The Man Who Sold His Son (Lanarkshire Strays) (17 page)
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Authors: Mark Wilson
28
Sarah breathed deeply, savouring the freshness of the air as the Zodiac bounced and weaved toward the
Rena’s Pride
. Despite the condition Alex was in, the fog of the half-life she’d been living in his absence had lifted at last, as surely as the humidity of the island they’d left behind with the speed of the Zodiac whistling them through the air. Placing her hand gently on Alex’s chest she drew close to him and kissed his lips gently. Gayle had warned them that they’d most likely been infected by the original
G-ENN-001.
Rob had radioed ahead to the ship, arranging for a quarantine room to be set up for the group, and to warn the crew to keep a distance after winching Alex up on deck. Sarah didn’t care. She had no doubt whatsoever, despite Gayle’s warnings, that her husband would pull through and give the world a gift. The gift of being free of reproductive constraints imposed by a monster who placed his desire for money and status above the freedom of his very species to fulfil their most basic human right.
For all that she believed being free of Ennis’s virus would truly be a blessing for everyone affected, that blessing paled in comparison to the gift that travelled with her in the Zodiac. She was giving her son his father back.
Sarah watched the sun wobble up over the East China Sea and took her husband’s thin hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. The lack of strength in the hand as it squeezed back should have worried her, but instead it brought hot tears of absolute joy to her heart.
END
Epilogue 1
Two years later…
Alex sat at the foot of a low-based statue
of bearded and mustachioed, long-haired warriors
–
something to do with Charlemagne
–
and looked up at Notre Dame’s round window. His legs appreciated the rest. After two years of recovery, they still didn’t feel quite like they should, but considering the alternative, he was grateful for the strength they had left.
“Right, shift yer arse along a bit.”
Alex looked up to see his granda smiling down at him.
“My legs are worse than yours, son. Move up.”
Alex shifted his backside along the plinth to allow his grandfather space. The old man kissed him on the crown of his head as he descended and ruffled his blond hair, exactly the way he had when Alex had been a child. He loved the gesture.
“All right, Granda?”
“Aye,” Tom puffed as he sat. He nodded out at the cathedral. “Some view, isn’t it.”
Alex nodded and felt a twinge in his upper back. He rotated his shoulder blades around to ease it.
Tom gave a little laugh. “Just had a wee flashback there of sitting in this very spot, years ago. God it must be more than sixty years ago now that I think about it.”
“That right?” Alex asked.
“Aye. It was my first time in Paris, and I was in a bad way. Your gran had dumped me.”
Alex laughed. It was odd to think of his grandfather as a young man, even more odd to imagine the rock of a man ever being upset about anything.
Tom jabbed a thumb over his shoulder at the horseman of the statue. “Would’ve fought that big bastard that day, son.” He laughed.
“What time is it?” Alex asked.
“Three,” Tom said, lighting a cigarette. “What time is she on at?”
“Four o’clock. Best get home.”
Both men groaned as their knees complained upon rising. They took each other’s arm and headed for home.
“Just there, Tommy,” Sarah instructed her son. She’d asked him to shift the sofas around for her in the living room. The press conference would start soon and Sarah wanted everyone placed just right.
Her Comm-Unit chimed from the mantel. Waving her hand over the device, Sarah made a throwing gesture, sending the call to the main Holo-Screen. Robert’s image appeared.
“Hiya, Uncle Robert,” Tommy called.
“Awright, son? Christ you’re getting big,” he boomed back. “You all ready?”
Young Tommy nodded. Sarah joined him sitting on the sofa.
“Hi, Robert. How’s things?”
Rob’s image shrugged, “Good. She’s ready, that’s the main thing. Where’s those other two eejits you live with?”
“God knows, Rob. They’ll be here though, they were well warned.”
“Right, I’m gonnae sign off. Speak to you afterwards, okay, darlin’?”
“See you then, bye, Rob.”
As Rob’s image disappeared, the front door of their apartment banged and Tom and Alex walked in. Taking a seat, Tom kissed young Tommy on his crown.
“Granda…” he complained.
“Shut yer face, you. You’re not too big to kiss your great-grandfather.”
Alex sat at the other side of Tommy and repeated the gesture.
“Sake! I just sorted my hair, Dad.”
The older men exchanged a glance, grinning at each other.
Sarah sat beside Alex and slid her hand into his.
“Here it is,” she said to nobody in particular.
The family watched as the Holo-cams focused onto the face of a middle-aged man. A high-ranking politician, with a reputation for plain-speaking and integrity, he was also known for going against his party at times in the World Government. Desmond McAnulty spoke with sincerity and commanded the respect and the attention of the world media. He approached the bank of microphones, a grim look on his normally jovial face.
“I’ve called you here to this press conference today to bring something very serious and very troubling to your attention, and to the attention of those people watching at home.”
McAnulty paused for effect, drilling his eyes into the camera.
“Many of you know the person I’m about to introduce. Most of you believe that she died in a serious fire some years ago, whilst working in a private facility. You’ll recall that it was all over the news… for a few days.”
He glared accusingly at the assembled media, before throwing his arm to the side, in a welcoming gesture.
“Please welcome Professor Gayle Robertson. You will not like what she has to say.”
McAnulty strode gruffly off the stage, leaving Gayle standing at the microphones.
She looked dignified, she looked calm and she looked happy. She’d waited two years for this moment. Two years of research, cloning Alex’s antibodies, developing functioning vaccines. She was ready. Her team had stockpiled a dose for every single human on the planet. She stepped forward half a pace and smiled.
“I’m here to tell you how the whole world has been held hostage to one man’s greed. How we were convinced by a very clever, very manipulative man that we are so much less than we are. That ends now, today. I’ll begin by telling you the story of a very brave little boy with a coward for a father.”
Epilogue 2
Sitting on his leather sofa made from bull’s hide leather, not cow’s
–
cow’s hide has stretch marks which ruins the leather
–
Gavin Ennis lets his scotch glass fall from his hand onto his thick carpet. He can’t process what he’s just witnessed. Words from the conference ping around his skull:
oppression
,
crime, cure, con-man, bastard.
Silently he rises. Dressed in underwear only, he walks calmly, dazed, to the balcony and takes the coward’s express to the pavement below. An impressive Jackson Pollock-esque splat attests to his cowardice.
End
on
For Dad and for Patrick
“
A father is a man who expects his son to be as good a man as he meant to be.
” -
Frank A. Clark
I’d like to thank the following people for their support in writing this novel:
Thanks to my regular test-readers, Gayle Karabelen and Jayne Doherty. Love you for the time you spend reading and for never saying no.
Thanks to Gayle also for letting me pinch her name and forcing me to bring back Tom Kinsella who I’d originally killed off.
“Even if he’s pishing himself in a nursin’ hame, it’s better than being deid.” You were right there.
Thanks also to Victoria McEwan, Jo Meneceur and Tracy Lynch-Stewart for giving their time to beta-reading.
Steph Dagg for her editing of the book. I can’t imagine publishing a novel without Steph. She’s the bestest.
Special thanks also to fellow writers Keith Nixon and Ryan Bracha. Both have been a tremendous support and source of inspiration and always make themselves available for advice or to just talk nonsense about whatever. Reading their books pushes me to be a better writer.
A special mention for my hometown of Bellshill, always a great place to set a book.
A huge thank you, as always, to my wife Natalie Wilson for her unwavering encouragement and support. Twenty years have only made me love you more in their passing.