Page 36 of Samuel

Frankie grinned as Sam turned and stomped back to the changing room.

“Sam,” I shouted after him, not entirely sure why.

He held up two fingers. “I’ll be two minutes.”

“Do you think he’ll shout at him?” Frankie asked his eyes shining brightly.

I chewed my lip and shrugged, feeling uncomfortable. This all seemed like too much of a ‘dad’ thing for Sam to do and after everything else over the last twenty-four hours it was a little weird.

True to his word Sam appeared a couple of minutes later, dangling the pale blue bag from his long fingers.

“Here you go,” he said passing it to Frankie. “And good choice of team, buddy.”

Frankie smiled widely as he took the bag and gazed up at Sam. “Wow, thanks. Did you tell him off?”

“Something like that,” Sam grunted.

“Oh god, what did you do?” I asked, worried about the prospect of dealing with an irate parent.

“Nothing,” he replied, watching Frankie as he took his swim gear from me and started to put it into the bag, unravelling it all as he did so. “I just told the little fu-fool who it belonged to and I gave Dave a mouthful for not sorting it out like he should have.”

“Sam,” I groaned. “You didn’t have to.”

“Yeah I did, now are we going to get food or not?”

I looked at him with my mouth open. “What?”

“Sam’s taking us for burgers, Mum,” Frankie cried excitedly, as he grabbed my hand. “Come on.”

Before I had chance to argue or question, I was being dragged out of the leisure centre, worrying about what all of it meant and what it would do to my son if it all went wrong. I had to speak to Sam and as much as I didn’t want to deep down, ask him to keep his distance.

Sam

the present

I had no idea why, but I’d told Frankie he could call me if he wanted to go swimming again before the lessons. After having spent the day with him and Maisie, it felt like the natural thing to do, but as soon as I’d dropped them back home and seen them into the house, I’d started to wonder if I’d done the right thing. If I’d been doing the right thing for the last twenty-four hours.

My Saturday night should have been spent down at the pub with my mates, but instead I’d stayed home, watching some crap action film, just in case Maisie needed me. My interest had only been half on the film as I’d had my eye on the phone willing it to ring, but dreading it at the same time. Now it was burning a hole in my pocket as I spent time having lunch at my parents’ house.

“What’s wrong with you?” Amy asked as she came back into Mum and Dad’s lounge after putting Bella down for her post lunch nap.

“Nothing, why?” I moved the cat, Biggins, making room for my sister-in-law on the sofa.

“Either you’re thinking too hard about something or you’ve got a stomach ache.”

She giggled and nudged me, prompting me to give her the finger.

“Charming.”

“Well you get on my nerves,” I replied, not really meaning it.

“So, tell me what’s wrong.” Amy reached for Biggins to pull him onto her lap, but he batted a paw at her and stalked off, probably to beg for food from Mum who was tidying up the kitchen, while Dad got Elijah’s advice on some bush in the garden which he thought might be dying.

“There’s nothing wrong,” I sighed, rolling my eyes.

“Samuel,” Amy warned.

“Oh for fuck’s sake,” I cried. “I spent all of yesterday with Maisie and Frankie, okay.”