The Good Girl (17 page)

‘You could do a romance,’ suggested Luke. ‘Why don’t you consult Rachel? She’s big on romance.’

‘Rachel is always in big demand,’ said my grandfather, who often irritated Mum by insisting Rachel was busier than her. ‘She’s probably been held up at work. Marvellous how much she takes on.’ Mum bristled.

We all now knew, apart from Grandpa, that Rachel was coming for a summit meeting to discuss what to do with him. Mum and Dad had had another big row after
he used Dad’s chainsaw to scalp the hedge that marked the boundary between our house and the Fairports’. After this they had finally agreed that he was well enough to go home but not well enough to live on his own. But I should have known from previous experience with Mum and Aunt Rachel that the motion up for debate was rarely the one they ended up wrangling over.

In the end Rachel arrived so late that evening that tempers had already frayed. Dad’s butterflied lamb was overcooked and he wanted Mum to concede that Rachel was ‘selfish, narcissistic and probably at Mr Harvey’s house having a preprandial shag’. Dad thought we were out of earshot.

‘What’s a preprandial shag?’ Ben had asked.

‘It’s something people do to work up a good appetite,’ said Rachel, suddenly appearing in the kitchen. She looked amazing. She was actually glowing. I wondered if this was how people looked after they had sex. Dad didn’t flinch. I knew he felt bad because later when we had eaten pudding he asked her how everything was going with Mr Harvey.

‘It’s brilliant,’ said Rachel. ‘Even better than your almond and orange polenta cake.’

‘Must be very good then,’ said Dad.

‘It’s early days though, Rach,’ Mum advised. ‘Take it slowly.’

Which completely contradicted her favourite piece of advice about seizing the moment. ‘Like you did with me?’ teased Dad, putting his arm around Mum. It was
part of family mythology the way Mum had met Dad, got married and given birth to Luke exactly nine months later, all because of Johnny Cash. A
coup de foudre
, as Dad called it. Although now I knew it was more likely lust at first sight.

‘Time for bed, Ben,’ said Mum, evil-eyeing Dad for encouraging Rachel’s reckless streak.

‘Show me your film tomorrow, Ben,’ said Rachel.

‘Sure.’

Ben grabbed the last slice of cake without asking and ran upstairs before Mum could stop him.

‘He’s going to hide it in his bedroom,’ Mum told Rachel.

‘He’s still doing that?’

‘Old habits die hard,’ said Mum.

‘Let him be,’ said my grandfather. ‘He’s a good lad. Did you know he’s teaching me how to use the Internet to book my holiday?’

‘You’re going away?’ asked Rachel incredulously.

‘I’m planning a tour of eastern Europe,’ said my grandfather joyously. That was news to all of us.

‘You can’t possibly go away on your own,’ said Rachel, who was always far more direct with my grandfather than Mum.

‘Are you planning to travel independently or go with a tour operator?’ asked Mum, trying to humour him without really agreeing to anything. It was a strategy she employed with us.

‘Stop treating me like a child, Ailsa,’ he said abruptly.

Grandpa
started outlining possible itineraries. It all sounded so convincing that I began to wonder whether it really was a bad idea. Then I remembered the day Mum and I found him by Granny’s grave and imagined what would happen if he got confused and wandered off.

‘Dad, you’ve got to face up to reality,’ said Rachel angrily. ‘We need to talk about your future.’

‘Calm down, Rach,’ Mum urged. ‘That isn’t the way to handle him.’

‘I don’t need handling,’ shouted my grandfather.

‘I’m off out,’ announced Luke, getting up from the table and throwing on his jacket. He was always the first to leave at the first sniff of trouble.

‘Really?’ said Mum. ‘It’s after ten thirty.’

‘Friday night,’ said Luke with a shrug. His shoulders strained against his coat. ‘I might stay over at Stuart’s.’

‘You’ve got mocks in less than a week. And you won’t see Rachel.’

‘I’m staying at Matt’s … so I won’t be here until lunchtime,’ said Rachel, trying to sound apologetic but unable to hide her joy at the prospect. Mum opened her mouth but said nothing.

‘Of course,’ said Dad quickly. ‘That makes complete sense.’

‘I’ll be back by lunch and I’ll revise in the afternoon,’ said Luke.

‘How are you planning to get to Stuart’s?’ asked Mum.

‘Loveday’s
giving Marley and I a lift,’ he said, as he closed the door behind him.

‘Marley and me,’ said Mum, muttering, ‘Bloody woman,’ under her breath. I couldn’t face listening to her moan about Loveday so I went into the sitting room and took advantage of Luke’s departure to lie on the sofa. I picked up my Chemistry book and was furious to see that he’d drawn smiley faces on all the atoms in the chapter on nuclear fission.

‘She’s fine, Ailsa,’ said Dad. ‘Different. But fine.’

‘I’ll say just one word: denim miniskirt.’

‘That’s two,’ said Dad.

‘Legs like a thoroughbred,’ said my grandfather, using one of his favourite phrases. ‘Nothing more boring than growing old gracefully.’

‘At least that’s one affliction you’ve spared us from, Dad,’ said Rachel. They all giggled, even Mum.

‘They’re good neighbours,’ said Dad. ‘And we need some new friends,’

‘What’s wrong with our old ones?’ asked Mum.

‘They’re not here.’

‘She has no parameters,’ said Mum. ‘Who lets their teenage children go out at eleven o’clock at night the week before exams?’

‘Quite right. I used a bike to get everywhere,’ said my grandfather, as if it was the mode of transport that was the problem. ‘Georgia and I used to cycle all the way along the coast to go to dances in Cromer. I remember
one night a harvest moon came up from behind the marshes. We stopped to watch. It was so heavy and voluptuous. Georgia bet me a pound it wouldn’t be able to rise. I won. I kept the one-pound note.’ He stopped. I didn’t turn round. I imagined his eyes filling with tears. Instead he continued cheerily, ‘Did I tell you that Wolf let me have a go on his exercise bike this afternoon? It’s hooked up to a screen, and I cycled through Prague so I get to know the layout of the city before my trip.’

‘I hope they don’t mind you spending so much time at their house,’ said Mum. It was a good example of her doublespeak. What she really meant was that she’d rather he didn’t go there at all. ‘Maybe you should think about going on a cruise?’ she suggested. ‘There are plenty of people to help you out in case something goes wrong. They even have defibrillators on board.’

‘Don’t indulge him,’ warned Rachel.

‘Why do you always assume something will go wrong, Ailsa?’ said my grandfather. ‘
Chicken Licken
was always her favourite story as a child. The sky is falling! The sky is falling!’

I could hear more wine being poured. ‘Don’t open another one,’ Mum warned.

Rachel ignored her, arguing that she wasn’t leaving without opening the wine she had bought in Châteauneuf-du-Pape the previous weekend.

‘I thought you said you were working,’ said Mum.

‘I can work anywhere,’ said Rachel, realizing her mistake.

‘Why
would I want to be stuck on a boat with a bunch of old-age pensioners?’ asked Grandpa. ‘Going on a cruise is like being in an open-plan prison except the company is more boring.’

‘The food is better though,’ said Mum.

‘People are forever getting food poisoning on those big boats,’ said Grandpa. ‘You’re always reading stories about cruise ships full of sick people with E. coli which aren’t allowed to dock at any port in case they infect the local population. Toilets overflowing, people wiping their arses with their hand. They won’t let them on dry land, even in Mogadishu. They’re part of a conspiracy to kill old people. It’s part of your plan to get rid of me.’

‘If we wanted to get rid of you, we’d let you cut the hedge with the chainsaw,’ said Mum. I stifled a giggle.

‘I don’t believe this,’ said Rachel, gulping down her newly poured glass of wine.

‘If you’re on a cruise down the Danube I fail to see how you can end up in Somalia,’ said Mum, not unreasonably. ‘In fact I’m not sure that it’s even geographically possible.’

‘What can’t you believe, Rachel?’ asked my grandfather. They were both argumentative drunks.

‘Well, given that I’d come here to discuss whether you should move into a care home, this wasn’t exactly the row that I’d been anticipating.’

A terrible silence fell. I looked around the corner of the sofa. My grandfather’s face had gone limp so that it looked as if it was melting. His mouth hung open and
his tongue stuck to one side of his lower lip like someone who had had a stroke. Mum, who was sitting next to him, put her hand on his shoulder. He shrugged her off. Then he stood up, pulled his shoulders back and puffed out his chest like an angry turkey and walked to the door.

‘If you want to get hold of me I’ll be in Bratislava,’ were his parting words.

‘It was a joke, Dad,’ Rachel called out behind him. ‘Come back.’

‘The definition of a joke is that it’s funny,’ shouted my grandfather as he headed upstairs, his shoes drumming a slow beat on the stairs like a dirge.

‘Well, that went well,’ said Rachel.

I wanted to go after him, but my desire to hear what was going to happen next was stronger than my urge to comfort him. It occurred to me that this lack of humanity made me spiritually more of a journalist than a doctor and perhaps I should reconsider my university application.

‘That was very unhelpful, Rachel,’ said Mum in the even tone that she used when she was about to send someone out of the classroom. She had moved to the sink and was noisily scouring a saucepan. I waited for Dad to say that she would scratch the metal, a particular obsession of his since he had gone domestic. He remained silent. ‘A flat has come up in some sheltered accommodation in Cromer. Dad could have his own space but there’s someone on hand to keep an eye on him. It would have been good to
talk about that in a measured way.’ The scouring noises got faster and louder.

‘I thought it might be a good way to open up the discussion,’ said Rachel finally. I knew from previous experience that she found it very difficult ever to admit that she had done anything wrong and that this was as close as Mum would get to an apology. ‘It’s getting late and someone needed to get to the point. Otherwise this trip’s a complete waste of my time.’

‘Don’t even try and make excuses,’ warned Dad.

‘Harry,’ Mum said. ‘Don’t get involved. It’s nothing to do with you.’

‘Ailsa’s right. This is something we need to resolve together,’ said Rachel, sensing an opportunity for a rapprochement with Mum.

‘I am involved,’ said Dad. ‘In fact I’m fuck of a lot more involved with your dad than you are, Rachel. I cook lunch for him almost every day. I drive him into town to stock up on Johnnie Walker. I wash his underwear and hang it out in the garden to dry. I listen to him when he tells the same story about the fish dying in front of your mother and the harvest moon. I take him to the doctor when he gets breathless and I make sure that he’s taken his medicine. What have you done?’

‘I phone him almost every day,’ said Rachel. Dad said nothing. ‘I’m grateful, Harry, really I am. I know I haven’t been pulling my weight and that’s why I’m here now.’

‘You wanted to hurt his feelings and you did,’ said
Mum to Rachel. ‘And you’ve totally undermined our efforts to talk about what happens next in a practical, non-emotive way.’

‘I’m still angry with him,’ said Rachel. ‘For how he treated Mum. It’s better to express those feelings than keep them inside.’

‘Better for who?’ Dad questioned her. ‘Perhaps for you but not for those of us at the coalface trying to do the right thing by him.’

‘Dad needs to acknowledge how I feel,’ Rachel insisted.

‘He’ll have forgotten ten minutes later,’ said Dad. ‘His short-term memory is appalling. He’s an old man with a thin grasp on reality who can’t really cope on his own any more.’

‘You need to let go of the past, Rach. It’s not helpful,’ said Mum. ‘You can’t hold him to account for things he can’t remember happening nearly half a century ago.’

‘I know you don’t like talking about it,’ said Rachel, ‘but that was a big part of the problem, everyone ignoring what was going on and sweeping everything under the carpet until the next time.’

‘We’ve talked about it before. He was a dysfunctional alcoholic; it was shit for a while and he managed to put it behind him. There’s nothing more to say,’ said Mum. ‘We need to deal with the current problem.’

‘I still remember the bad times, Ailsa,’ said Rachel. ‘Has she told you what happened, Harry?’

‘Of course she has,’ said Dad. ‘But your dad pulled
back from all that years ago. You have to give him credit for evolving, for overcoming his addiction.’

There was a loud crash as a bottle tipped over.

‘Shit,’ said Dad, his chair screeching backwards across the stone floor.

‘Sorry,’ said Rachel. ‘Did she tell you how we had to help Mum haul him upstairs and get him undressed, Harry? How sometimes he shat himself? Do you know about the knife that Mum kept in the drawer to scrape the vomit off his clothes the next day? Or how we couldn’t bring home friends because we never knew what state he’d be in?’

‘Stop raking over ancient history, Rachel. You need to move on,’ shouted Mum.

‘We didn’t have a childhood because of him,’ said Rachel.

‘Bits of it were good and bits of it were bad,’ said Mum. ‘Like the rest of life.’

I lay back rigid on the sofa, making myself as flat and still as possible in case they noticed me. I tried to process what they were saying. We all knew that Grandpa occasionally enjoyed a drink but not that he had ever been a complete drunk. I couldn’t believe that he had ever behaved like this. It was as though Rachel was describing a totally different childhood from the one that Mum had recounted to us. It had gone from
Famous Five
to
Shameless
in less than five minutes. I buried myself deeper in the sofa, alert to what was coming next.

‘You
believed all his excuses and false promises, just like Mum. It takes courage to face up to our history,’ continued Rachel. She sounded breathless but it could have been because she was wiping up the spilt wine. ‘That’s why Mum had a heart attack, because she tried too hard for too long.’