‘He’s pleased with my progress,’ Ben said, wiping his mouth free of grease. ‘Not much else to say, really.’
‘And you’re keeping up with your end of things?’ Harry asked. ‘All that paperwork and whatnot. It’s important.’
‘You don’t need to check up on me so much,’ Ben said, his bacon butty now finished. ‘But yes, I am.’
‘I do and I will,’ Harry said. ‘The prison service may have someone employed to keep an eye on you, true, but you’ve an extra pair of eyes on you: mine. So, you’d better accept it.’
‘I’m not a teenager.’
‘No, you’re not,’ Harry said. ‘But neither are you someone who’s had an easy time of it. And I’ll be seeing to it that you don’t put a step wrong.’
Harry saw then a darkness flicker behind his brother’s eyes. And it was because of it that he was laying it on thick. Happy and relaxed though Ben seemed, he knew it wouldn’t take much of a push to have him back down where he was.
Ben rose to his feet, draining his mug.
‘Work?’ Harry asked.
Ben gave a nod. ‘I know Mike has to give me time off to see the offender manager, but I don’t like to take the piss too much.’
‘Or at all,’ Harry said. ‘And supervisor is a lot easier to say than that offender manager nonsense, don’t you think?’
‘They don’t like the idea of us thinking we’re being “supervised,”’ Ben said, shooting out air quotes with his fingers around that last word. ‘Even though we know we are. Apparently, it’s more motivational if we have a manager, and less like still being seen as someone who’s been in prison.’
‘Whatever floats your boat, I suppose,’ Harry said. ‘It’ll probably change again in a year or so to something like offender motivator or some such bollocks.’
Ben laughed. It was a sound Harry loved and would never grow tired of.
‘Sometimes,’ Ben said, ‘you talk and act like you’re in your mid-sixties, not your mid-forties, you know that, right?’
‘Old and wise before my time,’ Harry said, stretching and standing up to face Ben.
Ben made to walk to the café door.
‘Oi!’ Harry said.
Ben stopped. ‘Really? Here? Come on, Harry . . .’
‘Something else you need to get used to,’ Harry said, and he reached out and pulled his younger brother into a hug.
Ben groaned, not so much out of embarrassment as from having his ribcage crushed.
‘Right, off you go then,’ Harry said, sitting back down to finish his food and drink. ‘And I’ll see you back home at around six, right?’
Ben nodded and made to leave, but paused, then turned back to face his brother.
‘What is it?’ Harry asked. ‘Something you forgot to tell me that your supervisor, sorry, I mean your manager, mentioned?’
‘No, it’s not that,’ Ben said.
‘Then what?’
‘You said home,’ Ben explained. ‘And it’s not, is it? I mean, not really.’
‘It’s not Bristol, no,’ Harry said, then his mind was back to that conversation he’d had with Firbank and Swift, and to that decision he was going to have to make sooner rather than later. ‘But would it be so bad if it was? Home, I mean.’
Ben shrugged. ‘I’ll see you later, Harry . . .’ but he paused again.
‘Are you leaving or what?’ Harry asked.
‘I am. It’s just that, there’s the other thing, you know? The thing we don’t talk about?’
Harry saw a dark shadow flicker behind his brother’s eyes. ‘You don’t need to worry about him,’ he said. ‘That’s dealt with. It’s done. Trust me.’
‘You sure, Harry?’ Ben said. ‘I mean, Dad isn’t someone who just backs off, is he?’
‘I’m no longer a threat,’ Harry said. ‘There’s plenty of others out there who are, so he’s got other things to worry about now. And anyway, I’ve wasted too much time on him as it is. You’re my priority now. You and me, Ben. Family.’
Ben gave an uncertain nod.
‘If you say so.’
‘I do.’
And Ben was gone.
Harry slumped back down to finish off his food then ordered another mug of tea. He had seen the team first thing that morning, and there wasn’t anything urgent to be going on with, so a few extra minutes to himself seemed only fair.
As he waited for his drink, Harry thought over what Ben was on with now, and how much his brother’s life had changed. And it only served to emphasise to him how important it was to keep him where they were, in Hawes, and not to head back in Bristol. Yes, it was good to have him living with him, and yes, Ben was working hard to move on from his past, even keeping down a proper job with Mike the mechanic, who had very kindly offered to take Ben on in an apprenticeship role.
The thing was, Harry was becoming increasingly sure that the bigger part in what was happening was being played out by the place itself, by Wensleydale. He knew that if he said these thoughts out loud they would sound idiotic, and he wasn’t one for seeing things where there weren’t, or for that matter, attributing anything good to any kind of supposed spiritual force, but to him, there was no denying the fact that Ben was far better off up here, in the dales, than he would ever be back down in Bristol. Here, he was free of all those old influences, the old connections, the old friends. He not only had no choice but to change, he was in a place that pretty much helped him along the way. But still, his brother had a point, Harry thought; this wasn’t home. Not yet, anyway. But that could soon change, couldn’t it? But there were hoops to jump through first, and Harry had never been much of a fan of that. Which brought him back to that conversation he’d been having with Firbank and Swift. And as for that stuff about their godawful father?
