Lost Boys (Ziam)

Chapter 2: The Bank Manager

It was the day after the funeral and the couple had climbed to the lamp room at the top of the lighthouse. Beneath them the bay glittered in the after noon sun. Small sailing crafts and boats shuffled in and out of the harbour. From this height, they seemed like white feathers skimming the blue water. Liam and Zayn had always liked this room, as had Liam's father. It was a place to come and think; to gain perspective on berry head and see it for what it was - a tiny patch of land with too many crammed houses, teetering on the cliff top. In the days since Liam's fathers death, the lamp room had taken on extra meaning for the couple. Geoff Payne had spent so much time in the room it was impossible for either of the couple to enter it without feeling close to him.

Even now Liam could see his father sitting In front of the window, his eyes fixed on the harbour below, humming an old sea shanty. He found himself singing it too. There would be a flask of hot lemon tea at his side and, almost certainly, one of his dusty old books of poetry. As he'd come in, he'd turn and smile at hi-...

"I say, I say, anyone at home?"

The distinctive accent of Edmund Paphitis signalled an unwelcome trespasser in the room. Zayn and Liam turned from the window to a red-faced bank manager appearing at the top of the stairway.

"Well, I declare, I'm obviously not as fit as I'd like to believe! Did your father climb up and down those stairs everyday?"

Zayn was silent. He had no intention into getting in a conversation with Edmund Paphitis. Liam simply nodded politely as the good boy he is and waited for the bank manager to catch his breath.

"Would you care for some water mr. Paphitis?"

He asked at last. He poured a glass of water and passed it to the bank managers clammy hands.

"Thank you, most welcome"

He said.

"Did I hear you singing something just now? A strange tune, I didn't quite catch the words. I'd love to hear it if you felt like singing it again"

Zayn shook his head and Liam decided it was best to proceed with caution. Clearly Edmund Paphitis was not a man who would climb 300 steps purely for a social visit.

"Is an, erm, old sea shanty my father used to sing to us" he explained politely.

"A shanty eh?"

"He used to sing us to sleep when we were little,"

"A lullaby, then a pretty song of calming things?"

Liam laughed lightly.

"Not exactly, in fact it's about pain and death and horrible things"

The bank manager seemed alarmed.

"The point of it is, mr Paphitis, to remind you that however bad your life appears, things could be far worse."

"Ahhh, I think I understand, mr Payne. And well, may I say how impressed I am at your... Stoicism, in the current situation."

Liam attempted a smile, though it came out as more of a grimace. Zayn looked at Edmund Paphitis with undisguised hatred. He was also trying to remember what stoicism meant.

"You two have experienced a loss that no child, no person your age, should have to deal with,"

Edmund Paphitis continued

"And now you find yourselves with no parent, no income and no hom-..."

"We have a home"

Zayn interrupted mr Paphitis.