Free Man and Boy by Tony Parsons Page A

wants Pat to have what you had. Two parents. Somewhere settled and stable to build his life on. All that.”
    “But it’s never going to be like that for him, Mom. Not if Gina’s really gone. I’m sorry, but it’s never going to be that simple.”
    My dad came back down eventually and I tried to give them some background as we waded through dinner. There had been trouble at home, things hadn’t been too good for a while, we still cared about each other. There was hope.
    I left out all the stuff about me fucking a colleague from work and Gina feeling that she had thrown her life away.
    I thought that might make them choke on their lamb chops.
    When I left, my mom gave me a big hug and told me that things would turn out all right. And my dad did his best too—he put his arm around me and told me to call if there was anything they could do. But I couldn’t look at him.
    That’s the trouble with thinking that your father is a hero.
    Without saying a word, he can make you feel that you are eight years old again, and you have just lost your first fight.
    ***
    “Our guest next tonight no needs introduction,” Marty said for the third time in a row. “Fuck…fuck…fuck…what is wrong with this bloody teleprompter?”
    There was nothing wrong with the teleprompter and he knew it.
    Up in the gallery, the director murmured soothing words into his earpiece about going for the rehearsal again when he was ready. But Marty tore off his microphone and walked off the floor.
    When we were live, Marty had always been fearless in front of a teleprompter. If he made a mistake, if he stumbled over the words rolling before him, he just grinned and kept going. Because he knew that he had to.
    Recording was different. You know you can always stop and start again if you are taping. This should make things easier, of course. But it can paralyze you. It can do things to your breathing. It can make you start to sweat. And when the camera catches you sweating, you’re dead.
    I caught up with him in the green room where he was ripping open a beer. This worried me more than the tantrum on set. Marty was a screamer but he wasn’t a drinker. A few beers and his nerves would be so steady that he wouldn’t be able to move.
    “Recording a show is a different rhythm,” I told him. “When you’re live, the energy level is so high that you just zip through it from beginning to end. When you’re recording, the adrenaline has to be more controlled. But you can do it.”
    “What the fuck do you know about it?” he asked me. “How many shows have you presented?”
    “I know that you don’t make it easier by ranting about the teleprompter girl.”
    “She’s moving that thing too fast!”
    “Yes, to keep up with you,” I said. “If you slow down, so will she. Marty, it’s the same girl we’ve been using for a year.”
    “You didn’t even try to keep the show live,” he sulked.
    “As soon as you smacked Tarzan, all this was inevitable. The station can’t take a chance on that happening again. So we do it live on tape.”
    “Live on fucking tape. That says it all. Whose side are you on, Harry?”
    I was about to tell him when Siobhan stuck her head around the door of the green room.
    “I’ve managed to find a replacement for the teleprompter girl,” she said. “Shall we try again?”
    ***
    “We’re watching telly-vision,” Pat told me when I arrived at Glenn’s place.
    I picked him up and kissed him. He wrapped his arms and legs around me like a little monkey as I carried him into the flat.
    “You’re watching TV with Mommy?”
    “No.”
    “With Granddad Glenn?”
    “No. With Sally and Steve.”
    In the little living room there was a boy and girl in their midteens wrapped around each other on the sofa. They were wearing the kind of clothes that don’t look quite right without a snowboard.
    The girl—thin, languid, blank—looked up at me as I came into the room. The boy—scornful and pockmarked—tapped the TV’s