Simon Beckett - Owning Jacob - SA

The other man looked away with a snort of derision. “You’re not fucking worth it,” he said, but Ben was attuned enough now to see his uncertainty. It fuelled him.

“Come on, you curly-haired twat!” He had his fists balled. “Come on!”

The other man kept his head averted, “Just leave me alone.”

There was a moment of savage joy when Ben almost hit him anyway. It burst as swiftly as an overfilled balloon. He stopped and let the other man go into the sports hall ahead of him as the shame rose up. He wanted to chase after him and say he was sorry, that he wasn’t really like that.

Aren’t I?

He could exorcise his frustration on a football pitch, with someone he didn’t feel threatened by, but not when it mattered. He would never have dared do it with Kale. So what did that make him? Lavish with self-disgust, he went into his team’s changing room to get showered.

Both teams went for a drink afterwards, filling one side of the pub with the smell of wet hair, deodorant and talc. Some of the players ignored him, especially on the opposing side, but others grinned and made boxing jokes.

He’d only gone to the pub because he’d hoped to restore some of his self-esteem by apologising to the curly-haired player. He’d visualised shaking his hand, buying him a drink, laughing about how stupid they’d been in the heat of the moment, until he’d begun to feel as though it had actually happened. But in the pub there was no sign of the other man. Ben heard someone say that he’d gone straight home.

He stood with Colin at one end of the bar. He could tell by Colin’s stiffness that he had something to say. Knowing he had deserved it, Ben waited.

“It’s no good taking it out on everybody else,” Colin said finally, when no one else was in earshot. He occupied himself by unwrapping the cellophane from a cigar. It was a habit he had only recently acquired, and Ben still wasn’t used to seeing him smoking them.

“Taking what out?” he asked, even though he knew.

“This business with Jacob. I know it’s frustrating but you’re going to have to get hold of yourself.”

“I lost my temper, that’s all.”

Colin just looked at him. Ben sighed.

“All right, I’m sorry. But it’s just... shit, it’s just so frustrating !”

“Kale’s only stopped you seeing him once. He might change his mind once things settle down.”

“He might let me sleep with his wife as well.”

Ben wondered if he’d really made that particular comparison.

Colin lit the cigar and puffed on it self-consciously. “I admit it isn’t very likely, but you’re just going to have to be patient and hope he comes round. You can’t do anything on the basis of one visit.”

“It isn’t going to make any difference whether it’s one visit or twenty. Kale isn’t going to budge. He doesn’t have to, he’s got Jacob now. Everything’s on his side.”

Colin tapped his cigar into an ashtray, frowning. “He can’t stop you from seeing him indefinitely.”

Ben swirled the beer around in his glass. “Can’t he?”

He’d already told Jacob’s social worker what had happened.

Carlisle had listened with the weary expression of someone who’d heard it all before. He’d grudgingly agreed to contact the Kales, but his manner grew downright frosty after Sandra told him that Ben had arrived late and drunk. Ben’s protests that she was lying were met with a stony insistence that the local authority couldn’t intervene in ‘personal squabbles’.

Incensed, he’d gone to see Ann Usherwood. He’d expected reassurances and promises of action. Instead she warned him that the social services were notoriously reluctant to become involved in arguments over contact. If Kale continued to prevent him from seeing Jacob, Ben could eventually take him to court, she conceded. But such disputes were always expensive and messy, and any rulings difficult to enforce.

Thinking about Kale, Ben knew it might be impossible.

As a last-ditch attempt he had phoned Sandra Kale, calling when her husband would be at work in the hope of persuading her to appeal to him.

“I know we got off to a bad start,” he’d said, before she could hang up. “But I’m not trying to take Jacob away again. I only want him to let me see him occasionally.”

“It’s nothing to do with me,” she’d said, indifferently. “He’s John’s kid, not mine.”

“But you’re his wife. Can’t you...?”

“No, I can’t,” she’d cut in. “So why don’t you just fuck off?”

It took an effort not to shout at her. “I’m not going to just give up.” He could hear her breathing.

“You would if you’d any sense,” she’d said, ending the conversation.

But he couldn’t. The alternative was to let each month put more distance between himself and Jacob. The boy was only six, and autistic He didn’t make the normal associations, might not remember a relationship with someone from a half-forgotten life. And then Ben’s last memories of his marriage to Sarah, the family he’d thought he’d had, would be proved ultimately worthless, would turn to dust and blow away.

He stopped playing with his beer and took a drink of it instead. “I just don’t know what else I can do,” he said, setting down the glass. “Kale’s already made up his mind, and I can’t see him having a spontaneous change of heart.”

The cigar sent aromatic smoke around Colin’s head. “Is there anyone else you could speak to? Somebody like a neighbour or friend, who could act as an intermediary. Talk some sense into them.”

“I don’t think so,” Ben said. But even as he spoke he’d already thought of someone.

It was the first Saturday he had taken off in weeks, since the hangover hell after the night with Zoe. He woke early and cooked himself scrambled eggs and grilled tomatoes. He ate them at the kitchen table, which seemed too big now he was the only person who sat at it. Afterwards he was still hungry, so he had a dish of cereal. He’d noticed he was tasting his food more since he had cut down on the joints.

He would have set off straightaway, except for the feeling that he ought to visit the cemetery. He’d only been once since the funeral, but that didn’t bother him. He didn’t feel the need to stand over a patch of ground when he carried thoughts of Sarah around with him every day. That morning, though, he felt an impulse to go.

The wind held a hint of rain as he made his way to the grave. Sarah had told him that she wanted to be buried during a drunken ‘when I die’ conversation one night. Ben had said he wanted to be cremated except for his penis, which she could save as a keepsake. The memory of her laughter was carried away on the wind before he had a chance to smile.

The grave was part of a row of other new ones. There was no stone yet because the ground had to be left to settle. The grass was growing over it nicely, though, which pleased him. He put the flowers he’d brought in one of the two earthenware vases at the grave’s head. Someone, her parents probably, had recently left another bunch. They were nearly dead, but he left them where they were because he didn’t want to risk upsetting her mother by throwing them away.

He felt a twinge of conscience that he hadn’t been in touch since the whole mess with Jacob had come out. He hadn’t wanted to make things worse, but enough time had passed now to soften what had happened. Wiping his hands dry, he told Sarah that he would make the effort, but reminded her that her mother was a difficult cow, so he couldn’t promise anything.

He stood remembering while the wind plucked at him, then went back to his car.

Islington was ten miles north of Tunford. Ben came off the motorway at the same junction and followed the same route for a while before turning off. The road signs led him past an industrial estate and then back out into a brief splash of green countryside before the town began.