Nate let out a burst of mock laughter. After all this time, did Lenny really expect him to believe that? “I warned Bruce not to pull a stunt like this.”
“Bruce?”
Nate glowered. Did the two of them actually think he was that stupid?
“What? You think he’s the reason I’m here?”
Yes, it would seem they did.
“Isn’t he?” Nate asked. “Him with all these grand plans for Mum in the pipeline and you who just happens to have a new album or whatever it is to promote. It all seems a bit too convenient to be anything else, wouldn’t you say?”
Lenny looked at him directly. “You know me better than that, Nate.”
Nate held his gaze. “Do I?”
“Look, I don’t expect you to make this easy for me, but you can at least sit down and hear me out.” Lenny gestured to the seat opposite. “Please?”
Nate approached the table and sat down. He watched Lenny take a deep breath as if preparing some grand speech that Nate didn’t want to hear.
“I know I shouldn’t have run out on you like I did. I should’ve tried to explain what was happening, but...” His words trailed off.
“Go on.”
“Oh I don’t know, I was a different person back then. Immature, selfish, too out of it to know any better, call it what you want.” He kept his eyes on his fidgeting hands throughout. “But I did love you and your mum, you have to know that.”
Nate sneered.
“It’s just that things were always so volatile between me and her. We weren’t always good together.”
Nate didn’t need reminding. He easily recalled how much of a pendulum their relationship had been. Everything fun and frolics, as if life was one big party as it swung one way. Only for things to turn nasty as it swung the other. The insults and accusations that were traded, the glasses that were thrown. At times, it was like living in a war zone and they were both as bad as each other. Nate took in Lenny’s pathetic manner. If he wanted sympathy he’d come to the wrong place. “That’s because you were both drunks.”
“Tell me about it.” Lenny’s expression turned even more pensive. “We did agree to go to rehab. A few times, in fact. We even got as far as booking ourselves in. Not at the same place, most centres don’t allow that. I often wonder if that’s the reason your mum always refused to go in the end. As if she didn’t have the strength to fight it alone.”
Nate felt his hackles rise. “So you’re blaming her?”
“No, no, of course not. You misunderstand.” Finally, Lenny lifted his gaze to look Nate square in the face. “But surely you remember how bad things became. Neither of us could take much more, someone had to do something. Anyway, I got it into my head that the two of you would be better off without me. I thought with me out of the way, your mum would get the help she needed.”
“Yeah? And look how well that turned out.” Nate knew he was being flippant, but he couldn’t seem to help himself. He let the room descend into silence for a moment, before speaking again. “And me? What was I? Collateral damage?”
Lenny sighed. “The way I saw it, you needed your mum. But she could never be there for you while she still drank, not properly.” He fell quiet, as if drifting back into the past for a moment. Then just as quickly he was back in the present. “I suppose given everything that’s happened, then, yes, Nate. That’s exactly what you were.”
Whatever response Nate had expected, he hadn’t anticipated one quite so honest and Lenny’s words stung like a slap in the face. His bluntness stunned him into silence.
“You have to understand,” Lenny carried on. “I wasn’t thinking straight back then. Jesus, the amount of crap in my system I’m surprised I could think at all. I loved you both so much, you have to believe that. I’d have done anything for you.”
“Except stay.”
“If I could turn back the clock I would.” Lenny leaned back in his seat. “I wrote you a letter, you know. More than one actually.”
“Really? Because I didn’t get them.”
“That’s because I didn’t post them. I felt too ashamed for abandoning you like I did, leaving you to pick up the pieces.” Lenny sat forward again, talking more to himself than Nate. “You were just a child, that wasn’t your job.”
“You mean the job of putting my mother into the recovery position night after night because she’d passed out? Or making sure I didn’t fall asleep after the fact, so I could step in if she started choking on her own vomit? You’re damn right, it wasn’t.”
Nate could see the guilt on Lenny’s face. He could see his embarrassment at not knowing how to respond. Maybe he was sorry, after all. Not that Nate supposed it mattered. Whatever it was that Lenny wanted from him, he wasn’t prepared to give. As far as Nate was concerned, this was all a bit too little, too late. “So why now? Why come here?”
Lenny shrugged. “Bruce put the word out that you needed some help and I saw an opportunity, a chance to say sorry. I figured if I didn’t do it now, I probably never would. Call it fate, call it coincidence, call it collusion, it doesn’t really matter. I’ve said my piece.”
