Page 55 of From Notting Hill with Love…Actually (Actually #1)

When I’d got changed and tidied up I ventured downstairs again. I stood in the hall, taking deep breaths to calm myself. David emerged from the bathroom while I was standing there. He jumped when he saw me. “So you decided to come back?”

“Yes, and I’m really sorry for storming out the way I did earlier…So, how’s Dad?”

“He’s a bit shaken after seeing your mother, which is understandable. But I’ve been keeping him calm with the inside of your friends’ liquor cabinet—so you may have to replace a few items before they return home.”

“Sure, I will. Thanks, David…for everything. I know it can’t have been easy for you being here tonight with Sean.”

“Hmm, that…I think we have a lot to talk about, Scarlett—and soon. But right now you have a more important issue to deal with waiting for you in the lounge.”

I hugged David. “What was that for?” he asked, holding me in his arms and looking at me with a puzzled expression.

“For putting up with me and understanding. You’re too good to me, David, do you know that? ”

“Yes,” he said. “I do.”

I froze, realizing that I’d just said the same thing to Sean a few minutes ago.

“But that’s all right,” David continued. “Because I love you—and I know once this is all over everything’s going to return to normal again. These hitches are only temporary ones.”

I was about to ask him what he meant by temporary hitches, when Sean appeared from the kitchen carrying two mugs.

Quickly I wriggled from David’s embrace.

“Scarlett,” Sean said, not looking me in the eye. “I’ve told your dad you’re back, and he’d like a word when you’re ready.`

“Ah, right,” I said, looking with trepidation toward the lounge door.

“You’d best take these,” he said, passing me the mugs, one of which was my tea and the other a mug of black coffee. “He might be needing it.”

I took the mugs from Sean as David dived for the lounge door to open it for me.

“Good luck, sweetheart,” he said as I passed him.

When did David ever call me that?

“Thanks,” I said as I saw Dad sitting on the sofa flicking through the channels on the TV. I glanced back at Sean standing in the hall.

“Go for it, Red,” he mouthed silently as David closed the door behind me.

My father looked up as I entered the room.

“I brought you some coffee,” I said, holding the mug out as a peace offering.

Dad looked at the coffee mug and then he looked at me. And for one awful moment as we stood staring at each other I thought he wasn’t going to take it.

“Thanks,” he said, eventually reaching out and taking the mug. With his other hand he switched the TV off with the remote control.

I sat down next to him on the sofa, strangely in the exact place I’d sat with Mum only a few days previously.

“I’m really sorry, Dad,” I began, taking a deep breath. “I should have told you about finding Mum here in London and that I’d been spending time with her. It was wrong of me to keep it from you.”

Dad just looked at me over the top of his coffee mug while he sipped steadily at its contents.

“But I just wanted to get to know her a little better first before things kicked off—as I was sure they would do when you found out. And for once it seems I was right.”

I gave a little smile, hoping to lighten the moment. I didn’t like it when my father was silent like this. It wasn’t his usual style at all.

Relieved I’d made the first move, I relaxed a little and tried to lean back against the cushions behind me. But they were further back than I thought, so I kind of toppled backward and had to balance my tea high in the air like some sort of circus acrobat to prevent myself getting scalded.

My father leaned across, lifted my mug away from me, and placed it safely on a glass coaster on the table in front of us.

“Do I still have to look after you even after all these years?” he asked, speaking for the first time.

“Looks like it. ”

Dad placed his own mug down now too.

“Why, Scarlett?” he said, looking at me with sadness in his eyes. “Why didn’t you tell me you were going to come and find her?”

“I didn’t know I was. It’s all just happened by accident.”

“You mean this wasn’t the reason you wanted some time away—so you could come and find your mother?”

“No. I hadn’t even thought about it. I mean, yes, I had thought about her, obviously, but I didn’t come to London so I could find Mum. I came to prove something else.”

“What?”

Oh. Now I was cleverly digging myself out of one hole by burying myself deep in another.

But it couldn’t get any worse, could it?

“I came here to try and prove to you and to Maddie and to David that movies do exist in real life. And that I’m not wasting my life by loving them so much.”

My father rolled his head back and closed his eyes.

“Oh, Scarlett, not this again.”

“Yes, this again,” I said, standing up. “And do you know something? I was right, because since I’ve been here I’ve managed to live my life in…

” I tried to do some quick calculations in my head.

“I don’t know how many movies, Dad, because there have been so many I’ve lost count.

So movies do exist in real life, because I’ve proved it! ”

“With your mother’s help, no doubt,” my father muttered. “I bet she was there goading you along. I can just see her loving all this. I bet it took her right back.”

I stood and looked at my father sitting on the sofa. He was scowling down at the carpet, caught up in his own thoughts and recriminations. And suddenly I felt I was fighting Mum’s battle as well as my own.

“Actually, Mum had nothing to do with any of my movie scenes. I only met her for the first time a few days ago. But she has told me the whole story as to why she came to leave you in the first place.”

My father’s eyes darted up at me.

“She’s what?” he said in a low voice.

“I asked her to. I wanted to know everything that happened back then. But why, Dad? Why would you risk it all happening again? Did you want me to run away, like Mum?”

“Oh, my darling Scarlett, no, of course I didn’t.” Dad stood up now too and reached his hand out toward me. “It…it’s complicated.”

“Tell me, Dad, please. I need to know your side of the story too. So I can fully understand.”

He nodded and gestured for us to sit again. Then he took a deep breath.

“As much as it hurts me to say this, Scarlett, you’ve always been like your mother—not only in looks. So however hard I tried I could never get rid of the memory of her altogether. And unfortunately, I could see you beginning to make the same mistakes she did.”

“So you thought you’d send me away, just like you did her?” I asked. “How was that going to help?”

My father shook his head. “No, let me finish, Scarlett. You have a good life and a good job—no, business; it belongs to us both equally. And more importantly, you have a good man who wants to marry you and spend the rest of his life with you. David is a good man; you do know that, don’t you?”

I nodded. “Yes, of course I do.”

“But you still weren’t happy, Scarlett. I could tell that.

You were growing increasingly dissatisfied with everything—just like your mother was all those years ago.

It frightened me seeing you beginning to turn into her.

So when David came to see me and told me how worried he was about you, I knew I had to do something to help.

“So that’s when I suggested we give you the same chance I had your mother. I knew it was a risk—but it was a risk worth taking for your sake.”

“But why—what would it achieve if it didn’t work out the first time?”

“That’s true—it didn’t work out well for me back then. But I’m guessing it worked out well for your mother. I bet if you ask her now she’s glad she took the opportunity to get away from me and didn’t continue living what she would now consider the boring life I have.”

I decided now was not the time to be telling Dad about Mum’s very colorful, yet quite unstable past.

“But what I still don’t get is why do it all again? Why persuade David to do something that worked out so badly for you?”

“Because I love you, Scarlett—and there’s nothing that means more to me in my life than your happiness.

But I knew if you married David, and continued the same way as you were, you wouldn’t ever be truly happy and neither would David.

You’d always be wondering ‘What if?’ I know what it’s like living with someone like that, Scarlett.

I did it for long enough, and let me tell you it’s far from easy.

And what if it had gone on longer and you’d ended up like your mother?

I wouldn’t want that for you or for David.

Even though I wouldn’t change our time together for the world, Scarlett, the aftermath of one parent leaving and trying to bring up a child alone is so hard I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. ”

I was feeling really guilty now. I was putting my dad through all this unnecessary hurt. He’d done so much for me, and this is how I was repaying him.

“Plus, Scarlett, I knew if you went away on your own for a while you’d almost certainly try to live out this wonderful life you think everyone has in the movies, and I hoped you’d quickly realize that no one really lives like that—and it’s all made up.

Then if my plan went well, you’d return home and be content with what you’d got.

You’d be happy with David and happy with me—just like your mother wasn’t able to be. ”

“Oh, Dad,” I said, leaning forward across the settee and putting my hands over his.

“I’ve always been happy with you—that was never in question.

You were right though; I was unhappy with the way things were back in Stratford.

But what if it had gone wrong, what if I had found something better—then what? ”

“Scarlett, only you can answer that question. Have you found something better?”

I thought hard. Had I found something better here in London than I’d known back home? I’d met new friends, had new experiences, yes. But was it better than my life before? I tried not to think about Sean.