"I just wanted to get a second opinion," I tell her with a half smile. 

Jenn nods and brushes her deep red hair back off her head, relaxing back in her chair while we wait.   She looks stressed but then, every GP I know looks stressed.  She works four nights a week at a mobile drop-in centre around Brixton as well as full time here and it shows on her pale face and large pale blue eyes.  I haven't seen her in so long, and each time I do I wonder why I don't see her more.

"You look really well Alex," she says with a warm smile. 

I give her a sceptical look.  "Thanks, I really don't feel it."

"Sickness?"

No, just the spectre of evil men clinging to my back.  "A little, but just today.  Mainly I'm tired, I feel tired all day."

She tilts her head in understanding.  "It'll get a little worse before it gets better, unfortunately - but maybe not - it's different for everyone as you know."  She shrugs. I did know.   Weirdly, I'd never given pregnancy symptoms much though before now.  I'd always considered them in a sort of abstract way; things that other people experienced but that I never would. But here I was.  "So, I didn't know you were seeing someone." she says, her eyes brightening with curiosity.  I don't use social media and so since we haven't seen each other in about six months I don't know how she would know unless I turned up in her office pregnant. 

"It's still fairly new, which yes, makes this even more embarrassing right?" I admit.  I'd already explained to her that it was unplanned. I felt embarrassed every time I thought about Jake and I's happy accident, as though I should have known better - which of course I should have. 

She shakes her head in a very non-committal way and shrugs again.  "Imagine we got to pick when and to who we got pregnant by? Christ, I'd have five by Jamie Dornan already."

"The Irish actor?"  I nod.  "He is very good looking."

"And what about the Daddy?" She asks before her face transforms in horror. "Fuck, that sounded weird - ignore me -" she covers her mouth to hold in a bubble of laughter. "I meant, what about your guy?  What's he like?  Good looking?"

"Well, my mum thinks so." I smile. 

She laughs again.  "And how and where did you guys meet. Are you in love?" This was Jenn's way.  Direct to the point of pushy.  It came the other way too, though - she overshared more than some people were fully comfortable with.   She was the same at Cambridge.  Rob isn't a fan of her.  Suddenly I remember why I don't see her more.  Rob gets pissy whenever I mention Jenn.  I think Rob thinks because we're both doctors it gives us a kind of bond that Rob and I will never have. It's nonsense of course but I find it cute when ever she gets pissy over Jenn. 

"Yes, we're very much in love," I tell her.  "And we met in a nightclub of all places," I tuck a stray section of hair behind my ear and let my eyes drift over her shoulder. The more I tell the story of how Jake and I met, the more truth it gathered.  "He asked me to take a look at a sick member of staff of his.  All lies, he really just wanted to seduce me." I smile.

She's looking at me wide-eyed.

"It worked,"  I shrug.

"Yes.  It certainly did,"  she raises her eyebrows, throwing a pointed glance at the white plastic tube.   "So have you spoken to him already, about this?"

I shake my head, dropping my eyes from hers.  "Not yet.  I only took the test last week.  I wanted to be sure first."

She nods.  "So how is he going to react, do you think?"

The million dollar question.  How was Jake going to react to this? I'd asked myself it a million times.

"Honestly, I'm not sure," I admit after a moment.  "I mean I think he'll be okay.  He has a little boy already, from a previous relationship, so at least the concept of a child isn't going to be a complete shock for him."

"He does? Wow." The look of shock is clear on her pretty features.

"What?"

She shakes her head "Nothing, I just never expected that."

"'that'?"

"I don't know," she shakes her head, looks at the tube and then back at me.  Then she makes a sweeping gesture towards me with her hand.   "You. Pregnant to a guy you're not married to, who you met at a nightclub, who has a child from a previous relationship.  It's just not what I imagined that's all - It's certainly not the Alex Marlowe from Cambridge that I used to know anyway," Her eyes sparkle with something mischievous.  She isn't judging me, there's a smattering of schadenfreude perhaps, but no judgement. 

"You thought I'd marry Ben Cooke the consultant, we'd relocate back to his family home in the Oxfordshire countryside and start a family when the nursery was ready?" I raise an eyebrow.  Jenn snorts and shakes her head. 

"No, not really.  But the overly sensible, studious, cautious Alex I went to Cambridge with would be completely freaking out right now.  But you're not," she remarks. "You seem extremely... calm about it all."

Calm?  Was that the serenity Rob mentioned before?  I feel calm. About the baby on its own I felt mainly calm. It was when I thought about everything else the panic set in.  But I mean what did I have to be calm about?  Seriously.  On paper, it wasn't exactly a bed of roses. Pregnant to a man I'd met only a few months ago.   Throw in Jake's past and the mess we had to get ourselves out of with his Dan and it becomes something I'd never have envisioned for myself in a million years.  It was something from a movie or a far-fetched romance book.  But it was neither of those things.  It was my life, and despite everything, I was rather happy with it.   I had him, I loved him and that was all that mattered.   But I am also loved by him in a way I never believed was even possible. 

"People change," I offer with a shrug.  Simplistic perhaps, but true.  I'd certainly changed. He'd changed me.

"Evidently," she smiles.   "And you look all the better for it."

I smile in response and glance down at my watch, hoping it will urge her to put me out of my misery.  She takes the hint and leans forward to lift the test stick and uncap it. 

That's when it hits me.  Fear.  Cold icy fear. 

If it's negative I'll be devastated. Heartbroken.  Bereft even.  Despite the untimeliness of it all, I want Jake's baby.  I want to feel it grow inside me and I want to bring it into the world with him by my side.  I want to raise it with him and love it with him.  Oh god, I feel sick with nerves now. 

I watch as Jenn lifts the stick, pulls the lid off and slowly lifts her eyes to meet mine.  I'm not breathing.

"Congratulations Alex.  Looks like your diagnosis was spot on doctor." She's smiling and I release the breath I was holding.

Letting the news sink into the sea of relief inside me, a rush of emotion asserts itself against my throat and the backs of my eyes and for a moment I think I might burst into tears.  But then as fast as it arrived, it recedes and I manage to smile   

"I was terrified there," I swallow, a little breathless.

Jenn has a knowing twinkle in her eye.  "Because you really wanted it to be positive. Often it takes until that very moment to realise just how much.  I'm delighted for you Alex, really."  She rolls her chair across the blue linoleum floor to her computer and starts typing.  "So... last period?"

"Mmmm just over eight weeks ago," I reach into my bag for my phone to check the dates. Christ so much has happened since then. 

"So end of June/start of July?" Jenn asks before I get the chance to confirm it from my calendar.  Her face is pressed closer to the screen now.

"Yes.  It finished around the 3rd," I nod.  So I had met, fallen in love, and gotten pregnant with Jake's child in the space of four weeks.  I'm certain that's the very definition of a whirlwind. 

"Which means..." she glances at her other screen and counts inaudibly.  "Hmmm...April. Your baby is due on the on the 10th of April," She gasps, spinning around her chair to face me, her eyes round and bright with excitement.  I wonder what my eyes hold in them.  Fear.  Panic.  Or serenity?  I feel spectacularly calm and my thoughts organised and static.  I feel slightly dazed too, as though I'm floating on air or a calm body of water.  "The dating scan should confirm that and I'll just book you in now for it.  Is St James' or Greenville better for you?"

"St James', it's closer to work." I'll need to tell Douglas.  Well, as soon as I've told Jake I need to tell Douglas.  I can't tell anyone until I've told Jake.  And now there was really no conceivable reason not to.  Apart from the ever increasing pile of 'dark shit' we were trying to climb to the top of.  Did this add to the pile?  Would he see this as a different pile?  Oh, I hope so.  I want him to be happy.  Like I'm happy. 

Jenn nods and taps the keyboard a few more times.  "Your address is still the same I assume?" She asks. 

"It is," I confirm. 

Once she's finished with the referral, she stands and crosses to the row of low white cupboards pressed against the far wall of her offices, reaching in to retrieve a stack of glossy colourful leaflets.  They're the standard 'So you're pregnant - what next?' and 'How best to prepare for your baby' pamphlets that I've handed out a hundred times before but I take them from her anyway and she gives me a sort of ironic smile and sits back down.  Then to her credit, she remains completely professional as she explains to me what does happen next and how best to prepare. 

"We should catch up for lunch sometime soon?" She suggests as she walks me to the door a short while later.  "No cocktails this time though unfortunately —  you can't have one of those for a while," She sighs regretfully. 

I groan.  "The lack of wine is already killing me Jenn please don't remind me.  But lunch would be great - I'm still on the same number.  Let me know when you're free and we can do something?"

"Sounds good. I can't wait to meet the father too," she says raising her eyebrows.  "I'll send you a text in the next few days and we'll sort something out."

"Perfect," I nod. 

At the door, she reaches out to pull me into a warm linen scented hug.  "Congratulations again Alex.  You're going to be a great mum."  Her smile is genuine and filled with warmth and I return it with a fragile thanks and a promise to see her soon. 

***

The irony isn't lost on me.   How now I was the one sneaking around, evading, and keeping things from him.  I'd told Jenn that people changed, and never did this feel more evident than it did today.  

Jake said that people didn't change, that their behaviours simply changed - which I suppose is also true.  But there was no getting away from the fact that I was now the one with secrets.   It makes me a hypocrite, I know this.  But when I tell him everything, which I will soon, he'll understand the reasons why.  He'll understand that I withheld them because these were things which could affect us in ways that I'm not sure we're equipped to handle right now.

I feel nauseous.  Again.  Today had been the first day I'd felt anything even resembling morning sickness.  I'd had to dart out of the shower and kneel by the toilet bowl dripping wet and freezing cold waiting for it to pass.   It's hard to tell whether this current wave is pregnancy related or because I'm about to do something that Jake might see as unforgivable. 

I haven't been here since I lived in London.  Ben's rented house was in Islington, but we'd often come here for a run or an extended walk on Sunday afternoons.  We'd park the car near Childs Hill and follow the footpath around and up onto Parliament Hill to enjoy the view.  Those days seem like a lifetime ago now, like sections of a story I'd read or a scene from a movie I'd watched once.  They don't feel part of a life I'd lived.  Funny, everything that had happened to me up until the moment I met Jake, when I think back on them now, are slightly blurred and out of focus. It was as though he had given everything definition and proportion.

Now, I take the same route as Ben and I used to, climbing the incline steadily, looking out over the ever expanding view of the fog covered grey city sprawled out for miles on all sides.  London looks better from up here I think — to me, it always looks better from afar.  On TV and in movies it held a kind of abstract allure that it lacked in real life.  When you were down there amongst it, it was mainly full of rushing bodies, careless drivers and choking transport fumes.  People who live in London feel differently, of course.  They fail to see it's less attractive sides; it's dark underbelly, the heartless detached way it drained its inhabitants, the dark parts it tried to hide.  

The take-out coffee I'd bought from the vendor by the gate starts to cool, and I don't need to blow as I lift it to my mouth this time.  It only occurs to me then that I should have brought two.  A tea maybe.    I scan the people of varying shapes and sizes for one that looks familiar but no one stands out. 

As I fish into my bag for my phone, to check for an instruction or cancellation, all there is is a text from Jake to say he'd just picked up Caleb and asking if I'm sure I didn't want to join them for burger night.   I'd declined when he asked me this morning because I've so much work to do when I get home — we were still in the process of hiring a new GP to replace Sam, and I had about ten applications to review before Thursday.   Wednesday night was out because we were having dinner with Dan.  Jake had been trying to think of a way to cancel since Sunday but I'd reminded him that last minute cancellations didn't ever tend to go down that well. 

I reply back saying that I wish I could make burger night but I can't and ask him to hug Caleb for me, finishing with a promise to call him later.  I'm about to dial the number to see if I've been stood up when I glance up once more and see her. 

She's about twenty feet or so away, wrapped in a light coat belted at her slight waist and looking around her with anxious curiosity.  When she spots me she offers me a small tight wave, which is echoed in her smile too, and begins hurrying toward me.    I  gesture towards the green bench halfway between us which is presently occupied by an older gentleman with a small collie breed of dog on a leash.  She reaches it first and the gentleman smiles politely at her as she settles herself down an arms length away from him.

I smile as warmly as my nerves and doubt will allow as I take a seat next to her on the bench.  "You found it okay then?" I ask, lifting my coffee to my mouth.

"Fine, yeah. A bit of a walk up 'ere though isn't it?" Her breaths sound laboured with the effort.   

"It can be if you're out of practice yes," I agree.  "I should have brought you one, sorry." I lift the brown paper cup guiltily but she just waves her hand dismissively. 

"Must admit," she looks down at her hands and then back up, a little dejectedly.  "I was hoping you'd managed to get 'im to come with you.  Last minute change of heart or something," she sighs.  It's a sad hopeless sound. 

I offer her an apologetic smile. "Jake isn't really one for last-minute changes of heart," I say.  He isn't.  He's strong and decisive and he knows exactly what he wants.  And by the same token, what he doesn't want. 

She nods, sadly.  

I take a deep breath.  "He doesn't know I'm here. I haven't told him. If I told him then I couldn't have come," I explain.  He'd have asked me not to, demanded me not to.  He'd likely make me choose.  Him of her.  And of course, I'd always choose him.  

When I look at Susan she's nodding, eyes studying me carefully.  "I understand."

"I'm not sure why I'm here because honestly, I don't think I'll ever get him to change his mind about this — I don't think I can fix this," I say hopelessly.  I'm not sure whether I even want to fix this. Whether she deserves a second chance. I guess that's part of the reason I'm here - to see what she wants and what she deserves.   "He's very... angry," I add.

"I don't blame him for being angry with me," She says, lifting her head to look out over the green sloping plane that drops down to reveal the city view.  Her profile doesn't share too many similarities with Jake's.  There are sprinklings, hints across the forehead, echoes in the expressions.  But that's all.  "That's his right."

The man to our left shifts slightly in his seat causing the bench to creak.  I'm not sure if it's just my imagination or if he's just leant in a little closer.   When I shoot him a curious look he just smiles and turns his head back towards the view laid out before us. 

"He never told me much about his childhood.  A little, against his will, but not a lot," I say.  When she turns, an attentive look in her eye, I decide to go on.  "Jake's an island in lots of ways.  Sometimes he lets me in, sometimes willingly, sometimes because I force my way in. He's not comfortable sharing things. But he's getting better.."

Susan bites the inside of her lip, her pale blonde hair tickling the side of her face as a faint breeze skips across us.   She seems not to notice it for a moment or two, but then she scoops it away behind her ear before clasping her hands tight together again. 

"I thought they'd do better without me," she says after a moment.  I wasn't much good to anyone back then, didn't know how to be a mother — and not in the way young mum's don't know — I just couldn't find it in myself to act like I knew mums was supposed to.  Mine was a hard old bitch - so maybe she handed that down to me," Her face hardens as she says it, giving the words more of an emphasis.   "She never wanted me, saw me as a burden and a nuisance and I suppose I just passed that down onto them two."

She takes a deep breath and lets her shoulders drop.  I want to know more about his brother then, what kind of relationship they had with each other. I also want to know what kind of child Jake was.  Had he been happy at all?  Had she ever told him she loved him or that she was proud of him? 

It breaks my heart thinking of him devoid of any kind words or loving embraces in his formative years, in those years where we learned who we were and what we could become, what our capabilities were. Those years where we withered or bloomed.  I run a hand over my stomach subconsciously.  Susan doesn't notice.  Did his anger towards her begin before or after she left him in that children's home?

"He told me that you drank a lot?"  I say evenly.  I've been trying my hardest not to judge her, but I suppose I already have.  I'd judged her the moment Jake told me about her in the restaurant that night.  

Suddenly, as if he's just experienced the surprising growth of a conscience, the elderly gentleman occupying the other end of our bench stands, makes a clicking noise to his black and white dog before they begin toddling off down the hill.  Susan takes this as the opportunity to stake her claim on the vacant end of the bench, shifting herself along it to where the man had previously been sitting.  I move inwards too, plopping my bag between us and laying my jacket over it.    She takes her time before speaking again.

"I'm an alcoholic," she says finally.  "Have been for a long long time  — and it took me as long a time to admit that," She exhales.  As I look down I see that she's knotting her hands together, something she did back at the flat too, a tense nervous display.  I notice she's wearing a thin gold wedding band on her ring finger.  Which meant unless it's some token of lingering devotion to Jake's absent father, she'd remarried.  Which meant Jake had a stepfather. 

"Do you still," I hesitate, still marginally distracted by the sight of the wedding band.   "I mean, have you stopped drinking?"    

"No. Not since five years last Sunday." She says.  There's no pride in her voice, just a kind of non-emotive truth. 

"Well, that's good.  That might help..."  Help?? Help with what exactly Alex? I doubt Jake would want to see her even if I told him that she'd taken up Mother Theresa's work in her homes for the dying and she was primed for sainthood.   "I suppose what I mean is - it might help him see that you're not the same person you were back then."

Actually no, that won't help either because Jake doesn't think people can change. She lets out another tired sounding breath and shakes her hear. Susan can also see that this won't help.

"I'm still the same person I was then," she says regretfully. "I just have my priorities in order, I see things a bit different now I 'spose."

"You waited such a long time before coming to see him — twenty years? He must think that you never cared at all." Did she care at all? I want to ask her.  But I decide not to. I watch her closely instead. She seems to care. By that I mean that she seems broken and sad, but since I don't know her I honestly don't know whether any of this is genuine.  Christ, I've never felt so clumsy and ill-equipped for something before in my life.  I don't know what I'm doing here.  Because you have no business being here, that's why.  

A crease appears between her eyebrows, confusion and uncertainty filling out the lines of her face.  "Well, not quite that long." She says.

"What do you mean?" I frown.  "Oh, you mean when you came to the children's home, with Christmas presents," I nod.   "Yes, he told me about that." Even now the memory fills me with a heartbreaking kind of despair.  I lift my cool coffee and sip and try hard to avoid her eyes. 

"No, not then.  I came looking for 'im a few years back," she tells me.  My head turns around to face her, to search for any trace of untruth in her eyes but I see none.  "Got a warning from Dan instead," she says in a brittle voice.   

"Dan?  You mean Danny Ward?  You know Danny?" I ask, mouth agape. 

She gives me a small smile, which speaks to very mild condescension.  "Everybody from the east end knows Danny Ward love," she says.  "But I'm gonna guess you're not from around there are you?" She tells me, her eyes skimming the whole of my face.  It's a rhetorical question.  Something else lights up her eyes a second later, and she turns round to face me more fully.  "You know, you're not the kind of girl I ever imagined him with," she shakes her head.  There's wonderment in her eyes I think.  Well,  she doesn't sound disappointed at least.  A part of me wonders if Vicky would be the kind of girl she imagined him with.  Does she know Vicky?  If she knows Danny then maybe she would know Vicky? 

"What happened when you found Dan?  When was this?" I ask instead, choosing to ignore the previous remark.  This was new information.  She had come to see him sooner.  He made no reference to it before.  Had Dan kept this from him? 

"About six years ago maybe, before I gave up the drinking..." she shakes her head, thinking hard.  "Christ, was it really that long ago?  But yeah, I went round the estate looking for him, asking if they knew what happened to him, where I mind find him. Was all new faces a'course - no one I recognised - but they knew Jake's name when I mentioned it.  Oh they knew him alright. Told me a few places where I might find him — Danny's places," she grits.     "Second place I went to was a bar just off Stepney Green.  It's closed down now, windows were all boarded up went I went round there the other day - mind you they was boarded up the night I went looking for him too.   Anyway, that night, he wasn't there, but I asked the old lad behind the bar if he knew him - which of course 'e did.  The lad told me to wait about, said Jake had been in earlier but he was coming back in a bit.  So I waited.   And about twenty minutes later Dan appeared."

"People asking questions about Jake in one of Danny's places wasn't going to go un-noticed I don't suppose," I mutter.  

"Exactly," she confirms. She turns to look out down the hill, pensive and thoughtful.  "I knew Dan back when he was a lad, nicking things from the back of vans and selling them down Broadway market.  He ain't changed much.  Still just a petty thief and violent little thug, still finks he's untouchable, still telling people what to do and making it seem like they've no other option."

"So, what did he tell you to do that night?"

"Disappear again."

A cold rumble of dread moves through me, a sinking feeling coupled with anger.  "He threatened you?" I ask my voice a half whisper. 

She turns to me, her bright blue eyes glittering and wide. "Dan never threatens people love, not outright anyway, not himself.  Nah, he just had a word.  Told me that Jake was just getting himself together, that he'd been through a hard time of it.  Dan said this whole thing would be better coming from him first.  Said he'd talk to him for me when the time was right, when Jake could handle it. He said Jake would come to me.  Positive about that too he was.  As if it would be up to him, not Jake," she tuts and shakes her head but there's a bitterness to her voice.  

"Jake never mentioned this, I'm certain he doesn't know - Dan never told him..." I shake my head. 

"You said yourself he doesn't always share things with you," she says.

When I turn to her, resentful at the insinuation, her eyes are soft.  There's hope in them too, and fear, and I relax.  Like me, she wants to believe that Jake didn't know about her visit.  She wants to believe this is the reason he never sought her out.  But she's afraid that maybe he just didn't want to. 

"He thinks you're back because you want money from him, not because you care." I tell her. It makes me feel heartless and cruel.

She nods.  "Then you should know that Dan gave me money that night. Well, I mean he had it delivered, after.  As long as I promised to stick to my end of the deal, and wait for him to come to me." She's staring straight ahead again, avoiding my eyes.

"So then it was bribery? He bribed you not to try and make contact again with your own son?

She smiles a hollow smile but still doesn't look at me.  "He made it so it wasn't like that, but I guess we both knew what it was.  I took the money and left without much of a fight.  Without any fight really.  She turns her head then.   "But people don't tend to fight with Dan when he suggests they do something, you know?"

I didn't know.  But I was starting to understand. 

So Dan had kept them apart all those years ago.  I wonder if it was why he'd turned up at the flat on Sunday morning too.  He'd heard that Susan had been looking for Jake again and was concerned about Jake's reaction if he'd known what happened five years ago. Dan still very much wanted Jake on his side, needed him on his side.  This, I find brings a small element of comfort.   

"But I'm not here for his money Alex, nothing like that, I'm not even here to be his mother," she says sadly.  There's genuine pain in her eyes and it pulls at something inside me.  "I'm not owed anything from him - from either of them - I had my chance to be their mother and that's that.  I wasn't a mother to them back then and there's no chance in hell I get to just walk back into their lives and start over," She states unequivocally.   A wall of emotion pushes up against me, at the fragile tone of her voice, the deep regret contained in every word, the hopeless acceptance in her eyes.  I want to cry.  For her and for Jake and his brother.  "He's happy now... because of you I gather." 

She's looking sideways at me, her mouth soft and an altogether lighter expression on her face.  When I frown in confusion at how she possibly knows that he's happy because of me she inhales deeply, before she begins nibbling on the inside of her cheek. In almost the exact same manner that Jake does.  "I sat outside his place the other day, after," she looks a little embarrassed by the admission.  "Behind his building, across the street, there's that little cafe - expensive for a tea mind you - but I didn't want to leave just yet.  Case he changed his mind or something you know?  So I just sat there at the window and had my tea.  Lost track of how long I sat there before the two of you came out."  She looks back at me with a smile. "He said something in your ear and you laughed, and then he smiled at you.  Properly.  I never saw him smile like that before - not since he was very little anyway," she shakes her head and I try and think back to what it was that Jake had said to make me laugh. Something cocky probably, naughty most likely. 

When she talks again I almost stop breathing in order to hear her better.  Her voice is wispy and quiet and I don't want to miss a word of this.   "He was a happy baby to start off with, giggled and laughed all the time, never cried, slept when he was supposed to, ate when he was supposed to. But then he just changed — overnight it was like — and he started to cry a lot.  When he got a little older, three or four, he just seemed to get real quiet — and it was sort of like he was scared all the time." A flicker of guilt moves over her eyes and she's quiet for a long moment.  "But it was nice to see him smiling again," she says directly to me, smiling wide herself. 

"So, what is it you want?" My words seem too hard somehow and too full of accusation. So I soften my eyes on her.  "You don't want to be his mother, you don't want money, so what is it you do want?  Forgiveness?"    

When I urge her with my eyes she sits up a little straighter and looks out at the view again.  "Been thinking about a lot of things this past while, and I decided that I had to try again.  One last time at least.  I ain't scared of Danny bloomin Ward," she snorts derisively.  "Lot worse things to be scared off in this world than a jumped up car salesman you know?  I had to try and put my house in order," she begins twisting her wedding band round and round rhythmically as she stares ahead thoughtfully. "Brian wanted to come down with me.  He didn't want me coming here on my own — getting upset.  Thinks he can fight off everything that one,"  She smiles lovingly.   

"Brian's your husband?" I ask, gazing down at the thin gold band. 

She nods, "We just got married last year."

"Congratulations," I offer. 

She turns and gives me a wide smile, almost as wide as when she talked about how nice it was to see Jake smiling again.  "It was just the two of us, and his daughter. She's grown up with a family of her own but it was a nice day."  She takes a deep breath.  "I thought about coming to see Jake then, before. I thought maybe he might have come along, but I decided against it in the end."

"What about Jake's brother?  Have you looked for him?  Jake said he wrote to him a few years back but the letters stopped coming." 

Her eyes lighten a fraction. "I haven't seen him but we've talked on the phone and he sends us emails.   He lives in Florida now, with his wife: an American girl he met in the army.  They have four little boys." 

"Ohh..." I whisper.  A swell of something thick and hard has risen up into my throat and feels lodged there.  Jake has a whole extended family he knows nothing about.  Our child has cousins. Caleb has cousins, aunts and uncles, grandparents.  

"Jon said Jake stopped replying to his letters, and when he tried again the letters got returned.  He didn't know what else to do," She shrugs. 

I frown at her. So what he just gave up?  A whole family torn apart. I feel another surge of anger rise, burning the lump in my throat to a cinder.  But can I really blame all of this on Susan and Jon when Jake did nothing to try and find them either?  Really it was just very sad. Sad and tragic and pointless.

"He was alone for so many years," I say more to myself than her.  "I guess he learned to cope. He doesn't feel he needs either of you now."

"I'm sure he doesn't need us now.  He has you, and his little boy," She replies softly.   "It looks like both of them did fine without me." 

I round on her again. Fine?  A children's home and prison and then under some unsavoury tutelage of one of the most dangerous men in London?  Fine? If he had turned out fine then it was in spite of all of these things, these odds stacked against him, not because of them.  He was forced to make difficult choices, choices I nor she have any clue about.

I get why to you I should have made different choices... Everything I've ever done, every bad choice I ever made was worth it the night I met you...

My anger fades quickly, burning through me and out into the soft autumn breeze.  She looks so sad and so small and quite weak actually as I stare at her.  Her skin is thin and from here I can see the finest of blue veins illuminated beneath it.  Her slight frame, small square shoulders and small bird-like hands make her look alone and lost and sad. 

"Everyone needs a family around them, it's how we learn how to love unconditionally,"  I say quietly, turning back to face the view.  If he still wants nothing to do with her then he would have me and Caleb and the child we would raise together to give him this.      

"That's true," she says with a small nod.  "Having a family around you is important — I understand that now in a way I didn't before."  I assume she means before Brian.   She turns to me then.  "And they both have their own families now.  But Jake... well he was always my baby, my beautiful baby boy, and I needed to know he was okay before I go.   I wanted to try and sort things a little with him before I went."

"Why? Where are you going?" I turn to face her.

She takes a long deep breath as she drinks in the view.

"I'm dying," she says simply.