Lucky Man Pt. 01

From what you know of me and my relationship with my father you might be mystified why his demise would have any effect on my situation to bring to the point where my story started.

OK, it was bound to have some impact on my household, I have already mentioned that he appeared to be a much better grandfather to my children than he ever was a father to me, and I knew they would be dramatically affected by his demise. I just didn't have a clue what was about to hit the fan. I guess nobody did.

Dad had had a good innings I suppose. He bowed out at the age of 90 after a short illness. Until then he had enjoyed a vigorous, active life. I was very much an unplanned late arrival to my old man's immediate family, my mother was pushing 45 and he was 55, so by the time I was 10 he was already retired, although he still maintained chairmanship of the scrap metal business his grandfather founded back in the heydays of Victoria.

I wasn't sure exactly what emotions I felt when my father died. We had been at loggerheads for so much of my life that I found it difficult to feel much sadness. I had tried quite hard to get closer to him in his last few years, particularly the months after his first stroke. I felt I had to, if only for the girls' sakes, but it was an uphill struggle, he was so unbending. I have always regarded myself as stubborn but he was intransigent in his attitude to me whenever we shared the same room. We just sparked each other off, we'd be rude and bitchy, souring any atmosphere; so we tended to gravitate to neutral corners, each keeping a wary eye on the other.

The funeral was the first time the whole family were brought together in one place that I can remember. There was only a small handful present when my mother was buried, my two sisters coming alone without their immediate families. For this one my sisters informed me that they would be coming in force. All sorts of uncles, aunts and umpteen times-removed cousins also emerged out of the woodwork and the ceremony was going to be lavish, a horse-drawn hearse, the pallbearers in black morning coats, the works. Of course on the grey morning of the funeral, the heavens opened and it absolutely pissed down.

The church service was due to start at 11am, so the entourage was due to leave his house, where he had laid overnight after the funeral directors had done their business, at 9.45am sharp. I was one of the bearers, Bob another, the others being cousins and grandchildren, none of Dad's siblings were alive, he'd survived them all.

Ruth, myself and the girls, I say girls, they were young women aged 20 and 18 by then, needed to be at Dad's house ready to greet the guests who would start to arrive at 9am on the dot. The girls were very tearful, and I thought it was unwise to let them into the room where the open coffin was on display, so I steered them to the comfort of his huge kitchen. Ruth kept them close to her, their sorrow had also been absorbed by her and all three were red-eyed.

I went into the front room on my own and found Bob comatose on the settee behind the coffin, a couple of empty whisky bottles on the floor. He had his suit on, just, but it was in disarray and he had vomited down the front.

Bob was always Dad's favourite nephew and he had always worked for Dad, having won by his own talents the managing directorship of one of the biggest plants. He was also a senior member on the holding company board of directors. I know he was fond of Dad, the feeling I'm sure was mutual but I simply hadn't realised Bob would take the loss of my father so hard.

Looked around the kitchen and grabbed a doddery old uncle, and together we bundled Bob up into the master bedroom and undressed him completely. Bob had a thick DL envelope in his jacket pocket, which was rather crumpled.

I pulled it out intending to put it to one side but couldn't help but notice that my name was written on the front in what was possibly my father's hand. I stuffed it in my own inside jacket pocket instead. I stripped off all my clothes and hung them around and over a chair, then dragged and pushed Bob under the shower.

Uncle Wayne went down to grab a pot of coffee and to quietly fetch Ruth. By that time I was trying to soap and shampoo Bob in the shower as he was barely conscious and couldn't stand up on his own. Uncle Wayne brought up the coffee and a cup and was then dispatched to clean up the front room's settee and floor and dispose of the bottle evidence.

Ruth did her best to sponge Bob's suit and tie and found him another shirt from Dad's wardrobe, they were alike as peas from a pod. Meanwhile, I cleaned up the stupid son of a bitch until Bob smelt like a rose, sat his barely conscious body on the bed and started plying him with coffee. I kept a towel and waste paper basket (all I could find instead of a bowl or bucket) to catch any upchuck. Yes, it was required, twice.

He was barely awake even when we started to dress him. Ruth was great help, I held his mostly limp form while we got him back into his apparel. She actually started laughing, she had been strained, affected by the girl's mood recently, and we were soon both laughing at the incongruity of dressing a full grown man as if he was a baby. When we finished he was more or less awake, still very drunk, but increasingly more aware of his surroundings and how miserable he was.

I got myself dressed too, well as far as my shirt and trousers anyway. A glance at my watch showed we only had a few minutes before we were due to carry the coffin the few feet from the front parlour to the hearse. It was clear that in the time we had before the entourage was due to depart, that Bob wasn't going to make it.

Leaving Ruth to deal with his peripherals, socks, shoes and tie, etc, I scooted downstairs and hunted out the funeral directors. They were completely sanguine about my problem with Bob, apparently grief took many forms and they had seen this all before. A couple of burly undertakers were swiftly drafted in to substitute for Bob and I.

We agreed that Ruth would accompany the girls in the leading car to the church for the ceremony, while I remained at the house with Bob to continue sobering him up. We would join them at sometime during the ceremony.

I took another scalding pot of coffee and a bowl of sugar upstairs with me and sent Ruth down to take the girls in hand, they would need Ruth with them at the church. While I tried to get some sweet hot coffee into Bob, I could hear the bustle as people exited and soon the house was quiet and empty except for the pair of us, and we looked a sorry pair indeed. I stood at the window retying my tie as the last car made its walking pace exit from the drive.

Bob was sitting up on the edge of the bed, head bowed and shaking slightly. What with the rain and the unseasonably cool weather for the time of the year, the cold air had filtered through to the bedroom from the doors which had been open for some time and the steamy dampness from our shared shower chilled us both. I only noticed then that my hair was still wet. I grabbed a warm towel and vigorously dried my long locks and ran a comb through it, before retying my trademark ponytail.

I stood Bob up, he still towered over six inches taller than me, but today he appeared smaller, his broad shoulders rounded, stooped and his head hung low. Silent tears streamed down his riven face. He looked pathetic, like a puppy dog who had been left indoors all day and had given up all hope that the children would ever come home to play with him again.

I hadn't realised how close he had been to my father, I didn't think anyone got close to him, let alone a fun guy like Bob. To me my Dad was a cold fish, violent, abusive and sadistic, I couldn't see how charismatic everyone - especially the ladies - thought Dad was, I could never see it, myself.

"Come on Bob, snap out of it," I said gently, hoping to softly penetrate the misery which was etched so evidently in his face, his very demeanour. We needed to be at the funeral service, both as pallbearers, with me as my father's only son and Bob as his oldest work colleague. We had each been asked to provide a reading and I was also to deliver the eulogy.

Bob had consumed a couple of pints of sweet coffee by now and was looking less green about the gills but emotionally he was inconsolable.

"I love you, Mark," he said, thickly, his tongue refusing to work as it should. "I really love you, mate, I always have," he slurred.

I had to smile at the classic statement from the completely inebriated.

"I love you, too," I assured him, "Since you helped me out in the playground my first day at school, mate, when you held off those bullies. You've been my best friend ever since."

I think he must have been thinking about what I had said because he was quiet for a long time. I struggled to get his jacket on and had one arm in when he spoke.

"That wasn't never s'posed t'happen. Dad beat me for that, called me naughty. He always beat me when I was naughty. I lied an' to'd 'I'm that you were protected by some of the older girls an' Dad laughed and only hit me once more, 'for luck' he said. I was in trouble but I s'ggested that if I become yer mate instead of yer worst nightmare I could replace the big girls and you'd be in my power and as I was in his power than so'd you be."

Then he lapsed into silence, still sobbing those big sobs and shaking water off his cheeks, nose and chin onto his jacket which I had only just got on him.

I couldn't make out what he was saying, it simply didn't make sense. I hardly knew Uncle Jonathan, Bob's father. He had disappeared years before I went to secondary school, so I didn't think he was even around at the time. Sad, really, he was the centre of family gossip, having been caught in the men's toilets at the recreation ground one night having sex with another man, caught up in a police operation. It led to a messy divorce and Uncle Jonathan ended up a broken man, dying of Aids just a few years later.

My Dad had taken Bob under his wing then, so we became like brothers. Actually, he soon became Dad's favourite, even when I was Dad's only son, I could never be his favourite. I had no chance with Dad after Bob turned up. They were so alike.

I was about 6 at the time and Bob about 10. I was a snot-nosed mummy's boy, truculent and uncooperative, while Bob appeared to be a well-behaved angel. We played together a lot but Bob had issues caused by his own father's circumstances and saw me as a rival for my Dad's affections; when no-one was watching Bob used to beat me down every opportunity he got. After he went to secondary school I saw less and less of him. I think by then my aunt had taken back control of her life and Bob was out of my life except for high days and holidays.

"Right, Bob we gotta go," I said as I completed dressing him and put a comb through his dark hair, straightening up his jacket and tie.

He was checking his inside and outside pockets looking for something, and mumbling barely making sense.

"Gotta destroy Mark's copy ... lost it ... musta burned it already ... thank god ... Mark mustn't ... be alright ... get ... lives back. Good old Mark, love you, Mark, you're the best, Mark."

The drivel that comes from drunks. I am lucky that I rarely drink more than a couple of glasses and never take drugs. I hate losing control of myself, and right then Bob wasn't anywhere near the surface of this planet.

"I love you too, man," I assured him, "but we've got to get you to the church service."

I got him down the stairs with a bit of a hair-raising struggle, I was not used to carrying heavy weights around any more, and we were outside before realising that Ruth had taken the keys for her car with her so I had to use Bob's Rover. His passenger door was open and I bundled him in. His keys weren't in the ignition and Bob didn't have them in his pockets. We were really running late now. I searched the hall first, then the kitchen, and found them on the counter. Another ten or fifteen minutes had elapsed and I literally ran out to the car.

Bob had just been incoherent before, now he was completely comatose and breathing worryingly unsteadily. Limp in his hand was a practically empty half bottle of whisky, which he must've had in his glove compartment. Shit! I had no choice now, I drove him straight to casualty.

I parked right outside where only the ambulances are allowed to stop and got him out and dragged him through the doors. As I did so, he convulsed and vomited all over my trousers.

An orderly came up with a trolley and helped me get him onto it and wheeled him away to a cubicle. It took me a full half an hour to get Bob registered. I wasn't allowed to use my mobile phone in the hospital so I couldn't contact anyone. After another 45 minutes they reported back to me that Bob's stomach had been pumped and he was being kept in overnight. I was surprised there was anything left in his stomach, most of it was on my trousers and they smelt ripe. By the time I got out of Casualty, Bob's car had been towed, probably to the Police pound.

I called a cab and then left a text message with Ruth that Bob was not coming and I'd had to catch a cab home to change. I knew that Ruth would have her phone switched off in the church.

I phoned the funeral directors too, after looking up their number on the web site, they said would get a message to one of their team. I thought if I got home to change I might still make it, probably not for the church service, but for the interment. I didn't want to put the phone back in my filthy trousers because I knew I would discard them as soon as I got home, so I tried to put it in my jacket, which was still relatively clean. The damn outside pockets were sewn up, this was the first time I had worn it, so I put the phone in my inside pocket and felt Bob's envelope residing there.

I had at least five minutes' wait for the cab, so I looked at the crumpled DL. I imagined I had seen my name on the front when I glanced at it earlier, thinking it must have said something like "Mark and Bob's speech" but I was intrigued when I saw it actually said "For the attention of Marcus Newlands, to be opened upon the death of Reginald Nickolaus Newlands".

Well, it was addressed to me, I had time to kill and I was, quite frankly, curious. It could only be a copy of the will, which was due to be read after the ceremony. Well, Dad's lawyers took care of that, they had already advised that they had the will. The wording on the envelope was in block capitals, which gave me no clue as to the identity of the scribe. I flipped it over and stuck my thumb under the flap and tore it open. There were three handwritten sheets inside. I pulled them out and unfolded the bundle of papers.

The first sheet was headed "Last Will & Testament" and went on to show my father's name and address, assuring the reader that he was of sound mind and body as of a date two months previously. I recognised the handwriting, it was Bob's. Clearly this had been dictated by my father about seven weeks before he succumbed to the second stroke.

I remembered now, he had been taken into hospital feeling breathless after collapsing at home. He was only kept in overnight and warned to change his lifestyle, like giving up his habitual daily cigars. After another six weeks he had a relapse and went downhill fast after that, he was over 90 after all.

The cab turned up then and I climbed into the back and we headed towards my house. I unfolded the papers again and glanced down the first page of the Will. I found my place and continued reading.

There were a number of smaller bequests to his daily housekeeper, the gardener and some work colleagues. The house and grounds and all the household goods were left to Bob, shown as Robert Jason Taylor. The stocks, holdings and cash in banks, including overseas accounts were to be distributed equally between his children. This was followed by a list of names, dates of birth, and addresses, entered in birth order. The list went on past the foot of the first page onto the other side of the sheet.

I went back and counted them from the top, Bob appeared at 16, so some of his earlier drunken mumblings about his "father" began to make sense, although at the back of my mind it did occur to me that this was very strange as my Aunt Anne was my father's sister.

I froze when I reached number 20, there was my wife's name Ruth Edmondson, her birthday and our current address. My wife, according to this last will and testament, was my father's daughter, that means ... I was horrified and my mouth was immediately filled with bile.

I vomited in the back of that cab.

Boy, was the cabbie pissed off and upset, but he was not half as pissed off and upset as I was. I was numb with pain. The cabbie kicked me out of the cab at my house and I forced an extra twenty on him, mumbling about something they must've given me at the hospital. He was not impressed.

I washed my face and cleaned my teeth but I still felt dirty, so dirty that I doubted whether I'd ever be clean again. I went back to the lounge where I had left the papers, I just had to read on. With my hands shaking, I picked them up once more and continued to read from where I left off.

Rather than just count, I read the names line by line. The names were aunts and cousins mainly, the rest were family friends, we used to see all the time. Two of them weren't cousins but girls I had met and made love to, girls that I thought were slappers that I didn't want to have long-term relationships with. They were also girls that I didn't think Dad knew. I couldn't see how he could know them, because at that time I had severed all contact with my Dad. I wasn't even sure Bob knew one of them. We'd only gone on a couple of single dates, never as a foursome.

I read on down the list and there at numbers 25 and 27 my world, which was already crumbling around my ears, completely collapsed. There, hand-written in blue-black ink were the names that killed my heart, the full Christian names and surnames, dates of birth and current address of my daughters, Andie and Charlie.

I never made it to the bathroom. I was retching all the way down the hall. I stayed in that downstairs cloakroom for half an hour washing my face and crying. Eventually I emerged in a daze and went back to the lounge and picked up those damned papers again. I didn't clean up the floor in the hallway.

The list of names ended with offspring number 32. Curiously, I noted that they seemed to be all girls with the exception of Bob. I read on and the next paragraph said that his remaining assets would be realised and split equally between his surviving children.

The final paragraph was a special bequest to me, his only legal son, according to my birth certificate, but he disowned me as the son of another and he was leaving me just one penny from his estate. Well, that put me in my place. I only realised then that I wasn't listed among his children. He was not my father. My next thought was that at least Ruth wasn't my sister. It then followed logically that Bob was her half brother. My head hurt.

I had honestly never given a thought to any inheritance, I had never got on with Dad and therefore had no expectations from that quarter. I assumed he was worth something, as he appeared to have so many lucrative business interests, but he never splashed his money about, his house was large and in a nice neighbourhood, but he had bought it when houses were cheap and was never flash with his money.

The next two pages consisted of a letter from my father, written in Bob's hand but signed in a scrawl by the person I once called my father, Reggie Newlands, as was the Will. I won't repeat verbatim what was written, it was long and rambling. In summary he said he had hated me from the time my mother couldn't hide her pregnancy from him any more. Reggie said he beat her pregnant arse to within an inch of her life and hoped I would be terminated, but I hung on.