Page 131 of The Man Upstairs

With Mum back at work, and me at college, our paths through the block wouldn’t cross very often, if at all. It was hell, knowing she was so close, but so far. One floor separated us, but that floor symbolised the world. Yet again, I could only begin to imagine the pain Julian went through when his whole family cast him aside.

He was smoking at the window one night later that week when I was missing Mum especially bad. I looked at how he was staring into the distance and wondered how bad he was missing his kids and his brother, and even Katreya. Surely all the time.

“Do you think about them?” I asked. “When you look out there, are you ever imagining Oxford in the distance?”

He didn’t hold back, turning to me with a sad smile.

“Yes. A lot of the time.” He stubbed out his cigarette. “Thank the Lord I have you to ease my pain, or I wouldn’t be here. I wouldn’t have hung onto life for much longer.”

He sat next to me when he was done with his cigarette, and put his hand on my knee. I leant into his side, hating how awful his situation must be, regardless of me being in it. Every tiny memory of his family must cut like a knife.

“I miss Mum,” I said. “I don’t know how you do it. Really.”

“It’s simple. I find solace in you. That’s how I do it.”

The hurt in me was a nasty fog, most likely because it was Mum’s birthday in a few weeks’ time. I rested my head on him and gripped his arm, sighing at the thought I wouldn’t be there.

“Would you go back to Oxford? If you could?”

He straightened up, looking down at me with piercing eyes.

“Would I return to my wife, do you mean?”

“Not necessarily, no. But your life in general. If someone gave you the option on a plate, right now, go to Oxford and pick up life again, or stay here, with me, which would it be?”

“No one is ever going to do that. It’s a pointless thing to ponder on.”

“You would ponder it, though?”

He sighed, his eyes warm. “Sweetheart, of course I’d love to return to Oxford. Believe me, I miss my children, and my family, and my life. Friends, career, neighbours. My dog. Everything.”

I didn’t blame him in the slightest. Being upstairs from Mum was bad enough. He ran his thumb across my cheek in the way I loved. His stare was meaningful. Soulful, even.

“I miss it all, but that doesn’t mean I’d be willing to leave you behind. Oxford, or not.”

I opted to make light of it, even though I’d jabbed a wound that ran very deep.

“It would be the best thing ever if they did let you back into their lives again, and I’d love to be the girl at your side through all of it. I’d even love to meet your dog, but I can’t see I’d be invited to family gatherings with you for the next hundred years. They’d probably throw eggs at me.”

“No, they wouldn’t. They’d be far too busy throwing eggs atme.” His thumb was still on my cheek, and he read me. He always did. “I know you miss your mum, and in your case I hope it’s not going to be an all or nothing situation. We don’t have to leave this place, and you don’t have to leave her, and hopefully one day, preferably soon, she will be willing to speak with you again, even if she still despises the very sight of me. I believe she loves you too much to hold you at arm’s length for ever. Most certainly.”

It was always the case with him. Such faith in me, such little in himself. It made me sigh.

“Wouldn’t your family do the same? Don’t you believe they love you too much to throw you out for ever?”

His eyes were fixed firm.

“No, I don’t. I’m dead to them. Figuratively, if not literally.”

I wasn’t nearly so certain. I couldn’t be. Julian was such an incredible man that I didn’t believe anyone would want to cast him aside permanently, no matter what the situation was, but he knew them better than I did, just as I knew Mum and Crenham Drive better than he did. With everyone’s voice in Mum’s ears constantly, she’d be under the spell of judgement, and I’d be lost to her.

Still, it was what it was. The world would keep spinning, and Julian and me would still be together, pain binding us as well as love. I didn’t expect anything different, genuinely.

I read Julian’s amazingly written scenes at night, and focused on college in the day, and I spent time with Lola after lessons, and she and Peter joined us for one of Julian’s pork roasts at the weekend. It was great.

But still, I didn’t see my mum.

I stood strong through jeers and whispers, and revised for my exams, and played filthy games with Julian every evening, and it was all fine for weeks. Apart from the fact that I didn’t see my mum.