Theo

by Amanda Prowse

  ‘Okay.’ Anna exhaled. ‘I will try.’

  ‘And what about you, Mr Montgomery? How are you feeling about this?’

  He didn’t like the slant to her head, as if she really had seen something in him that might be a tick in the wrong box. He held her gaze. ‘Er... I’m a bit nervous too, I guess. It’s more the fear of the unknown for me, I think.’

  ‘Would you like to expand on that a little?’

  ‘Er... I don’t know.’ He paused, feeling like an idiot. He decided to change tack. ‘I just wish Anna would show you her true self, because she’s—’

  ‘I am being my true self!’ Anna shot back, cutting him short.

  ‘I didn’t mean it in a negative way, I was only thinking that you are perfect and you don’t need to perform.’

  Mrs Wentworth raised her pen. ‘What do you mean by “perform”, exactly?’ This had clearly caught her interest.

  And, awkward though it was, that exchange turned out to be the least uncomfortable of the day...

  They drove home in a fug of hostility distilled from all the words left unsaid and bubbling under the surface, waiting for release.

  ‘How do you think—’

  ‘Don’t talk to me, Theo.’ Anna raised her palm. ‘Don’t say anything!’

  He took her advice and kept quiet.

  It was she who broke the silence, a few minutes later. ‘Did you deliberately try and sabotage the whole interview? Was that your game plan?’ She shook her head, muttering something acidic but inaudible.

  ‘Of course not! I got flustered, I—’

  ‘What was all that about me performing? It made me sound like a fake!’ she yelled.

  ‘I was only trying to say that the real you, the everyday Anna, is more than good enough to adopt a child and that you didn’t need to be so on edge!’

  ‘The everyday Anna? And who is that exactly? I was being myself! Not that Mrs Wentworth would believe that, not now! Jesus, Theo!’

  ‘I just—’

  ‘No, don’t say anything!’ She turned and pointedly stared out of the window, staying like that for another good few minutes.

  ‘Then she asked you a basic question, Theo! Basic! “Why do you think you would make a good parent?” And you... you just... Urrrrgh!’ She shook her head and looked furious.

  Theo’s mouth went dry at the recollection.

  ‘Why do you think you would make a good parent, Mr Montgomery?’

  Twisting in his seat, he’d seen the image of Sophie smiling at him on the bus and then Kitty’s face, horror-struck at the prospect of any interaction, and his confidence had evaporated. Why do I think I would make a good parent? I don’t, not really! I’m not sure I could be. I am weird, toxic, useless. He then heard his father’s voice, loud and clear: ‘The idea of him looking after a baby!’

  And then he’d given his stupid answer, mumbled from cracked lips. ‘I don’t...’

  ‘You don’t think you would make a good parent?’ Mrs Wentworth had prompted.

  He’d sensed Anna sitting ramrod straight in the seat next to him, her words a decibel higher than her normal speech, her tone urgent. ‘He’ll... He’ll be great. He’s just nervous! He’s kind and he listens and he has a good, good heart...’

  Her rapid and heartfelt defence only made him feel worse. He shook his head. ‘No, I was going to say, I don’t know exactly, but I will try very hard.’

  Glancing across the car now, he noted his wife’s set expression, the tension in her jaw. Her hand was clamped over her mouth as if to prevent her from saying the wrong thing, the hurtful thing.

  I want so badly to be the man you want me to be, Anna. I want us to adopt, but I don’t know how to jump through hoops and be the smiley, untroubled father you have in mind. I don’t know how! And that’s the truth.

  15

  ‘Your dad’s asking for the projection figures on the Deptford development.’ Marta stood in the doorway to Theo’s office, clinging to the frame with her red, talon-like fingernails, her lips painted to match. She tapped the toe of her black stiletto on the floor impatiently.

  She bothered him.

  ‘I’ll give them to Marcus.’ He spoke without looking at her again, keeping his eyes on the unopened envelope that had just been delivered to his desk.

  He heard her sigh as she closed the door. Sitting back in his chair, he tried to imagine working as an intern and feeling confident enough to treat the chairman’s son with such disdain. Was that how everyone saw him – a walkover?

  A few seconds later she opened the door again. ‘He says, can you—’

  ‘Look, I’m sorry, Marta,’ he said, cutting her short, ‘but if my dad wants to speak to me, he is capable of coming in here himself and if he isn’t, he can use this.’ He picked up the telephone and held the mouthpiece towards her. ‘And if for whatever reason neither of those things are possible, then you too can use the phone and call me. I’m trying to concentrate here and that’s a little hard to do when you keep popping through the door like a bloody cuckoo clock.’

  He wasn’t sure why he was so irritable, or where his confidence had come from, but the way Marta pursed her glossy red lips and slowly walked backwards told him that he’d got the message across. And it felt good.

  He picked up the brown envelope. His heart beat a little too quickly and he felt lightheaded. He breathed deeply, trying to quash the surge of excitement. This was it, the letter from the planning office in Bristol. He ran the pad of his thumb over the postmark and slid his finger under the gummy flap. The single sheet was officious, peppered with words, dates and departmental logos, all in red, but the only thing that drew his attention, was the single sentence informing him that planning permission for his twenty-four self-contained studio units had been APPROVED. He read and reread the word, feeling a fire of achievement in his belly – and this was before he’d shifted a single brick.

  He contemplated calling Anna but instantly decided not to. He felt disinclined to argue with her today or hear the inevitable disappointment in her voice. The fallout from the adoption meeting was still tarnishing things between them and it took the edge off what should have been a day of celebration.

  Sitting back in the leather chair, it felt as if his bowels had turned to ice. It wasn’t just that all their money was tied up in this pile of vintage bricks; he’d also paid for security, started clearing rubbish from the site and engaged the best architect he could find. It felt like he had a mountain to climb and, much worse, it felt as if he was climbing it alone.

  He sighed and leant back, feeling the tilt at the base of the chair as he stared up at the same ceiling his forefathers must have stared at many a time, plotting and scheming to build up the business. He closed his eyes.

  ‘Are you asleep?’ Marta woke him with her question.

  ‘No!’ He let the seat tilt forward again, aware of dampness on his chin. He had drifted off and he must have been drooling, but there was no way he was going to admit to either. He wiped his face with the back of his hand.

  ‘It looked like you were sleeping to me.’

  ‘Did you want something?’ he asked, recalling their conversation about using the phone not an hour since.

  ‘Yes. I’ve been to sent to ask if you’re coming in for the quarterly review? It’s just that everyone’s waiting to start.’ Her blouse gaped open to reveal a lacy camisole and she stood there with her right hip sticking out and her hand resting on it, as if striking a cover pose. It made him feel uncomfortable.

  He’d forgotten that the quarterly review was today – he’d been too distracted. ‘I’ll be in in a minute.’ He hurriedly opened the file on his computer that would provide him with the information he needed to share with the board.

  ‘You might want to...’ Marta touched her own fringe.

  The moment she left, he checked his reflection in the window and cursed the wayward flicks of thick curl that stuck up vertically around his face. He used his fingers as a makeshift comb and tried to calm the
m. With his laptop under his arm, he gulped down the cold coffee sitting in the mug on his desk and winced at the bitterness, then crossed the hallway.

  His father’s terse glance at the wall clock did little to assuage his anxiety.

  Theo felt only semi-present, nodding as reports and updates were given slowly and methodically, a stream of numbers and information in which he had only the vaguest interest. All he could see was the letter of approval from the planning department, as if it was tattooed on the inside of his eyelids. His mind whirred with all the possibilities.

  ‘Theodore?’ His father’s voice drew him into the proceedings.

  ‘Yep?’ He straightened his tie and sat up in the chair.

  ‘Sorry, are we keeping you from something more important?’ Perry Montgomery asked. ‘We are waiting for your input.’ He nodded at the men assembled around the table.

  ‘Yes. Of course.’

  He tapped the keyboard, trying to find the damn spreadsheet, unsure of where they were up to and what had been said. ‘Sorry, just give me a moment.’ His face flared with embarrassment.

  ‘If my son is a little distracted, it might be because he is fixated on buying a property in Bristol, would you believe! He wants to drag us down the M4 and get involved in social housing or some such.’ A strained chortle rippled around the room.

  Theo heard the laughter. It felt the same as it had that day in the library at Vaizey College. ‘Right, Mr Homo, gather your books and leave! I will not have disruption in my library. There are people trying to work. Off you go!’ He felt a jolt in his gut and before he knew it he had closed the lid of his laptop and was standing.

  ‘Actually, it was more than a fixation, it was a sound business proposal. But I can see there’s no point in regurgitating the details here and now. As it happens, I believed in it and so I bought it, a little while ago now.’

  He enjoyed the look of surprise on his father’s face.

  ‘Well, well. Interesting.’ His father nodded and tapped his fingertips in a pyramid at chest height. ‘Can we now get back to the task in hand?’

  Theo looked at the gathered group and felt a shiver of dislike. These men were his father’s cronies. In a sudden moment of clarity he decided he no longer wanted to be part of the gang. ‘I’m sorry,’ he mumbled, before buttoning up his jacket and leaving the room.

  ‘Finished already? That was quick,’ Marta called out as he walked past her desk and into his office.

  He ignored her. Standing at the window, he looked down at the pavement, as he was wont to do, drawn by the hundreds of dark suits traipsing up and down, presumably every one of them trying in their own way to make their mark.

  I’m thirty-one years old, not a boy. It’s time, Theo. Time to do something different. He thought of Mr Porter, pottering in his front garden, sitting at the table, taking brightly coloured feathers between his leathery fingers and turning them into something wonderful. He felt beneath his lapel where his gift of a fly on a safety pin nestled.

  I wonder if you’re still alive? How old would you be now, dear friend? If you were nineteen in 1944, blimey, you must be in your seventies. I always thought of you as an old, old man back when I was at school, but you weren’t all that old, were you? Just grey-haired and dealing with all life had thrown at you. I am sorry, I will always be sorry. I should have done more, said more... I didn’t realise until it was too late and you were gone.

  The door of his office flew open, pulling him into the present. He closed his eyes briefly and steeled himself. His father was the only one who came in like that, without introduction or forewarning, making the point this was his building, his company and that they had to play by his rules. It had the effect of making Theo feel like a guest, keeping him on his toes, and this too was familiar.

  ‘Well, well, well, that was quite a display.’ Theo noted the hint of amusement in his father’s tone. ‘When you have calmed down, do you think we might be able to continue with our meeting? There are six good people sitting around a table waiting for you to deliver your report. The report you are paid to deliver. They’re not used to being kept waiting and I’m not used to having to explain away such unprofessional behaviour. So if you don’t mind...’ His father gestured towards the door.

  Theo stayed by the window and shook his head briefly. His limbs were trembling. ‘I received a letter today from the planning department in Bristol. They’ve approved my plan for the warehouse.’

  He wasn’t sure what he wanted from his father by way of response. Good advice? A little bit of support?

  His father sank down into the chair on the other side of the office and crossed his legs. His eyes were bright, his stare challenging, and there was a nasty smirk on his lips. ‘Well, what a surprise!’

  Theo had imagined this moment often, but it didn’t feel half as good or victorious as he’d anticipated. He paced behind his desk. ‘How can you sit there as my father and not be happy that I’ve succeeded in something? Would it kill you to give me a bit of reassurance? Why do you always make it feel like I’ve lost!’

  ‘Is that what you’re after, boy? A pat on the back? A medal? Trust me, I know good men who’ve received medals for doing great things...’

  Theo stared at him, dumbfounded.

  ‘...and you haven’t succeeded at anything yet. Buying a pile of bricks and turning them into something are two entirely different skills. And your business model is flawed!’ He was yelling now, wiping spit from his damp lower lip with his handkerchief. ‘That challenge, however, now sits firmly on your shoulders, but it’s not important, not to me. My loyalty is here with the company my father and grandfather built.’

  Theo got the picture. He had let them down, all of them. ‘If you’d given me room to move within Montgomery Holdings, then maybe I wouldn’t have felt the need to do something outside. But you’ve never valued me, you’ve always assumed the worst, treated me like a failure without giving me the chance to prove otherwise.’ He faced his father and placed his hands on his waist.

  ‘So this is my fault now?’ His father chuckled. ‘I am the reason you need to throw all this away?’

  His dad’s laughter was like a punch to Theo’s already fragile confidence. His temperature flashed hot. He was furious. ‘You could say that.’ He breathed heavily, unable to list the many ways his father had hurt him and let him down.

  ‘Is that right?’ Perry sat back in the chair. ‘Have you ever looked at it from my perspective, Theodore? I was overjoyed to get a son – a son!’ He balled his fist, as if he’d won the jackpot.

  Theo desperately wanted to ask if he was his father’s first or second son – just how old was Alexander? But this was neither the time nor place.

  Perry continued. ‘I tried to coach you, influence you, tried to lay the foundations that would turn you into the man I wanted you to be. But, Jesus Christ, you never even picked up a fucking rugby ball! I used to place one in your hands and try, but you simply weren’t interested.’

  Theo could just about see the funny side of this. Was this what his old man’s disappointment boiled down to – his lack of interest in the game of rugby?

  Perry wasn’t done. ‘Why couldn’t you have been like every other Vaizey boy, the sort I grew up with, men I loved and admired? Was it too much to ask for you to try and fit in a bit, find one thing in common with everyone else – just one thing? Even as a toddler you were always running off to hide behind you mother’s skirts like a nancy boy. What was the matter with you?’

  Theo stared at his father, wondering how much of his unhappy childhood to dredge up, not wanting to make things harder for his mother than they already were. The air between them was thick. The shadows of their words crept into the cracks in the ceiling and hid between the drawers of the desk. They weren’t going to disappear any time soon. He took a deep breath and rounded off the sharp edges of his response.

  ‘I don’t think there’s anything wrong with me. And I don’t think not having an interest in a particular spo
rt should be the thing that defines whether I’m a man or not.’ His voice was calm. ‘And actually, Dad, if I found you hard to approach as a toddler, if I preferred to run to Mum, was that my fault?’ He let this sink in and saw the faint twitch to his father’s left eye. ‘Sometimes trying to force a square peg into a round hole results in it breaking. But I didn’t break.’ Not quite.

  His father stared back at him with the beginnings of a smile on his face. He was hard to read sometimes. ‘I like your frankness,’ he said. ‘And I have to say, knowing that you actually had the balls to follow through with something that caught your eye, this Bristol business, knowing you had the nerve to follow your instinct, is bloody marvellous! That, Theodore, is what makes a businessman.’

  Theo felt the strength leave his legs. He had waited years to be thrown even a crumb of congratulation by his father and here, at this moment of exhaustion and in the face of his triumph, here it was. It was sickening to him just how overjoyed he was at his old man’s self-styled compliment.

  Perry had more to say. ‘Following your heart, that’s what it’s all about. Not following orders or toeing the line. It’s about challenging those orders and carving your own path. That’s when things get really interesting.’

  Theo opened his mouth to respond to this, but his thoughts were three steps ahead and he was as shocked as his dad when he gave them voice.

  ‘I’m leaving the company, Dad. I’m setting out on my own. I can’t do this any more and I think putting space between us can only be a good thing, a healthy thing.’

  The smile fell from his father’s face and something close to hurt flickered in his eyes. Far from feeling triumphant at having gained the upper ground for the first time in his life, Theo instead tasted the familiar guilt, this time tinged with fear.

  ‘Be bold, Theodore.’ His father stood, straightened his cuffs and held his son’s gaze before he left the room. ‘Always be bold.’

  * * *

  Anna laughed loudly into her fist before grabbing a piece of kitchen roll and wiping her nose and mouth. ‘For real?’ She gazed at him and refilled her wine glass. ‘You’ve quit your job?’