“Took you long enough," Frank said when I came back to the car. "All set for tomorrow?” “You must rate that band to queue so long.”
That was Frank, always with the pally wally chit-chat as he ferried me here and there, pretending to be interested in every aspect of my life. Doing what he imagined fathers do, I guess.
“Yeah, all set” I mumbled, clutching the precious concert tickets I’d queued for an hour for in the rain, while he’d waited for me in the comfort of his car. As if he cared. He was just glad to see the back of me for the evening. That’s why he’d persuaded mom to let me go when she’d been adamant that fifteen is far too young to go galavanting alone in the city. Typical of her to give into him. She trusted his word more than she considered mine.
She wasn't the most unreasonable mother, but her point of view, well, what can I say? She thought I should play happy families with this stand-in, this imposter. Like when they married four years ago, he wanted to adopt me, said he wanted to be a father to me. Hahaha, how stupid was he? My father is dead; I’d spat at him before storming off to my room.
Next day off to the gig we went, myself and my pal Jen, arranging with Frank to pick us up at the bus station off the last bus from town.
We had an excellent time until after the gig when some older lads started following us, joking and jibing at first but then trying to grab at us. Jen was so scared that we took to our heels to try to outrun them. They were gaining on us fast when what do you know we came crashing slap bang into Frank. He came out of nowhere charging down the street, all six foot three and two hundred and twenty pounds of him, his eyes wild, his hair standing on end and ice cream dripped on his shirt, just the sight of him sending our tormentors running for the hills.
“I didn’t need your help; I was handling it" I snarled at him, realising he’d been sitting in the car outside the whole time. “And weren’t you meant to collect us 40 miles away at the bus station?”
I wish Frank were my father Jen whispered to me as we sat safe and snug in the back of the car on the way home. “He’s always there when you need him,” And as the familiar words he’s not my father sprang to my lips, his eyes met mine in the rearview mirror, and I returned his sappy grin with my scowliest scowl, though we both knew that my heart wasn’t in it.
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