Page 50 - WTP Vol.IX #3

Chestnut (continued from preceding page)
Like Sports day. Like parents’ evening. Like someone to go over your GCSE maths.
No-one.
Your dad was never there, and neither was I.
All because of a married man with a hairy back and a small Japanese car!’
She says Dennis got the seven-year itch—from her. But it’s fine cos now
she
and
I
can make up for seven years lost time.
I think of embracing her at this moment of parental epiphany. A sort of slow-motion thing that would right every wrong. But before I can, she looks me in the eyes like she never has done before and gives me the hug I was waiting for that day I was too scared to sit the SATS.
Softness And Tenderness. Sweet.
And it’s all a bit cheesy, but it’s gonna be all right. I know it is.
We sit on the sofa. We hold hands. She talks about that time we were in Wales on that tiny train, and when I was in my nappy and the can of beans fell onto the floor, and when she held me up high and told me she loved me. And we giggle like kids.
Dennis has gone and left a huge hole, but I am going to fill it. I look at her face.
Pretty.
Smooth And Tranquil Situation Soft As True Silk
Support and Trust Survives.
Then Dennis lets himself in with his key.
‘Trixie, I’ve changed my mind, babe. It’s you I want.’ He takes her hand, tugs her upstairs.
Silence
as they cling onto each other, sucking at each other
like fish.
And then it starts...
I sit there listening to the bedsprings, and the head- board banging against the wall.
Snogging And Tragic Shagging. Synchronised Amour. Tantric Sex.
I ask the fridge, as I help myself to more chocolate, ‘And what about me, Little Miss Invisible?’
I think: ‘You missed that one Roger Hargreaves.’
And I imagine... squeak, squeak, bang, bang... Kerry, Jen, Melanie, Daksha, Robbie, Zak, Big Phil—all the friends I have never made. Too scared.
And I imagine ... squeak, squeak, bang, bang... Ge- ography, English, Chemistry, Photography, Sports Science, Maths, beautiful Maths—the GCSEs I never sat.
And I imagine Bristol, Manchester, Edinburgh, ... squeak, squeak, bang, bang... Dundee, Cambridge, East Anglia—the universities I was too chicken to apply to.
Waiter, Fish Farm Manager, ... squeak, squeak... For- ester, Dental Hygienist, ... bang, bang... Theatre Lighting Technician, Mechanical Engineer—the jobs I didn’t even send off the form for.
And the high-flyer scratches her arms with her nails till they bleed.
I phone Kirsty and Kirsty comes round cos she knows it’s an emergency.
Upstairs the bed’s still springing and the headboard’s still knocking.
Kirsty puts some music on to drown it out. I say ‘I wish someone would drown me out.’
Kirsty goes upstairs, opens the door to my mum’s room and screams:
‘Will you two fucking shite-heads bloody grow up?!’ The squeaking stops. The banging stops.
My mouth drops open: I’ve never heard her say any- thing except...
She closes my open mouth because it looks weird. And she holds me tight.
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