Reunited at The Altar

‘This is the lifeboat. We’ve winched down the paramedic from the helicopter. You’re his son, who called us out, right?’

‘Yes.’

‘OK. We’re going to fly your dad back to hospital. Can you give us some information?’

‘Anything you need,’ Brad had said, and had gone through his father’s medical history.

But it had been too late.

Jim had had a massive heart attack in the helicopter and the crew hadn’t been able to resuscitate him. He’d died on the way to hospital.

Stop wearing that hair shirt and thinking you have to atone for something that really wasn’t your fault.

Now that was where Abby was wrong. Brad didn’t blame himself for his father’s death. Even if he’d been there, if he’d given his father the medication, there was a very high chance that Jim would still have had that heart attack and died on the way to hospital.

That wasn’t what crucified him every single day.

It was the fact that he’d been the last person to speak to Jim while he was still alive—while his father was still conscious—and he’d known that he couldn’t do a thing to save his dad. That the lifeboat and the air ambulance wouldn’t get to him in time. And then, in the days after the funeral, he’d realised that he would never get the chance to prove to his dad that he’d made the right career choice, following his heart to become a scientist rather than following in Jim’s footsteps and becoming a barrister.

Brad just hadn’t been able to cope with it all. To keep himself functioning, he’d had to build a wall round his heart. And that hadn’t been fair to Abby: so he’d done the right thing by the love of his life. He’d set her free to find happiness with someone else.

And she thought he was being self-indulgent and wearing a hair shirt?

He stared into the darkness.

If only things had been different.

If only.

Eventually, he slept. His dreams were vivid, to the point where he actually reached out for her, the next morning, thinking she was curled up in bed beside him.

Of course not. How stupid of him. Those days were long gone. She wasn’t next to him, she was next door. There was only a single brick wall between them, but they might as well be on different planets.

Brad dragged himself out of bed and had a hot shower, but he didn’t manage to scrub away the guilt and remorse. Or the sick feeling that today he was going to have to face everything he’d spent years avoiding.

Toast and coffee—thanks to the supplies Abigail had left him—made him feel more human.

OK.

He’d do the hardest bit first.

He headed into the centre of the town to renew the ticket for his parking space, then went to buy flowers. It meant he had to walk past the quay, and he could see another boat moored in the place where his father’s used to be. Well, of course there would be. His mother had never really been into boats, so there was no reason for Rosie to keep the boat or the mooring after Jim’s death.

But it still felt as if a little piece of his dad had been wiped away.

He bought a bunch of flowers from the shop in the middle of the high street, then walked to the church on the edge of town. It was a big old barn of a place, built of flint, with a massive tower, a lead roof and tall arched windows.

What he liked best was the inside of the church, and not just because it was full of light from those enormous windows. He turned the massive iron handle and pushed the heavy door open. He could remember coming here with his father, who’d showed him the ancient graffiti of the old-fashioned sailing ships scratched into the stone pillars, explaining they were probably prayers of thanksgiving for safe returns from long voyages.

If only James Powell had made a safe return from his last voyage.

But you couldn’t change the past.

Brad shook himself and wandered through the church. There was the hexagonal stone font with its carved wooden cover and the smiling stone lions at the base—the font where he and Ruby had been christened as babies. And the ancient wooden pews with their poppyheads and carved bench ends, parts of the carvings polished smooth over the centuries where children’s hands had rubbed against them. He’d always especially loved the carvings of a cat carrying one of her kittens and the mermaid.