Love and Other Drama-Ramas!

by Sarah Webb

  “Yes!” she says. “Felix is telling me about his band and all the gigs they have lined up. Isn’t it exciting?”

  “No kidding. OK — see you in a mo’.” I walk out of the room and close the door behind me.

  Clover is in the hall with Seth, who is sitting on the bottom step of the stairs, waiting to talk to me.

  “Brains and Felix have to be at RTÉ in half an hour to record ‘Caroline’ for a radio show,” Clover says. “Do you want Eloise to meet Brains, or is Felix enough? I’d love to snatch a few minutes with Brains if you can spare him.”

  “Don’t worry about Brains,” I say. “Felix is doing brilliantly. He’s being so sweet. I think Operation Boy Immersion is really helping, Clover.”

  She grins. “Good. We aim to please. I think she’s all set for a real teenager. You ready, Seth?”

  He nods and gets to his feet. “Sure.”

  “Coola boola. Right, I’m off to cuddle my boyfriend while he’s actually in the same part of the country as me. See you later.”

  “So what’s the deal?” Seth asks as soon as she’s gone. “I just have to be nice to this Eloise girl, yeah? Get her used to boys.”

  “Correcto.” I pause. “Seth?”

  “Amy?” He looks at me, his blue eyes soft and a little serious — the whole Bailey thing is really taking its toll.

  “Thanks for doing this.”

  He smiles gently. “If it makes my favorite girl happy . . .”

  Felix looks up as we walk into the living room. “Time for me to motor, Eloise. Really cool to meet you. Listen for us on the radio.”

  Eloise beams. “Oh, I will. I promise. And thanks for all the advice.”

  “You’re welcome.” He kisses her cheeks again, and she blushes — but she looks less mortified.

  “Hey, man,” Felix says to Seth as he walks past us.

  “Um, hey,” Seth murmurs. He’s a huge Golden Lions fan, so it’s no wonder he’s a bit tongue-tied.

  Eloise is positively glowing as Seth sits down beside her. “Hi, Eloise,” he says. “I’m Seth.”

  She smiles at him a little shyly, blood ebbing in and out of her cheeks, and then manages a small “Hi.”

  “I’m Amy’s boyfriend,” he adds.

  “Do you like music?” she asks him gingerly.

  “Yeah,” he says easily, sitting back in his chair. “I like all kinds of stuff — bit of vintage punk, bit of soul, indie, some rock, Golden Lions, of course . . .”

  “And what kind of movies are you into?”

  He smiles at her, his eyes sparkling. Good question, Eloise! Seth is a movie nut. He watches everything from slasher films to old black-and-whites. And Eloise is smiling back at him, her cheeks dusky pink, not fire-engine red. Success!

  “Back in a second,” I murmur happily — I want to tell Clover our plan has worked!

  When I walk into the kitchen, I find Clover sitting on Brains’s knee. He’s stroking her hair and murmuring in her ear. Today a gold elastic hairband is cutting through his Afro, and he’s wearing yellow coveralls. Ah, the usual Brains “style.” Outside, Dave, Felix, Gramps, and Alex are playing football in the backyard.

  “Sorry to interrupt,” I say. “Can I borrow you for a moment, Clover?”

  Brains looks over at me and grins. “Always dragging her away from me, Amy Damey,” he says with a fake sigh. “You be Speedy Gonzales with my girl, ya hear? Me and Felix have to shoot off in ten minutes for RTÉ, then we have a late gig in Cork this evening, and I need more sweet lovin’ from my woman first.”

  I laugh. “I’ll be quick, I promise.”

  He lifts Clover off his knee, then stands up and kisses the top of her head. “Missing you already, buttercup,” he says before going to join the other boys in the yard.

  “So what’s up, Beanie?” Clover asks as soon as he’s out the door.

  “Operation Boy Immersion has been a total success, sir!” I say, clicking my heels together and saluting her. “Eloise and Seth are chatting away like old friends. And her flaming blush has chilled to a low glimmer. Clover, you’re a genius.”

  “Today, Eloise; tomorrow, world domination,” she says with a grin. “Beanie, our work here is done.”

  While Clover sees Eloise out, I walk back into the living room to catch Seth. He’s standing by the window, staring out. As soon as he hears me, he turns around.

  “You OK?” I ask him. “I know the whole Bailey thing has really knocked you sideways.” He’s been quiet for days now, and I’ve been trying to find a moment to talk to him.

  “I’m fine. Just—” He shrugs. “I miss hanging out with him, you know.”

  “I understand,” I say gently, a ripple of anger running up my spine. How dare Bailey Otis squash my friends like ants under his stupid Doc Martens! I put out my arms and pull Seth so close, I can smell his lemony hair gel. Sometimes, we all need a hug.

  Mum corners me in the hall on Sunday afternoon. “Amy, I have to nip out to the shops and Dave’s at work. Can you keep an eye on the monsters? And keep them away from the kitchen. My Dictaphone and book notes are on the table.”

  “No problemo.”

  As soon as she closes the front door behind her, I have a thought: Finn’s intimate details are sitting on our kitchen table, just crying out to be investigated. I just need some time!

  I dash toward the door and swing it open. Mum is already backing the car out of the drive, but I call out to her and she buzzes down her window. “Everything OK, Amy?”

  “Mum, I’m not doing anything today. Why don’t you go to Dundrum? Have a look around the shops. You’re always complaining that you don’t get a minute to yourself.”

  Mum looks at me suspiciously. “Are you after something, Amy? New Ugg boots, is that it?”

  “Nah, I’ve gone off them. I just thought you could do with some time out. You look tired.”

  Mum presses the skin under her eyes with the tips of her fingers. “Do I?” She sighs. “I guess with the kids and all this Finn stuff . . . Anyway, thank you, Amy — that would be a real treat. I won’t be longer than a couple of hours. Are you sure you can cope?”

  I beam at her. “Positive.”

  After settling Alex and Evie in the living room with cookies and Peppa Pig, I sit down at the kitchen table, feeling strangely nervous. I know I shouldn’t be reading Mum’s notes, but it’s all going to be published soon for the whole world to read, so surely it can’t do any harm?

  Mum’s yellow notebook, Dictaphone, and a large manila envelope are on the table. I pick up the notebook and turn to the first page. “Pot Luck Outline,” I read in Mum’s curly handwriting.

  Chapter 1: Introduction to Finn’s current career

  The adoring fans, the telly show, the cookbooks — but how did he get here?

  Chapter 2: Finn’s early years in Portstewart

  Leaving school and going to work in the Ice House Restaurant, where he met his first love, Lane Otis.

  I read it again. Does that really say Lane Otis, like Bailey Otis? I peer at Mum’s handwriting. It does. What a spooky coincidence. There can’t be that many people in Ireland called Otis.

  Chapters 3 to 6 are all about Finn’s career in London and his rise from kitchen dishwasher to Michelin-starred chef. I scan down the page.

  The notes end with “Chapter 7: Finn moves back to Dublin from London in July.” And that’s as far as Mum has gotten — or since he only moved back recently, maybe that’s the end of the book. But then I spot another note scrawled in capital letters across the bottom of the page:

  TALK TO FINN ABOUT THE LETTERS FROM HIS SON — COULD BE THE KEY TO THE WHOLE BOOK!

  Letters from his son? Finn Hunter has a son?! Wow!

  I feel so guilty finding out all this stuff about Finn that I glance around the kitchen nervously, as if someone is watching me, and my eye falls on the envelope. I know I shouldn’t delve any further into Finn’s private life — but it’s so tempting that I can’t help myself.

  I tip the c
ontents onto the table — dozens more envelopes fall out, all addressed to Finn Hunter in the same spidery handwriting. I run my fingers over a couple of them, my heart thumping in my chest, and before I know what I’m doing, I’ve picked one up, pulled the letter out, and started to read:

  Dear Finn,

  Did you get my other letters? Why haven’t you replied yet? I hope I got the address right.

  I wish you’d write back. Things are rubbish here. Jennie left last week. Mac’s really cut up about it. I miss her too. Writing to you was her idea. It feels stupid without her.

  When can I come and see you? Or maybe you could come here to Dublin? There’s loads of things I want to ask you about.

  Mac won’t talk about you or Mum or any of that stuff. But sometimes I just wish someone would talk about it, you know? Get it all out in the open. It’s like this big, black secret and we’re not allowed to say anything or, I don’t know, the world will blow up or something.

  Anyway, PLEASE write back soon!

  Bailey Otis

  I gasp and stare at the page. Bailey. It says Bailey Otis! There can’t be two boys called Bailey Otis in Ireland, can there? I put down the letter and stare into space. Mum’s notes definitely said “letters from his son.” Can it be true? Can Finn Hunter really be Bailey’s dad?

  I pull out another letter — same handwriting, same signature at the bottom. I check the postmark; it was sent in November last year. I scan the letter and find the words “This is about my tenth letter. And you still haven’t written back. Do you hate me that much?”

  Sifting through the pile I find the final letter. It was sent in April this year:

  This is the last letter. I’m never writing to you again. Jennie was wrong. She said I should give you a chance. That maybe you were scared to contact me after all this time. And scared of what Mac might do to you.

  You’re not scared. You just don’t care about me. I’m your BIG MISTAKE. Don’t worry, you won’t hear from me again. I HATE YOU!

  This time, Bailey hadn’t signed his name.

  I sit back in my chair, thoughts swirling. No wonder Bailey’s so messed up. But why didn’t Finn write back? He seems like a really decent guy.

  I flick through the notebook, looking for clues — but there’s nothing much in there, just some information about Finn’s time in London, with restaurant names and dates. Nothing about Bailey. Then my eyes come to rest on the Dictaphone. Picking it up, I turn it over and over in my hands, and then, trying not to think about what Mum will do to me if she catches me listening to it, I press Play.

  “. . . And when Mum died in May, I had to go through her things, you know how it is.” It’s Finn’s voice, and I listen carefully. “And that’s when I found all of Bailey’s letters. He’d sent them to my home address in Portstewart, but Mum had never forwarded them on. I guess she thought she was protecting me . . . I don’t know what was going through her mind, to be honest. She was always a world unto herself. She encouraged me to run off to London when I got Lane pregnant. I wanted to marry Lane, try to make a go of things, but Mum persuaded me against it. She said Lane was flighty, would never be happy, and that it would be no life for me with a young baby and wife to support. I deserved better.”

  “And you believed her?” Mum asks him. She sounds surprised, shocked even.

  “She was my mum. She was all I had. What was I supposed to do? I was only seventeen. I didn’t know what to think. I had visions of Mac — that’s Lane’s dad and Bailey lives with him now — coming after me with a shotgun for getting Lane in trouble like that. Especially after he’d taken me into his restaurant and treated me like a son. Jennie, Lane’s stepmum, tried to persuade me to stay, but I wouldn’t listen.”

  “So you ran off to London while Lane was pregnant?” Mum asks.

  Finn gives a deep sigh. “I’m not proud of it. Biggest mistake of my life.”

  “When did you find out that the baby had been born? That you had a son?”

  “Mum rang me a week after it happened. It all seemed a bit unreal, to be honest, like it was nothing to do with me, you know. Mum said to put it out of my mind. She said Lane and the baby were going to live with Mac and Jennie — everything was already sorted. I wanted to send the baby a present, some money or something, but Mum said that was a bad idea. It would only go giving them ideas about child support. I sent twenty quid, anyway, in a blank baby card. It wasn’t much, but it was all I could afford. And then I tried to forget all about the lad until” — he pauses — “all that stuff in the paper about Lane abandoning him. The printout I gave you the other day . . .” There’s another long pause.

  “I’m sorry,” he says finally. “I — No. I just can’t. Forget I said anything. In fact, I think I’ve made a mistake. I should never have mentioned Bailey at all, or any of that baby business. I don’t want it in the book, OK?

  “I was hoping things would be different by now. I moved back from London to try and make contact with him. To make up for the past, you know. But he won’t talk to me, you see. And Mac’s no help. He refuses to speak to me as well — let alone meet up. Jennie was better — sent me photos of Bailey every now and then. I found them at Mum’s when I discovered the letters. I’ve tried writing to Mac, ringing him at work, e-mailing. Nothing.

  “I was at my wit’s end, so I rang the house last Friday. Bailey picked up — but it was a disaster. He went mental: started yelling through the phone, saying he hated my guts—” He breaks off, sounding upset. “I’ve messed everything up. My son hates me . . . my own son. And to be honest, I don’t blame him. I’ll never forgive myself.”

  Friday! That was the night of the Golden Lions gig. No wonder Bailey was all over the place. He felt he’d been abandoned by Mills and Finn, both on the same day.

  Mum’s speaking now. “Would you have written back — if the letters had reached you?”

  “Honestly?” Finn says, blowing out his breath. “I don’t know. I like to think I would have, but back in London, it was all about me and my career. I never had time for anyone else.” He gives a dry laugh. “No wonder I can’t keep a girlfriend. I’ll probably die alone too, just like Mum.”

  “That’s a terrible thing to say, Finn,” Mum says. “You’re young.”

  “I feel about a hundred. Look, I’m sorry for burdening you with all this, Sylvie. Just what you don’t need, right?”

  “It’s my job, remember? I’m writing your story. But I think we should include the baby story. Maybe without mentioning your son’s name or anything to do with the newspaper reports. Why don’t you use the book as a way of reaching out to him? Send a copy to him, see if he responds. It’s worth a try. Admit you’ve made a lot of mistakes and say that you want to make it up to him. You could write an open letter to your son in the book, Finn, for the whole world to see.”

  “Do you think it would work?” Finn’s voice sounds achingly hopeful. “I’d give anything to meet Bailey, to try and put things right.”

  “It’s worth a try,” Mum says softly. Then there’s a click and the tape ends.

  I sit at the table for ages, staring into space. Poor Bailey. No one should have to deal with being rejected by both their mum and their dad — and in Bailey’s mind, Finn rejected him twice: first at birth and then when he never replied to his letters. I imagine Bailey sitting at his own kitchen table, writing letter after letter to his father, and never hearing anything back. No wonder he’s so unhappy and confused.

  I sit there a few minutes longer before starting to shuffle Mum’s notes back into place, in case she comes home unexpectedly early. As I pick up Mum’s yellow notebook, a folded sheet of paper falls out of the back of it. I open it up. It’s a printout of a newspaper article.

  DUBLIN TODDLER ABANDONED

  A toddler, 3, was discovered abandoned in a house in Dublin over the weekend. Social services have confirmed that the child was found in a distressed state and had been on his own for some time.

  The boy, referred to as Baby X becaus
e he cannot be named for legal reasons . . .

  I stop, tears filling my eyes. I just can’t read on — it’s too horrible. Suddenly there’s a knock on the front door. I hurriedly shove the sheet back into the notebook, in case it’s Mum and she’s forgotten her door key again, but then I hear Clover calling through the mail slot: “I know you’re in there, Beanie. Open up.”

  Relieved, I swing open the door.

  “What’s wrong?” she asks, spotting my teary eyes. “Is it Seth? Did you guys have a fight?”

  “No! It’s Bailey,” I say, tears rolling down my cheeks. “I think I know why he’s so messed up, Clover.”

  “Let me get this right,” Clover says slowly when I’ve stopped talking. “Bailey Otis, the guy who broke Mills’s heart, is Finn Hunter’s son? Are you positive?”

  I give a huge nod. “Yes!”

  She whistles. “This is explosive stuff, Beanie. And as for the letters Bailey sent Finn, any journalist would have a field day with that information. I can see the headlines now” — she frames her hands in the air —“‘TOP CHEF REJECTS LONG-LOST SON SHOCKER.’”

  I look at her, aghast. “You wouldn’t, Clover.”

  “‘Course not, Beanie. My lips are sealed. No wonder Bailey can’t hold down a relationship with someone like Mills, though.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Mills treated him like a prince, right? So he pushed her away and took up with Annabelle Hamilton — who probably treats him like dirt. He doesn’t believe he deserves someone kind and decent like Mills — or maybe he’s just afraid of getting too close and getting hurt again, like he was when he wrote to Finn and never got a reply.”

  “You should be doing psychology, Clover. How come you have such people smarts?”

  “Experience, babes. School of hard knocks. I was an orphan, I was.” She starts singing “It’s a Hard-Knock Life” in a Little Orphan Annie voice. Then, going serious again, she says, “It’s terrible for Bailey and everything, but I don’t see why you’re so upset, babes.”