“I like you being around Liam, you make Mum happy, you look after her and I think you’re cool. I never had a dad but you’re going to be the baby’s dad forever right? You’re not going to leave her?” That’s when he meets my eyes again and my heart drops seeing the tears he is trying to hold back.

“Is that what’s worrying you, that I’m not going to stick around?” I’ve spent so long trying to prove to Ellis that I’m in this for the long haul that I just assumed Jack would know too. I’m an idiot.

“It would hurt if you left me too.” His voice shakes, then he bursts into tears. Heavy sobs wrack his little body, his bright blue eyes filling at the brim, unable to hold them back any longer.

“Oh Jack, come here.” I pull him onto my lap and some tears leak onto my shirt. I let him cry it out and rub circles on his back. “I’m not going anywhere, I’m not just staying for your mom and the baby, I’m staying for you too, okay?”

“You and Mum and the baby will be a family without me.” He sobs into my shoulders. This kid has been having some huge feelings. I never would have expected a five-year-old to even have thought about this stuff but Jack has. Then again, Jack isn’t a normal kid, with his mom’s illness and his dad’s absence, it shouldn’t be surprising that he is wise beyond his years.

“No Jack, never. You are my family,” I tell him and I mean it to my core.

“I wish you were my dad.” His voice is scratchy and raw but I hear him over his sobs. I wish I was his dad too. I have since I found out Ellis was pregnant with him by scrolling on social media. I thought that it should’ve been me all along. Now that I have had the displeasure of seeing Michael up close, I wish it even more. That man didn’t deserve Ellis and he sure as shit doesn’t deserve Jack.

“Then I am,” I tell him.

“What?” Jack pulls his tear-stained face away from my shoulder looking at me with eyes full of confusion. I wish I could hug him hard enough to put all of his broken pieces back together.

“If you want me to be your dad then I will be your dad. I’d be lucky to have a son like you.” I mean it, too. If my daughter turns out half as amazing as her brother then she will be more than I could ever have wished for. I’m staying in this boy’s life for as long as he wants me: it will be me who teaches him to shave, me who helps him talk to his first crush.