White Goods (17 page)

But it was more than
that.

‘It’s like Tomorrow’s
World,’ I added and Della smirked, but Ian gave me a look like he
thought I was on to something.

‘Have to
smoke in the entrance, Tony,’ Gary commented, as we entered; Dad
was about to spark up. Instead of putting it away, he stepped back
out again and had his fag in the upstairs hall, taking in the view
from a window. On the way out, I noticed a burn mark on the
woodwork of the windowsill; Dad’s bitter act of spite for
being
sent-outside-like-a-naughty-kid,
Ian
told me later.

When you
walked into
Uncle
Gary’s flat there was a long hallway, with a kitchen and
bedroom off to the left, a bathroom and bedroom off to the right
and a big lounge at the end, stretching across the width of the
place. The walls were plain – not wallpapered like in our
house.

The hallway was a dark
green and the ceiling olive green, with a paper globe lampshade
hanging from the centre, constantly lit-up, so we could see where
we were going, I guess.

The kitchen
was all browns and oranges: a
fitted
kitchen, Gary told us,
with
chocolate
cupboards and drawers,
mandarin
tiling,
marble
work surfaces and black and
white lino flooring, like on the Flash adverts. He had jars all
over the work surfaces, with various things we recognised – tea,
sugar, coffee – and various things we didn’t – muesli, fusilli,
lentils.
‘Len who?’
Dad had joked, thinking he was funny, but no one
laughed.
Uncle
Gary also had various food processors on display – all in
white, so clean you wouldn’t think he’d ever used them – and a
stack of cookery books leaning against the wall at one
end.

‘
Bit of a
chef, eh?’ Dad said aloud, like it was an insult, you could
tell.

‘
Oh, my Gary’s
a proper Fanny Craddock,’ Auntie Stella beamed, accidentally adding
on to what Dad started and
Uncle
Gary blushed, before offering to open some wine,
which made it all much worse.

‘
Jesus, Gary,
why don’t you just poor me a Martini and give us a fiddle while
you’re at it! Now, have you got some bitter?’

Moving down
the hallway, I glimpsed into the bedrooms – plain walls in red on
one side and black and white on the other, double beds and fitted
wardrobes in each. The bathroom was sludge green –
‘Avocado’ -
with sludge
green tiles –
‘Avocado, Scotty,’ –
with a fluffy white carpet that was
just-asking-for-a-piss-stain –
Dad. But it was impressive – walk in shower and
two loos.
That’s not a loo, Scotty,
Ian later explained, forehead creased-up,
thinking how we’d clean it up when there wasn’t a flush, just a
fountain of water that apparently washed your bum off
like-in-France.

It was the
room at the end of the hallway – the
lounge-through-diner
as Auntie
Stella introduced it – that was particularly impressive. It was
cream and white – completely cream and white throughout. Thick
cream shagpile carpets. Cream leather sofa and chairs. White walls,
doors and skirting. A white display cabinet with a glass front. A
white TV and stand. Cream curtains made of corduroy. In one corner,
four white chairs were crowded round a circular glass table. There
was also a glass coffee table in front of the sofa. It looked
immaculate.

‘
Shoes off,’
Auntie Stella instructed, before we were allowed to enter this part
of the flat.

We obeyed, although there
was a bit of embarrassment all round, as I had holes in my socks,
Ian had neon green fluffies on and Dad’s white ones were long
overdue a wash – you could tell this with both your eyes open and
shut.

Auntie Stella did her best
not to notice, and carried on with her list of instructions: white
wine or clear spirits only in the lounge-diner, all other drinks
and food in general to be nibbled in the kitchen.

We’d arrived
around 7pm; by 8pm, it was still a bit quiet. About eight of
Uncle
Gary’s mates had
arrived and were crowding up the kitchen. His mum and sister were
also there, drinking wine, but looking uncomfortable, worried, it
seemed, by Auntie Stella’s strict house rules. We mainly stayed in
the hall, hovering in the kitchen and lounge-diner doorways,
wondering what to do.

‘
I’m bored,’ I
told Ian, and he shushed me, as Auntie Stella was passing. ‘But
there's no one here for me.’

‘
No
Justin,
you mean.
Thought you weren’t mates anymore?’

I shrugged.

‘
They weren’t
invited anyway.’

That was Della.

‘
Overheard
Gary tell Dad that Auntie Stella had made a point of not inviting
them.’

‘
That doesn’t
usually stop them turning up,’ Ian added, laughing a little.
‘Gary’s in business with Adrian. He’s got to have asked
him.’

‘
Apparently
not.’

Ian was right, though: it
didn’t usually stop them and it didn’t that night, either. At
least, it didn’t stop the Tankard women: at just after 9pm,
Chrissie Tankard and daughter, Sharon, made their
entrance.

Chrissie had bought a big
bottle of champagne with her, so Auntie Stella couldn’t really tell
her to leave.

‘
Congratulations,’ she said, handing it over to
Uncle
Gary, her boobs
wobbling a bit under her leopard-print top. She had a black leather
skirt on, fish-nets and black stilettos too.

Mutton-dressed-as-lamb,
Mum would
have said. It was one of several things she said regularly about
Chrissie Tankard. Others included:
swears-like-a-soldier, smokes-like-a-trooper
and
open-all-hours.
(‘Like the TV
programme?’ I’d asked Mum, referring to the latter comment. ‘Yes,
Scot,’ she had answered, refusing to elaborate further.)

‘
Alright,
Scotty,’ Chrissie said to me. ‘Not seen you round ours in a while.’
At which I blushed, as I still wasn’t officially allowed to go to
the Tankard’s house; Dad didn’t hear her, though. ‘So, Stella,
let’s have a look at your fella’s gaff...’

I liked Chrissie Tankard,
despite what Mum had said about her; despite the fact she clearly
hadn’t liked Mum either. She was a bit rough – there was no getting
away from it. She swore a lot, smoked at every meal, and was known
for her public shouting matches with her big scary, hairy husband,
Adrian. But there was something about her. She was a laugh. If you
were at their house at a mealtime, she’d just include you. She
didn’t make you go and wait in the garden, like Mum did if friends
came round at the wrong time. In a way, she was somewhere between
Mum and Auntie Stella: she had Auntie Stella’s brassy nature and
dress sense, with a bit of Mum’s sense and love about
her.

Thereon, the party livened
up a bit. Auntie Stella got a bit flustered when shoes were walked
all over the cream shagpile, and tearful when a bit of dog-shit got
trodden in, but people were good about the smoking and food rules.
Drink of all kinds made their way round the whole house, but there
weren’t many spillages.

‘
Just relax,’
I heard
Uncle
Gary tell her, handing her a glass of something and she’d
shrugged, finally giving into the spirit of what a party was
supposed to be.

There was
something I wanted to do whilst I was there. Something that had
been playing on my mind since I’d heard we’d be going to his flat.
I just needed to find the right time. I found that moment about an
hour after Chrissie and Sharon arrived, when Chrissie started up a
drinking game in the lounge. Everyone was quickly drawn in and
distracted – Dad and
Uncle
Gary because they liked to drink, Auntie Stella
because she was still fearful of spills and stains. Even Ian and
Della seemed curious. So, with almost everyone in the lounge,
playing or watching, I slipped away.

My destination
was
Uncle
Gary’s
bedroom: the big red room. Once in, I pushed the door
to.

‘
You gone on
queer on us, Gary?’
one of his mates had
said earlier in the evening, popping his head round.

‘
Looks like a
knocking shop in there,’
said
another.

‘
And how’d you
know that, Deano?’
And the ribbing went
from
Uncle
Gary
to Deano Jackson, who claimed all innocence amongst jeers and
shoves.

But the women liked the
room. Chrissie and Sharon Tankard making particular
comments.

‘
I imagine you
keep her happy between those silky sheets, Gary,’
Chrissie had laughed and Sharon had given
Uncle
Gary a look that
made him excuse himself in a hurry.

I liked it too. It was
strange, like a made up room – like on a stage or in a pop video.
The furniture – wardrobe, chest of drawers, drawers under the bed –
were all black, but everything else was shades of red. Curtains
were dark red, with writing on them, like the writing we had on the
calendar in the kitchen that came from the Chinese takeaway. The
carpet was shagpile again, but a very deep red, like dried-up
blood. A huge red paper lampshade dangled in the middle of the
room, casting a warm, shadowy glow about the room. The bedding was
red, too, brighter though, and silky. I lay back on it and felt it
wobble, like the mattress was full of water; looking up, I saw
myself in the big mirror above his bed, floating on the big silky
wave.

So,
I thought to myself,
this is where it all happens.
And
then I stopped thinking, trying not to think about that and trying
to stay focussed. I had come looking for something and I didn’t
have long. Someone was bound to come in sooner or later.

Getting off
the bed was more difficult than I thought, but I ended up rolling
off and landing on the floor with a
thud.
For a second, I thought that
might be enough to draw someone’s attention, but no one came. I
listened: laughter was coming from the lounge; Chrissie’s game was
still in full-flow. So, I got on with my job.

I started with his chest
of drawers, checking at the top and working my way down. Then I
tried the fitted wardrobes, looking at the back, feeling for
anything hidden. Nothing. The bedside cabinets produced nothing
either, but then I noticed the drawers under the bed.

Tony, I want
one of these beds with the drawers underneath. Can’t you get us one
of those?

Mum.

I could hear her asking
Dad, complaining that she’d run out of places to put
things.

They are all
the rage.

Dad never did
get them for her, but
Uncle
Gary had them, two drawers on each side. It was
here, in the third drawer I opened, that I found what I was looking
for.

In a tin. Just like the
one Mum had kept all her photos in. An old biscuit tin. At the very
bottom, from under all the photographs, I pulled out a white
envelope.

‘
What the
fuck-.’

Uncle
Gary was suddenly in the room and moving towards
me. Almost leaping towards the tin. I was sick with fright; I
hadn’t heard a thing, too engrossed in my illicit task.

‘
You shouldn’t
be-. Jesus, Scot. Jesus. Shit. You shouldn’t have-.’

I don’t know what I would
have seen in his face had I looked in it, but I was instantly
sidetracked by Auntie Stella’s appearance in the
doorway.

‘
Gary, what’s
going on in here? What are you doing with Scot?’

She was a bit tipsy,
swaying in the doorway, but she sensed something; she knew
something was up. I shouldn’t have been in there. But I was and it
was obvious I was up to something.

‘
What have you
got there?’ she asked, peering, about to move in.

I don’t know
if a colour can make you feel hot by itself, but the redness of the
room seemed to make me sweat, seemed to close in on me, making my
heart beat faster and my mouth dry right up. Suddenly, I wondered
if I was in danger. What if there was more to these people than I
knew? I had a thought she might close the door. No one would have
known I was in there; no one would have heard me above the raucous
laughter in the lounge. What if she already knew what he’d been up
to? What then? Would she help him shut me up? Did she really love
him that much?
Your meal ticket’s
here.
That’s what Dad had said and now I
got it, looking around.
Uncle
Gary had money.

‘
Gary? What’s
going on?’

We were abruptly saved
from Auntie Stella and my imagination, as disaster struck elsewhere
and created a much needed diversion.