practised card sharp had dealt them out, and a glass bowl containing the kind of sugar that reminded Melanie of miniature grave-chippings.
Gwen Thomas sipped at her coffee and gave Mel a beady glance over the fluted edge of the cup.
‘I wasn’t exactly rushed off my feet looking after Rosa, you know, Mum,’ Melanie told her. ‘I mean she is nearly nineteen, and has been telling me she has a life of her own for the past three years at least. Most days we just crossed paths once or twice on the way to the fridge.’
Gwen laughed. ‘You’ll be surprised. You think there’s no difference but when the washing machine’s half-load button is permanently on, and when it’s taking three days to fill the dishwasher – then you’ll know you’re really on your own.’
Melanie took a deep breath, forcing herself not to protest. There was no point. ‘OK, so what is it you want me to do with all this time?’
Gwen took a deep breath. ‘It’s your father.’ Shelooked down at the table and her fingers picked at bits of sugar that weren’t really there.
Mel felt cold suddenly, sensing disaster, illness, death.
‘Dad? Is there something wrong? Where is he, by the way, has he gone to the garden centre again?’
‘Garden centre! I wish it was the garden centre.’ She looked at Mel, glittery-eyed but defiant. ‘He’s at the pub. Takes the dog every day and goes to the pub. He’s there hours. Comes home reeling.’
Melanie tried to imagine her father blind drunk. It wasn’t easy, even for a woman who made a very good living from exercising her imagination.
Carefully, she put together a picture of the man she knew so well. It was like painting by numbers, with the finished view so familiar you barely had to refer to the chart. There was the cricket-club blazer, faded navy corduroy trousers (baggy and faded at the knee), soft brown and cream check Viyella shirt, Marks and Spencer V-neck brick-coloured wool-mix jumper (only three-ply, he hated anything heavyweight), thoroughly polished slip-on shoes. Having carefully assembled this portrait, she set her father down on the road out near the parade of shops by the crossroads and tried to send him tottering along the pavement, one hand in his pocket, the other outstretched to ward off obstructions he might not see in time.
‘Aren’t you going to say something?’ Gwen prompted, while Melanie was still sorting out her mental pictures.
‘Er . . . are you sure?’ she said eventually. ‘I mean lots of people like a bit of an appetizer before lunch and, well, he’s retired, there’s no reason why he shouldn’t. He can even sleep it off in the afternoon if he feels like it.’
‘
I’m
retired!’ Mel’s mother got up abruptly and started bustling the coffee things together, practically hurling them onto the draining board. ‘
I
don’t go getting plastered in the middle of the morning. There are things to do!’
There weren’t things to do though, really, Melanie thought. Her parents always seemed to be filling in their days, as she assumed all the other non-employed elderly did. They devised time-consuming routines to occupy the hours. Gwen hand-washed her dusters every week, even though there were rooms in the house where the air was barely stirred enough to gather dust. She ironed underwear that could (possibly should) be simply fluffed and folded straight from the dryer and put away. Her father swept fallen leaves from the garden every single morning, from the first autumnal flurry right through to the first buds of spring. Once, Melanie had commented to Vanessa that it was as if the virtuous pursuit of good order would keep them alive longer. Vanessa had been sniffy about that, saying they’d never been the sort to take to the idle life and weren’t likely to start now. If one of them declared they fancied simply lying on the sofa for an afternoon reading a novel, the other would probably decide their spouse was sliding into terminal decadence. Active
Gwen Thomas sipped at her coffee and gave Mel a beady glance over the fluted edge of the cup.
‘I wasn’t exactly rushed off my feet looking after Rosa, you know, Mum,’ Melanie told her. ‘I mean she is nearly nineteen, and has been telling me she has a life of her own for the past three years at least. Most days we just crossed paths once or twice on the way to the fridge.’
Gwen laughed. ‘You’ll be surprised. You think there’s no difference but when the washing machine’s half-load button is permanently on, and when it’s taking three days to fill the dishwasher – then you’ll know you’re really on your own.’
Melanie took a deep breath, forcing herself not to protest. There was no point. ‘OK, so what is it you want me to do with all this time?’
Gwen took a deep breath. ‘It’s your father.’ Shelooked down at the table and her fingers picked at bits of sugar that weren’t really there.
Mel felt cold suddenly, sensing disaster, illness, death.
‘Dad? Is there something wrong? Where is he, by the way, has he gone to the garden centre again?’
‘Garden centre! I wish it was the garden centre.’ She looked at Mel, glittery-eyed but defiant. ‘He’s at the pub. Takes the dog every day and goes to the pub. He’s there hours. Comes home reeling.’
Melanie tried to imagine her father blind drunk. It wasn’t easy, even for a woman who made a very good living from exercising her imagination.
Carefully, she put together a picture of the man she knew so well. It was like painting by numbers, with the finished view so familiar you barely had to refer to the chart. There was the cricket-club blazer, faded navy corduroy trousers (baggy and faded at the knee), soft brown and cream check Viyella shirt, Marks and Spencer V-neck brick-coloured wool-mix jumper (only three-ply, he hated anything heavyweight), thoroughly polished slip-on shoes. Having carefully assembled this portrait, she set her father down on the road out near the parade of shops by the crossroads and tried to send him tottering along the pavement, one hand in his pocket, the other outstretched to ward off obstructions he might not see in time.
‘Aren’t you going to say something?’ Gwen prompted, while Melanie was still sorting out her mental pictures.
‘Er . . . are you sure?’ she said eventually. ‘I mean lots of people like a bit of an appetizer before lunch and, well, he’s retired, there’s no reason why he shouldn’t. He can even sleep it off in the afternoon if he feels like it.’
‘
I’m
retired!’ Mel’s mother got up abruptly and started bustling the coffee things together, practically hurling them onto the draining board. ‘
I
don’t go getting plastered in the middle of the morning. There are things to do!’
There weren’t things to do though, really, Melanie thought. Her parents always seemed to be filling in their days, as she assumed all the other non-employed elderly did. They devised time-consuming routines to occupy the hours. Gwen hand-washed her dusters every week, even though there were rooms in the house where the air was barely stirred enough to gather dust. She ironed underwear that could (possibly should) be simply fluffed and folded straight from the dryer and put away. Her father swept fallen leaves from the garden every single morning, from the first autumnal flurry right through to the first buds of spring. Once, Melanie had commented to Vanessa that it was as if the virtuous pursuit of good order would keep them alive longer. Vanessa had been sniffy about that, saying they’d never been the sort to take to the idle life and weren’t likely to start now. If one of them declared they fancied simply lying on the sofa for an afternoon reading a novel, the other would probably decide their spouse was sliding into terminal decadence. Active
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