won't need to be cut until April, and the mower is in the shed.'
'If Colette gets pregnant…' I deliberately left a pause for him to jump in and bluster that nothing of the sort would happen. But he didn't. I forced myself through the dread. 'If she gets up the pole, I want you to ring me. You hear me? Do you think you could possibly manage that?'
'Ah, Gemma, don't be like that.'
I sighed, regretting my spite. 'Sorry. But you'll tell me?'
'I will.'
So even though it hurt that he never rang me, it was also kind of a relief. Back to Susan.
I have also become fixated with the idea of owning a Hello Kitty toaster. It's so cute, and - get this - it puts the Hello Kitty face on the slices of toast.
I've managed to get Internet access software onto Dad's crappy old PC. Multi-talented and all as my ball and chain (communicator brick) is, it can't give me colour pictures of Hello Kitty toasters.
Wish me luck.
Love
Gemma
PS it is now six weeks since Dad left and Mam is doing great. She's lost three stone, got blonde highlights, a discreet face-lift and a thirty-five-year-old boyfriend. They are going on holiday together to Cap Ferrat. She's still refusing to learn to drive but it doesn't matter because her new man (Helmut, he's Swiss) always sends a car for her or else picks her up in his red Aston Martin with gull-wing doors.
I pressed 'send' then turned on Dad's old computer. I would track down a Hello Kitty toaster on the Internet, or die in the attempt.
'What are you doing?' Mam came into the room and stood looking over my shoulder as I clicked and typed.
'Looking for a Hello Kitty toaster.'
'Why?'
'Just…' I was scrolling down the merchandise with fierce concentration, 'I read that Reese Witherspoon has one.'
Mam paused, then said, 'If Reese Witherspoon jumped off a cliff, would you do it too?'
TO: [email protected]
FROM: Gemma [email protected]
SUBJECT: A black day
The last of Dad's free confectionery is gone. Perhaps this will shake Mam out of the rut she's in. Not so much stuck in a rut, as lying down in it, almost buried by chocolate.
Yes, of course I was joking about her transformation! God Almighty. I don't think she's got out of her candlewick dressing-gown since the morning Dad left and she still hasn't surrendered his porridge bowl. And as for losing three stone, I'd say it's three stone the other way. She won't stop eating chocolate, she says she 'feels closer' to Dad by consuming what his company makes.
Love
Gemma
PS I've ordered the toaster and now I want a Barbie rucksack.
PPS Helmut has bouffant blondish hair (very similar to Mam's), a permanent tan and a tall lithe body which I find curiously repellent. He uses La Prairie products, the really, really expensive skin-caviar stuff. He left a jar in the bathroom, so of course I used some and the following day he confronted me about what he called 'the stealing'. Naturally I denied it, but he said he knew it was me, that I'd left the shape of my finger in the jar and that no one but a savage just sticks their hand in and gouges out a lump of La Prairie skin caviar.
I objected to being called a savage, so I told on him to Mam. She was sitting up in bed wearing a silk, oyster-coloured negligee and eating breakfast - one slice of wholemeal toast with an invisible scraping of honey. Her hair and make-up were already done. I made my complaint.
'Oh darling,' she sighed. She never used to call me 'darling'. 'I do wish you two would stop fighting over me and try to get along.'
'I don't know what you see in him!'
'Well, darling.' She quirked a plucked eyebrow at me - when did Mam begin getting her eyebrows plucked? And then quirking them? 'Let's just say he's… veeerrry gooood between the sheets.'
'Too much information! I am your daughter.'
She got out of bed. Her negligee barely covered her bottom. She has very good legs for a sixty-two-year-old woman. Although she's begun telling people that she's only forty-nine and saying that she'll be
'If Colette gets pregnant…' I deliberately left a pause for him to jump in and bluster that nothing of the sort would happen. But he didn't. I forced myself through the dread. 'If she gets up the pole, I want you to ring me. You hear me? Do you think you could possibly manage that?'
'Ah, Gemma, don't be like that.'
I sighed, regretting my spite. 'Sorry. But you'll tell me?'
'I will.'
So even though it hurt that he never rang me, it was also kind of a relief. Back to Susan.
I have also become fixated with the idea of owning a Hello Kitty toaster. It's so cute, and - get this - it puts the Hello Kitty face on the slices of toast.
I've managed to get Internet access software onto Dad's crappy old PC. Multi-talented and all as my ball and chain (communicator brick) is, it can't give me colour pictures of Hello Kitty toasters.
Wish me luck.
Love
Gemma
PS it is now six weeks since Dad left and Mam is doing great. She's lost three stone, got blonde highlights, a discreet face-lift and a thirty-five-year-old boyfriend. They are going on holiday together to Cap Ferrat. She's still refusing to learn to drive but it doesn't matter because her new man (Helmut, he's Swiss) always sends a car for her or else picks her up in his red Aston Martin with gull-wing doors.
I pressed 'send' then turned on Dad's old computer. I would track down a Hello Kitty toaster on the Internet, or die in the attempt.
'What are you doing?' Mam came into the room and stood looking over my shoulder as I clicked and typed.
'Looking for a Hello Kitty toaster.'
'Why?'
'Just…' I was scrolling down the merchandise with fierce concentration, 'I read that Reese Witherspoon has one.'
Mam paused, then said, 'If Reese Witherspoon jumped off a cliff, would you do it too?'
TO: [email protected]
FROM: Gemma [email protected]
SUBJECT: A black day
The last of Dad's free confectionery is gone. Perhaps this will shake Mam out of the rut she's in. Not so much stuck in a rut, as lying down in it, almost buried by chocolate.
Yes, of course I was joking about her transformation! God Almighty. I don't think she's got out of her candlewick dressing-gown since the morning Dad left and she still hasn't surrendered his porridge bowl. And as for losing three stone, I'd say it's three stone the other way. She won't stop eating chocolate, she says she 'feels closer' to Dad by consuming what his company makes.
Love
Gemma
PS I've ordered the toaster and now I want a Barbie rucksack.
PPS Helmut has bouffant blondish hair (very similar to Mam's), a permanent tan and a tall lithe body which I find curiously repellent. He uses La Prairie products, the really, really expensive skin-caviar stuff. He left a jar in the bathroom, so of course I used some and the following day he confronted me about what he called 'the stealing'. Naturally I denied it, but he said he knew it was me, that I'd left the shape of my finger in the jar and that no one but a savage just sticks their hand in and gouges out a lump of La Prairie skin caviar.
I objected to being called a savage, so I told on him to Mam. She was sitting up in bed wearing a silk, oyster-coloured negligee and eating breakfast - one slice of wholemeal toast with an invisible scraping of honey. Her hair and make-up were already done. I made my complaint.
'Oh darling,' she sighed. She never used to call me 'darling'. 'I do wish you two would stop fighting over me and try to get along.'
'I don't know what you see in him!'
'Well, darling.' She quirked a plucked eyebrow at me - when did Mam begin getting her eyebrows plucked? And then quirking them? 'Let's just say he's… veeerrry gooood between the sheets.'
'Too much information! I am your daughter.'
She got out of bed. Her negligee barely covered her bottom. She has very good legs for a sixty-two-year-old woman. Although she's begun telling people that she's only forty-nine and saying that she'll be
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