Read Online Somebody to Love: Sigh With Contentment, Scream With Frustration. At Time You Will Weep. by Sheryl Browne - Free Book Online

then went off to scout about for other candles that might inadvertently be left burning.
    ‘I’ve got some of that walnut coffee cake in, if you fancy some,’ his dad called after him. ‘Your mother’s cake was always better, of course.’
    Mark paused on the stairs.
    His dad didn’t often talk about his mum, but when he did his tone was always tinged with remorse. Mark had been furious with him, initially, but now… Whatever he’d done, it was enough for Mark that he knew how much hurt he caused.
    ‘Man after my own heart, Dad,’ he called back, then swallowed quietly as he peered into his parents’ bedroom; at the bed where his mum had sat once, quietly crying. That was the only time Mark had seen her cry. He’d known she was, though she wouldn’t admit it, dabbing quickly at her eyes when he came into the room.
    She was fine, she’d assured him, telling him to get off and see to his own problems, of which she knew Mark and Emma had plenty, Karl being at the stage where he seemed to be unlearning all that he’d learned. She hadn’t been fine though. Mark had heard the arguments and the loaded silences when he’d visited thereafter. He’d gleaned his dad had had ‘a fling’ while working away.
    It was later though, while his dad kept up a vigil at his mum’s side at the hospital, that Mark had learned how much of a fling.
    His mum had been taken ill so suddenly, it shocked both of them. Mark recalled with familiar sadness how she’d seemed to lose weight overnight. She wasn’t going to make it, they’d realised that as they’d watched her slip silently into unconsciousness. Needing to confess, Mark supposed, his dad had started talking to him, telling him how, as the sales director for Mercedes Benz in Japan — where there was cachet in owning a European car, he’d been kept busy; too busy to come home sometimes. There were times, though, he’d admitted, not meeting Mark’s eyes, when he could have come home, and he hadn’t… because he’d had a longstanding relationship with another woman.
    That’s what had made his mother cry openly that day, Mark realised then. She’d obviously found out. And his father had examined his conscience every day since, living a frugal existence, donating all of his mother’s insurance payout — other than that which he’d put in trust for Karl — to the hospice. Cutting himself off from the company.
    Mark knew it was his father’s way of trying to make amends. He wished he wouldn’t; isolation seeming only to exacerbate his confusion. Knew also that he had to let any resentment he might have go. At the end of the day, hadn’t he walked away from his responsibilities, too? He didn’t blame Emma for leaving, not really. He should have been listening, not getting to work as fast as he could, leaving Emma to cope on her own with Karl, to feel utterly alone. Mark knew how that felt now.
    He closed the bedroom door and went back down to the kitchen, where his father was slicing up the coffee cake. He definitely looked older. The perpetual swarthy tan had gone and there was a slight stoop to his shoulder. No, there was no point raking over old coals.
    ‘Your mum was a good cook, you know?’ his dad said, glancing at Mark, nostalgia shot through with sadness in his eyes.
    ‘I know, Dad.’ Mark nodded and went to pour the tea.
    ‘Upstairs, is she?’ his dad asked.
    Mark tensed. This was not good. ‘No, Dad. You know she’s not,’ Mark reminded him gently. He looked back at his dad now seated back at the farmhouse table. The same table his mum had stripped of ‘atrocious’ gloss paint and lovingly restored. That was the abiding smell of home Mark always remembered, wax polish, and home-baked cake.
    ‘There’s plenty,’ his dad said, eyeing the cake, then Mark hopefully. ‘I like to keep some in for…’
    … when Mark ever bought Karl round, Mark knew his dad wanted to add. He would bring him, he decided, at the weekend, though the chances of Karl