It's sad when you get old before you're ready. Some people embrace age. They rush to it headlong. Others suddenly wake up and they're almost past middle aged, slipping comfortable into that twilight time where everything is settled, and you don't want any more adventures. Like Gary and Cheryl. He forgot sometimes, that Gary was actually younger than the others. It could have done with his friend not trading in the old model. If your wife is going downhill, what's the point of fighting the slide yourself? Not that he didn't like Cheryl. Just not his type, that's all.
Then there's the Patricks of this world. Never young, never quite old. Just a mellow flow of urbane moments. Look at Patrick in twenty years, he wouldn't be any different. Still smiling, still able to draw the birds with that smooth look of his. Yet not quite touching anything.
At least you knew when Terry'd been around. If you didn't, he'd let you. So what if his kids hated him, or if he came across sometimes like a bit of a twit. He had adventures, he acted more like a man half his age. No middle-aged boredom for Terry. And if he spent more nights alone than he admitted, so what? He had fun!
James supposed that was why he copied Terry more than the others. Why he'd always followed Terry's lead. Oh, he knew what he was. Always did. Not the brightest bulb in the Christmas tree. Always letting others tell him what to do, how to lead his life. But he liked letting others take charge. It made life easier that way. And if sometimes, at night, he wondered if he'd made a mistake with Elizabeth, well, who was to know besides him? He had adventures like Terry. His kids didn't hate him. At least he didn't think they did.
Until today.
Which brought him to why he was in bed, with his strange companion, his muscles screaming at him for the punishment inflicted upon them. Nothing more frightening for a man running away from aging to be told he's going to be a Grandad. He couldn't be a Grandad. Grandad's are wrinkly old men with no teeth, who spilt their tea and smelt of piss and tobacco. They didn't have twenty soemthing girlfriends, or the latest roadster, and they didn't wear leather. They didn't go out partying all night. They stayed at home, and waited for their Grandkids to come visiting. So when he got Elizabeth's news, what did he do? He ran away. Into a 23 year old Squash player who wiped not only the floor with him, but the walls, the ceiling, and the observation window. Instead of proving he was still young, he aged his poor battered body by about ten years.
It wasn't that he didn't like children? He actually did. Elizabeth was wrong in that. She'd conveniently forgotten a few things. He didn't cheat on Anabel. He cheated on her. While she was pulling foals from her prize mares, he was soothing a cholicy Annabel, or putting her first tooth under the pillow for the fairy. He'd been the one to take Annabel for her first day of school, and cried all the way home. It had only been when his daughter had gotten older that Elizabeth had taken over. At loose ends, not knowing what to do while she was off training the horses or rushing the children to their different activities, he'd looked around and found himself lonely and bored. And prat that he was, he followed his old mate Terry's sample for relieving boredom.
A game. That's all it was. A stupid bloody game that they all played and should have grown out of ages ago. He knew it was a game, but he couldn't stop. So he kept pretending that he was having the time of his life. That he wasn't bored, or lonely. That he didn't miss his family, and the sound of children running around and laughing. And when he'd found out about Annabel he pretended that he was the put upon victim, that he'd suffer her and the baby. And if anybody asked why he went to the nursery department of Harrod's and personally picked out the cot, and went to several decorating places till he found the right wallpaper, he would have told them that if he had to do it, he'd do it properly. And if they asked where he got the toy, well it was probably delivered with all the others. Yeah, it might look a bit like Annabel's favourite Nonky, but that's a coincidence. It wouldn't be as if he'd kept all her things in storage and went searching for it as soon as he'd found out about the baby. All for nothing.
So here he was. In this stupid big bed, his body suffering from his latest piece of bravado, alone. Again. Not wanted by his own daughter. Considered not worthy of taking care of her or the baby, and once again being told by his ex-wife that all he was good for was a blank cheque. Just like his mate Terry, who seemed to bounce back from the knocks with a new girl every time. He may not be the smarter one, but he was beginning to wonder who was the real fool. Him for trying to live Terry's life, or Terry for thinking his life was everything it ought to be.
James sighed, drawing Nonky to him. The sound seemed to rattle in the empty apartment. He worked out long ago that 3am was a good time for philosophy and emotional bravery. But tomorrow; well, tomorrow he'll put Nonky away, redocorate his den again, and tell his mates how glad he was that he didn't have to disrupt his perfect life with the presence of his daughter and grandchild. Then he'll probably get drunk and find a young girl who saw the size of his wallet and his cock, and not care how much gray mingled with the fair hair. Then he could pretend his body ached from screwing her, and life was perfect once more.