Chapter 39

Em gave birth to a son exactly nine months after he was conceived. He was eight and half healthy pounds, and the mother came through the labour like real trouper. The midwife told us it had been an unusually easy birth for an older woman having a first child. We giggled a bit at that. All those years of fisting had paid off!

We decided to call the baby Mark Stephen Hunter. I was very happy that poor Steve would be remembered in this way, but sometimes wondered if little Mark would ever ask who his second name came from. Big Mark was expecting a little one of his own by then, but no-one could have been prouder of his firstborn. He was at the hospital the whole time, Mel trying to calm him down. I was with Em through every minute of that wondrous day.

Lady H lived to see her grandson's first steps and hear his first words, but it was as if having a male heir at last meant she could let go, and once she was certain he was healthy, bright and beautiful, she seemed to welcome the end. She died in her sleep in bed, which is all any of us can ask for. The happiness of her final days made losing her considerably easier to bear. She left me her jewellery, and the memory of a very special friendship.

I think Em and I made good parents, Mark is now twenty-four years old. He's big, and burly, with his Dad's abundance of dark hair. With the typical contrariness of youth, it looks like he's going to follow his Dad's career as well. A while ago he asked me the kind of questions about his birth parents' lives that it was very difficult to answer. I decided to write this memoir for him. He isn't squeamish, but he'll be embarrassed by the sex. He's known about our S&M devotion since he was eighteen, because I insisted we told him. Thankfully he's open-minded enough to accept it without disgust. The painful parts our story will hurt him; the happy parts will make the hurt better. We've nothing to hide anymore.

My cousin Sarah is in a secure mental institution. I make sure she's well looked after. She's calm, most of the time, but she's a remaining sadness in our lives. I will always be grateful to her, despite everything. She gave me my present life. Without her I would still have discovered my true sexuality, eventually, but with whom, and where it would have led is not worth the speculation. We just hope that what is left of her life can be passed in comfort and safety. Hers and ours...

Em is sixty-nine and I'm sixty. I look at us sometimes and still can't believe it. We've been together, on and off, for over thirty years, and to celebrate the next anniversary of the day we became lovers one long ago afternoon at Keepers, an afternoon that began in deepest despair and ended at the beginning; there will be a civil ceremony.

Ed will give me away; Big Mark will be Em's best man. Yes, we're getting married! Honeymoon in Morocco, where else?