Growing Pains ✔

Chapter 9

Jamie was heading out of school when Laura caught up to him. He wasn't surprised, she was a nice girl and after he'd dropped his bombshell earlier she was bound to want to delve deeper.

'I owe you an apology,' she said gasping as she fell into step beside him. He smiled and slowed down.

'No you don't, I probably owe you one. I dropped that shit on you and I had no right to, I didn't mean to make you feel bad. Not really anyway.' He knew on some level he had meant to upset her, to shock her out of her assumptions.

She touched his arm. 'Do you want to talk about it, I'm a good listener.'

His eyes met hers, she seemed sincere but wasn't sure he even could talk about it. 'I'm don't think it would be fair to dump my messed up thoughts on you.' 

She smiled. 'Try me.' She linked her arm through his and they walked along in companionable silence.

'I'm not sure where to begin,' he said with a shrug.

She steered him towards the park and they sat down on the bench. 'It doesn't sound like there's a particularly right place to start. Why don't you tell me about your sister.'

He sighed looking over at the children playing in the park. 'She was never my sister, not really, but she should have been.' He closed his eyes briefly remembering. 'I can only have been about four, my parents were still together, and they were going to have another baby. I've not imagined it, my mom started getting bigger and she told me. I used to feel her belly, feel the baby.'

He paused remembering one afternoon clearly. He'd been with his mom in a pale yellow room, a new white crib was in the corner. Charlotte had been showing him around, and he'd given her one of his teddy bears for the baby. She smiled down at him and the baby must have moved because she'd taken his hand and pressed it to her stomach for him to feel.

He met Laura's eyes which were bright with unshed tears, she grabbed his hand and he looked away. 'One day, Iater, I was told the baby had died,' he murmured. 'She was a girl, my mom called her Caroline. I don't know what went wrong.' Laura squeezed his hand. 'My mom never got over it, even after she left my dad, even after my little brother was born it was like there was still something missing.' He sensed a sadness deep within his mother. 

'I don't think any parent would get over the loss of their child,' Laura said, her own eyes now on the children that were playing.

Jamie chewed his lip. 'I thought that's why my parents split up, I sorta assumed that it came between them. I think that's wrong now, surely if they were a normal couple they'd have turned to each other but...' He didn't go on, what did he know about adult relationships?

'It might have come between them,' Laura said. 'Maybe it drove them apart. They must have been devastated.'

'My mom was, I know that. My dad, well he was always working.' He couldn't quite remember those days. He vaguely recalled his dad telling him his mom was in the hospital, and the baby was in heaven. In his four-year-old mind, heaven hadn't sounded so bad, and he'd rather have had a baby brother than a baby sister anyway. But when his mom came home she was different, vacant, and no longer engaged in family life.

'You don't much like your dad do you?' Laura asked watching him closely.

'No I don't, he's just this guy I have to see now and again. I don't really know him. When I was younger we'd do stuff together.' He scoffed. 'That's not entirely true, I'd do stuff with his parents mostly.' His dad would take him to his grandparent's house, and they'd shower him with attention. 'My dad was kinda distant, except when he had a girlfriend he wanted to impress with his single father act. Funnily enough, none of those women stuck around for long.' He knew his dad had to be the cause of his parents break up, his inability to hold down a long-term relationship made that pretty obvious.

'But you're happy with your mom?'

Jamie gave Laura a rueful smile, he used to think Charlotte was the most beautiful, perfect person ever. He didn't just love her as his mom, he idolised her.

'To be honest these days my mom's a pain. She's always on at me about homework and stuff. And she's so over protective, when she's aware I exist that is.'

Laura frowned at him. 'Jamie she probably knows she's overprotective so she tries to give you space, and then she reigns it back in.' 

Jamie shook his head. 'Nah she's been like this my whole life, or at least since Andy was born. She had him with my stepdad when I was six, and that's when things changed.' Laura opened her mouth and he quickly continued. 'Yes I know, of course things would change when I had to share my mom with a baby but it was more than that. She was obsessed with Andy. I understand now, she'd lost a baby, but at the time I didn't. It was like she was trying to create this perfect family with Lou and I didn't fit in so well anymore.'

Laura's face was etched with pity. 'Did Lou not like having a stepson?'

Jamie's face broke into an easy smile. 'Nah Lou was great, he is great. When he and my mom got together he was like my best friend, he'd spend time with me, even when my mom wasn't around. He felt like more of a dad than my real dad, to be honest. And I sometimes used to think my real dad only wanted to spend time with me to get at my mom.' He well remembered Charlotte's forced smile when she'd say goodbye as he left with his dad, and how utterly relieved she'd looked when his dad returned him home.

'I guess it's hard for everyone when parents divorce,' Laura said and Jamie could tell she was desperately trying to say the right thing all the time. He wondered what she really thought. 'But you were saying your mom lost interest in you when your brother was born?'

'I dunno, that's how it seemed.' He didn't want to sound like a petulant child. 'I think she was terrified something would happen to Andy, she wouldn't let him out of her sight. I just remember that on the weekends when I wasn't at my dad's, Lou would do stuff with me, not my mom. It's like he was trying to overcompensate or something.'

Laura suddenly laughed. 'Maybe Lou didn't like babies, they are kinda boring.'

Jamie laughed with her, glad to lighten the atmosphere although he knew that wasn't true. Julia's arrival proved that.

'Nah, my mom was obsessed with Andy, and she was like it again when my sister was born, she was even worse.'

'Because she was a girl?' Laura suggested.

'Yeah, she'd wanted another baby for years. I think deep down she secretly wanted a daughter, and once she got one that was it. Only this time it was me and Andy who were being ignored. He was only four so Lou had to give him a lot of attention, and he's his real son. I had my own dad.' Not that his dad was around so much by this point. He'd cut the frequency of his visits down, along with the length of them, insisting he had too much 'planning' to do. It had happened so gradually Jamie had barely noticed, and in truth his father was boring, it was his mom's family he wanted to be a part of.

'You're mom's not sounding so great here,' Laura said hesitantly.

Jamie sighed. 'I know, but she's the only mom I've got, and I kinda understand why she was like that. Is like that.'

'She has three children though.'

Jamie tried to push Laura's words to one side, it didn't do him any good to think like that.

'My mom's not very well,' he said and Laura's eyes widened. 'I mean in the head sometimes, I can tell there's something wrong. Everyone walks on eggshells around her, her and Lou hardly ever argue, and when they do it's mom who does the shouting. And he's not the kinda guy who'll be pushed around but he never raises his voice to her.' Louis would shout all right, but never at Charlotte.

Laura's face softened. 'Aw he sounds so sweet, he must really love your mom.'

Great so now she was swooning over his stepdad.

'Yeah Lou does love my mom, I don't doubt that for one minute. And I think he tries to protect her, from everything.' Jamie paused a moment. 'Especially from my dad.'

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