Posy shoved a multicoloured fluffy dog at her Uncle Ted and said, ‘This puppy has a broken tummy. Fix him.’
‘Yes, oh Empress Posy,’ said Ted, as Posy poked the stuffed puppy in a way that would guarantee a broken tummy or, at least, severe gastric discomfort. ‘Exactly what sort of puppy is this?’
‘A zebra shetta puppy,’ Posy said. ‘You’re silly not to know.’
‘Yup, silly me.’
Sitting in an armchair, watching, Sam thought happily of how Sunday dinner at Joanne’s was always fun. Fun because Joanne’s three little girls were a delight.
They adored Ted and pulled him down onto the ground so they could get him to be the vet for a line-up of teddies who would all have injuries.
‘He’s going to be a great dad,’ Joanne said as she somehow managed to shut the oven door with her bum while carrying the roast and shoving some children’s toys out of the way with her foot. Sam marvelled at her sister’s ability to multitask. Joanne could cook, mind kids, talk and not get the slightest bit fazed by any of this.
Sam was good at multitasking when she was at work, but at home, she liked a different, more laid-back sort of vibe. But this was motherhood, she knew: she had to watch and learn because that was very important.
‘What are we eating today?’ she said.
‘Roast lamb stuffed with rosemary and garlic,’ said Joanne, her voice slightly questioning. ‘Sound good?’
‘If she winces and asks for fish paste,’ said Ted, coming back in as he wrapped up another teddy, a bright pink one this time with the bandage made out of toilet roll, ‘say no. No matter how much she begs. Gives her heartburn.’
‘I have not had fish paste for ages, in my defence,’ said Sam.
The door banged and the sound of Patrick, Jo’s husband, ushering in Sam’s father could be heard.
‘Liam, how are you, and Jean – we weren’t expecting you to make it, but gosh, er, you look lovely.’ Patrick was using his most respectful voice.
Joanne and Sam exchanged a glance.
‘Mother,’ they mouthed at each other.
Jean swooped into the room. Her greying hair, cut short, was curled the way she did it with heated rollers, her limited make-up was perfect and she wore a silky cream knitted suit with a single loop of discreet beads round her neck.
Sam looked at her mother and wondered if she had ever seen her dressed down. Sam loved dressing down: taking off her work clothes when she used to work in the bank and slipping into comfortable stretchy leggings and fluffy socks with one of Ted’s sweatshirts on. Then, she’d curl up on the couch with the dogs, relax and watch delicious junk on the TV.
She had never seen her mother in such a state of undress – even her mother’s nightwear was a collection of quasi-Victorian nightgowns. No comfy pyjamas in that house.
Joanne recovered first. ‘Mother, delighted you could come. I thought you were busy.’
‘I’m never too busy to see you all,’ said their mother and, yet again, Sam and Joanne exchanged a glance.
Their mother had always been too busy to see them. Their father had raised them. But that ship had sailed a long time ago.
Sam managed a brittle smile and knelt with difficulty down on the floor, where her youngest niece was playing with trains.
There was something about her mother these days that was bothering her and she just couldn’t put her finger on what it was; just something there in the background that was niggling away.
‘It’s ridiculous,’ she had said to Ted a few weeks before, after her mother had sent her a terse email hoping she was feeling well with her pregnancy. ‘Whose mother emails about their pregnancy? That’s fine if you live in a different country or you’re on the space station, but if you live in the same country, not that many miles away, you’d phone, and then you’d come over, like a normal mother would.’
She was aware that her voice was rising with each breath.
‘Honey, don’t get your blood pressure up. It’s bad for the baby,’ Ted said.
Sam had groaned. ‘That’s the best excuse ever,’ she said. ‘You can stop me getting irritated with my mother by reminding me it’s bad for the baby.’
‘You haven’t got annoyed over your mother for years,’ he said, ‘so it’s a little weird, but hey, hormones! Just remember to take the annoyance down a notch or, I promise you, I will buy one of those little blood pressure machines.’
Sam hadn’t answered the email. If her mother wanted to behave like a robo-mum, she was not going to go along with it. Step away from the crazy!
Posy wanted all the toy train-track joined together. Ted and Sam had bought it for her when it was clear that Posy liked what were officially termed ‘boys’ games’. Joanne was entirely laid-back about it all: ‘If she wants to play with boys’ stuff, fine. Why are there girls’ toys and boys’ toys? Why not just toys? I was never into Barbie myself.’
‘No guns, though,’ Patrick said.
‘Definitely,’ agreed Joanne. ‘But a crossbow when she’s old enough, so she can be cool, like Katniss . . .? And I think karate or tae kwon do lessons when they’re older. Girls need to feel empowered.’
‘So nice to see you aren’t using gender-stereotypical toys for the children,’ said a cool voice.
Sam felt that tightening in her guts again. Her mother felt that non-gender-stereotypical toys were useful in that they might convince a girl to do higher level science and maths and go off to prove themselves in male-dominated worlds.
She didn’t seem to realise that a three-year-old wanting to play with trains was just a three-year-old wanting to play with trains. No, everything had to have a superior purpose down the line.
‘Isn’t this great, Posy,’ said Sam, trying not to grit her teeth in case the ensuing rictus grin frightened her niece.
There was something therapeutic about making a curved track, she’d found from previous visits. Finally, after what seemed like an interminable amount of time, with Jean exchanging idle chit-chat with Joanne while Sam studiously ignored it all and played with Posy, it was time to eat.
The calm of track-making vanished over dinner.
‘I sent you an email enquiring about the pregnancy,’ said her mother, looking at Sam over the top of her bifocals, precisely the way an irritated headmistress would look at a misbehaving student. For a moment, Sam felt just like a misbehaving student, preferably one from St Trinian’s.
‘I get so many emails, I just never got round to answering it, Mother, but I had been talking to Dad. I was telling him things were doing really well. Phone calls are easier – you can only imagine the number of emails I get from work.’
‘Yes,’ said her mother. ‘Talking of work, your father told me about this scandal of the missing money and some volunteer person who has been helping themselves with a credit card over the years. Goodness, what a mess that appears to have been. It’s . . . how shall we say . . .’ Jean seemed to be considering the correct Oxford dictionary definition of a mess, ‘. . . tricky to extract oneself from that sort of scandal. You don’t want your career blighted.’
Sam glared at her father, who mouthed sorry. What on earth had made him divulge this bit of information?
‘Have you sorted it out yet?’ her mother went on, excellent in the role of High Inquisitor.
‘We’re trying to get to the bottom of it but it’s complicated,’ said Sam, which was an understatement. ‘It’s an older lady who didn’t mean any harm.’
‘You shouldn’t make excuses for people,’ her mother interrupted. ‘We all make our choices in life.’
Sam stared down at her plate, rage surging up inside her.
Her inner voice was screaming: And your choice was to have children and then never be there for them! Where’s the apology for that? And you’re still doing it!
‘Wasn’t that a fabulous match yesterday,’ said Patrick, determined to break the impasse.
‘Yes,’ said Ted, picking up instantly. ‘Some great tries.’
‘Oh fabulous, fabulous match,’ said her father and the three men talked loudly as if they might somehow banish the frostiness by discussing tackles and points and really why was there not special eye surgery for referees because they kept missing fouls.
Posy wanted to clamber onto Sam’s lap and she let her.
‘Hello baba, what’s wrong?’
‘Not a baba, I’m three,’ said Posy crossly.
‘Three, I thought you were seven,’ said her Aunt Sam, hugging her and feeling the comfort of having this little scrap of beauty sitting on her lap.
Luckily Sam’s parents didn’t stay long and with a final hug from her father and a whispered, ‘I’m sorry I mentioned the problem in work, Sam,’ they were gone.
‘Please tell me when she’s invited for dinner again, will you,’ said Sam, sinking down into an armchair and then wondering why because she knew she wouldn’t be able to get out of it without help.
‘Don’t you like Granny?’ said Isabelle, standing in front of Sam, little hands on her tiny little girl hips. ‘I like Granny. She’s in charge of a school. I’m going to be in charge of the world when I grow up.’
‘You’re in charge already,’ sighed her father. ‘She is, you know,’ he said to Sam and Ted, ‘totally in charge.’
‘That’s because I’m the oldest,’ said Isabelle, staring smugly at her sisters. ‘I’m the oldest so what I say goes.’
As the tidying progressed, a mild scuffle broke out over who was really in charge, but a roar from Joanne settled them all down.
‘No TV all week if you fight. Shouting hurts Auntie Sam’s baby’s ears.’
‘Ooohh.’
Three little girls arrived to stand in front of Sam and looked at her belly curiously, as if wanting to see evidence of the baby’s ears, a diagram of possible ear damage or even a real, live baby they could dress up in dolls’ clothes.
‘You can touch if you like,’ said Sam.
Pixie patted the bump, but Posy laid her head on Sam’s belly.
‘I am your cousin,’ she whispered. ‘I will take care of you, but stay away from my trains ’cos they are mine, right?’
The grown-ups laughed and eventually, bored, the three girls went off to various parts of the room to play.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Sam, ‘I know I should be doing something to help but I just can’t – I have to sit here, I just feel like a, a . . .’
‘A whale?’ supplied her sister.
‘Yeah, a whale. Exactly. It’s really weird, this growing a person inside you.’
‘How does a baby get inside you?’ said Isabelle, arriving back at speed.
‘We want to know.’ Pixie and Isabelle were both staring at her now, fascinated.
Busy playing with her trains, Posy explained: ‘The mummy eats a seed from the daddy and the mummy has to be careful not to poo out the seed until the seed is a baby.’
Isabelle giggled.
‘Is that it?’ said Pixie. ‘I don’t want to eat one of those seeds because I don’t want a baby. Babies cry all the time, like Posy.’
‘I don’t cry.’
Suddenly there was a full-scale riot going on, complete with screaming. Posy, who had clearly been having ninja training from somewhere, began hair pulling.
‘I’d cancel the karate lessons,’ remarked Ted. ‘No need for them.’
‘Mummy, she pulled my hair,’ screamed Isabelle.
‘You were mean to me,’ shouted Posy, and to prove that she was indeed the youngest and most injured, she let forth a few blood-curdling roars that made her father pick her up. Her mother went to comfort the other two girls.
‘You stay there,’ said Ted to his wife, putting a kiss on her forehead as Patrick and Joanne defused the row. ‘I’ll finish the tidying up. It’s only fair.’
‘OK,’ said Sam, content now to just sit there.
The rioters were eventually calmed by their parents with threats of timeouts. Joanne and Patrick made it look so easy, Sam thought.
She just hoped she’d be able to calm her own child half as well. Ted would be brilliant at it but, for a moment, she had a glimmer of anxiety: what if she was hopeless at that type of thing? What if she hadn’t a maternal bone in her body and should have stuck to dogs?
After all, her mother had swanned into the lunch, spoken little to the children and had had the gall to think that an email was an acceptable form of contact to find out how her pregnant daughter was.
What, Sam thought again – the thought that was circling endlessly in her brain – if she was just like her mother?
Cold, unyielding, unable to form a bond with her child?
What then?