Seeing The Other Side: A Short Story.
I was asked to write a short story from the perspective of a 70+ person. So, I decided to take a friend’s advice and write a sequel of “Content As A Cat.” with the Scottish Fold, Jeeves in it. So ladies and gentlemen here is “Seeing The Other Side.” I hope you enjoy it…
It was the one day that I wished that Jeeves wasn’t so reasonable. I told him quite plainly that I wanted to do this alone. But he still persisted until I gave in on the condition that I put his leash on so it might seem like I was taking him on a walk.
“And no talking!” I said. “People will think it strange if my cat can talk.”
“Right you are Miss Marple,” promised Jeeves and we both got in the car. Miss Marple is not my real name of course. I am actually Ophelia Thornton (née Parker) but Jeeves likes to call me Miss Marple because he says that I am just as smart as the character in Agatha Christie’s books.
To be honest, I’ve been called many different names over the years. My late husband, Benjamin Thornton used to call me love, our son, Chris Thornton still calls me Mama, and my guardian and aunt, Emma-Ann Parker, used to call me Opie.
I know what you’re thinking, why did she have a guardian? What happened to her parents? Well, I can tell you now that my past was not a pleasant one. My mother, Grace-Lynn Parker was twenty three when she met my father and had me. Then when I was just a week old, my father, Doyle Stevenson, killed my mother. Yes, like he actually stabbed her in the chest. I didn’t know this myself until I was fourteen.
At first I simply refused to believe it but then Emma-Ann showed me some newspaper clippings and photographs. I then asked Jeeves if this was true.
Jeeves is Scottish Fold and he used to be my father’s cat. He said he was very sorry but it was so; he’d seen the proof. The reason that Jeeves could tell me this was because he can talk. Like real human words! He can also live for over 100 years too.
I asked Emma-Ann if my father was out of prison yet. She said that he had been for seven years now. I was furious and said she should have told me before then. Emma-Ann just shrugged and said that I wouldn’t have been ready before then to hear it.
She then told me that he’d sent a ton of messages and gave me her phone. They were all recordings. There were twenty one of them all together. They told of how, once he’d got out of prison, he simply couldn’t face seeing me. He regretted what he’d done to the depth of his soul. He said he was now living in Chicago with his new wife Jacklyn Stevenson. They’d had a child together called Hamish Stevenson. And now they wanted to meet up with me to tell me how sorry they were etc… etc.
I listened to those recordings all night long. My father’s voice sounded husky. I hated it. I hated all of it. I hated everything about my father and his ‘perfect family’. So that was it. I ignored my father’s pleas and moved on.
I grew up. I moved out and went to uni to study Surrealism, which was my passion. I got a job looking after old pieces of art. I met my husband Benjamin Thornton, who was a fellow art enthusiast. We got married and a few years later our son Christopher was born. He was our joy. Then he grew up and moved to New Zealand to study ancient ways of life there.
It was a few years ago that I finally decided to meet this father of mine. However, our presence together was awkward and I still couldn’t get over my residuals of hate. We didn’t meet up again. We kept in touch, a bit. Yet, our messages always felt strained and sieved, so that we never really said what we wanted to. It was as if there was no connection to draw us together.
Then two years ago the messages stopped coming. At first I thought nothing of it; maybe my father was tired of all this. It was one Monday morning that I got the call.
Father was dead. He had been 102 and had died peacefully in his sleep. It was half brother Hamish who had called me. The funeral was a week later. I didn’t go. I had an operation on the same day. Secretly I was glad this was the case. I couldn’t face seeing my father’s other family. Besides, I hadn’t really known the man. He might have been my father but it amounted to nothing more than name.
Two years on and something changed. It was after one of my good friends, Iris Langley, was reunited with her father, Karl. Iris had told that she had never experienced such joy within herself. Her father was more than she could have ever hoped for.
It was then that I felt something inside me slide into place. I knew it was time to rediscover my father for the man he actually was. I called up my half brother Hamish Stevenson. He was still living in Chicago but decided to come over to England for a week so that we could meet up more easily. Now it’s the actual day I feel really quite nervous, which isn’t like me at all. Jeeves also isn’t helping but I try to ignore him as best I can.
As I walk down the streets, Jeeves in front on his leash, I notice how dull many people’s eyes are as they go about their day. That’s how I must look — a miserable old lady, I think to myself. I get to the park on time and standing there waiting is a tall man with broad shoulders. He waves and comes over.
“You must be Ophelia. I’m Hamish Stevenson,” he says as he warmly shakes my hand. Hamish looks so jolly and full of life. Just like Benjamin always was, I think and quickly swallow down my rising tears.
“Good to meet you at last Hamish,” I say and mean it.
We sit down on a bench and cross our knees in unison.
“This is Jeeves, he’s my cat but he used to be father’s,” I add as he jumps up onto my lap. Hamish grins.
“I know, Dad used to talk about him quite a bit,” and he gives Jeeves a chin rub. “You’re quite famous in the Stevenson house, you know, my friend.” Jeeves gives Hamish a look as if to say ‘Why, of course I am!’
“Did father ever mention me much?” I ask and just as I say it I realise how badly I want the answer to be yes. I want to be the daughter that my father longed to reclaim but couldn’t.
Hamish’s face clouds over.
“No,” he says slowly. “He didn’t much. I think it was too hard for him. I remember he once said how upset he’d been when he had realised he’d murdered his child’s mother. But I knew he thought about you a lot.”
“How do you know that?” I ask, sniffing and blinking furiously.
A sly smile creeps over the corners of his mouth. “Because I read his diary once,” he admits.
At that I laugh. “And what did it say? That I’m a waste of his space and he wishes that he’d murdered me too?”
Hamish’s jaw hardens.
“Look here, Ophelia. Dad wasn’t all bad.” I forced myself to look into his steely grey eyes. I gasp.
“Your eyes-”
“They look like Dad’s don’t they?”
I nod.
“Dad was a good person, Ophelia, honest. I’m just sorry you never got to see him like that. You probably haven’t been told this but Dad saved a woman’s life once.”
“No,” I breathe.
“Oh yes! He saw her drowning and knew there was no way she was going to survive without help, so he dived in and saved her.”
I feel gobsmacked.
“Why didn’t he tell me?” I ask.
“He didn’t like the fuss,” Hamish says.
“So he was modest too,” I mumble.
“Yeah, he always was,” Hamish smiles.
“I’d better go now,” I say, getting up and putting Jeeves down on the floor. “But thank you,” I say to Hamish.
“You shone the light on what I couldn’t see,” I tell him.
“It’s a pleasure,” he says and shakes my hand.
I walk down the streets feeling uplifted. I’ve seen my father from the other side and I know that he truly was a brilliant person. All my hate is gone and what is left is only love.
“Well, what an interesting man he was, but a great son,” says Jeeves thoughtfully and I smile.
I agree with Frida Kahlo: long live life!
The end, thanks for reading.
Hetty Monksea
