James shut his eyes briefly. Of course he had.
“But my mum never did nothing wrong,” Tanay whispered fiercely through tears.
That nearly undid him.
James sat down heavily on the step and pulled the boy gently between his knees.
“Leave it with me,” he forced out.
Tanay looked up uncertainly.
“My mate Marvin said bastard means I don’t have a father.”
James was silent for a moment. Then nodded once.
“Aye. That’s what folk mean when they say it.”
“Oh.”
“But tell you what, lad.” James squeezed the back of his neck gently. “We’ll sort it.”
Tanay studied him solemnly before nodding.
Back upstairs, James stumbled awkwardly through the boy’s nighttime routine while Asha slept, dead to the world in the common room.
He supervised tooth brushing, then waited outside the bathroom door while Tanay showered in the cold water.
Then the boy insisted he check homework because apparently that was what fathers did. The entire thing felt like a learning experience.
When Tanay finally climbed into his little mattress in the closet room, James hovered uncertainly nearby.
“You alright sleepin’ there?”
The boy looked scandalised.
“Aye," he said, imitating James. "I’m not a baby.”
James snorted softly. Then Tanay tugged the blanket up to his chin and added in a muffled tone—
“But I been sleepin’ wi’ Amma ‘cause I heard her cry.”
All over again, James felt something that painful throb in his chest.
The boy peeped at him very seriously in the dim light.
“James?”
“Aye?”
“Don’t make my mum cry anymore, okay?”
James swallowed once.
“Never,” he said simply.
***
The next morning Asha woke slowly to warmth wrapped around her from behind. For one confused second, she was disoriented before it all came back to her.
