Space-Time Story 28.

„Hi Mark,“ I decide to use my lawyer’s first name, when he appears on the display of my cell phone.

„Hello, what can I do for you, Bill?“ he asks me shortly. Of course, he´s a lawyer and his time is money. And surely no small money for that matter.

„I´m calling to ask about Monday,“ this time it is me who plays obscurely with words. I wait what’s his answer gonna be.

„Are you alone?“ he asks me and I say yes. I don´t quite get it why he asks me such a thing at all, but I don´t think about it too much.

„We’d better meet up, we shouldn’t be discussing this on the phone, Tom might hear,“ Mark almost whispers now and I have to smile to that.

„The poor guy is sleeping like a baby upstairs after yesterday’s party, you don´t need to worry.“

„It would be better to speak to you in person anyhow. I will pick you up in half an hour, be ready. I don’t feel like waiting for you in front of the house for ages again, okay?“ he threatens but I feel that he is only joking. Why the hell is everybody telling me not to keep them waiting? The last few years I’ve always tried to be on time. Come to think of it, I might have been trying, but the old Bill probably couldn’t care less. That must be it.

„All right, you can be sure I will be there on time waiting for you in front of the gate,“ I reassure him and end the call. I have just about enough of time to fix my hair and make-up, put the papers back in the envelope and hide them away in my underwear drawer. I let Scotty out into the garden and I sit down on the stairs of our villa, watching the dog running around, enjoying his freedom. Freedom… that part of my life is about to end soon. Davey is going to rob me of my precious freedom and I can’t barely wait for it to happen. I´m desperately looking forward to see him again. It´s incredible how quickly it can happen that a child steals one’s heart. He´s so sweet. Perhaps I could get him on Tuesday already. Hopefully the court will act quickly and efficiently enough so that the final decision could be made soon enough; especially given the fact Karin is dead.

Time passes by fast, so I whistle at Scotty to prompt him to come back inside. I should get ready for my meeting with Mark. I go and check on Tom one more time, but he is sleeping like a baby so it doesn’t even feel necessary to leave a message for him. I will be back before he even wakes up.

Tom… he is the only one that makes me worried about the whole Davey matter. It would be so much easier if I let him in on the whole thing, if I came clean right from the beginning. There is no point to beat a dead horse though; what’s done is done. I simply have to tell him. I´m not that sure though if I will be able to do it tonight. I´m afraid… I´m terribly afraid that he will leave me. My heart skips a beat just thinking about this alternative, but it would equally bad if they refused to grant me custody of David. Sabine was most certainly right when she predicted that David would be Tom´s competition.

I can´t even begin to imagine what would happen if Tom wanted me to chose between them… either „Me or him.“ That would be terrible. I love Tom, but Davey is my child I´m responsible for now. Besides, in the short time I have known him, he totally managed to steal my heart. Having to decide would be incredibly difficult, I can´t imagine that I would leave him in the orphanage or give him up for an adoption. It mustn’t come to this point at all because I won’t be capable of making that decision. They both are the most important boys in this world to me and I want to have them both too. I just need to explain it somehow to Tom carefully, to make him see, to make him understand.

A car’s horn shakes me out of my thoughts and I run into the garden and to the gate. Mark grins at me from behind the wheel. I would estimate him to be around thirty years old, but I have never been good at guessing people’s ages, so he might be even older. In any case, at first sight he looks like a sympathetic person.

„Hi buddy,“ he greets me, and when I get in the car he fastens my belt for me.

„Hi there, sorry for not waiting here outside, but I would feel like on a display. The neighbours are watching you know.“ I make a disgusted face.

„That’s cool, the important thing is that I didn’t have to wait here for an hour as always.“ He slaps my shoulder with a grin and starts the vehicle. „Where shall we go?“ he asks and I suddenly face the same problem as with Sabine.

„It doesn’t matter, anyplace you want, everything is fine with me today,“ I try to assure him and I let him steer the car to the downtown. After ten minutes he parks in an underground garage and soon after we are taking a lift to a fancy restaurant. He talks to a head waiter for a while and we are directed to a private lounge. He must be an important regular here, everything goes smoothly.

„Here we can talk undisturbed,“ he says with a cocky expression in his face.

„Can I take your drink orders gentlemen?“ a waiter asks politely and unobtrusively and when he gets what he came here for, he bows again and steps out of the lounge. Mark must be a really important guest of this establishment, they treat us like kings. We don´t even manage to take a breath before the waiter is back putting the ordered drinks in front of us… wow, that was fast. „The food will be ready in fifteen minutes, gentlemen,“ he informs us when we make the order and he is gone again.

„So, about Monday.“ Mark looks at me when he takes a drink from his glass. „We’ve already settled everything, but let’s go through the most important details one more time, just to be sure, okay? First of all, you will be there on time, Bill… do you do know what on time means, don’t you?“ He looks into my eyes.

„Of course, I will be there at ten exactly,“ I assure him with a smile.

„We agreed on half past nine, so try to remember, please. I´ll still need to fill you in on some last-minute details before the trial starts and at ten sharp we have to be in the courtroom already.“

„Fine, understood, clear. At half past nine in front of the court building.“

„The next thing is your clothes. You will come in a suit with a tie. No eccentric accessories, normal hair. We have a female judge, but still, you never know if she doesn’t hold any grudge against you, so you won´t style yourself in the role of a rock star, but a responsible father of a child you intend to bring up, understood? Even if it isn’t the truth, you have to come across as genuine as it gets.“

I nod in agreement and I have to admit that such things as clothing didn’t even cross my mind. I take a mental note of one thing he said though. Why wouldn’t it be the truth, why do I need to act genuine? I do want to bring up Davey. Mark continues immediately not giving me any opportunity to retort.

„And finally…“ he says and raises his forefinger threateningly in front of my face. „No contact with Karin! Even if she managed to get to you, which I hope she won´t, the security should be tight enough, you don’t speak to her under any circumstances. She will be surprised to see you there, she will finally understand who arranged for taking her son away from her, she will be terribly angry. Prepare for the worst. You can´t budge, respond or crack. Keep a straight face, no emotions, no approachability. It would be best of all if she turned up drunk,“ Mark finishes his long speech and I finally understand that he still doesn’t know the most important information.

„Well, that shouldn’t worry you anymore, Mark. Karin won´t be there. She´s dead,“ I shoot the three-day old information at him.

First he looks like his jaw just dropped under the table, but soon enough he gathers himself, closes his gaping mouth and looks at me questioningly. „You finally killed her?“ he asks me dead serious without a trace of smile on his face.

I am not sure what he is talking about, but I try to be neutral, not showing any uncertainty in my voice.

I try to answer as calmly as I can. „No Mark, I didn’t have to do that, she took care of that part by herself. She overdosed on alcohol and pills and died on last Wednesday night in her own bed. Right before it happened she called me saying she felt sick and urging me to come, but I didn’t want to go there. The next day I was contacted by police, that’s how I found out. I was presumably the last person she spoke to, so I had to explain what she wanted from me and how I knew her, but they closed the case with the cause of death being a drug overdose.“ I smile at my lawyer, because I can see that he is tremendously relieved.

I still wonder though what he could possibly mean by his remark of me finally killing Karin. Did he really think that I would be able to kill her? Oh God, what had he and the old Bill been up to, that he thinks this of me?

„In this case it seems we’ve won already,“ Mark grins triumphantly. „If she´s dead, the judge can´t do anything else but give him to you. You won, Bill… Still, you mustn’t do anything stupid at the courthouse.“ He watches me carefully for a while and I can detect a trace of disappointment in his eyes. „Hmmm, you won´t even need me after all. I was already getting ready to put up a fierce, merciless fight with that cunt you wanted to spite and take a revenge on so badly and in the end she won´t even be there. No payback time, no revenge then, huh,“ he adds quietly. Revenge? What’s that all about?

„What are you going to do with the boy? Nothing has been arranged for yet. This will speed it all up somehow.“ He looks at me questioningly. I don´t understand his question so I don’t even consider lying to him. „What am I going to do with him? I will raise him, of course,“ I answer surprised, still puzzled by his question.

„What? You can’t be serious, Bill!“ he shouts at me. „We agreed on a plan; a plan of hiring a nanny and renting a flat where you would keep him, so that Tom wouldn’t find out. Do you know what would happen if the reporters got hold of this? You’ve spent the whole fortune to keep everything a secret. We must have bribed almost all the clerks and officials in all of Berlin and you decide suddenly that you want to take care of that child yourself? Did a brick fall on your head or something?“ he hisses at me over the table now quite angrily.

The expression on my face my must show a mix of horror, hurt and disbelief because Mark pauses suddenly and waits for my response. „No Mark, no nanny. I´m positive about this. I will get him out of the orphanage as soon as possible and as any loving father would do I will take care of him. I really love him and I don´t understand why I would need a nanny to take care of my own son. I´m not a heartless bastard first promising him that I would be his daddy, then handing him over to a total stranger for a nanny,“ I raise my voice and don´t even let him catch his breath.

„This whole year has been bad enough for him already, thanks to me. If you could see him, how unhappy and alone he is there, you would cry over what we have done to him. It´s nobody else´s but my fault that he´s psychologically traumatized already in such a tender age. My own doing, just because I wanted to get revenge on Karin. Did you ever realize when you were giving me your advices that we would be hurting that child? Do you get it now?“ now I already scream at Mark, because his attitude to the matter really makes me angry.

He is staring at me with disbelief. „What the hell happened to you?“ he asks me. „We agreed. I don’t understand. You want to lose Tom? Don’t you realize that you have been lying to him for all these years and now you want him to find out? You know very well that he hates it when you lie? Are you certain that you want to prioritize that small brat over your brother? He can’t be worth it. Wait… How do you even know where he is? You have seen him? Why don´t I know about this? That seriously pisses me off. I’ve been working on this mess for a year already and now you start undermine my authority, going solo, making your own decisions? When did you go to see him?“ He looks at me with question marks in his eyes and pushes his chin forward threateningly.

A door behind him opens and the waiter enters bringing us our lunch. I got quite, simply looking straight into Mark’s questioning eyes. The tension between us is palpable and air is suddenly heavy to breath. He jerks in surprise when the waiter puts the dishes on table and finally turns his eyes away from me.

What kind of an asshole was I? Oh my God, everything starts to dawn on me now. I couldn’t care less about Davey, my only motivation was to get back to Karin as a repay for playing with me and tricking me. I am disgusted with myself and I am not even sure how I can ever explain all of this mess to Tom. Will I ever be able to excuse old Bill’s behavior? I feel like such a vastly different human being now though. Oh my God, what did I get myself into? Isn’t my new life Tom even harder than the old one after all?