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Sebastian White is a good kid. That’s what everybody says. Every teacher he’s had told his mum and Ross and now Auntie Angela that he’s a pleasure to have in class, that he gets along well with his classmates and is popular and kind. The woman behind the counter at the shop on the corner always gives him an extra sweetie from her jar (unaware of the two chocolate bars he stuffed into his pockets while he was out of her sight, one of which he’ll eat and the other he’ll give to his girlfriend at school. Her name’s Erin and she gave him her scrunchie to wear on his wrist and he’s the only boy in the year with a girlfriend. He’ll probably dump her when the summer holidays start.) because he’s so well-behaved waiting for Auntie Angela to buy her newspaper and TV guide every week. Angela walks a lot slower than Seb can so he’s learnt to race to the end of the road and back to her to make sure she’s okay before racing away again. The other old ladies coo at him and try to ruffle his hair when they see him but he ducks away from their hands quite easily. He doesn’t like it when people touch his hair. The only person who was allowed to do that was his mum and even then he’d get squirmy and whiny and run away after a few minutes.
Anyway, Sebastian White is a good kid and everyone knows it.
Because he’s such a good kid, he’s leaving a note.
Dear Auntie Angela
I’ve gone away to meet my dad. You said I could at Christmas and I didn’t.
I’ve taken my money, it hasn’t been stolen.
I love you lots. I’ll be home soon.
Love from
Sebastian
Angela doesn’t like calling him Seb, only ever Sebastian. She also makes him take his feet off the seat of the chair when he’s trying to get comfy and doesn’t give him dessert if he puts his elbows on the tabletop at teatime. His mum and Ross were never strict on things like that so Seb sometimes forgets. He missed out on his chocolate muffin only a few days before.
Seb reckons his dad would never deprive him of his dessert.
Resolve hardened and saliva filling his mouth, Seb laces up his Timberland boots and pulls his overstuffed backpack onto his shoulders. He’d packed all his essentials: underwear, t-shirts, pictures of him and his dad and his dad’s friend from when he was a baby as proof that he is his son, his favourite Hot Wheels, his glasses case, and the entire contents of his piggy bank. He picks up his front door key on its Batman lanyard - Angela had explained to him the importance of keeping it safe when she gave it to him, and he only needed it when he went to the park to meet up with Erin or his friends because Angela trusted him to go there and back alone - and puts it around his neck.
Angela is napping and Seb had given her a goodbye kiss on the cheek before he wrote his note. He whispers see you later into the empty air of the hallway and closes the door as quietly as he can behind himself.
Seb is smart enough to not take his own bike to leave behind at the train station but he doesn’t mind taking someone else’s. Ross had told him all about his car jacking back in the day so Seb knows he’ll be forgiven for simply nabbing someone’s bike from their front garden. They shouldn’t have left it there if they didn’t want it to get nicked.
Having the bike halves the time it takes him to get to the train station and he ditches it in the car park.
“Hello,” he says, going on his tip-toes to seem older and smiles brightly at the old man sitting behind the ticket booth, “I’d like to go to Emmerdale, please.”
The old man furrows his brow and leans forward,
“You’re awfully young, aren’t you?”
“My dad is meeting me, it’s fine. I need to go to Emmerdale.”
“I don’t know where Emmerdale is, kid. We’ve got departures to London Paddington, Portsmouth Harbour, Cardiff Central, Western-super-mare, Stansted airport, Edinburgh, Manchester Picadilly, Swansea, Leeds, Gloucester, Oxford, any of these ringing a bell?”
Seb, getting slightly overwhelmed and feeling tears threatening to spill, shakes his head.
“I need-” he repeats sadly, “to go to Emmerdale.”
The old man sighs harshly and does some loud typing on his computer.
“Okay, you want a train to Leeds and on to Hotten. There’s one leaving in ten minutes and every hour after that. You want the earliest one?”
Seb nods, bottom lip quivering despite his best efforts.
“No need to cry. You’re going to get on the train departing from platform 2 to Leeds. Stay on it until it terminates, then go to platform fifteen at Leeds because you have a connecting train ten minutes later going to Hotten but the final destination will be Liverpool. Got that?” When he gets only a wide-eyed frightened look in return, the man sighs again, “I’ll write it down for you. After you get to Hotten, go find a bus stop and there should be an hourly bus going through the villages. Emmerdale will be one of them.”
The man hands him a piece of paper covered in small contained letters, detailing what he had just said and Seb takes it and reads it carefully, trying to memorise it.
“Your ticket will be fifty-nine twenty-five.”
Seb hadn’t been expecting it to cost that much, he’s only got seventy in total. Oh well, he’s sure his dad will give him the money he needs to get home again. The man helps him count out his coins until he has enough and then prints his tickets for him and Seb has to run through the barriers to get on the train in time.
He’s got himself a window seat and is watching the world race by as he smacks his lips around the biscuits he brought with him from Angela’s cupboard. There’s a woman in the seat next to him but she’s keeping herself to herself with her headphones on over her ears so Seb isn’t paying her any mind. He’s thinking about why his dad didn’t actually see him at Christmas; Angela told him that something had come up and Seb thinks that’s a pretty poor reason to cancel. Things came up all the time with his mum but she was still there when she could be. His mum and Angela had both told him, time and time again, that his dad loved him very much but wasn’t there for reasons they’d never tell him but now he could be there and he’s not. He didn’t even get Santa to deliver presents from him last Christmas, it’s the first year he forgot to send his orders up to the North Pole. Or maybe he and Santa fell out which is why he cancelled. Seb is angry and sad and he wants his dad to explain why, to take it all away. Ross had been enough of a dad for a long time but he’s gone too.
Matt gets to go to the football games with his dad. They took Seb once last year, to a Bristol City vs Norwich City match, which Bristol won 2-1 and Matt’s dad had lifted him onto his shoulders with an uproarious cheer and Matt held his Bristol scarf aloft and they were both so happy and Seb pulled his scarf - which Matt’s dad had very kindly bought for him - tighter around himself and wondered why Matt got that and he didn’t. Seb doesn’t even like football, he’d been confused the entire ninety minutes.
Seb must fall asleep for a couple of hours because there’s someone different next to him - an older man with an unpleasant smell - and he taps him on the arm to ask him to move out of the way so he can go to the toilet. He doesn’t like using the toilet on trains but, after the Disneyland incident where he’d refused to go despite drinking the whole chocolate milkshake Ross bought him and wet himself before they even got onto the Eurostar, he’d learnt his lesson. He doesn’t want to meet his dad with wet trousers, that would be embarrassing and his dad would think he’s still a baby. He’s not a baby. He’s a big, grown-up kid and he’s going to prove it to him. There’s a small mirror above the sink on the train and Seb sees that his glasses have left red indents in his skin from where he’s slept at a funny angle. He twitches his nose to try and get rid of them.
The train finally rolls into Leeds and Seb’s beyond excited to escape the confinement he’s been trapped in for three and a half hours. His tablet had run out of battery and his book wasn’t interesting and he’s keeping his phone off in case Angela calls and makes him go home. He rereads the instructions the old man had given him before the doors open, to make sure he gets it right. He follows the surge of the crowd through the station, enjoying the temporary freedom, until he finds his next train and hops on. It’s a much shorter journey, only another hour.
Hotten is a smaller train station and a sharp cold wind whips him in the face as soon as he steps out into fresh air. Only a few other people got off with him and he hangs back until they’re a bit ahead before he goes to find the nearest bus stop. He’s never been this far from home by himself before and he’s filled with giddy anticipation. He’s going to meet his dad. And his dad will be everything he’s been dreaming about: kind and heroic and funny and strong. Once he’s met him, there’s no chance his dad will reject him again. Seb’s a good kid, and good kids get good fathers.
The bus stop is easy to locate and there’s a bus waiting as Seb approaches.
“Excuse me, sir, do you go to Emmerdale village?” he asks.
The bus driver looks at him and replies,
“Not this one. You want the 6. It should be coming next.”
“Okay, thank you.”
Seb gets off the bus and perches on the bench under the bus shelter. He kicks his heels together, trying to exert some of the energy he can feel thrumming through his body. He’s a big boy. He’s nearly there now. He hopes Angela finds the note before she starts worrying about him. He hopes his dad likes him. He wonders, vaguely, about his dad’s friend and the girl from his pictures. Mum had told him their names, too, but he’s forgotten them. They looked like they loved him when he was a baby, he hopes they love him now.
The bus he shouldn’t get on pulls away and he’s joined at the stop by a pair of teenagers. The girl is short but the boy is tall, a lot taller than her and a giant compared to Seb. They both look serious as they speak and Seb doesn’t mean to eavesdrop because Angela tells him it’s rude but he doesn’t exactly have anything else to listen to.
“Paddy won’t care, he won’t be expecting anything,” the girl says, and she has a very strong accent. Stronger than Ross’ ever was. Seb never adopted his accent, preferring to imitate his mum.
“I know,” the boy sounds different, softer than Seb was expecting, “but I wanted to get him something. I can’t believe the shops had nothing for him.”
The girl shrugs and casts a look about them, her eyes land on Seb and drift off just as quickly. Seb is getting properly hungry, he wonders if he has time to run across the road and get some chips from the chip shop opposite. It smells really good and he knows how to order because Angela sends him to the Chinese with a tenner every other Friday night. Aw, he hopes he gets home in time for take-away night. Or maybe he could do take-away night with his dad, instead. He holds his tummy as subtly as he can, not wanting to draw attention to himself. He glances up at the chip shop again and pouts, not wanting to risk missing the bus and having to wait another hour. He thinks about opening his backpack and finding the last biscuit he didn’t eat on the train but he doesn’t want everything to spill out. He starts biting one of his fingernails instead but it doesn’t fill him up.
The bus arrives soon enough. Seb gets to his feet and the teenagers move into a queue behind him. The back of his neck prickles with wariness but he pretends he’s fine and gets onto the bus. He’ll be safe on the bus.
“One way to Emmerdale, please,” he requests politely and counts out the coins for the two-pound fare.
He takes a window seat and catches the teenagers looking at him weirdly. He tries to ignore it, plays with the strap of his backpack, and they take a pair of seats a couple of rows behind him. They’re not the only people on the bus but he can hear their whispering behind him,
“Whose kid is that?”
“No idea. I don’t recognise him.”
He clenches his hand into a fist and wills his speeding heart rate to slow. He knows a little bit of karate, and Ross taught him how to throw a punch so he’s good if they try anything. “And if they’re too big to punch,” the Ross in his head says, “kickin’ ‘em in the balls will do some serious damage.”
He breathes out deliberately slowly and thinks about turning his phone back on to call Angela. But that’s what a baby would do. He’s not a baby. He does wish he’d thought to pack Mr Neck in his bag, though, so he could rub his nose in his fur. Mr Neck is his giraffe teddy that daddy’s friend bought him when he was a baby and his mum said that Seb could never sleep without him. He can sleep without him now, has gone for plenty of sleepovers at Matt’s and Toby’s without dragging Mr Neck along too, but he misses him. Mr Neck would make him feel less alone.
The only reason he knows he’s getting to his stop is because he reads the sign that races by the bus windows that says Emmerdale Please drive carefully and they’ve gone past before he can finish reading it. The bell rings before he thinks to reach for it which he’s grateful for and he lets the teenagers get off the bus before he follows. He waits in the bus shelter until the bus pulls away again and luckily, by that point, the teenagers have disappeared.
The village somehow feels bigger than Bristol ever did. The paths are mud and stone and crunch under his feet and his backpack is beginning to feel extremely heavy on his shoulders. He walks along the main road, moving out of the way of the adults going about their days. He’s trying to stay invisible, fearful now that he’s here and his dad is actually within touching distance. He recognises a pub, a car garage, a shop, and he chooses to go into the cafe. He thinks it’s odd the cafe is open this late, especially because there’s no one else inside when he goes in.
“Excuse me, miss,” he says to the blonde woman behind the counter. She whirls around and looks at him like he’s some alien lifeform, “I have ten pounds. Could I get a sandwich and a cake?”
The woman’s mouth opens and closes and Seb waits patiently for her to find her words,
“Sure. Where’s your mum or dad?”
“Do I need my mum or dad to have a sandwich and a cake?”
He pulls the tenner out of his pocket and shows her to prove that he’s a serious customer and ten minutes later he has a hot ham and cheese toastie and a chocolate muffin (take that, Auntie Angela) and the woman gives him a Coke for free.
He is very glad for the food and he finishes his meal in record time. He trots back up to the counter,
“Excuse me, miss,”
She turns around again,
“Was everything to your satisfaction, young man?”
He thinks she might be making fun of him, but everything was to his satisfaction so,
“Yes, thank you. I was wondering if you might help me with some information.”
“If I can.”
“I’m looking for Robert. Do you know where he is?”
Her face suddenly opens up in recognition,
“You’re Robert’s boy, oh wow, look how big you’ve gotten.”
It’s a sentiment he’s heard before from Angela’s friends who only come round every few months. They’re always astounded by his growing two inches.
“Do you know where he is?”
“He lives up at Emmerdale Farm. It’s a bit of a trek.”
“I’ll be fine, thank you.”
“I could call him, get him to come down here instead.”
“No!” That would ruin the surprise.
“Alright, I’ll get my Jimmy to take you up there.”
“I’ll be fine alone.” He’s been fine alone this far. He’s not going to fail when he’s so close.
The bell on the door jingles and Seb turns around to see who’s come in. It’s a man with brown hair and a light dusting of stubble on his cheeks. He’s wearing a jumper, a jacket, and a coat and Seb thinks he must be very warm with all that on.
“Well, here’s someone who works up there. He could show you the way. Can’t you, Mack?”
The man blinks and looks at Seb, then at the woman, and his face turns confused,
“What am I doing now?”
This man has a different accent. One similar to the ones they had in Glasgow when his mum took him up there for a week.
The woman is about to launch into an explanation of who Seb is and he thinks that that’s one too many people knowing before his own dad does so he distracts her by knocking over her tip jar. She starts gathering the coins back up and the man starts helping her and Seb takes the opportunity while they’re both distracted to grab a brownie from the display case and bolt from the building.
He doesn’t even want the brownie but he eats it anyway as he darts up the nearest alleyway and ducks behind the next building so they can’t find him.
Emmerdale Farm sounds very important, Seb thinks, if only he knew how to get there. He hears a commotion behind him, the woman shouting about thieving little scoundrels, just like their fathers, and the Scottish man saying something quieter in reply. He giggles and runs away.
There’s a play area with a slide he’d have loved if he was smaller and a set of swings that he sits on, letting himself go back and forth sadly. He’s never felt so close and so far away from his dad. He pushes his glasses up his nose where they’ve slipped and then he hears a familiar voice,
“Dad, look! It’s Seb!”
Moses comes running right up to him but Seb can’t take his eyes off Ross. He didn’t know Ross was here. Ross is looking back at him like he isn’t real. And Seb has fat tears running down his cheeks before he knows it. Moses hugs him around the middle and Ross won’t stop staring and Seb wants to run away again.
“Seb, what are you doing here?” Ross asks after an eternity,
“I came to see my dad,” he says as confidently as he can, wiping his nose on his sleeve,
“Don’t do that,” Ross chastises him gently, patting his pockets for a tissue, “You know your mum didn’t like it.”
Seb’s mouth curves deeply downward, trying not to cry any more. His dad is going to think he’s a crybaby and want nothing to do with him. Ross wipes his face for him. Seb clings onto his shoulders and Ross lifts him off the swing when he straightens up, holding him. It’s the most familiar feeling he’s had in months and months. Moses’ hand lays on Seb’s back, rubbing gently.
“Are we going to Robert’s?” Moses asks.
Seb feels Ross’ hesitation, then when he releases his breath all at once and says,
“I guess we are.”
Moses carries his backpack and Ross carries him. The woman was right, it is a trek. He untucks his head from Ross’ shoulder so he can see where they’re going and when a house comes into view, the lights on and shadows moving about inside, he starts wriggling and demanding,
“Put me down! Put me down, Ross!”
So he does. Seb gets his backpack off Moses again and sends them away.
“I want to do this by myself.”
“Seb, I’m not leaving you alone to go knock on a stranger’s door.”
“Not a stranger,” Seb says, jutting his chin out, “My dad. You know him.”
“Yes, but-”
“Please, Ross.”
“Fine, you can go up there alone. I’m coming to check on you in twenty minutes, though.”
Seb concedes to his terms and Ross watches as he finishes his pilgrimage.
Nervousness overtakes his confidence the closer he gets to the house so he diverts his course to the window and has a peek inside. There he is. His dad. He’s older, visibly so, lines carved deep into his face around his mouth and eyes and forehead. He’s wearing a black t-shirt which is weird because he’s always in a suit in Seb’s pictures. His shoulders are hunched inward and his hands are moving frantically as he speaks, words unheard through the closed window. Seb’s eyes drift to the person he’s talking to, and he recognises him as well. It’s dad’s friend, the one who gave him Mr Neck, although he looks less soft than the pictures. His features are sharp and his mouth is a straight line, barely opening to respond to whatever his dad’s saying. He looks back at his dad. He’s imagined meeting him for so long, got so close at Christmas only to have it snatched away at the last minute. Now he’s a pane of glass away from it happening and he can’t make his legs move around to the front door.
“Stop casing the joint and knock!” Ross shouts over to him and it startles him out of his fear enough that he laughs and sticks his tongue out at him. He probably doesn’t see it through the dark but it makes Seb feel better having done it.
The outer door is unlocked - Seb has a habit of trying door handles before remembering his manners and knocking - and leads to a small porch with loads of coats and work overalls hanging up on hooks. Seb touches the sleeve of one of them, a green one that looks well-worn with a big mud stain up the arms and back. There’s textured material on the interior cuff that he likes the feel of so he runs it between his fingers and thumb as he knocks and waits politely. He hears the murmur of voices cut off, and footsteps coming closer and he holds his breath and clutches tighter at the sleeve.
It’s not his dad who stands on the other side. It’s the other bloke. The one who’s just as familiar in his 2D photograph memories yet nameless in his head. Seb begins to feel bad that he let this man’s name slip from his mind because he’s clearly still important in his dad’s life. His mum just didn’t mention him as much as she mentioned dad. The man looks at him, then an eyebrow raises, and he turns back to speak inside the house,
“Does this answer your question, Rob?”
Seb is granted entry into the house, and he steps inside. It’s warm because there’s a log burner crackling in the living room. He inches further in, dropping his backpack onto the floor just in case his dad wants to pick him up or hug him or something.
“You, kid,” his dad’s friend says, voice gruff, “are in so much trouble.”
Seb stops in his tracks and sticks his bottom lip out, turning to face him properly,
“No, I’m not! I haven’t done anything wrong!”
The man’s lips twist as if he’s trying not to smile,
“Your aunt called us hours ago, worried out of her mind because you’d disappeared.”
His surprise, completely ruined. He feels his brow lower over his eyes and he crosses his arms and readies himself to stomp his foot but the movement gets suspended mid-air when his dad’s friend bursts out laughing.
“Oh, Rob, he’s literally your mini-me.”
“Aaron-” A shaky voice says (that was it! Aaron! that’s his dad’s friend) and Seb whirls around to see his dad standing in the living room doorway.
He’s taller than Seb had thought from his glimpse through the window, shoulders straightened out now, and he’s not smiling. He doesn’t look happy to see him. Actually, he looks terrified. He just stands there, staring, until Seb decides to take matters into his own hands. He steps forward and holds his arm out,
“Nice to meet you. I’m Sebastian. I’m your son.”
Seb’s dad all but collapses onto his knees, pulling Seb into the tightest hug he’s ever received. He’s crying into Seb’s t-shirt so Seb tries to hug him back even tighter. He doesn’t think he manages it. Seb isn’t crying, he’s beaming brighter than he ever has before. His dad is speaking, muttering apologies over and over. Seb pats his back the way his mum did when he would cry, avoiding his hair in case he doesn’t like that too.
“It’s okay, dad. I forgive you.”
A choked sob jerks his dad’s shoulders and then he’s pulling away to look at Seb’s face. Big hands cup Seb’s cheeks as his dad looks at him properly for the first time since he was a baby.
“I missed you,” his dad says, voice wrecked.
Seb’s mouth suddenly pulls downwards, his chin wobbling and he tries desperately to hold onto the tears because he doesn’t want his dad to think he’s a baby although his dad is crying so maybe it’s okay.
“I missed you too,” he confesses, pushing back into the circle of his dad’s arms.
A hand cradles the back of his head and an arm holds him securely around his back and the floor suddenly falls away as his dad carries him over to the sofa in the living room, not letting go of him for a second.
“I’m going to call Angela,” Aaron’s voice says, the only sound in the room outside of tears rolling down cheeks.
“Yeah,” his dad agrees, pressing a kiss to Seb’s hair.
Seb pulls away and looks up at Aaron, who also has tears in his eyes and is biting down on his lip staring at them,
“I don’t want to go home yet.”
Aaron swallows and nods a couple of times,
“I still need to tell her you’re here. Then, we’ll see.”
Angela demands to speak to Seb on the phone and he begs and pleads with her to be allowed to stay with his dad for a few days. Eventually, he has to hand the phone over to his dad,
“She wants to talk to you.”
His dad glances up at Aaron and inhales shakily before he takes the phone.
“Hello,” his dad says, managing to sound put-together even as he holds his thumb and index finger below his eyes to catch the stray tears still falling. “No, of course I didn’t know he was coming here.”
“Seb,” Aaron’s soft voice catches his attention and drags it away from the phone call, “Cool socks.”
Seb had kicked off his boots so that he could test out the bounciness of the sofa before he’d had to sit down to talk to Angela. He looks down at his own feet and realises he’s wearing his really cool Lightning McQueen ones that he got for his birthday last year. He smiles shyly at Aaron,
“Thank you,”
“Do you like Cars?”
Seb nods,
“Yeah.”
Aaron glances away for a second, looking pained for a second before he hides it again.
“Me too.”
Seb narrows his eyes at him,
“Really?” he asks suspiciously.
“‘Course. Best movie ever.”
“Wait there!”
Seb jumps off the sofa and drags his backpack into the living room. His dad’s on his feet now, still talking to Angela, but Seb doesn’t care about that anymore. He unzips his bag and pulls out his Cars toys and hands them up to Aaron,
“I have Lightning and Mater and Jackson Storm and Doc with me but I have all the rest at home!” He says as Aaron takes every one he offers up with the reverence of someone being handed the baby Jesus. “I didn’t bring my track but we could draw a different one,”
Aaron laughs,
“I’m sure we can.”
Seb snatches Lightning back from Aaron’s hands and starts driving him along the coffee table. Aaron transfers himself from the armchair to the floor with Seb and joins in, taking control of Doc Hudson.
Seb gets so engulfed by playing cars that he only notices that his dad has left the room because a door slams upstairs. He and Aaron both look up to the source of the noise and Seb looks at Aaron for him to tell him what to do next. Aaron ghosts a hand over Seb’s hair, which he doesn’t mind but if he tries anything more then Seb will have to throw a tantrum about it, and puts Doc Hudson down on the table.
“Stay here for me,” he instructs and then disappears up the stairs.
Seb stays knelt on the floor, biting his lip to shreds in his anxiety. He has a terrible feeling he’s done something wrong. Maybe his dad doesn’t like that he still plays with toys. Or that he was playing with Aaron, maybe his dad felt left out. He rotates Lightning back and forth in his hands, hating the silence that surrounds him.
“Alright, it’s been way more than twenty minutes but I said- Seb, where’s your dad?” Ross’ voice comes from behind him. Seb looks over his shoulder and shrugs,
“They went upstairs.”
Ross is racing upstairs before Seb can tell him they’re meant to stay there.
Seb is a good kid but as he creeps up the staircase, overcome by his own curiosity, he feels like a bad one. His Mater car toy is leaving marks in his hand from how tightly he’s clutching it.
The layout of the house is foreign to Seb but there’s a door cracked open and he can hear voices inside.
“That little boy - your little boy - is downstairs with no idea what’s going on,” Ross is saying, sounding irate.
“Back off, Ross. He didn’t deliberately have a panic attack, did he?” Aaron responds, voice a deep growl. “He shows up, completely out of the blue-”
“Don’t blame the kid!” Ross snaps back, “He was expecting to meet you half a year ago and then you guys just left him without a word! He’s your kid, he’s my kid, you should have expected something like this at some point.”
“Good point, he was your kid, for a long time, Ross. How many times have you seen him, hell, how many times have you, so much as, phoned the poor boy since you’ve been back?” Aaron’s shadow, spilling onto the landing, is big and angry. “So don’t you come up here and try to lecture us on mistreating that boy.”
“I had to give him up, too, Aaron, you realise-”
A floorboard creaks loudly under Seb’s careful shuffling step and the house falls silent. He holds his breath and crosses his fingers that, by some miracle, they didn’t hear.
“Seb,” that’s his dad’s voice, for the first time, calling out to him, “come here.”
Fearfully, Seb enters their line of sight. Aaron and Ross are tense and snarling, standing toe-to-toe with each other, but his dad is sat down on the edge of a bed. He’s got his elbows pressing into his thighs, and his skin is pale except for a mark on his forehead that happens when someone's been pressing skin onto skin for too long. He holds his arms out to him and Seb edges past Ross and Aaron to grip onto his forearm, not quite a hug but as much comfort as he feels comfortable taking. He holds Mater out to him and he takes it with a surprised look,
“What’s this for?” he asks, thumb rubbing gently over the deep red dents in Seb’s palm from where he’s squeezed the toy. Seb keeps his eyes on that point of contact when he mumbles,
“I thought you felt left out of the game.”
His dad’s lips quiver and he closes his eyes and breathes in deep, putting slightly more pressure on Seb’s palm,
“That’s very sweet, Sebastian, thank you,” he says, “Your aunt said you can stay until Sunday, if you want to.”
Sunday! That’s basically a full week! He thought he’d get one or two days if he was lucky. He’s nodding enthusiastically almost before his dad gets to the end of his sentence.
“Yes, please!”
Ross stays for a while. Seb and his dad sit on the sofa, Seb runs his cars up and down his own and his dad’s legs, making engine noises and the occasional Kachow. Aaron has put a film on but none of them are really watching it. Seb has a cup of orange juice on the table and the grown-ups have tea.
“Well, I better be heading home,” Ross declares, dropping his empty mug on the coffee table and standing. “Seb, if your dad upsets you, you know where to find me.” He winks at him and Seb giggles, shuffling closer to his dad.
“Bye, Ross,”
“Yeah, bye, Ross,” his dad says,
“Aaron, walk me out, would ya?”
Aaron busies himself in the kitchen after Ross leaves, filling up the sink to wash the dishes. Seb usually helps Angela with that at home, drying the plates and bowls she hands over before putting them in the rack, standing taller on his step-stool so he can reach. He turns to his dad,
“When does Aaron leave?” he asks in a whisper because he doesn’t want to hurt Aaron’s feelings. His dad stops staring at Aaron over his head, giving Seb his attention,
“Aaron doesn’t leave,” he whispers back, “He lives here.”
“Oh.”
“Did your mum not tell you about us?” The question is asked so flatly it takes Seb a second to realise it was one.
“She did! Look, I have- I have pictures!”
He yanks his small collection out of his bag, crumpling the corners of most of them. He holds them out for his dad. The top one, the one of him in his high chair with Aaron and his dad either side of him, is on their fridge; he saw it while he was waiting for Aaron to pour him his orange juice.
“That’s me!” Seb says, jabbing his finger at the ginger baby,
“I know it is.”
His dad started slowly looking through the pictures,
“Mum told me about you, I promise! I might o’ forgot some of it, though. I forgot-” He glances over to Aaron, feeling like an idiot. What if they get mad because he forgot Aaron, “I forgot his name, and- and hers,” he says, pointing to the picture that is now on top of the pile.
“That’s Liv,” his dad tells him, not sounding angry at all. He’s stroking the picture gently over the girl’s face, “She’s Aaron’s sister. She loved you.”
“Can I meet her?”
“No, uh, she’s not with us anymore.”
Seb knows what that means. He glances down at the girl in the picture again and wants to rip it in half. When the doctors had said your mum is no longer with us, he’d thrown his tablet at the wall of the hospital waiting room and punched Ross over and over again until his knuckles went numb. He curls a hand in his dad’s t-shirt instead. At least he’s still here. Not everyone who loves Seb is dead.
His dad seems to sense that something is wrong and he flips to the next picture; one without Liv in it.
Aaron wanders in from the kitchen, drying his hands on a tea towel which he throws over his shoulder, peering over their shoulders to see what they’re talking about.
“Should’ve known it wouldn’t take you long to get the pictures out,” he says lightly, smoothing a hand along his dad’s shoulder,
“These belong to Seb, actually. The ones Rebecca gave him.”
Aaron makes an ahh of understanding,
“Big softie, just like ya dad,” he teases. He runs his fingers through his dad’s hair, “Do you want another cup of tea?”
“I think it’s getting close to bedtime, isn’t it?” He asks, eyes on Seb who feels a traitorous yawn in his throat that he desperately holds back, as he shakes his head to indicate his vehement disagreement. Both of them laugh at that. Aaron wraps his hand around his dad’s jaw to tilt his head up and kisses him quickly. Right on the lips. Like Seb does with Erin but not with any of the other girls. Like his mum and Ross used to do.
“I’ll go and make up the spare bed,” Aaron says and heads upstairs.
“Shall we tidy your cars away and get you ready for sleep?” This one does sound like a question but Seb knows it’s not.
He forgot to pack a toothbrush. He bounces on the balls of his bare feet, dressed now in his dinosaur pyjamas, as his dad almost crawls into the cupboard looking for a new one that he swears is in there somewhere.
“Mackenzie just text me,” Aaron says, appearing in the doorway and leaning against the doorjamb.
“Oh yeah? What does he want?” His dad asks, voice muffled by the cupboard. Something falls with a bang as his hand roots around,
“He says there was a kid he didn’t know in the cafe earlier. Apparently, this kid knocked over the tip jar and made off with some food he didn’t pay for.”
His dad retreats from the cupboard and looks at Seb who’s already wearing his most angelic face.
“Really?” His dad says, “And why, dare I ask, would Mack be messaging you about this new thief in the village?”
“According to Nicola, this kid was asking for your whereabouts.”
“Was he really?”
Seb looks back and forth between Aaron and his dad. They’re both looking back at him, waiting,
“I didn’t do anything!”
“He’s definitely ours,” Aaron says with a chuckle, walking away with his eyes on his phone screen.
Ours. Seb thinks. Not just his dad’s, but Aaron’s too. He finds he likes the idea of that.
“Here you go.” His dad hands him a new toothbrush. It’s yellow which he finds offensive but it’d be cheeky to ask for a different one. He can put up with it and he won’t forget his one - his blue one - next time. “I’m going to choose to believe that you didn’t actually steal anything from Nicola this time. If I hear it’s happened a second time, though, that’ll change. Understood?”
Seb nods and accidentally puts too much toothpaste on the bristles.
The mattress is a bit hard and the sheets smell funny but there’s a nightlight on the bedside table that’s casting a soft yellow glow around the room and he’s tucked under his dad’s arm as he reads Seb’s book out loud to him. Aaron is hovering in the doorway again, just noticeable in Seb’s periphery if he tilts his head slightly. His dad gets to the end of the chapter and stops. He ignores Seb’s subsequent whining, standing and pulling the duvet right up to Seb’s chin.
“Goodnight, kid,” he says, kissing his forehead, “I love you. See you in the morning.”
Seb frowns up at him,
“More book,”
“No. Sleep now. Do you want the light to stay on or off?”
“On,”
“No problem.”
He kisses Seb’s head again and starts to walk to the door. Before he leaves, Seb gathers up his courage and says, all teeny-tiny,
“I love you too.”
His dad’s smile is wide when he turns around, hand on the door handle to pull it to. He doesn’t close it all the way, letting a sliver of light shine through from the landing. Seb hears their voices as they speak quietly and he decides to be brave again,
“Aaron?”
The door opens slowly,
“What’s up?”
Aaron takes a step into the room,
“Can I ask you a question?”
“Is this just so you don’t have to sleep yet?”
“No! It’s a real question.”
“Alright, go on then.”
“You have to come over here. And dad has to go away.”
Aaron laughs and comes to sit on the edge of Seb’s borrowed bed, he looks up at his dad who’s still there,
“You heard the boy, Robert, go away.”
His dad holds his hands up and Seb waits to hear his footsteps go down the stairs before he speaks again,
“Are you and my dad in love?”
Aaron’s face softens, looking much more like the man in Seb’s pictures in an instant,
“Yeah, we are. Is that okay?”
Seb nods,
“Have you always been in love?”
Aaron looks over to the empty doorway for a moment, then back to Seb. He lays a hand over where Seb’s ankle is and holds it there,
“For a very long time, yeah.”
“So… you’re like my dad too?”
“Only if you want me to be.”
Seb considers it. Ross isn’t his real dad but he loves him just the same. Aaron is nice and he likes Cars and he loves his dad.
“I think I’d like that,”
“I’d like that too. Now you need to get some sleep.”
Aaron squeezes his ankle and looks like he’s about to leave.
“You can kiss me goodnight as well. Since you’re also my dad.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
Aaron’s beard feels weird against his skin, but not any weirder than Ross’ always did. Another question suddenly bubbles up in Seb’s head,
“What’s a panic attack?”
Aaron blinks at him, sweeping Seb’s hair away from his eyes with careful fingers.
“You shouldn’t have heard that. I’m sorry. A panic attack, uh, have you ever been really, really scared?”
Seb nods, reluctant to voice any of the instances he has been but knowing they exist in the recesses of his mind.
“‘Course you have. Well, when someone gets really, really scared, sometimes their body doesn’t know how to keep it inside anymore. That’s what we call a panic attack.”
“What was daddy scared of?” Seb asks, pulling his duvet even higher, biting down on it where Aaron can’t see.
“There’s not always a reason for it. Your daddy’s head sometimes makes things up for him to be scared about. He’s okay, though. It’s only ever temporary and he knows how to handle it. And I’ll always be there to protect him.”
Aaron eases the duvet away from his mouth.
“Do you promise?”
“Yes, Seb, I promise.”
“Okay.”
“Do you have any other questions?”
“Can we have pancakes for breakfast tomorrow?”
Aaron says yes (well, he says I’ll see what I can do which is basically a yes) and Seb falls asleep with a smile on his face.
Seb’s a good kid, you see, and good kids get what they wish for.