#oh my god also the way he talks about trudy before revealing he was her brother. like i don't know how to describe it but it's so detached

[justmypartner]

Still Breathing: Chapter 7 

Summary: AU | When a case goes sideways, Hailey wakes up in the hospital with a revelation that leaves her evaluating her life. While she recovers at Med, she meets Jay, an aloof, yet intriguing patient that catches her by surprise. The two get to know one another as they take on the task of rediscovering what it’s like to truly live, and eventually learn their lives intersect in more ways than one.

Writer’s Note: I realize how mean that cliffhanger was, so I offer you this chapter in apology. I *hope* it makes up for the torture that last line of chapter 6 created. I think this is my favorite chapter so far, so I really hope you enjoy!!!

Read on AO3 or below

“I’m falling in love with you.” 

Stillness followed as those words left his mouth. They stood before one another, barely inches apart, and somehow it was still too much space. Her hand remained trapped in the confines of his, laying rest over his heart. It was as if the world around them stilled too. There was no noise, no wind, no movement, just the two of them there on her walkway, their hearts beating in sync with one another.

It took her a minute to process. At first, she wasn’t even sure if it was real — if the words that left his mouth weren’t just some figment of her imagination. Then she noticed the look on his face, the firm set of his jaw, and the glimmer in his eyes, and it was all enough to assure her that it was real. 

She released her hand from his grasp, reaching up to cradle his face. He closed his eyes with the touch, his hands finding her waist, pulling her even closer against him. It was the type of touch and intimacy that was unfamiliar for them, yet it felt like a habit they’d practiced every day. She raised up, ready to let everything go, the thought of his lips against hers the only thing on her mind. Then, he removed his hands from her waist and brought them to rest on her forearms, pushing her away gently. 

“You’ve had a lot to drink tonight,” he told her, a pang of regret in his voice.

She released the breath she was holding, dropping her forehead against his chest as she let out a confounded, “I know.”

“Trust me, I want this, I just want it when we both have a clear state of mind,” he told her, and she pulled away so that she could look up into his eyes. His level of honor and restraint only made it harder for her not to jump him right then. Though as difficult as it was to admit, she agreed. She wasn’t so happy about it in that moment, but she knew the future and sober version of herself would appreciate their prudence.

“You know, you ruined my surprise,” she whispered as her hands dropped from his face to his collar, fidgeting with it for a moment before resting against his chest. 

He cocked his head at her, his left brow raising to voice his lack of understanding. 

“That thing I needed to tell you earlier… I was going to say I’m falling in love with you too.” 

He bit his bottom lip to smother the smile that broke out with her words. He then grabbed her hand from his chest, slowly raising it up to leave a kiss on the top. Her eyes fluttered closed, melting at the sensation of his lips against her skin. God was she regretting those last few shots of tequila. 

“Goodnight, Hailey,” he said as his lips pulled away from her hand, a low gruff in his voice sending shivers down her spine.

“Goodnight, Jay,” she told him, grudgingly pulling away from his grasp.

She turned and walked up to her front door, turning around when she got there to see he was watching her every move.

She wasn’t just falling in love with him, she was nose-diving, like she had been shoved from a precipice with no warning. Hearing him say those words back only made it worse, giving her that feeling of falling all over again. Though, as enraptured as it made her, it also scared her half to death. She chose to push those fears aside for the time being. They were falling for one another, and that was the only thing that seemed to matter.

— — — —

“Upton! You coming to Molly’s tonight?” a voice echoed through the small locker room, startling her as she shoved the last of her things into her bag. When she closed her locker door, Adam was standing behind it with a look of anticipation on his face. Kim stood behind him with a similar look, both of them eagerly waiting for her response.

“I’m sorry, I have plans,” she told them. She had to force a sad tone, trying her best to keep the smile from breaking away at the thought of said plans.

Not even the hangover Hailey had woken with the morning after the confession was enough to dampen her mood. The first thing she saw when she woke was a text from him. 

Good Morning, please don’t work late tonight. We have plans. 

And don’t even ask, it’s a surprise ;)

She spent the rest of the day staring at the clock, and to her delight, the case wrapped early. 

She slugged her bag over her shoulder as she moved to exit the locker room. Kim and Adam followed her movements, keeping their eyes on her as she kept her stare straight ahead. 

“C’mon, it’s your last few days of desk duty. That’s something worth celebrating. Also, you’re starting to give me a complex. I’m thinking maybe you just don’t like us,” Adam said, the playful twitch in his voice making her chuckle. 

“Shut up. You know I love you guys, I just… have plans,” she said, nervously trying to avoid having to explain exactly what her plans were, or rather, who her plans were with.

“Uh huh. Are we ever going to get to meet these plans?” Kim questioned, her inquisitive look implying the double meaning of the word. 

“I- I don’t even know what that means,” Hailey laughed out, shaking her head as she felt her cheeks burn. 

“Oh, but I think you do,” she said, Adam’s head now snapping in her direction. Hailey opened her mouth to object, but Kim cut her off. 

“Please, don’t think I haven’t noticed the way your face lights up when your phone buzzes. I’ve seen it for weeks, I guess I just figured you would’ve told us by now,” she shrugged.

“You know, now that you say it, I’ve noticed that too,” Adam butted in. 

“Hm, maybe it’s about time you both make detective then,” Hailey said sarcastically, pushing the door for the bullpen open as they descended the stairs into the lobby. 

The department wasn’t as big as it seemed. Hailey had come to learn everyone was connected in one way or another, so revealing anything could mean inadvertently breaking her promise to Jay. She found it best to avoid the subject in any way she could, which meant avoiding even the idea of him when it came to talking to anyone in the CPD.  

“Why don’t you invite him out tonight? We’d love to meet him,” Adam proposed. 

She tried to come up with an excuse, and she was grateful when her thoughts were cut short.

“You three, come here,” Trudy instructed. They shared a look between one another before descending the rest of the stairs and coming to lean against her desk.

“Little birdie tells me you’re back in the field soon,” Trudy said leaning over her desk as she directed her attention to Hailey. 

“Your source may be correct,” she told her, forcing a slight smile that hid her mixed feelings about the idea.

“That’s great. Try not to get shot again, will ya?” Trudy said bluntly. 

“Yeah, copy that,” Hailey said, rolling her eyes as she smiled at the sergeant. 

“You two,” she addressed, pointing to Adam and Kim. “Either of you hear from Halstead?”

“Halstead?” Hailey questioned before either could answer.

“Yeah, he’s the other detective who’s on furlough,” Adam told her before directing his attention back to Trudy. “I haven’t heard a peep since the day before he left.” 

“Neither have I. I still can’t believe he just up and left out of nowhere,” Kim added.

It was the first time Hailey was hearing anything about the detective. Curiosity got the best of her, so she pressed the conversation further. 

“Where’d he go?” 

“No clue. Voight came in one morning with furlough papers on his desk, along with a note that said he was going on some long-planned trip. It was super unexpected-“ Adam’s voice continued on, but Hailey’s mind failed to comprehend a single word.

Her vision blurred and the noise around her muffled. Her mind brought her back to that first night with Jay. When he was still a nameless stranger, telling her his story for the first time.

My team doesn’t know about my cancer. They think I’m on vacation, traveling the world or sitting on a beach somewhere.

Suddenly, she made a connection she should have seen from the beginning. Voight had told her about the detective who took furlough, the whole reason he’d brought her onto the team in the first place. It would be a lie to say the thought hadn’t crossed her mind, but she didn’t entertain it enough to actually believe it could be true. Hearing Adam talk about this Halstead guy, giving an eerily similar story to what she knew about Jay’s team? It made her nervous. She wasn’t even sure why. Her first thought was that it was some unwarranted guilt for being his replacement. She didn’t exactly take his position, but some paranoid part of her imagined him seeing it that way — as some sort of betrayal. Before her mind could roam too far, she snapped back into focus. 

“I really have to get going,” she lied, looking down at the time on her phone then bringing her attention back to the trio before her. 

“Have fun with your plans!” Kim called out as Hailey moved to exit the building. She waved a hand back, not turning around to let them see how rattled she was.

She didn’t want to stick around for more details. She didn’t want to have the theory confirmed. She figured if she could continue to live in her world of blissful ignorance, everything would be okay. 

She was halfway home, lost in her thoughts when her phone rang. His contact popped up on her screen, and it was enough to cast away all of the cloudy thoughts fogging her brain. The rest of the night was about being with him, about openly sharing those feelings she’d tried to keep locked up for weeks. Whether or not he was the same detective from her unit, she wasn’t going to let the idea and whatever implications it carried ruin her night with him. 

When she got home, she took a little extra time to pull herself together. He’d told her he was picking her up, remaining vague about the evening’s plans, so she kept in her work clothes and just fluffed out her curls a little more than usual. Her heart picked up in her chest when she heard a knock at her door. She felt like a teenager, giddy about her crush coming to pick her up for a date. 

The wide smile she was greeted with on the other side of the door immediately had her grinning right back. 

“Hi,” he said, the smile never leaving his lips. 

“Hi,” she returned as she joined him on the stoop, closing the door and locking it on her way out.

He grabbed her hand as they walked out to the street, interlocking their fingers as he pulled her closer to him. She looked up at him, that same smile stuck on her face. She could get used to being that close to him. 

He drove them deep into the city, and she tried piecing together what he had in mind. He’d asked her about her day, and she’d asked him about his, but none of that small talk distracted her enough from eventually figuring out their intended destination. It wasn’t until he was pulling into a random parking lot by the river that her heart officially dropped into her stomach. 

“No…” she whispered. He just chuckled from the driver’s seat, shifting the truck into park as he looked over at her. 

“Jay, I am not jumping into the Chicago River. Do you know how polluted that thing is? And don’t even get me started on the number of bodies I’ve had to pull out of there,” she rambled and he reached over, placing a hand on her knee, making her freak out for an entirely different reason.

“You don’t have to, but it would be more fun if you did it with me,” he said, rubbing his thumb against her jeans. 

“Are you sure you even need to be doing this? Isn’t your immune system wrecked by the chemo and everything?” a sudden look of panic overcame her face.

“I don’t plan on drinking the water, Hailey. I’ll be fine,” he assured. The tense look on her face told him she wasn’t so convinced.

They eventually got out of the truck, and he gathered a bunch of towels from the back. It was nearly 9 pm by that time, so it was dark, and not to mention very cold out. Chicago Autumn was nowhere near as brutal as Chicago Winter, but it wasn’t exactly swimming weather either.  

As they approached the bridge, she only became even more nervous. He’d settled by a bench on the riverwalk, dropping towels on it before kicking his boots off and shooting her a questioning look.

“Last chance,” he said, prepared to make the walk up to the walkway of the bridge alone. She blamed it on a brief lapse of sanity, but she couldn’t shake the idea of wanting to join him. She wasn’t sold on the idea, but she also didn’t think she could bear to watch him jump in alone. 

“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” she muttered. She shook her head as she kicked her own shoes off, resting them next to his. 

“I’m coming with you.”

“What?” he asked, a smile breaking away across his lips. 

“It’s the whole point of the list, right? Make some memories… live a little?”

His smile grew and he nodded, holding out his hand for her to grab as they walked up to the bridge together. They probably looked insane, walking on the bridge barefoot in the middle of the night. When they made it to the ledge, the nerves only got worse as she looked down into what she knew to be very cold water below. 

“Are you sure about this?” she asked as he released her hand to climb over the railing. 

“We’re still breathing aren’t we?” he returned, and she shook her head at him with a nervous groan. 

Once he was on the other side, he balanced himself with one hand on the railing behind him and offered her his other. She took it hesitantly, climbing over to join him on the other side. With one hand joined with his and the other grasping the metal behind her, she looked down into the dark water.

“Ready?”

She whimpered. 

“If I catch a disease from this, I’m blaming you.” 

He laughed, pausing only for a second before taking the leap without warning, his grip on her hand pulling them down together. 

She let out a scream as their bodies gave way to gravity, and in a matter of seconds, they were submerged under the unbearably cold water. The sensation sent chills throughout her body as every muscle tensed up. When her head rose above the surface, she gasped for air, looking around for Jay. She treaded water for a second, her head swiveling around to try and find him. A brief panic overcame her, but then his head popped up a few feet away and she let out a sigh of relief. Somehow the beanie he wore survived the jump.  

“See that was not so bad!” he called out, his cheeky laugh causing her to swipe water at his face.

They swam to the riverwalk, and Jay pulled himself up onto the sidewalk first as Hailey followed behind. The swimming and the effort it took to pull her up must have been too much for her shoulder, and she winced in pain as she exerted herself up onto the sidewalk.

“You okay?” he asked, reaching out to help her stand once she was on solid ground.

“Yeah, that just made my arm a little sore,” she said, rolling her shoulder out.

“Here,” he told her, grabbing a towel and walking towards her. He wrapped it around her tightly, giving her a smile before wrapping himself up in one of his own. 

They carried their shoes back to the truck, their feet leaving footprints on the dry pavement. Out of nowhere, she began to laugh, drying the droplets that trailed down her face with the edge of the towel. 

“What?” he asked as he blindly laughed along with her. 

“I can’t believe we just did that,” she said, shaking her head. 

“Worth it though, right?” 

“Debatable,” she muttered as her teeth chattered. 

When they made it back to the truck, they threw their shoes into the back, and he immediately got his keys to start it up. He was trying to get it as warm as possible before they climbed in. 

“Hang tight a bit, I’ve got some more towels for the seats.”

She hoisted herself up onto the tailgate, scrunching the towel against the ends of her hair to dry the droplets leaving tiny puddles all around her. Every part of her body was shivering. The wet sweater she wore clung to her skin, only making her even colder. She did a quick scope around, finding herself in the clear before trying to tug the sweater over her head. She found it hard trying to pull her right arm through. The pain from her irritated shoulder made it almost impossible, and she let out a sharp wince every time she tried. 

Jay walked around the truck, his movements halting when he noticed what she was trying to do.

“Do you need help?” he asked hesitantly. She was half topless with her right arm stuck in the sleeve of her shirt, and she found it sweet that he was so seemingly unsure of if it was okay to look at her like that. 

“Uh, if you don’t mind,” she said, her chest rising and falling quickly, no longer just because of how cold she was.

He made his way over, standing between her legs as he helped pull the sweater over her head and slide her remaining arm out of the sleeve. He tossed it somewhere in the back of the truck and quickly took the towel from beside her to wrap it over her shoulders, pinching the ends together at her chest.

“Thanks,” she said. He nodded before picking a towel up for himself, resting it between his knees as he removed his own shirt. Her breath caught in the back of her throat as she saw his bare torso, the muscles contracting and relaxing as he pulled the shirt over his head. He kept the beanie on as he draped the towel over his shoulders, and she frowned as she watched water continue to trail down his face from it.

“You don’t have to wear that for me,” she told him in a low voice, her eyes pointing to his head. His mouth parted as if he were going to object, but she just reached out to him, pulling him closer by his arm. She watched him swallow hard as the gap closed between them and he was right back to standing between her legs. She took the hat off slowly, causing him to shudder. His hair was thin and patchy, but it still had a slight wave in it. It wasn’t as bad as he’d warned. She actually found him to be far more attractive without the hat. 

“Brunette. Very light brown, but brunette,” she voiced with a smile, dropping the beanie beside her. 

His breath was shallow, and he remained silent for a moment.  

“I know it looks bad, you don’t have to be nice,” he said evenly, his mouth barely moving as he spoke. The insecure look on his face and the way he couldn’t look her in the eyes filled her heart with pain.

“Jay-“ 

She couldn’t find the words, so she grabbed the sides of his face, pulling him down to her so that she could pepper a slow trail of kisses against the top of his head. Then her lips trailed down his temple and to his cheek, finally pulling away to rest her forehead against his. 

“You’re perfect,” she whispered. “Plus, you should know I kind of have a thing for brunettes.”

She felt him let out a relieved sigh as his mouth curled up at the sides. Instead of responding he just leaned into her and captured her lips with his. 

Her shoulders dropped as she kissed him back. She felt his hands almost immediately snake under her towel to slide against her waist. His fingertips against her bare skin sent chills throughout her body and made her pull him even closer to her. The kiss was hungry and slow, and she was certain she’d never been kissed that way before. When she pulled away, he followed, and when she slid a hand down his chest, his grip on her waist tightened. It was the kind of kiss that made her lose all sense of time and space — the kind you only dream about. He moved his hands to her legs, gripping the sides of her thighs to pull her closer toward him, and eventually those same hands rose to grab at the sides of her face. He instilled a warmth in her that was almost enough to make her forget how cold she was, a warmth that lingered even after he’d pulled away.

“Wow,” she muttered, mindlessly playing with the chain around his neck. 

“Yeah,” he said, stroking a thumb down her jaw as his eyes blinked open. 

“I uh- I don’t mean to cut this short,” she breathed out, still trying to catch her breath. “But it’s really cold, and I desperately need to get out of these clothes.”

They laughed and he raised a brow at her, causing her to swat the back of her hand at his chest. 

“Not like- You know what I mean,” she giggled.  

“I do,” he grinned. He leaned down and left one last peck on her lips before grabbing her waist to help her down. “Let’s go.” 

As she thawed out on the drive home, she also cooled down from that moment they shared. Then she thought about her unintentionally suggestive comment. They hadn’t talked about it, they hadn’t exactly had the chance to, but she wanted to take things slow. Maybe part of it was not wanting to accept the option that left them with a short amount of time together, or maybe it was the fact that she’d never really figured out what a real relationship should look like. Either way, she knew what they had was unlike anything she’d ever had with anyone else. She wanted to make sure they did things right. Though she wasn’t exactly sure if he was on that same page. 

“Hey, um I know time’s not exactly on our side, but I do want to take my time with us… with you,” she told him as his eyes flickered from the road to her.

“I want that too,” he nodded, reaching over and intertwining their fingers together. 

“You do? You’re okay if I want to take things slow?” she asked him, uncertainty clear in the way the words left her mouth. 

“I don’t have any expectations, Hailey. All I know is I want you, and I want this. Everything else we can take day by day,” he said, squeezing her hand gently. She smiled, reaching over and grabbing at his face to leave a kiss against his jaw. 

— — — — 

Hailey insisted on a shower the second they made it back to her place. Jay took that as an opportunity to order dinner, light a fire, and build a bed of pillows on her living room floor. She just about melted into a puddle when she came out to find the setup, a still shirtless Jay trying to dry his pants by the warmth of the fire. 

“How’s your shoulder?” he asked as she sauntered her way over, her mouth agape at his surprise as she brought her arms to wrap around his neck.

“Better,” she said, flashing him a dimpled grin. Her eyes surveyed the room before meeting his again.

“I never would have guessed you were a romantic,” she teased, her eyes pointing to the setup before them.

“Shut up,” he said, rolling his eyes as his fingers tightened around her waist. 

“I can throw those in the dryer if you want to shower real quick,” she told him as she nodded to his soggy pants, her fingers once again fidgeting with the chain around his neck. 

“My shirt’s in the back of my truck, any chance you got a shirt I could borrow?”

“I don’t know I kinda like this look you’re rocking right now,” she said, sliding a hand down to poke a finger at his bare chest. He let out a chuckle, his cheeks turning a bright shade of pink as he sent her a smirk that could make her knees buckle. “But… if you insist on putting a shirt on, I’m sure I have one that’ll work.” 

“Okay,” he murmured. He leaned forward and her face scrunched up as he left a light kiss on the tip of her nose. “Be right back.” 

He left his clothes out in the hallway and she tossed them in the dryer. She had a collection of oversized shirts she often wore to bed, so finding one that fit him wasn’t hard. She picked one out and left it on the door handle of the bathroom before making her way back to the living room to wait for him.

Not long later, he returned in just the shirt and his boxers, causing a smirk to creep across Hailey’s face. 

“Actually, I think I like this look better,” she told him as he made his way over to her.

“The jeans were still damp, also I figured if you get to be comfy, so do I,” he smirked, helping her with the boxes of takeout splayed across her coffee table. 

“Hey, you don’t see me complaining,” she winked at him. “I’m going to go get a beer from the fridge, you want one?”

“Sure,” he said, nestling into the pillows she was retreating from.

When she made it to the kitchen, she checked her phone that rested on the counter. She had one text from Kim. The message elicited a mindless smile the second she opened it. It was a picture of Kim, Kevin, and Adam at Molly’s, their drinks raised in the air as their bright smiles lit up the screen.

I hope your PLANS are treating you well. Totally not sending this to make you miss us ;)

Her smile fell when she looked over at Jay in her living room and she was reminded of the conversation at the district earlier that evening. What if he really was the same detective from Intelligence who took furlough, the one who left them shorthanded, the one whose spot she had filled. Part of her wanted to talk to him about it, but then again she found it pointless to try and put out a fire she wasn’t even sure was lit yet. She took a step back from it, trying to settle her mind on just being with him, savoring every bit of that perfect night that she could. She pulled two beers from the fridge before turning her phone off and rejoining him in the living room. 

The rest of the night was filled with easy conversations, tangled-up bodies, and lazy kisses. Yet, there were a few times that night when she tried the name on him. Jay Halstead. She repeated it in her head, and she couldn’t shake the way it seemed to fit him so well. Then her mind would drift to a reality where it was true. A reality where he was better and he was back at work, and they were partners, and they worked well together, and that same way he naturally made her feel safe translated to when they were on the job. She was pulled even further into the fantasy when she imagined they would get to go home and work well together there too, build a family, spend time with their friends, and everything in that reality seemed to be so perfect. It seemed like the kind of well-lived memories she would have wanted to have when she woke up in that hospital room.

Then she looked over at his beautiful face in the orange glow of the fire before them, the light from the flames creating dancing shadows across his face, and she realized he wasn’t that guy and that wasn’t their reality. To her, he was just Jay, and their reality was perfect moments and indefinite timing. Though that might not be as ideal as that one she’d created, she just knew she wanted every moment with him she could get. He’d taught her how to live, how to find a way to appreciate life outside of her job, and it made her that much more grateful for everything he was. She found some solace in that, so she tried to push that fantasy from her mind completely. Though no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t help but replay the name Jay Halstead in her mind. It made her wonder if maybe that was one part of her fantasy that carried some sort of truth.

[officialcherubcampus]

CHERUB: Disconnected

The events in this story take place at the same time as Chapter 44 of CHERUB: Divine Madness

James Duncan was thirty-one years old. A maths professor with tangled blond hair, he felt pure love as he crouched over the cot of his fourteen-month-old daughter, Megan. She was fast asleep with a pink and white teddy nestled under her chin.

“Is she OK?” James’ girlfriend, Gaynor, asked as he stepped through to the living-room. They’d been out for a meal. She wore a long strapless dress and her high heels had been kicked under the coffee table.

“She’s all snuggled up,” James nodded, as he stretched into a yawn. “I gave the sitter an extra fiver. She seemed really nice.”

Gaynor tutted. “And she’ll expect a tip every time now.”

James was startled to see a tower collapsing in flames on the TV screen. “What the hell’s that?”

“I don’t know,” Gaynor said. “I just flicked the ten o’clock news on. It’s down under, I think.”

James grabbed the remote and turned up the sound as he sat with his girlfriend on the sofa. The reporter spoke in an Australian accent and the screen had LIVE FROM AUSTRALIA in the top right corner.

“The colourful religious guru Joel Regan is dead, believed murdered. His world-famous ark has been devastated in a massive explosion that killed many of his most devoted followers, and government sources have revealed that his controversial Survivors cult has funded the terrorist group Help Earth to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars...”

“Oh, it’s those nutters,” James said. He felt dizzy as he bent forwards and kissed Gaynor on the neck; he’d drunk more wine than he’d realised. “There was a thing about that lot in the Sunday paper a couple of months back.”

“At this stage there are no casualty estimates but there are thought to be more than two hundred children inside the ark...”

“There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you,” James said, as he sat on the couch. “Something I probably should have told you a while back.”

Gaynor recoiled as she watched an image of a burned child being hoisted into a helicopter on a stretcher. She was engrossed in the drama and turned irritably towards James as he switched TV into standby.

“I was watching that.”

“Sorry,” James said, “but we’re getting married in less than a month and there’s something I’ve got to tell you.”

Gaynor suddenly looked uneasy. “What is it?”

“Before Megan, erm...I mean, a long time ago - I have a son.”

“With Trudy?” Gaynor gasped. “Is Kieran really yours?”

“No, give over!” James smiled. “Kieran was born before I ever met Trudy. This boy would be fourteen now.”

“Fourteen! But that would make you barely seventeen when...”

“You know I told you that I ran away from home?”

“After you went nuts, knocked over that little girl and crashed your dad’s car?”

“That’s the one,” James nodded. “I was out of my mind. I had no money, nothing to eat and I was just wandering around the West End of London scared that the cops were gonna nab me and throw me in young offenders.

“It was getting dark and this lady sat down next to me. She looked really beefy, but then she started pulling video games out of her coat and sticking them inside her backpack. Remember the old Sega Megadrive? She must have had thirty Megadrive games tucked inside her coat. I saw what she was doing and I couldn’t help but laugh. After a while we got talking about this and that. I told her that I’d run away from my parents, although I left out the bit about the cops being after me for knocking down a kid. It was December, freezing cold and I clearly had no place to go, so she took pity and invited me home.

“She was in her twenties, a bit overweight - even without all the stuff inside her jumper - but I was kind of in awe. The closest I’d ever been to a girlfriend was a game of chess with Stacey Beech. She told me to take a shower and when I came out she’d found me some clothes: stolen of course.”

“So what was this woman’s name?” Gaynor asked.

“Gwen Choke. She was nice, even though we were as different as could be. Like, my dad’s a doctor, her dad was a bus driver. She made us a nice roast dinner and told me I could stay in the spare room for a couple of nights. But we drank all this wine and started mucking about, chasing around the flat and one thing led to another. I was on cloud nine. I mean, I went from never having kissed a girl to boffing Gwen in the space of about four hours...”

Gaynor looked a touch upset. “You said you got your first girlfriend at university, after you’d been inside.”

“I made a huge mess of my life back then,” James admitted. “This is the first time I’ve ever told anyone the truth about when I ran away. Even my folks don’t know this stuff.”

“So it was just the one night?” Gaynor asked.

“No, I was totally smitten. I mean, she was seven years older than me, but she really pampered me. Stolen food, stolen clothes, stolen booze. Nothing but the best. We had Christmas and New Year with her parents and it was a great time, but a few weeks into the new year she told me she was pregnant.

“I was seventeen and I couldn’t handle it. Gwen said she wanted a baby and understood if I wanted nothing to do with it. At first I said I’d stick by her, but the more I thought about it, the more it freaked me out. I mean, I’d always imagined that I was going to be a doctor like my old man and yet there I was, seventeen years old living in a council flat with my pregnant girlfriend. I told Gwen that I wanted her to get an abortion, but she said she wanted a baby with someone smart like me and she wouldn’t ask me for anything.

“I got really depressed. I knew the cops would catch me eventually and I just waited until she went out, packed up all the stuff she’d bought me and headed back to Cambridge. My mum was glad to see me. She didn’t pry and the next morning my dad took me to the police station to give myself up.”

“So have you ever seen him?” Gaynor asked.

James nodded. “He’s named after me. Gwen sent me pictures and stuff when I was in prison and she brought James up to visit me when he was a few months old. She’d started getting a few other girls to shoplift for her whilst she was pregnant and she was building herself a proper little empire.”

“Didn’t you bother contacting her when you got out of prison?”

“Yeah,” James nodded. “The baby was walking by the time I got out of young offenders. I was flat broke and I’d got my place at university, but I was determined to be a proper dad to the little fellow. But Gwen seemed to like picking up waifs and strays and she had this new bloke called Ron. He was a right horrible sod. The first couple of times I turned up to see James he kept having digs at me. Calling me a snooty so and so.

“Then the third time I came he’d heard something about the car crash. He kept going on about how a bloke like him would have got life for knocking down that little girl and that I’d only got off with three years because of my public school accent. I’d toughened up a hell of a lot when I was inside and I just saw red and decked him. But James was really upset and Gwen was crying and it was just this whole god-awful scene.

“I called up again a few weeks later. Fortunately Ron was out and I managed a chat with Gwen. She said she was pregnant with Ron’s kid. I said maybe it would be better if I steered clear for a while. We spoke on the phone a few more times and she sent me some pictures of James with his new sister. It wasn’t that I didn’t mean to go back, but I got into my degree and I waited longer and longer.”

“So when did you last hear from Gwen?”

“She used to write a letter and send me his school picture every year and I used to jot a few paragraphs in a Christmas card. But she stopped about three years ago for some reason. I wrote a letter to ask if she was OK, but I didn’t get a response. I even tried calling, but the phone was disconnected. I think she’d split up with Ron, so I guess she moved away. Probably remarried or something.”

“There’s a part of you that I won’t ever know,” Gaynor smiled. “So why did you choose to tell me this now?”

“Well, partly it’s the getting married thing. But also I figure that he might go looking for his old man at some point. My parents still live in the same house, so he’d have no problem tracking me if his mum gave him the address.”

“When did you say he was born exactly?”

“October ninety-one,” James said.

“So he’ll be fifteen this year?” Gaynor smiled. “I could just see you trying to squirm your way out of it when this big strapping son turns up on our doorstep!”

“You sound OK about this,” James said uneasily. “I mean, tell me if you’re mad. You’ve got every right to be.”

Gaynor shrugged. “You were so messed up at that time...It’s like, you were this geeky kid who grew up to become a maths professor, but right in the middle there’s two years of absolute craziness. That part of your life is like some whole other person who I’ve never met.”

“I was thinking that I might try to track him down,” James said. “I think a boy should get to meet his dad, even if he ends up thinking that he’s an arsehole.”

“James, he’s almost fifteen. He’s just as likely to plant one on you and tell you to piss off.”

“And maybe that’s what I deserve...”

“And don’t start on this now,” Gaynor said. “I mean, Megan’s still a baby, we’ve got the wedding and the honeymoon to plan. We could probably get by without a teenage boy in our midst over the next few months.”

“Yeah,” James smiled, as he slipped an arm around his girlfriend’s back. “I wasn’t talking about getting in touch right now, but I’d like to meet him, you know? I might try finding out where Gwen Choke moved to and I’ll ask her if it’s OK to write a letter or something.”