I honestly think he might have a heart attack. His eyes are bulging and his jowls, doubled with the extra weight he carries, are quivering with rage.
‘Dad, calm down.’ Anxiety twists my stomach as his face reddens even more. ‘Please.’ But he’s in full patriarchal fury mode and isn’t even listening. He’s already moving on to the next agenda item.
‘And what about that girl?’
Predictably, Lydia hadn’t endeared herself with her home truths, even though her rise to my defence is a lighthouse beam in the gloom. A clear directional beacon. I’ve been lost for a long time.
‘Who the fuck is she? Going to tell me that you’ve knocked her up?’
‘No,’ I say sullenly. By telling him the bare minimum about her, keeping my feelings to myself, I’ll protect her from his petty disapproval and manipulation. If he thinks I care about her, I know he’ll interfere. He’s quite capable of wrecking her career – for my own good, of course. I keep quiet, which in hindsight probably wasn’t smart because Dad’s hell bent on answers. He’s not going to let anyone derail his son.
‘Well, who is she? And who’s her family? What do they do?’
There’s only one way I can protect Lydia.
‘She’s nobody,’ I say, with an indifferent shrug Lydia would be proud of, even though the outright lie pinches at my heart. Liar. Liar. Liar. I continue, desperate to head Dad off. ‘I barely know her.’
Even as a defence mechanism, the words are a betrayal and nausea rises up my throat. Lydia deserves better. So much better. She definitely doesn’t need to be tied into this warped version of love. There is no winner here. If I stay with her, I’ll ultimately disappoint her. Even if I rebel against my father’s wishes and make my film, it will never be good enough. Eventually Lydia will see me in the same way.
Thankfully Dad does calm down but then he moves on to stage two, reasoned, logical, wise parent.
He sits heavily in the chair behind his enormous desk as if the disappointment is too much to bear. I straighten, a Pavlovian response to the situation as the predictable lecture ensues.
‘All we’ve ever wanted for you is for the best. Good job, good salary, good home and … we’re still waiting … for you to settle down. At your age I was already on the board and engaged to your mother with our own home.’ He shakes his head and sighs. ‘Even your brother and sister have managed to get on the property ladder but you’re still renting a poky apartment in a dreadful postcode. And now you’re talking about giving it all up. I don’t understand. What have we done wrong?’
Even though I know the anxiety twisting my gut is the result of classical conditioning, I can’t stop the rising tide of guilt and sense of failure. I’m letting him down.
‘You haven’t done anything wrong.’ God, how many times have I reassured him of this. ‘I just—’
‘Just what? Want to turn your back on your career for a whim? Do you know how many people would like to have a job like that? You wouldn’t have it without my connections, guidance and advice. How do you think that makes me feel? That you’re even considering giving it up.’
‘Dad,’ I say firmly and reasonably. I’m not going to back down this time. ‘I’m not going to give my career up. Just take a sabbatical.’
‘BCHA are hardly going to give you a sabbatical when you’ve just joined.’ He sneers at my lack of foresight.
‘I meant a personal sabbatical. I’ll get another job after the film.’ That’s my fall-back option; I’m really hoping I can keep going making more films. There’s a reason I live in a ‘poky apartment’ on my salary. I’ve been saving as much as I could for this very reason.
‘And I expect you think I’ll pull strings for you then, do you? Get you back in again? I’m going to have to tell my hard-won contacts that my son is just taking some time out to play, but don’t worry, he’s committed to his work. How the fuck is that going to look to the industry? And I can tell you what people will think. That’s Nigel Dereborn’s son, the dropout.’ His mouth twists with bitterness as he spits out the final word and repeats it. ‘Dropout.’
I’ve heard variations on this lecture before, when I smashed a window at school with a cricket ball, when I got a C in my Maths mock GCSE, when I wanted to go to Portsmouth, when I finished with Natalie, when William was made a director, when Rosie got married.
Love comes at a price.
But I’m not going to back down – I’m not giving up on my dream, but at the same time, I’m not going to provoke Dad any further. There’s no point until I know I’ve definitely secured the funding.
I’ve had enough of chasing approval – this is why it’s better to be self-contained and not allow yourself the chance to disappoint people. They will always want more. Even Lydia.
I emerge from the study with Dad on my heels just as Annette turns up.
‘Annette,’ my mother greets her warmly. ‘How lovely to see you. And so good of you to come when I know how busy you are.’
‘That’s all right, Barbara. How are you?’
She greets my mother with a polite kiss on the cheek before doing the same to my father.
‘Annette. How’s the lifesaving business?’ asks Dad. I refrain from rolling my eyes. He asks this question every time he sees her.
‘Can’t complain,’ says Annette, with a tired smile. There are new tiny wrinkles fanning out from her eyes and deep purple smudges beneath them. I honestly think my parents believe she wafts around the wards laying a hand on fevered brows.
‘Of course you can’t,’ says Dad with a sidelong glance my way. ‘Dedicated doctor and all that.’
‘Nice to see you, Tom,’ says Annette giving me a hug. She gives an extra squeeze and a wink. She’s much better at playing the dutiful relative than I am. ‘How’s Lydia?’ she asks.
‘You know Lydia?’ asks my mother, hiding neither her surprise nor her disapproval.
Annette’s smile broadens, with a just hint of mischief. ‘Oh, yes, we were at Cambridge together.’
The way she says it, it sounds as if she and Lydia were best buddies. I knew there was a reason I liked my cousin so much.
‘Oh,’ says my mother. ‘Look, it’s George and Annabel.’ She darts off to the front door and I can hear her greeting them with great enthusiasm. Obviously important people. They must work with Dad.
‘Any chance you could look at Lydia’s leg?’ I mutter while my parents’ attention is diverted.
‘Sure. I haven’t got my medical bag with me, though. Where is she?’
I nod towards the window, through which I can see the floaty blue dress halfway down the garden near the gazebo that has been erected to house the bar.
