Queen Mum (23 page)

I was going to open the window and call, but she shot off into the house. I continued to stand there stupidly. Where were Juno and Manny, for God’s sake? How much had they paid for that
violin?

Sophie came racing back out, this time with a pair of kitchen scissors and some pliers. She wrenched the bridge off, snipped the strings and pulled out the pegs one by one as if they were
teeth.

Suddenly there was a terrific hammering on our front door. I almost fell on the bottom step trying to get to the latch.

It was Pascale, wide-eyed and breathless. ‘Can you come round, quick, Ally? Soph’s gone mad.’

‘Where are your mum and dad?’

‘Sainsbury’s. Please, Ally, quick. She’s smashing things up.’

I nipped back to grab my keys from the kitchen, then we hurried down the side of her house to the garden.

‘Where’s she gone?’ said Pascale, panting slightly. Bits of glossy chestnut-coloured wood were strewed over the green. ‘Shit. I hope she’s not having a go at mine.
I need it for Tuesday’s recital.’

She bolted for the back door and I followed. ‘Or she might be harming herself,’ I suggested.

Pascale gave me a scornful look.

There was no sign of Sophie downstairs so we went up to see if she was in her room.

She was. The door was locked and we could hear angry music from behind it.

‘Soph? Soph? It’s Ally.’ No response. ‘Are you all right? Can you open the door for me?’ Still nothing. Pascale emerged from her own room clutching her violin
triumphantly. ‘This is fine, anyway.’ She inclined her head towards Sophie’s door. ‘She’ll want you to try a lot harder than that. You could be there for the duration.
Would you like a chair to sit on while you wait?’

I shushed her and drew her across to the other side of the landing.

‘What’s the background to this?’

Pascale shrugged. ‘Some sort of row with Mum. There’ve been a lot of those lately.’

‘What about?’

‘I wasn’t listening to most of it, I’ve heard it all before. It started with Mum asking Soph why she wasn’t dressed yet, and then it moved on to shopping, because Soph
wanted some crappy fluorescent drink she’d seen on TV and Mum said she wasn’t going to buy it because it was full of additives and looked like pee. Then I think it went on to how Soph
should do more around the house, and Mum took her upstairs to see the mess her room was in. They must have had some kind of meltdown in there, because Mum stormed out and went and sat in the
car.’

‘Where was your dad?’

‘On the phone.’

‘What, all the time?’

‘Yeah. He’s always on the phone. Then Dad went and had a word with Mum, and he came back in and said it was best if they both left each other alone to cool off, and the shopping
would only take forty minutes, and was I OK to keep an eye on my sister. I said yes because I didn’t realize how freaked out she was. I went upstairs and she shouted at me to leave her alone.
I said, had she remembered about the recital on Tuesday and she just flicked open her violin case and stared into it. Then she got this bottle of red nail varnish and, and
poured
it all over
the violin, I couldn’t believe it. So I said, “You’d better stay away from mine,” and she goes, “I’m not interested in your fucking violin.” That’s
it, really. You saw her in the garden, you know the rest.’

But I didn’t know the rest at all.

By the time Juno had come back, Sophie still hadn’t emerged. I’d tried talking to her through the door but she wouldn’t answer except to tell me to leave her alone. I
couldn’t help feeling hurt. Pascale didn’t seem as bothered as she should have been; now she was stretched out on the living room sofa gabbing into her mobile.

‘Has Madam calmed down yet?’ Juno called from the hallway.

‘Uh-oh,’ I heard Pascale say.

‘What?’ said Juno when she saw my face. ‘Is there a problem?’

*

*

‘I’m going to leave it for Manny to clear up,’ said Juno, coming in again with another carrier. ‘I’m too upset to deal with it now. Pascale, go
check on your sister, will you? See if she’s deigned to unlock her door yet.’

Pascale slalomed obediently off through the bags of shopping that dotted the hallway.

‘Where is he?’

‘Manny? I left him at the library. He announced on the way back that he needed to pop in and have a word with the head librarian about an exhibition. I was supposed to wait for him, but,
you know, I had this sixth sense that something wasn’t right at home. So I went in to see how long he’d be and he said he couldn’t tell me. I got straight in the car and drove
home.’ She put her hands against her temples. ‘I wish I’d insisted he’d come with me, now. What a God-awful mess.’

We started unpacking together.

‘What are you going to do with her?’ I asked, unsheathing a French stick from its paper bag.

‘Give me that, Ally, thanks. Good question. For a start, she can play Pascale’s violin when it’s not being used – although what we’ll do about Tuesday, I
don’t know – and if she damages that, she’s grounded till a new one’s paid for. It’s an awful thing to say, but I feel like giving her a good old slap.’

‘Don’t say that, Juno.’

She raised her brows at me. ‘It’s all right for you. You live with a reasonable teen. You know where you are with Ben, he’s a star. But I never know from one minute to the
other what Soph’s going to be like. Moody isn’t the word.’

She started slamming tins into the back of the cupboard with a force that made me wince.

‘And I told her, and I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve said this, I have not got the time or the energy at the moment to keep up with her awkwardness. It’s no joke
driving up to Yorkshire every few days, and not sure what you’ll find when you get there. I know Mum’s stable for the moment, but it won’t last. The doctor’s warned
me.’

‘Here.’ I handed her a bag of fruit as sympathetically as I could. A lemon rolled off the kitchen top and fell on the floor.

‘Damn thing,’ she said, and kicked it out into the hall. It skipped over the tiles and ricocheted off the skirting board, coming to rest by the telephone table. I fought with myself
not to run after it.

‘What do you think it was that made her flip?’

Juno emptied tangerines into a copper bowl. ‘I have no idea. It started with the usual stuff about how she needs to have more consideration for the family unit, I could write the script. I
did say to her as well – not to go
throwing herself
at Ben— Maybe that was what sent her silly. Although if you can’t give your own daughter some advice about these . . .
’

I stared at Juno but she was peering into a drawer. Something about the set of her shoulders told me she was avoiding looking at me.

‘Oh,’ I said. My mouth went very dry and I had to swallow. ‘Yes, I said I thought she had a crush on him, do you remember?’

‘And I just said to her it was completely pointless.’

‘Yes.’

‘He’s made it quite clear he doesn’t fancy her. She’s only making a fool of herself.’

Because Juno knows he’s gay, I thought. Will she say it?

‘Damnation. Look at that, the bag’s split. I’ve been trailing couscous all over the floor. Manny, where are you when you’re needed? Ally, can you get the mini-hoover from
under the stairs?’

I did as I was told. When I got back she was muttering about Kim.

‘So I’m up and down to Yorkshire, Manny’s nipping off to Bolton every other week, reckons he’s got to drop off all these books and tapes for Kim’s course.
It’s ludicrous. She can get her own books out of the library, and record all the films she wants off the TV. They’ve got a big enough satellite dish stuck on the side of the
house.’

‘Manny goes to visit Kim?’ I could hear the surprise in my own voice. I didn’t mean it like that, I wanted to say. But you can’t start justifying yourself in these
situations or it sounds so much worse.

‘He’s helping her with her course. I did tell you. But there’s no half measures with Manny, not where films are concerned. Don’t look at me like that, Ally, there’s
nothing going on. This is “Two O-levels” Kim we’re talking about. She’s about the last woman Manny would find attractive. He’s just got this passion for educating
people. Remember last year when Ben mentioned he liked Westerns, and Manny insisted on lending him that whole pile of so-called definitive ones? Wanted him to fill in a sheet about them
all?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I had to do it for him.’

Juno blinked. ‘You didn’t? I am sorry. But, you see, that’s what he’s like.’ She paused, frowning, then seemed to brighten. ‘Anyway, it’s sort of a
reciprocal arrangement.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘I’ve been helping Chris with his options. He
asked
me, before you say anything. That lad’s the best of the bunch, not that that’s saying a great deal. He phoned
me up wanting to know what Pascale was going to do for AS, so I’ve been outlining some courses for him. He says he might think about English language and business studies. Though whether
he’ll get as far as—’

Pascale appeared at the door. ‘Soph says she’ll come out but you have to promise not to hit her.’

Juno let out a cry. ‘Oh, Ally. Oh, what a thing to say; as if I’d hurt my own daughter.’

‘Of course you wouldn’t. Do you want me to speak to her?’

Juno shook her head.

I stepped over and took the packet of rice she was holding. ‘Pascale and I’ll finish here. Go up and see her.’

She stood for a moment, then walked briskly out of the room.

‘Silly little drama queen,’ said Pascale, pulling out a packet of ginger biscuits and picking at the top. ‘She winds Mum up and then we all get it in the neck. There’s no
way she’s borrowing my violin, either. Pass me that bread knife, Ally, would you?’

Upstairs there was the sound of a door banging several times, as if two people were tugging on either side.

‘She hasn’t ever hit Sophie, has she?’ I heard myself say.

Pascale stopped sawing the biscuit packet for a moment. ‘Not yet. I’d say it might only be a matter of time, though.’

*

Because Ben’s birthday’s in October, we’ve never been able to plan anything outdoors for him. But this year there was an unseasonably warm spell that came out
of nowhere and so we took him and Felix to Oulton Park and let them tootle round the mini-track on go-karts.

‘Will they be all right?’ I asked Tom. It had been Tom’s idea; I’d have taken them to see a film, had them sit safely in the darkness for three hours.

‘Look at them, Ally. They’ve got Kevlar back shields and leg pads and helmets, and they’re fastened in with harnesses. Besides, see his face? He’s loving it.’

Before we went home, Tom signed himself up for a track day. ‘I can blag a bike for the weekend. Hire one, if I have to. Ally, I’ve got to have a ride.’

I said nothing. But late that evening, after Felix had been picked up and Ben was in bed, Tom was so tender with me that he must have known how I was feeling. He came and sat behind me and
massaged my scalp, something he knows I love. Then he kissed my neck and stroked my shoulders and arms for ages. For a long time I resisted the good sensations and held on to my resentment. How
dare he be so happy? But the touching continued. My anger sublimated. ‘I don’t want to have sex tonight,’ I said at one point.

‘Fine,’ he said, and carried on.

At last I turned to him and he kissed me deeply. His hands moved down to my breasts and I didn’t stop him. ‘Oh, Ally. Thank you,’ he kept saying. ‘Thank you.’

*

*

‘How close are you to Tom?’ said Juno.

The question came out of the blue; we were sitting behind her French windows watching it drop dark. It was Ben’s night for swimming practice and he wouldn’t be back for another hour
and a half, so there was no point starting the tea yet. Four till six was one of those stretches of day when I hated being in the house on my own. It used to be CBeebies time. Tweenie clock, where
will it stop? I have trouble with dusk, too. Juno knows these things.

‘How close? Too close. I found one of his toenail clippings in my slipper this morning, and he wasn’t at all contrite. I suppose that’s what marriage is, when it comes down to
it, an intimate knowledge of toenail clippings.’

I thought Juno would laugh, but she didn’t. She said, ‘But do you know the way he’s going to act in a given situation?’

‘Hmm. Usually. I know when he finishes a packet of something he’ll put the empty packet back in the cupboard and not in the bin, which is incredibly annoying. I know he still hopes
one day to be world bike-racing champion. And that he turns off any party political broadcast, by any side, on principle.’

‘Better than complaining all the way through it, which is what Manny does.’ She sipped her wine and gazed out across the garden. ‘But what I mean is, do you know him
right
through
? Do you know what he’s thinking, deep down?’

‘Tom doesn’t have a deep down. What you see is what you get. Ben’s the one with scary depths.’

‘You should try living with Soph.’

Yes, I thought, and you don’t know the half of it.

‘Maybe you don’t ever really know anyone,’ I continued, because I didn’t want to remember the spilt Coke running down the wall and what came after. ‘Let’s be
honest, lots of people don’t even know themselves.’