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Gran pointed the spoon at her son, and they glowered at each other in a stare-off. Gran won, so my father turned his glare on me. But I wasn’t having this today.
“The fight wouldn’t have happened in the first place, if ye dealt with Stephen years ago!”
There was a sudden intake of breath from everyone at the table. Gran lowered the wooden spoon as her eyebrows went up.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” my father ground out.
“Ye let him get away with years of poor performance and never did a thing about it!”
“He’s family! He needed a chance to pull up his socks and prove himself!”
“Stephen was a bad egg from the start. Ye promised your brother to give his son a job and ye didn’t want to tell him it was a bad idea! And he’s still around causing trouble!”
James’s mouth fell open.
“Stop catching flies!” Gran flicked his chin.
“He’s right, Da.” Robert stared at me with a look of pride. “Letting Stephen go was a good decision.”
Da huffed, glaring at me. “We look after family!”
“Stephen never did! He was a thief and had to go! And, at the pub, he insulted Caroline, as well as Amanda.”
“The auditor was supposed to be a bloke! And that went wrong!”
“So what if the auditor is not a man? Ye can’t blame me for the original accountant getting sudden appendicitis! Amanda’s fantastic at her job, she’s helping us to get out of this mess, and she’s done more for staff morale in the last week than anything I’ve tried in the past two years. I’ll not hear a bad word about her!”
I was suddenly standing, looking down at my father. No one said a word. Angus dropped his spoon, mush going all over Robert.
I sat quickly, wincing, as I adjusted myself on the donut pillow.
My family stared at me. My father and mother were agape. Gran smirked. Robert stared in awe. James sat in shock.
“Ye were very loud, Uncle Stu,” Jess whispered.
“Sorry,” I muttered at my empty plate, avoiding eye contact with everyone.
My phone rang; the ringtone still set to Lesley Gore’s song, ‘Sunshine, Lollypops and Rainbows’. I’d been too preoccupied with Amanda over the weekend to change it.
At least the song broke the tension. James snickered and Robert covered his mouth to prevent outright laughing.
“I love rainbows, Uncle Stu!” Jess yelled, bouncing on her seat.
“I need to take this,” I said, recognising the mobile for the staff member rostered on the still today.
Gran whacked the wooden spoon on the table and we all jumped.
“Ye’ll put that phone away, and then ye’ll sit doon on the donut pillow and enjoy a meal with your family!”
I swallowed hard and sunk back down, silencing the call.
James snickered again and Gran cuffed him around the ears. “And I’ll noo have the sexting from ye, young Jimmy!”
“I don’t even have my phone out!” he spluttered.
“What’s sexting, Uncle Stu?” Jess asked.
“Christ, there was no sexting or mobiles in my day!” Da barked. “We got on with the job.”
