The Son-in-Law by Charity Norman Read Free Book Online

humiliation. I heard what you told your probation officer. I heard an awful lot of snivelling about life with Zoe, I heard shitloads of self-justification and self-pity. It’s Zoe’s side of the story we never heard! The judge might have been taken in but, believe me, I wasn’t. I’ve come across a thousand men exactly like you, violent men who think their women deserve everything they get. So let me tell you this, Joseph Scott: until you take responsibility and accept it was entirely your fault—not Zoe’s, not Hannah’s, not Frederick’s—until then, you needn’t even bother applying for membership of the human race, so far as I’m concerned.’
    ‘Look, Marie—’
    ‘Oh, piss off.’ A click, then a continuous tone. As rejections go, this one was pretty unequivocal.
    •
    Even the rain spat in his face as he stepped into the street. Passing cars seemed to scream, so that he actually ducked and pressed his hands to his ears. The pavement was coated in de-icing grit. It crunched under his feet.
    A bus lumbered around the workmen’s barrier. The sign on its broad crimson forehead read york. When it pulled ponderously into a stop and disgorged a mother with a pushchair, Joseph began to sprint down the gritty pavement.
    Just a glimpse, he told himself as he found a seat; just one sight of his beautiful daughter. He’d make sure he wasn’t spotted this time.
    The bus stopped at every village on the way to York and became mired in traffic on the inner ring road. Joseph jumped off and ran the last half-mile, arriving gasping at the school gates with three minutes to spare. He knew it was the right place, because he’d used Akash’s computer to search for Scarlet’s name and found her among other award winners on a school website. Someone had left a property magazine on the bench outside the gates; he sat down and pretended to be absorbed in a selection of three-bedroomed semis in Tadcaster.
    When the school bell rang, it seemed to be hooked up to an electrical circuit that ran right through his body. He jerked to his feet. A door banged, followed by the thunder of five hundred pairs of shoes as girls began to stampede down a path and through the gates. Joseph forced himself to sit down again. Any minute now. He hadn’t clapped eyes on Scarlet since she was ten, but he’d know her anywhere: a skinny pixie with long legs and a wild mane of reddish hair. She used to sit on his lap and wrap thin arms around his neck. Lovely Daddy, she used to say, when she wanted to get around him. Dad- ee . She’d smack kisses onto his nose, and pat his cheek with her palm. He’d always given in.
    The pupils were a spring tide, hugging and texting and gossiping and promising to phone. Some pushed bicycles, others ran for buses. Traffic was gridlocked as parents in cars tried to inch closer. Gradually, though, the tide slowed to a steady stream, then to a trickle. By three thirty the street was quiet. The Minster bells began to ring.
    Joseph leaned forward to stare at the pavement, resting his elbows on his knees and his mouth in his hands. He’d missed her. She must have walked right past. He hadn’t even recognised his own daughter—what kind of a father was he? Useless. He was useless, and he needn’t bother applying for membership of the human race so far as Marie was concerned. He shut his eyes.
    It was dusk when he raised his head. A small sound had disturbed him. Not five yards away, frozen in mid-stride and staring at him in horrified fascination, stood a ghost.

Six
    Scarlet
    Oh my God. I honestly thought my heart was going to smash through my ribs and go bouncing along the pavement like a rubber ball.
    I was supposed to have violin on Monday, but the lesson got cancelled. Violin bitch was ill. I hoped it was something really serious, like cholera. Music teachers get shirty if you don’t turn up for your lesson, but they don’t practise what they preach. To add insult to injury, I’d waited nearly twenty minutes