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The warm rush of the water over his hands did nothing to stave away the chill in his body. He could’ve blamed it on the crisp, autumn air, but the windows had been long closed, and the fireplace had been crackling for a few hours now. Snatching the salmon-coloured dishcloth from Its hook on the wall, he vigorously dries the plates, placing them in the rack nearby. The faint aroma of jasmine filters through the kitchen, accompanied by sounds of teaspoons knocking against porcelain. He passes by Julia pouring cups of tea on his way to the sitting room, slumping down on the sofa. He groans at the awful cracking noise his back makes. He sinks into the cushions, smiling as Julia walks into the room and hands him his cup, before taking her place beside him.
Jude had already long-since retired to his room. These days he was far more exhausted than usual, understandably so. Harold would have joked about how someone as old as Harold could stay up later than the youthful Jude. Instead, he’d only watched silently as his son stumbled into the hallway, catching glimpses of his face cinched in pain. Months ago, he might’ve gotten up and helped him to his room and, despite his son’s protests, Jude would’ve let Harold take his arm and guide his dragging feet down the hallway. That was a different time, one that no longer existed and would have to be painstakingly rebuilt. A time when Jude once allowed him to put an arm around him when he came through the doorway, pressing his cheek against Jude’s in greeting. A time where could pass by him in the kitchen and place his hand on his shoulder, leaning over him to see what he was doing. Now, when Harold came up to him in the doorway, he maneuvered his way around him, only muttering a quick ‘Hello’. He shrunk away whenever Harold so much as lifted his hand, his head ducking into his collar, the muscles in his neck pulled taut.
He's pulled away from his thoughts as Julia gently squeezes his shoulder. He manages a strained, thin smile, before taking a swift gulp of his tea. The hot liquid singes the back of his throat, but he swallows it without a flinch. All at once the thoughts come flowing back to him again, the nauseating theories that had been swirling around his mind since he’d first laid eyes on Jude’s broke body lying on the hospital bed, the surface stained with blood (Jude’s blood, his son’s blood), begin to rise to the forefront.
“I think Jude might have been sexually abused as a child,” Harold says, cringing at the flinch on Julia’s face. He could have been gentler with saying that, but really, how gentle can you be with a topic like that? And he needed to say it to someone, he couldn’t bare keeping it to himself for any longer.
Julia puts a hand to her heart, breathing in deeply, “Harold…”
“I tried asking him, you know?” Harold says, “He wouldn’t answer me.” Julia said nothing, sipping at her tea, watching him intently. “I saw them, in the hospital,” He says, “Andy showed me.”
“Saw what?”
“The scars on him, on his back,” he says, “I know that fucking piece of shit Caleb made some of them, but some of them looked so old, like they’d been there for years.” His fingers, wrapped around the handle of his coffee mug, tighten their grip. “Julia. I can’t possibly imagine what’s been done to him. What he’s been through…” She hummed in response, lips pursed tight. “He won’t tell us anything…”
“But do you really want to know?” Julia said, making Harold look up at her, “I mean, do we really want to hear it? The way he’s been hurt. I don’t know if I could stomach it, Harold.”
“Do you ever wonder if….if we’d had him since the beginning?” Harold grits his teeth, muttering more to himself than Julia, “Then maybe everything that he’s gone through…”
Julia shakes her head softly, “Harold, please…” Her face has gone slightly sallow.
“I’m sorry, love,” he places his hand on hers, Julia interlocking their fingers. “I just can’t help but think, what if he was ours from the start? So whatever horrible things happened to him, never happened.”
“Harold,” Julia squeezed his hand, “He’s ours now. He’s safe now, with us. That’s all that matters. He’s safe and he’s here.”
“Maybe, but that doesn’t just erase everything that’s happened to him,” Harold argues.
“I know, Harold,” Julia sighs, “But we can’t change it, we can only try to love him enough to make up for it.” Harold says nothing, only leaning his head on top of Julia’s, watching the bright crackling flames of the fire.
They sit in silence for a while longer, before Julia shifts away, and Harold feels a chill on his side where she’d been. “I’m going to bed, are you coming?” Julia asks, getting up to put away her empty teacup.
“I’ll come in a minute,” He says with a strained smile, taking her hand and pressing a kiss to her knuckles as she walks by. He watches her disappear down the corridor and looks down at his half-empty cup. He swallows back the rest of his tea, which has cooled down significantly since. He lifts himself from the couch towards the kitchen, placing his cup in the dishwasher. He saunters around the kitchen and the sitting room, slowly shutting off the lights one by one. He creeps into the hallway, hands folded across his chest. He can see in the corner of his peripheral, down the hall on the right, the door to Jude’s room. There’s no light peeking out from below. He’s never known Jude to be the type to go to bed quickly. It’s something he’s known from the early days of Jude’s law school years, completing assignments that should’ve taken weeks in a matter of days, utterly relentless.
He’s suddenly gripped with a sense of panic and he presses his head against the door, heart hammering in his ears as he strains to hear for sounds of water rushing out of a tap, muffled sobs reverberating throughout the bathroom. He relaxes his terse shoulders when he hears nothing but silence. As he rests his hand on the doorknob, brows furrowed in thought, his mind returns to his earlier thoughts. Despite Julia’s assurances, he couldn’t help but wonder. What if, what if, what if. He turns the doorknob, walking into the room. The room is suddenly unfamiliar to him, completely different to what he once knew it as. His own self is unfamiliar to him. He is forty years younger, the ache in his joints dissipated, his grey hair turned a burnt honeyed-brown.
The wallpaper, which used to be a dreary eggshell, is painted a light, airy blue. Adorning the walls are many crude drawings done in crayon, some decorated with glittery stickers of various cartoon characters. The mahogany desk in the far corner of the room, next to the window, that is usually scattered with Jude’s work papers and pens is gone. In its place sits a wooden trunk, engraved with the word “Toys”. Near him, he can see a pile of colourful, wooden blocks spread haphazardly across the carpeted floor.
His wife, Julia, looking as youthful as he, illuminated by the golden rays streaming through the windows, stands by the edge of a small bed. In her arms is a dozy toddler, barely more than three years of age, with rosy, tanned skin, and tufts of soft brown curls adorning his head. The child’s eyes are closed, cheek pressed into the crook of Julia’s shoulder. His feet swing gently as Julia rocks him back and forth. In his right fist is a plush rabbit, slipping out of his grasp. As he walks closer towards them, Harold can hear soft snores coming from Jude, his mouth slightly open.
He puts his hand on his wife’s shoulder, pressing a chaste kiss to her cheek. She turns slightly to him, a smile on her own face. Harold reaches out and tickles Jude’s cheek gently with the side of his finger. Still deeply asleep, Jude smiles─his sole two bottom teeth showing─for a second. A grin stretches across Harold’s own face, before he leans in, planting a kiss in Jude’s hair. Jude fidgets in Julia’s arms, letting out a low gurgle before burying himself further in the crook of her shoulder.
“Harold, please, I’ve just got him to fall asleep,” Julia chastises. Harold puts up his hands in surrender with a chuckle, as Julia sets down Jude in the bed. “If you wake him up, he’ll be cranky in the morning.”
“I know, I know,” Harold muses, pulling the blanket up to Jude’s chin, pressing another kiss to his cheek.
Harold purses his lips, turning the doorknob and pushing the door open only a crack. “Jude?” He whispers into the darkened room. He gets no answer in response, only the sounds of Jude’s soft snoring fill the terse silence. He slowly opens the door, cringing as the hinges squeak. The crayon drawings, the toys, the general disorder of the room are replaced by sterile cleanliness, the desk back in it’s rightful place with it’s papers stacked neatly on one side.
Jude is lying on his side in the bed, one arm tucked under his cheek, the other wrapped around himself. Even in the dark of the room, Harold can make out the yellowing bruises on his face. Harold walks towards the bed, sitting down on the edge near Jude, cautious not to wake him. He takes the hand that’s wrapped around his stomach─around the bandages wrapped against his scarred skin─and cusps it between his own. He slides his fingers down towards his wrist, breath hitching as he feels the raised, rough scars. He turns Jude’s arm over, thumbing the cuff of his sweater upwards. He feels the chill return, goosebumps prickling against his skin, when he sees the plethora of blood-stained bandages wrapped around Jude’s thin arm. He pulls the sweater cuff down, tracing his fingers over the starburst-shaped scar on the back of Jude’s hand.
He leans down, moving away Jude’s bangs with his fingers, pressing a kiss to his forehead. He watches as Jude’s mouth twitches upward at the corners. The small smile on his face disappears as quick as it came, but it stayed enough for Harold to notice, and for the warmth in his chest to spread at the sight of it. Seeing Jude smile ─really smile─ was a rare thing to witness. Sure, he had his shy smiles he often wore, usually when witnessing his friends and their shenanigans, or when he was discussing something that he was passionate about with Harold. Then there were the times he’d laugh, a laugh that sounded as clear as church bells, and the corners of his eyes would crinkle with mirth, and the wary expression he often wore would dissipate.
He’d heard from JB once, while Jude was in the kitchen with Julia, that Jude once had a tic in college where he’d cover his mouth with his hand whenever he smiled or laughed. It was a tic that had disturbed them, and even though he didn’t do anymore, disturbed Harold to think that at even one point in time Jude felt the need to conceal his own joy.
Though he sometimes felt a twinge of guilt for it, he’d often egg on JB to continue telling him more stories about their years in college. Jude had told him plenty of his own stories from his undergraduate years, but he’d wanted to hear more about Jude himself, than he did of the others (Though he still cared for them, and the stories Jude would tell were still amusing and Harold cherished them beyond anyting). Harold was insatiable for these stories; the ones of Jude from before Harold met him. Though JB often stuck to amusing, lighthearted stories, Harold couldn’t help the emptiness in his stomach at the reoccurring details often present in these stories. How Jude came to college at such a young age (Impressive, no doubt Harold was immensely proud, but a sixteen-year-old should’ve been in high school, not worrying about college), how he wore heavy splint-like braces that enveloped his legs, their pins drilled into his bones (Harold winced to even think of it), how he’d worn his hair long to hide behind it, the wary expression he constantly wore (If Harold noticed the dismal look on JB’s face when he told him that, he said nothing of it). Every detail, regardless of whether it was good or upsetting, Harold devoured it with insatiability. He wanted to know everything about Jude, everything that he missed out on witnessing. Not out of suspicion or doubt towards Jude, but because these stories were of Jude. It’s in these moments that he ponders over just how much Jude has come to mean to him, to their family. It’s in these moments he feels as though he’s known Jude his entire life and it becomes harder to remember his life pre-Jude. He, of course, would take meeting Jude later in life than never meeting him at all, but he often thinks of those 20 years in which both of them didn’t exist to each other, and it feels inconceivable to him.
He goes to remove his hand, beginning to lift himself from the bed. A small whimper escapes Jude, such a tiny noise that makes Harold’s heart completely shatter to hear. He looks down at his son, whose eyebrows are now furrowed, face pinched in discomfort as his fingers flex around Harold’s. Harold lets go of Jude’s hand, quickly shifting around and propping himself up against the headboard right beside Jude. He gently takes Jude’s head, lifting it from the pillows and into his lap. He takes Jude’s hand back into his, rubbing circles over the starburst-shaped scar on the back. Jude’s pinched features slowly relax as his breathing steadies, harsh lines disappearing into smooth skin.
“Judy…” he rests his forehead against his sons, “Judy, Judy, Judy.” His voice is reduced to a barely audible whisper. “My sweetheart.” He presses a kiss to his forehead. “My darling…” He can feel his hands beginning to shake. “My baby…” his voice breaks off into a stilted sob. His baby, his son, his Judy. His baby who was hurt so much, so badly, in ways Harold doesn’t and may never know. His Jude, who came out of some dark, faraway place, and became someone Harold was inconceivably proud of. His Jude, who was immensely kinder than the world had been to him, who oozed with every bit of goodness that resided within him, who could never be anything less than gentle with the people around him.
Quiet footsteps patter down the hallway, before Julia’s shadowy figure appears in the doorway. He quickly wipes away the tears prickling in the corners of his eyes. Julia’s eyes soften with understanding as she steps towards him.
“You know, we did this same thing once, a long time ago,” Harold’s voice is croaky, the muscles in his neck taut. “When he’d had his first episode here at home.” Julia raises an eyebrow in confusion. “No, not the one you saw,” Harold continues, thinking back to the first episode Jude had in front of both Julia and him, “This one was way before then. You were out shopping when it happened.” Julia sat down in front of him, brushing her fingers over Jude’s head for a second.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I didn’t know what to think of it. We were going to make this souffle I’d seen online, I went upstairs to print out the recipe. When I came back down to the kitchen, I couldn’t find him. I heard this small noise coming from the pantry and when I opened it, he was there on the floor. In pain, Julia. It looked agonizing.”
“What did you do?”
“I didn’t know what I was to do, I just held him like this,” Harold sighs, “And waited for it to be over.”
That day was one of those days that Harold could easily replay in his mind in vivid detail, like he had a film strip of it that he placed into some imaginary camera. He’d come downstairs looking for Jude, knowing he’d been in the kitchen, preparing the supplies for a souffle Harold had decided he wanted to make with Jude. When he couldn’t find him, he remembered the jolt of panic that went through him. He heard a pained noise coming from the pantry and he remembered the tug he’d felt at his heart. He'd found Jude lying on the floor of the pantry, limbs jerking as pained yelps and whimpers escaped him.
“Jude?” He’d asked, though it came out as more of a strangled gasp, “Jude, can you hear me?”
Jude had nodded, opening his eyes but squeezing them shut immediately after as another burst of pain jolted through him. He’d sat down in the pantry, pulling Jude’s head into his lap just as he did now, watching his son (though they both didn’t know it yet) squirm and grunt as pain overtook him. Harold hadn’t known what to do then. In all his years with Jacob and his illness, he’d never experienced dealing with an episode like this.
Before he knew it, he was singing softly. A lullaby, the same one he used to sing to Jacob during his hospital visits. He kept singing, threading his fingers through Jude’s hair and down the sides of his face, until Jude had finally relaxed (how long had it been? Five minutes? It felt like hours, seeing him twitch in agony) and went limp in Harold’s arms, panting with exhaustion. Harold took out his handkerchief, wiping the sweat from Jude’s face, his other hand didn’t leave the younger’s hair.
“Are you okay?” Jude nodded, looking profoundly embarrassed as he did. Yet, he’d still allowed Harold to guide him to the living room and help him get settled on the couch.
Jude hadn’t been able to look Harold in the eyes for a few weeks after that, at least not without embarrassment tinging his features. Harold had done his best to continue as normal, as though nothing had happened, but he couldn’t help his stares lingering on Jude for longer, or the way his head would snap towards him whenever Jude made a noise.
It was that moment, and the sheer terror Harold had felt seeing Jude in such pain, that had made him first realize how much he’d come to think of Jude as more than just a brilliant student. The idea of Jude being his son hadn’t come to him then, but the love and worry that he’d felt was all the same.
Jude shifts around in his lap and Harold is thrown out of his thoughts, looking down at his son. Jude’s fingers squeeze around Harold’s as his eyes flutter open.
“Harold..?” He blinks, his voice groggy with sleep, “Is everything alright?”
“Shh, Jude,” He hushes him “Everything is okay, just sleep, everything is fine.” Jude nods, closing his eyes once again, turning his face into Harold’s chest. Harold maneuvers his right arm to place it under Jude’s head, pressing him closer to him. Julia puts her hand on Jude’s shoulder, rubbing soothing circles on his upper arm.
“Mmm…” Jude hums, his shoulders tensing and relaxing.
“It’s okay, Jude, you’re here now,” Harold whispers into his hair, the low rumble of Jude’s snores thrumming against his chest, “You’re home, you’re here with us.” He begins humming the same lullaby he’d sang to Jude that day, the warmth in his chest fills him with a sense of calm. Sitting here, with his wife, their son in his arms. If Harold could take this moment and pause it in time, he would. But for now he’d wrap it up with care and nestle it in the corner of his heart, to keep it there forever and for as long as Harold was alive.
He looks over at Julia, whose own eyes are filled with the same kind of deeply-rooted love Harold feels in every inch of body. He puts his free hand over hers, and she smiles and leans into their huddle.
Their Jude. Their sweetheart. Their baby. He was home. He was safe. He was here.