Boyfriend Material(74)

Personally, even putting aside how little I wanted to be there, I wouldn’t have chosen the course of action that had “get assaulted” as a possible consequence. Oliver, apparently, didn’t have a problem with it. We walked round the guy and into the house.

Where we were immediately yelled at by a red-haired woman in her early fifties. “Cut. Cut. Who the fuck opened the door?”

We were standing in what, when it wasn’t full of boom mics and angry people, would have been a gorgeously rustic entrance hall, with stripped wooden floorboards, slightly faded rugs, and an enormous fireplace set into a stone wall.

“My apologies for the interruption,” Oliver said, unperturbed. “We’re here to see Jon Fleming. But there seems to be a schedule clash.”

“I don’t care if you’re here to see the fucking Dalai Lama. You don’t walk onto my set.”

At this moment, Jon Fleming stepped through from the room beyond—a sitting room decorated in the same style, which somehow managed to look cosy despite also being enormous.

“Sorry. Sorry.” He made what James Royce-Royce would call a mea-culpa gesture. “They’re with me. Geraldine, you okay with them sitting in?”

“Fine.” She glared at us. “Just be quiet and don’t touch anything.”

“Well”—I sighed sadly—“there goes my plan to scream and lick the furniture.”

Jon Fleming gave me a look of sincere contrition, though I was sure that he was neither sincere nor contrite. “I’ll be with you soon, Luc. I know this wasn’t what you expected.”

“Actually. It’s pretty much exactly what I expected. Take as long as you need.”

It took him five fucking hours.

Most of it, he spent mentoring Leo from Billericay through a soulful acoustic rendition of “Young and Beautiful.” They were sitting on one of the expansively homey sofas—Leo from Billericay, with his guitar cradled on his knee like it was a dying lamb, and Dad watching him intently with this look that said “I believe in you, son.”

I knew shit all about music but Dad was depressingly good at this stuff. He kept making insightful, but non-pushy technical suggestions and offering the sort of praise and support that stayed with you for a lifetime. And, incidentally, also made for great TV moments. At one point he even guided Leo from Billericay’s fingers into a better position to transition between chords.

And then we had to clear the entrance hall so Leo from Billericay could sit by the fireplace and tell the camera how amazing my dad was and how important their relationship had become to him. Which took several takes because they kept asking him for more emotion. By the end he was on the verge on tears, although whether that was because it had been such a meaningful experience for him, or because he’d been sat under hot lights for the whole afternoon with nothing to eat or drink while people shouted at him, I couldn’t say. Well, I could. But I didn’t really care.

While they were doing whatever TV slang for tidying up is—folding the pooches or clearing the banana—I slunk off to steal a baked potato from ITV. It did not make me feel substantially better. But finally Oliver, Jon Fleming, my stolen baked potato, and I were sitting round the kitchen table, sharing an uncomfortable moment.

“So,” I said, “what with you filming pretty much constantly since we got here, I couldn’t introduce you to my boyfriend.”

“I’m Oliver Blackwood.” Oliver offered his hand, and my father gave it a firm shake. “It’s good to meet you.”

Jon Fleming gave him slow nod that said You have been judged and found worthy. “And you, Oliver. I’m glad you could come. Both of you.”

“Well”—I made a gesture that came as close as I could get to “fuck you” without literally giving him the finger—“that’s nice, but we’ll be leaving soon.”

“You can stay the night if you want. You can take the annexe. You’ll have your own space.”

Part of me wanted to say yes if only because I was pretty sure he was banking on me saying no. “We’ve got work.”

“Another time, then.”

“What other time? We had to rent a car for this, and we spent the whole afternoon watching you shoot a shitty TV show.”

He looked grave and regretful—which, when you were a bald man in your seventies with more charisma than conscience, was very easy to do. “This wasn’t what I wanted. And I’m sorry my work got in the way.”

“What did you want?” I stabbed my potato with a wooden spork. “What was the plan here?”

“There isn’t a plan, Luc. I just thought it would be good for us to spend some time together, in this place. It was something I wanted to share with you.”

I…had no idea what to say to that. Jon Fleming had given me nothing my whole life. And now he suddenly wanted to share, what, Lancashire?

“It’s a very beautiful part of the country,” offered Oliver. God, he made the effort. Every. Single. Time.

“It is. But it’s more than that. It’s about roots. It’s about where I come from. Where you come from.”

Okay. Now I had something to say. “I come from a village near Epsom. Where I was raised by the parent who didn’t walk out on me.”

Jon Fleming didn’t flinch. “I know you needed me in your life, and I know it was wrong of me not to be there. But I can’t change the past. I can only try to do what’s right in this moment.”