ve been a proper dad? Giving money to a woman who lied to me? Taking the wean to McDonald’s or that stupid safari park in Blair Drummond every Sunday? What’s this about? That wee slag refusing to gie you kids?”

Daniel’s fury surged, white-hot. It roiled in his stomach, rising through his chest, burning his throat. The most satisfying thing—the most natural thing—would be to knock the little fuck into the middle of next week.

He exhaled slowly. Pictured Joe beside him.

Aye, keep the heid. Keep the heid.

Mark, his wretchedly selfish, idiotic brother, was no oracle of truth. But somewhere, buried in all that bile, was a sliver of honesty.

Daniel lowered his hands, placing them on his thighs out of harm’s way. “Aye. Mebbe,” he admitted. “I just dinnae get why you never bothered staying in touch.”

His accent thickened, pulling from the past. Years of working with suppliers, promoting products and speaking to customers had smoothed the rough edges, softened the vowels, tidied up the consonants. He said I, not Ah . No dinnae , no cannae , no youse .

But sometimes, the old tongue was the only one that fitted.

“Mhari Colquhoun was a wee slag. Just about everyone in the school’d had her.”

The blonde at the next table was forgotten. Mark’s entire focus was on him now.

“Didnae even think he was mine when she telt me. Probably went round telling every guy the same thing, waiting for one tae bite.”

Daniel nodded, listening, letting Mark talk. Wondering if this was the version of events that he’d repeated to himself so often that it had hardened into truth. A better, more palatable excuse than I couldn’t be arsed being a dad.

Should he say something?

What stood out wasn’t the excuses, but what Mark hadn’t said. All those years he could’ve been there.

Yes, taking Ryan to McDonald’s. The Science Centre. The cinema. Living the single-dad cliché. Even if he’d only been a part-time father, it would’ve been something . Maybe he and Mhari could’ve stuck it out for a few years, built some kind of family. Maybe he could’ve at least tried .

The miscarriage Nell had—the child who never was. The girl, the boy who might or might not have been biologically his. If only…

Sighing, he placed his hands on the table and pushed himself to his feet. “Goodbye, Mark.”

He laid a hand briefly on the top of his brother’s head. Mark scowled but said nothing as Daniel walked away.

At the door, Daniel glanced back one last time.

Mark had already made his move, sliding into the seat beside the shimmery-haired blonde. He leaned in, murmuring something in her ear. She chuckled, resting a hand on his arm.

Daniel stepped outside.

The night air was sharp. Clean.

He breathed it in.