He's There Now

Chapter 3

It took us about four maybe five hours to get from London to Manchester with Alexander falling asleep about 30 minutes into the journey. I'm not really looking forward to this. He's going to be walking out with his dad and I feel so bad because neither of them know about each other.

I turned the engine off as I parked behind my friend Sarah's car at her house. I got out the car and she came running over me.

“Abbey!” She shouted, giving me a hug. “How are you?”

“I'm good. How are you?” I asked while walking round the back of the car to get Alexander out.

“I'm happy know. It's been what? A year since we last saw each other,” She said opening the boot up to get the suitcases out.

“About that,” I said picking Alexander out of the car and carrying him.

I closed the door over and looked at her.

“He looks more like his dad by the day, doesn't he?” She whispered closing the boot down.

“Tell me about it,” I replied.

I locked the car and we walked into her house.

She put our suitcases down in the hall and closed the door over as I went into her living room and put Alexander down on the couch. I walked back out to her and picked a suitcase up. We started walking up the stairs to one of the guest bedrooms.

“So, have you seen Joe since...” She started opening the bedroom door.

“Saw him earlier actually,” I said putting the suitcase I had down on the floor.

“Oh my god. Did he see..” She asked in a shock voice.

“He did but he didn't piece together the fact that he's his.” I told her.

“That's a good thing though. He doesn't know that he's his,” She said sitting on the bed and looking at me.

“He's asked him to be a mascot at the game tomorrow.”

“Abbey, please tell me you said no to that.” She asked. I shook my head. “You do realise that there are photographers there from newspapers and as soon as they see him with Joe, they'll piece it together.”

“Don't you think I haven't thought about that? I'm scared that as soon as everyone sees him, they'll start talking and...I don't want that for my son,” I told her.

“Why did you agree to it then?” She questioned.

“I...He was already upset with me today after I shouted at him. I wanted him to be happy,” I said.

“I just hope that you know what you're doing and don't worry, I'll be with you all day tomorrow. If people do turn against either of you, they'll have to deal with me,” She said.

I laughed, “Thank you.”

“What are friends for? Now, bed I think because it's almost midnight.”

“I better go and get Alexander,” I said walking over to the bedroom door.

Sarah got up and followed me out the room and down the stairs. I walked into the living room to get Alexander. He was still asleep so I carefully picked him up and carried him up to the bedroom. 

I placed him on the bed and took his shoes off. I sat down next to him and stroked the side of his face.

“I hope you don't end up being hurt tomorrow,” I whispered and gave him a kiss on the head.

I stood up and went to get changed before going to bed.

I woke up at 11:00am with Alexander jumping on the bed. He stopped jumping and sat down next to me.