Blood Relatives by Stevan Alcock

her desk told us where we’d find Gran that day. Parked beside t’ desk wor a bearded bloke in a wheelchair. The girl said that his name wor Bobby and that he’d been abandoned there as a child.
    Bobby had a book propped before him on a music stand. As he read he turned the pages wi’ a long, thin metal hook that he waggled between his teeth. When he saw us, Bobby’s head wobbled enthusiastically, the hook batoning about. He emitted a strangled ‘Nnnnhhhh.’ The girl reached across and wiped away t’ dribble that ran down his chin.
    ‘Bobby says hi,’ she said, swallowing some cake.
    ‘Hello, Bobby,’ Mother said in a tone she usually reserved for owt mildly cute. I nodded my ‘Hello’, and Bobby made another excitable ‘Nnnnnhhhh.’
    ‘You’ll find Betty in t’ lounge at the end of t’ corridor,’ the girl said.
    We clopped along t’ dully-lit corridor of mushroom gloss walls and the sharp tang of bleach over stale piss. Mother blathered on about t’ sour-faced staff and the girl in reception being t’ only cheery one.
    ‘Nice-looking girl. Don’t you think so?’
    ‘Uh-huh.’
    Mother gave me an assessing look.
    We entered a cavernous lounge area, empty save for a semi-circle of armchairs at the far end. Gran wor buried in one, her head bowed forward slightly, and smiling oddly, as if taken up by some pleasant scene on t’ rug before her, such as a frolicking kitten. Except that there wor nowt.
    We’d been told that Gran’s mind wor steadily disintegrating, like cabbage boiling down to mush. But as we neared her, we saw that she’d stopped caring for hersen – or being cared for. Her cardie had a dried egg stain on it, her hair wor all matted, and without make-up, her face looked sallow.
    Mother crouched alongside Gran’s chair and spoke loudly and slowly.
    ‘Hello, Mum. How are you today?’
    Gran’s head lolled. Mother took a hairbrush from her handbag and began tidying Gran up a bit. I walked over to t’ window. In spite of t’ drought, the lawns wor well watered, the flowerbeds wor flourishing. An exhausted wasp wor crawling along t’ sill. I tried to lift the sash, but it wouldn’t budge. The windows had been nailed shut. Mother came over to t’ window, still holding the hairbrush. Together we took in t’ blooms.
    ‘They do a nice job on t’ gardens.’
    ‘Aye,’ I said. ‘On t’ gardens they do.’
    Mother’s face twitched. ‘What were we supposed to do?’
    ‘Did I say owt?’
    ‘Oh, spare me. We might not have seen eye to eye, and my God your gran could be a troublesome old goat, but that don’t stop the guilt sitting in me like a stone.’ She touched her stomach wi’ t’ back of t’ hairbrush. ‘We couldn’t have cared for her at home, Rick.’ She looked across at Gran wi’ a regretful half-smile. ‘I do wish we’d talked more. Before t’ gate started closing.’
    Gran raised her head slowly and her face opened into a wondrous, trusting smile that wor never part of her when she had all of her cups in t’ cupboard. Her fingertips quivered anxiously. Mother went over and crouched beside her. Then Gran’s expression darkened, as if she wor seized by a worrisome thought, and she grabbed Mother’s wrist very tightly.
    ‘Ow, Mum! Let go. Mum, let go, you’re hurting me!’
    But her grip wor so tight that Mother couldn’t wrench hersen free. Gran’s eyes widened, the whites like crazed china, her damp mouth agape as she screamed into Mother’s face, ‘He’ll be t’ death of us, child!’
    ‘Who? Who will?’ Mother cried, yanking her wrist free. ‘Who?’
    ‘Him! Frank! Frank, and that man!’
    ‘What man?’
    ‘That man! Him! HIM!’
    On t’ way home I said, ‘What man?’
    Mother flapped a hand. ‘There wor a man who used to go to t’ races wi’ your granddad. Your gran hated him. Wouldn’t have his name breathed across t’ doorstep.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘Search me.’
    ‘Did you ever meet him?’
    She rooted in her shit-brown handbag for