Moving On

Moving On

William came to see me the Monday after I returned from Swanage. He phoned first, saying he needed to pick up some clothes. He looked dirty and tired and smelt pretty bad, too. I so often now get a rush of adrenalin when I am with him, I’m still uneasy. My first thoughts are to lock doors upstairs to protect property. I’ve got used to doing this, and attach no emotion to it. We need to safeguard things in the house, and I think it’s helpful for him too that there isn’t the temptation.

‘Give us a kiss, then’ I say to him, just like my mum used to do. He bends down to kiss me and I give him a hug, trying to act as normal as possible, although I don’t know where he has been staying for over a week. I ask him how he is.

‘Yeah, okay. How was Swanage?’ he asks, looking over at me quite tenderly.

‘Yes, good thanks. Lovely. How have you been? Did you have other clothes with you or…?’

‘No, I’ve been in these same things for ten days. Haven’t changed my pants since then’ he points to his underwear.

What? But I’m no longer shocked, more like relieved that he is one piece. I ask if he wants a shower. He goes upstairs, and I hear him singing in the bathroom like he always does. All his clothes are on the floor outside his room. I take them and put everything in the washing machine, even his coat which smells strongly of tobacco. There is a yellow form on the bed, which I pick up to read. It’s a police caution. I read that Will was arrested for shoplifting a pair of trousers from a department store in Victoria. Seems to have happened on the same day as he rang me in Swanage and I transferred money into his account. I replace it on the bed, and scream internally.

We talk later, I make him a sandwich and I sit opposite him in the kitchen drinking tea. I ask him what he plans to do, and he says he doesn’t know. I mention the police form | had found.

‘Yeah’ he says, smiling. ‘I knew I wouldn’t get away with it. I was laughing when they caught me. I needed a bed to sleep the night. They questioned me for ten hours.’

Okay. Not sure what any of this means – a cry for help? He had £100 that day, so maybe. I feel out of my depth again. I would have been willing to have Will home again. Part of me wants to protect him, and look after him, but Guy is sure that doing that would just lead to a repeat of old patterns. I rang Guy straight after Will had rung to say he was on his way over. I began to talk about options. I talk about Will coming home.

‘You’re such a loving person, but he can’t come home. I can’t have him upsetting everyone. You’ll get stressed when he’s back to lying in bed all day and going to bed with the light and telly on. The other boys will get upset. I just can’t have that anymore. It’s time to think with our minds now, not our hearts. To help him too. We can set up another b and b place, if that would give you peace of mind. I’m sorry if it feels like I’m giving you orders over the phone – but you do see that he can’t live with us anymore don’t you?’ he says.

I instinctively go into my heart when thinking about my kids, and I know that Guy is right on this one. I’m glad I’m not trying to cope alone, don’t think I’d make a good job of it especially with sons. I have huge admiration for single parents. One of my difficulties is that I don’t yet think of William as a man, yet whenever there is someone of my son’s age in the newspaper they are termed ‘an eighteen year old man’ not a ‘boy’. This is something I need to recognise. The upshot of my thinking is that William tries to pull me in, because he must know how easy that is to do - then I get hurt when he lets me down.

Guy has often suggested that I need to look after myself around this issue, and he’s right. I guess this must also be a function of the fact I was orphaned and I lived for most of my life with the pain of not having been loved unconditionally by anyone since the age of twelve. I never knew my father. He had committed suicide when I was two. I had grown up believing that my step-father was my ‘real’ father. It was a relief to find out the lie in this, as he had been rude and unloving to me and my sister for most of our lives. He had provided for us after our mother’s death, though, and for that I am very grateful. No blood relatives had stepped forward. It was only when I was 21 that I found out I had had another father. I remember receiving the death certificate I had sent away for, and reading the cause of his death ’Multiple injuries consistent with having been hit by a train’. I found out the details years later: he had put his head on a railway line and waited for a train to come. He had been a Second World War RAF navigator, and had never got over the fact that he had helped kill thousands in the bombing raids over Germany in which he took part.

My lovely mother became seriously ill, probably from stress, when I was 9, so I had few years of feeling safe and protected. I’ve always wanted to be a great mother, like my own mum was to me, only over a more extensive period hopefully! I’ve wanted my kids to have the upbringing I didn’t have – a cliché I know, but my lack of love as a child has, of course, informed my parenting.

Jack comes home from school quite soon after Will and I have begun talking.

‘Hey, how are you man?’ Jack inquires, as he comes into the kitchen where we are sitting, looking surprised to see his brother.

While Will is upstairs I ask Jack what he thinks about Will coming home, and his eyes flash at me as says it’s too early and that his brother needs longer on his own. He tells me that we need longer too. He looks anxious that I may decide Will should be with us again. I note the look in Jack’s eyes, and know that he’s right.

The Marios had given me the number of another Italian family who do b and b. I ring them and explain what we need. Fine, they say. I take Will there and leave him. This house is a huge old place, just off the main drag leading from Lee to Bromley. Most of the houses along the road were gentrified years ago. and house prices are steep here. This one looks uncared for, and inside it’s dirty and shambolic. A massive weeping Madonna dominates the hall-way. She wears a frilly blouse and looks like she needs dusting. Starsky and Hutch dubbed in Italian is on the tv, their lips ridiculously out of synch with the dialogue. We are shown to the vacant room. Will sits on the purple nylon-covered single bed, there is a wooden crucifix above it. The landlady waves a plastic-covered set of rules to him and begins to go through them. Oh, my. I say that Will can read them later, maybe? It is still amazing to me that Will is not on bended knees asking to come back to live with us, in a comfortable home in a lovely neighbourhood with loving parents (the fact that you’ve even got parents has got to be a plus, oh here I go again.) I recently asked him why he has never asked to come back, and he says it’s because things never work out at home with him living there. Seems like I’m the only one who wants this. Alex is against it too, and gets frustrated with me.

‘Why are you so concerned about him? He never thinks about you, except when he wants money. You must admit I’m right, mum’, he said to me recently, his blue eyes looking directly into mine.

I love that boy so much.

I’m so lucky to have both Jack and Alex in my life.

Two days later Will’s landlady rings me to say she can’t have Will there any longer. She doesn’t want someone who is around during the day. I’d been having a tense week, taking Will to see his drugs counsellor, helping him sort out benefit, and trying to get a hold on the anxiety I feel when he is with me. I haven’t felt comfortable around him for years. He and I used to be so close, my first beautiful boy who lit up our lives. It’s so sad and doesn’t seem to be improving, from my side anyway.

We arrange new b and b accommodation for him, or rather I do and Guy pays for it. My husband is really busy at work, which is good because we need the money to support Will. His new address is closer to us, which seems comforting somehow. Less travelling for me too. The landlady there is a young mother, a warm, sweet woman who I take to immediately. The house is clean and cosy with no catholic paraphernalia. Will’s room is at the front of the house. There is a Buddha on the mantelpiece. We seem to be moving from Catholicism to Buddhism, what’s going on here? Everything looks very homely. I feel much better about leaving my son here.

Will rang me on the evening of Mothers’ Day, Sunday, having heard about the Guardian piece from friends. One of his closest friends from school has talked to him about it, he tells me. (I am friendly with this boy’s mother, and had emailed her to let her know that there was going to be a feature in the paper. Didn’t think of the consequence of Jon reading it too, as he lives on his own now. Damn).

Will begins saying how upset he is, and is furious with me for going public with our family’s problems. He starts crying on the phone, saying that he’s lost everything and everyone. His friend doesn’t want to see him, he says.

‘I’m trying to move on and you’re bringing it all up again. How am I ever going to have a normal life?’

Oh, no, maybe he has a point. He sounded distraught, and I start to panic on not knowing what to say. Defend myself or …..I could start to feel guilty but push that emotion away from me as it comes close. No, I know I’m doing the right thing about coming out with the story; I just know it’s right. I had already that weekend received hundreds of emails from other deeply sad parents and I know that we can help others. I have repeatedly told William this, particularly at the web-site’s inception, inviting him to get involved and letting him know that his part in this family’s story, his ‘script,’ if you like, could potentially be of value to millions around the world. I’ve talked to him before about the ‘bigger picture’, and his role in that, and how important he is to it all.

I repeat this now, then tell him to come over and he does.

He has brought me a Mother’s Day card. It is beautiful. This is the first card I’ve had for years. We are all in the kitchen finishing off dinner when he arrives. I ask if he would like anything to eat, and look over at the virtually empty bowls of potatoes and vegetables on the table. He looks thin, and my heart lurches as I wonder when he last ate a hot meal. Oh, god. He sits down slowly and starts to cry saying that he’s lost everything. He sheds large tears, which fall on his track-suit bottoms and make a small puddle there. When he was little and used to cry, his forehead would be motley red and his tears profuse. We used to say that we could hold him over the garden to water it. They are the same still.

I hold his hand in mine and say that he still has so much in his life. Guy talks about college, and the possibility of getting a job in June when Will finishes his AS levels.

‘I think you’ll feel better when you’re earning money that is yours. It’ll give you a lot of self-respect, I know you’ll enjoy it to. You’ve got college still. My advice is to continue there, get your AS’s and you can go forwards from there’ he says kindly. ‘Jon is one of your oldest friends, he’ll come round, I know he will’.

I talk to him about his drugs counsellor and how he’s getting on with her. Guy asks if Will is still doing cannabis.

‘It’s the only thing that kills the pain’ he says.

Will is looking down and away from Guy. I squeeze Will’s hand and then notice the time. It’s way past Alex‘s bed-time, I leave Guy and Will and go and shout for Alex. Will leaves soon after and I hear myself sigh loudly as the door shuts behind him. Just how did things get like this? I’m still surprised.