The Importance of Being Auburn

I think my driver was enjoying the intrigue. Half an hour later he called me.

"Right, boss. I followed the taxi back into town. It dropped a woman off at a hotel then I managed to have a word with the driver. He said the girl hailed him outside the place I picked you up from and asked him to follow us. Once she had your address she told him to take her back to town. He said he told her that I was following him but she just thought that was funny and was not bothered about it.

"The taxi driver was a bit curious and waited until the girl had gone into the hotel. You know, he said he wasn't sure what to make of it. For his piece of mind he wanted to make sure she was actually staying at that hotel."

I thanked my driver and asked him if he was available to run my car home to me the following morning and he said he would arrange that.

Saturday morning I was laying on a lounger in my back garden sunbathing when I heard a car pull into the drive. I assumed it was the driver with my car. He knew the score and would just leave it there for me.

A little later a shadow fell over me. I didn't look up. "Hello, Anita what can I do for you?"

"You know who I am."

"I worked it out last night, girl. It didn't require Sherlock Holmes, and besides you have your mother's eyes. Now what can I do for you?"

"I just want to know my father."

"Well, I think you've got the wrong man. I believe your father is called Ray Stevens."

"No, he's not. My father is Reece Colne and that's you. Mother told me she never slept with Ray Stevens. She says that you are my father. She told me how much of a bitch she was to you and how she drove you away."

I turned and looked at her. She had long auburn hair down to her shoulders. Except for that hair colour it could have been Deanna standing there.

"I can't believe she is sticking to those lies after all this time. From almost the day we were married she was not a wife to me, and then I saw her with that wanker. Does she really think I'm going to believe that crap now."

Without me offering, Anita sat herself down on the other lounger.

"Mother isn't asking you to believe her, I am! I know that it is hard for you to believe but mother loves you, she's always loved you. Look, after you left mother had a breakdown. She finished up in hospital and they said she was suffering from serious depression. Very serious depression and had probably been since I had been born.

"Do you know that grandfather divorced Nan over it. He said that instead of helping the pair of you through a difficult period, Nan had spent all her time trying to drive a wedge between mother and you. That had made mum's depression worse and she took it out on you.

"Mum has told me over and over that she should never have gone out with the girls those times. She said that being with the girls seemed to make all her troubles go away for a while. But when she got home she had to look after me again; then her mother would keep winding her up about you and the fact that you were out all the time. Mother knew you were working very hard to get enough money together to buy a house, so you could get her out of that flat she hated so much. She felt guilty about going out and having a good time.

"She felt so guilty that she tried to hide the fact that she was going out from you. When you found out, she just didn't know what to say to you. So she did what her mother had taught her to do. She attacked you and told you to mind your own business. Then that night you came home early and had a big row with Nan. Mother said it was such a shock when you suddenly threw Ray Stevens at her.

"She says that Ray Stevens and John Brag came past whilst she and the girls were waiting for a taxi out side the club. John offered the girls a lift, but mother said she wanted to wait for a taxi. The girls accepted the lift and mother didn't have enough money for a taxi on her own, so she had to get into the car as well. But as she was last, the only place for her to sit was on Ray Stevens's lap.

"She told me that she had gone out with Ray a couple of times a few years before when you and her had fallen out for a while. But she says she only ever went out with him to make you jealous. Anyway Ray got out of hand in the car and pulled her top down just as the car arrived at the flat. She told Ray off and so did John Brag and the girls. You won't know but after you left John Brag and Ray had a fight over it. John is a nice man really; he and Angela have been good friends to mum and me.

"Oh, I don't suppose you know John married Angela. They invited you to their wedding in a vain attempt to get some dialog going between you and mother. But I suspect your sister never sent the invite on."

"Oh, but Susan did. I just couldn't figure out why they had invited me. We were never close friends at school. They were your mother's friends not mine."

"Their plan was to get you two together and tell you what really happened."

"I can't see that that would have done any good. I'm afraid I left you mother because I am sure that I'm not your father. I had begun to notice your hair getting some colour in it and it wasn't a colour that I could place in your mother's or my families. I thought it was turning ginger and that's why I thought that probably Stevens could be your father. Is it still ginger, do you dye it?"

"No, this is my natural colour and it is in your family. It's just that you have never realised it."

"Oh, yes, where do you get that idea, we're all blondes."

"Not quite, father!" She said with an assured tone as she opened her handbag, and took out a compact; she flipped it open and turned it towards me. "Would you like to tell me what colour your moustache is? Are you going to say you dye it?

Taken somewhat by surprise I looked at my tash in the mirror. I am quite proud of my Mexican style moustache. I looked and I studied. I look at the damn thing everyday but I have never noticed. It's not blond. It's brown, no red; no it's a very pale auburn colour.

"Oh, My god!"

"Yes, daddy, your father's beard was the same colour, but I guess you never recognised it. Here look at these old pictures."

She pulled several pictures of my father from her bag and held them out to me.

"When you left us, you left your photo albums behind. I spotted the colour of his beard in some of them a couple of years ago. It appears to vary a bit, in the Christmas photo's the colour is quite pronounced but in the summer holiday shots his beard looks almost white. Gramps and I have been looking for you ever since I spotted it."

Looking at the photos of my deceased father, I suddenly remembered how his beard would appear to change colour. Then the realisation of what Anita was telling me hit home. I think I cried out as I burst into tears. My whole world suddenly seemed to crash around me. I couldn't think straight or really make sense of what was happening. I think I must have been very near having a breakdown. I can recall Anita rushing out of her seat and throwing her arms around me. After that nothing!

How long I sat there crying I don't know. The next few hours are a complete mystery to me. When I came out of my daze I was laying on my bed and my doctor was giving me an injection. He was saying something to me but I never heard him, then the room went black again. I was to learn later that the shock of realising that I had been so wrong was nearly too much for my brain to handle. The doctor had giving me a sedative, hoping that some rest would help.

I opened my eyes when I heard a voice say "Reece, can you hear me?" The room was dark and I could see stars out of the window to my left. Turning my head to the right I saw a vague outline. Then a voice that I knew so well said, "I'm sorry, Reece, I didn't mean to be so nasty to you but my head was in such a muddle." Then Deanna lent down and kissed my forehead. "Will you ever forgive me?"

I reacted up and grabbed hold of her pulling her down onto me. "It's you who have to forgive me. I walked out on you and out child."

"Now you two, lets not get into who's fault it was." Anita's stern voice came from somewhere else in the room. "There is no point in playing the blame game. If you do that we will never be a family and we've been apart much too long. You've both made some big mistakes so can we please forget them and try and get on with our lives."

+++++++++++

What is going to happen now? I don't really know. Deanna and Anita are staying at my house for the time being. Dea and I are talking and have kissed and cuddled a bit. Deanna wanted to share my bed but I asked her to wait a while. I'm not the same young man she married all those years ago. She might decide that she doesn't love me after all. Anita thinks that is doubtful

I realise now that Deanna and I were much to young and naive when we got married and she had Nettie. I was completely out of my depth trying to be a husband and father. I was trying to be the man that my father was, but I was just to young to handle it. I know that I loved Dea, but I hadn't recognised that she was also out of her depth and needed more support than I had given her. I had a one-track mind back then and was only thinking of the future.

I was out of that depressing little flat most the time. Although I was working, I wasn't stuck in the hellhole. Dea needed to get out of that place as well, even if it was just for a few hours.

Dea was wrong not to tell me she was going out with her friends. But the young are not famous for making the right decisions. She was also under the influence of her mother, who I now believe had a hidden agenda. Dea's mother wasn't just being a bitch to me, I think she wanted the marriage to fail. I believe she thought I had stolen her daughter and she wanted to get her back.

Do I really want Dea back in my life? Yes, I believe I do. Every one of the women I've dated over the years I have turned down because they did not measure up to Dea. From what Anita has told me, her mother has never taken the approaches of other men seriously. Anita has told me that since she was very small whenever the subject of the suitors who had approached her mother came up. Dea had just said that there is only one Reece, no other man would do!

But I'm going to take things very slowly. To rush things now, I'm sure could be a mistake. We have to get used to each other slowly and then we shall see what the future brings.

Life goes on.