Danielle Steel - Daddy

“He was very nervous, but he looks like a proud papa now. Oh Sarah, you should see him.” He was proud of him, and happy for him, and sad all at the same time.

“You're such an old softie, Oliver Watson. You should be having more kids of your own one of these days.” It was an odd thing for her to say, but their lives were in separate worlds now.

“So I've been told. How are you, by the way?”

“I'm all right.”

“Your eyes okay?”

“Still a little colorful, but they'll do. Give Benjamin my love. I'll call him tomorrow.”

“Take care of yourself.” He sounded sad again. Sometimes it still hurt to call her, but he was glad he had anyway. It was her grandson too. And he had wanted to tell her.

“Congratulations.” She smiled into the phone, “Grampa.”

“Same to you. It makes us sound ancient, doesn't it?”

“I don't know. I think I kind of like it.”

He hung up then, and waited for Benjamin to emerge. He drove him back to the house in Purchase, and it was the first time in six months that he had slept in his old room. He had left in defiance, and come home a father. It was a strange world, Oliver thought to himself, as he walked to his room, thinking of the baby that had been born that night. He wished him an easy life, an easy berth, and an easier path into manhood than his father had just had. And in his own bed Benjamin had just drifted off to sleep at last, smiling about his baby.

Chapter 20

Oliver drove them home from the hospital to the dismal apartment in Port Chester, and no amount of pleading had induced them to come home to Purchase, He suspected that Sandra would have gladly given in to the idea, but Benjamin insisted they could manage on their own. He was going to take care of her, and the baby. He had taken two weeks off from work, and by then everything was going to be in control But whenever Oliver called them after that, the baby was screaming, and when he went to visit them the following week, Sandra looked dreadful. She was pale, with dark circles under her eyes and was in obvious pain. Benjamin looked as though he was beside himself, and the apartment was a disaster.

It was four days later when Oliver got a call in the middle of the night at the New York apartment. It was Benjamin. Sandra had been taken into the hospital, with an infection from the cesarean, and he was managing the baby by himself. He was in tears when he called, and Oliver went and picked him up, packed all the baby's things, and brought both of them home with him.

“Agnes can take care of Alex, and you can get some sleep for a change.” This time he wasn't going to argue with him. Benjamin had never looked worse. He seemed relieved to turn things over to someone else for once, and the next day, when he came back from the office, he sat Benjamin down for a long talk. The baby was screaming all the time, and Sandra was complaining. He couldn't find a second job, and they could hardly make ends meet. Suddenly it was all crashing in on him, and he was panicking. And no matter how cute the baby was, Oliver was sorry again that they had had him.

“Son, you have to think about this carefully. Is this really what you want to do with your life? Do you really feel you can keep the baby? And more importantly, what are you going to do about yourself? Do you want to work as a busboy for the rest of your life? And what about Sandra?”

These were all the questions that had been plaguing the boy for months, and now he was overwhelmed. He admitted to his father that he didn't love Sandra anymore, he wondered if he ever had, and if he had, it hadn't been for a long time. He couldn't bear the thought of spending the rest of his life with her. But what complicated matters now was that he loved the baby.

“He's my baby, Dad. I can't leave him. I couldn't do that to him, or to myself. But I just don't think I can stay with her for much longer … but if I leave her, then I have to leave Alex with her.” And he had serious questions about her ability to mother the child. She seemed to have none of the instincts that he had assumed she would have. And all she thought of, as before, was herself, and not the baby.

“Why don't you give her a chance to get on her feet again? Maybe what you need to think about is supporting her, but not staying with her yourself.” And just exactly how was he going to do that? Washing dishes? Pumping gas? “I'll do everything I can to help you. Why don't you just relax for a few days, and try to sort your thoughts out.” But when he did, he felt responsible again. Sandra came out of the hospital, and feeling sorry for her, he took the baby and went back. Aggie was heartbroken to see him take the baby, and Oliver was equally so to see Benjamin go back again to do what he thought was right. He just wouldn't let go of what he felt were his obligations, and it broke Oliver's heart to think of him there, with the baby and the girl. He insisted on giving him five thousand dollars, and Benjamin had fought him like a tiger to give it back.

“Think of it as a loan then. I'm not going to have you starving with three of you to support. Be sensible, for chrissake.” And finally, Benjamin relented, promising to pay it back to him as soon as he could manage.

And matters grew more complicated still only two weeks later. The head of Ollie's firm called him in and made a request that took him totally by surprise. The head of the Los Angeles office was dying of cancer. He was leaving within the week on permanent medical leave and someone had to take his place. More than that, they wanted to enlarge the office, and make it as important as the one in New York. They wanted “bicoastal equilibrium,” as they put it, to be close to the television industry that was so important to them, and acquire bigger, better clients on the West Coast. And the chairman of the board had decided that Oliver was their main man to run it.

“For God's sake … but I can't do that … I have two kids in school here, a house, a life … I can't just uproot them and move three thousand miles away.” And now there was Benjamin with his problems with his baby. He couldn't walk out on him, the way Sarah had done to all of them the year before. “I'll have to think this over.” But the salary they mentioned, the terms, and the participation made it a deal he would have been crazy to refuse, and he knew it.

“For chrissake, Oliver, come to your senses. Take it! No one will ever make you another offer like that, and one day you'll wind up chairman of the board.” Daphne tried to talk sense to him that night, as they sat in his office long after everyone else had gone home.

“But what about my kids? My house? My father?”

“Don't be ridiculous. Your father has a life of his own, and a wife who loves him. And Benjamin has his own life now too. He'll sort himself out sooner or later, whether you're here or not. He's that kind of kid. He's just like you. And Mel and Sam would love it out there. Look how good they were about moving to New York.”

“But Christ, Daph, that's different. That's thirty miles from Purchase. This is three thousand miles from home.”

“Not if you make a home for yourself out there. And Melissa is a junior. In two years she'll be away in college somewhere. Don't use them as an excuse. Go for it! It's a terrific offer.” But Los Angeles? California? This was his home.

“I don't know. I have to think this over. I have to talk it over with the kids and see what they say.”

They were both shocked when he told them, but not as horrified as he would have expected them to be. They even seemed to like the idea after they thought it over. They didn't like the idea of leaving their friends, and Sam was worried about how often he would see Sarah, but Ollie said he could send them back to visit her fairly frequently, and they could spend their vacations with her. But to Ollie, it was still a hell of a thought, and a frightening prospect. And what's more, they wanted him out there within a month, sooner if he could make it.