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I’m standing at the end of my driveway, keeping an eye out for Dad and Gail, who should be here any minute, with the food that was originally bought for Gail’s married sons and their wives and kids, that I have no idea where I’m going to store, and the clingfilm-wrapped Christmas tree that I have no idea where I’m going to put either.
I hear Kenny’s front door open. Brilliant, that’s just what I need, my usual sparring with my unfriendly neighbourhood shagger man. Admittedly not my best work, but give me a break, I’m stressed.
Obviously he has a younger woman with him, again, I can’t tell if it’s the same one, but this one is being picked up by another girl. She hops into the car. As Kenny makes his way to the back car door, he gives me a wave – a sarcastic one, if such a thing exists – as he goes to get inside too.
‘Aww, Kenny, I didn’t know you were fostering,’ I say, in an entirely put on, sickly-sweet voice. Okay, that is my best work.
He just sticks his tongue out at me, gets in the car and they all drive off together. It’s as I watch them drive away that I notice a black Range Rover driving in this direction.
I take such a deep breath; the cold air hurts my lungs. I cough and splutter right as they pull up next to me. I’m effortlessly cool like that.
‘Hello, Silly Billie,’ Dad says warmly as he hurries around the car to give me a hug.
I suppose it should be cute, that he calls me the nickname he did when I was little, but it only reminds me that our relationship got sort of suspended in time.
I’m a little taken aback when I clap eyes on him. Dad always had a thick head of black hair that he would wear very neatly styled backwards. He looks so different now. His hair is softer, and shorter, and grey, just like his short beard, and he wears a pair of round tortoise-shell glasses. It’s a shock to see him looking so much older.
‘Hello,’ I say politely.
‘You’re our hero,’ he tells me. ‘Isn’t she, sweetie?’
Ugh, sweetie. He never called Mum sweetie.
‘Thank you for letting us stay with you,’ Gail says as she approaches me for a hug.
Gail is probably in her mid-sixties. Her light brown hair goes to just below her shoulders before flicking outwards – too perfectly to be something she isn’t styling that way on purpose. Her brown eyes are dark, made darker by the heavy kohl eyeliner she’s wearing on her upper and lower lids. She looks nice, like she’s dressed up to meet us all for the first time.
I glance down at the men’s joggers I’m wearing that I bought indiscriminately from TK Maxx to do decorating in (but found them too comfortable to mess up by the time I got home and tried them on) paired with a cropped T-shirt – not that you can see that under my oversized puffer coat. Perhaps I should have dressed nicer, to meet my dad’s new wife for the first time.
‘So wonderful to finally meet you. Your dad has told me so much about you and your sister. Go on, Rowan, get the tree.’
She turns to my dad and hints towards the car with a strange movement of her head.
‘Yes, of course,’ Dad says with an enthusiasm I don’t remember him having.
He hurries to the boot and begins unloading two suitcases, bags for life full of shopping, and then finally the Christmas tree. Well, I think it’s safe to assume it’s the Christmas tree, it’s a large green and blue something tightly bound in clingfilm, looking like anonymous leftovers you forgot were sitting at the back of the fridge for God knows how long.
‘Come inside,’ I say, as warmly as I can. ‘Cuppa tea?’
God, I sound just like my mum.
‘That would be lovely,’ Gail replies. ‘Can you handle all those bags, Rowan?’
There’s an uncomfortable stiffness to Gail. Obviously Dad can’t carry all those bags and that mouldy sausage Christmas tree on his own.
I take my phone from my pocket and punch a message to Jess.
Help!
‘I can help him,’ I say. ‘Jess is on her way out too.’
‘There she is,’ Dad says brightly as Jess joins us. Jess’s reaction is more of a dull one.
‘Yo,’ she says, very much like an angsty teenager. I find this especially funny because I’ve never heard Jess say ‘yo’ in her life.
Dad hugs her. Gail is up next.
‘I’ve heard wonderful things about you, Jessica,’ she tells her.
