She had even sold herself for him and his brothers and sisters; why couldn't she see that all she had done had made him love her more, not less. Had made him look up to her, not down on her.
Pat walked over to her and, pulling her into his arms, he said sadly, 'Oh, Mum, I just want to help you, darling, that's all. You can do what you like, I ain't going to judge you, am I? None of us would. I just don't want you coping on your own any more. You don't have to. I am here now and I will do whatever is needed, OK?'
Lil hugged him and felt the strength of him as he held her close and she knew he meant every word he said to her.
'Whose is it, Mum?'
She could hear the nervousness in his voice and realised that he thought she was pregnant by Lenny again. He couldn't even say his name out loud. It would be laughable if it wasn't so tragic. As if she would be that stupid! And yet once more she was reminded of how she was seen by her children. That this boy, her eldest son, could think that she would even consider sleeping with Lenny again after what he had done to them all was so insulting that she had to fight the urge to smack his face. She wanted to tear at his skin with her nails and make him hurt as he was making her hurt.
Did they really think she was so low, so base that she had been capable of coupling with Lenny again after everything he had done to her, to them?
She roughly pushed Pat away. Her anger was in check, but for how long, she couldn't say.
'You can't think this is Lenny's, surely?'
Lil's voice was low and colder than Pat had ever heard it before. He knew she had picked up on what had been in the back of his mind. He didn't answer her and it was his silence that told her all she needed to know.
'I would never ever have given him the time of day. How can you think that I would have been capable of something like that?'
Pat didn't know how to react to her, didn't know how to make things right. He knew he had been well off the mark. But he had had to ask her. Especially considering the events of the last few days.
'No one has said that, Mum. And I don't care what you've done…'
Lil sat back on the big leather chair that told anyone who came in that the occupier of that chair was the boss. That chair said that she was the boss of everyone and everything around her.
'Done? What I've done? It was that word that hurt more than anything. It was like an assumption of her guilt or her stupidity. It made her feel responsible for something and she wasn't sure what.
'You cheeky little fucker, how dare you talk to me like that…'
Pat didn't speak; he knew she had to get it off her chest. He knew he had said the wrong thing and he understood her anger.
'I did what I could all my life to make things better for us. To make sure you and the others had some kind of fucking life outside of what was said about us, what was assumed about us, after your father's murder. I had to live through it and protect you lot into the bargain. Your father didn't even see us all right for a few bob, did you know that? We were left with nothing. It was like we never existed for him or anyone else, come to that, after he died. Do you realise that we could have been taken out? If the Williams brothers had decided to finish us off, that would have been it. I had to fucking make sure we were safe and that meant Lenny. He took them out, for his own reasons, I admit, but he took them out all the same. We were seconds away from death, boy. Your father made no provision for us, fuck all. And now you have the fucking cheek to look down on me, to judge me. And you expect me to swallow an insult like that without attempting to dispute it in any way?'
'Look, Mum, I just want to help you, that's all. I don't give a fuck who the father is…'
'Well you should and you should also have enough respect for me to ask me straight out and not fucking insinuate. That you could even contemplate that.'
Patrick watched his mother's anger and hurt and knew that he could not do anything to stem the flow of her unhappiness. So he said what was on his mind and hoped that she would understand his worry about her and his annoyance at her silence over her predicament. He was shouting at her and that was something he had not planned on doing. He just wanted answers and he was going to get them from her. No matter what it took.
'Well, who is the culprit then, Mum? You tell me because I can't fucking put the finger on anyone. I just want to know the score, that's all. You are me mother and I feel a certain responsibility towards you, to all of you. I feel the need to take care of you because whoever the fucking bloke is, he ain't beating a path to your front door, is he? No one has seen you out with a geezer and there ain't even any gossip in this dump. So unless you enlighten us, how the fuck are we supposed to know anything? Were you going to wait until it was born or what?'
Lil didn't answer him. She just stared at him with those big eyes of hers and the guilt he felt was once more in the forefront of Pat's mind.
'Look. I didn't mean any of that. You can do what the fuck you like, you're me mum. But you have to let me know what's going on. I want to help, that's all. I want to make it easier for you. If the bloke needs a fucking talking-to then that is what he will get, believe me, Mother.'
Lil's anger was gone and she could understand what was wrong with him. But how could she explain that she had been too embarrassed to tell them what had happened to her, that she was pregnant again at her age. Why was she always the one who was caught out? Even with them all grown up she was still stupid enough to get caught and, once more, it was by a man who had no interest in her really. Though in fairness to Jambo, he was willing to do as she asked. But that was only because of her sons; she assumed that was why, anyway. But they didn't need to know any of that, of course. Lance, whatever she thought of him, was always her biggest champion. Not that it made her feel anything towards him but she knew that anyone who said a word against her was dicing with death. Patrick, however, was more like her than he realised. He understood on some level that she was still a relatively young woman and she needed not just the sex, but the holding part. The aftermath, when she lay beside someone and pretended, just for a few minutes, that someone cared for her and was looking after her for once and not vice versa.
'I was sixteen when you were born, Patrick. Can you imagine that? I had five kids so fast I didn't even have time to realise how hard it was.'
She laughed gently. 'Then the other two, who I love more than anything. They were once more given to me, by a man who didn't really care about the consequences of his actions. He gave me two kids and it meant nothing to him. And now you have killed him.' She laughed huskily at the incongruousness of her conversation, of the whole situation.
'All my children are fatherless and both fathers were murdered. Can't you see the irony in that? One day the youngsters are going to want to know what happened and they still won't give a fucking toss. Do you know how that makes me feel? Do you? All my life people have taken from me, taken whatever they wanted, you included. All you kids did and that's because that is what kids do. Kids just take.'