Back Home

 

 

Friday night. Dad’s supposed to be picking us up, but he’s late. Hannah and I are packed and ready and sitting in the living room. Hannah’s kicking her heels against the sofa. Dud-de-dud-de-dud-de-dud.

“Is he here yet?”

“He’s coming,” says Grandma. “Don’t fuss. Why don’t you put the telly on or something?”

Hannah flicks through the channels, but doesn’t settle on anything. She starts turning the TV on and off, on and off, so the Neighbours characters appear and disappear, here, gone, here, gone, here—

“Stop it,” says Grandma. “Hannah!” but Hannah jumps up and runs to the window.

“Is he here?”

He isn’t.

I hold my book up over my face, so close that the writing blurs and separates, words merging into each other until nothing makes sense. I know I ought to feel glad about going back to Dad, but I don’t.

I don’t feel anything.

 

When he does come, Dad’s awkward. He ducks his ugly head and looks at us sideways.

“Hey there,” he says. “You ready?”

I nod and Hannah says, “We’ve been ready for hours,” not at all like she’s pleased to see him.

We’re quiet in the car too. Dad says, “I hear you’ve been causing trouble,” and gives his snorty, nervous laugh.

Hannah says, “No,” which is totally ridiculous, as Grandma’s already told Dad exactly what happened.

I say, “I haven’t done anything. Hannah broke half of Grandpa’s kitchen, and we had to have sausages out of breakfast bowls.”

“Grandma hit me,” says Hannah.

“It sounds like you deserved it,” says Dad.

“She hit me,” says Hannah.

“It was more like a slap,” I say.

I know what Hannah’s thinking. I can see it in her face. She’s thinking: Mum would be furious about this. Mum’s good at being furious, in a way that Dad isn’t.

“What do you want me to do about it?” he says. He gives his nervous laugh again. “You live with Grandma now. If you’re going to break her possessions, she’s got every right to punish you.”

“She hasn’t got the right to hit me,” says Hannah. “And she’s making me pay for everything. You’re our dad! Can’t you stop her?”

Dad’s eyes are on the tractor in front of him. “No,” he says wearily. “It’s none of my business any more.”

Hannah and I are speechless. I want to hit him.

“If it’s none of your business,” says Hannah, at last, “why are you having us home for the weekend?”

For the longest time, I think Dad isn’t going to answer. Then he says, without looking at us, “Because your grandma asked me to.”

 

Our house doesn’t look like home any more.

There’s a stale smell that I don’t remember. Like old socks, or bedrooms without air in them. There are mouldy mugs and things on the table and, on the floor by the sofa, old plates with the ends of pizzas and baked-bean juice still stuck to them. There’s a pile of letters and papers and bits of stuff on the hall table. The kitchen bin is full so high that when you press the lid, it doesn’t open. Dad’s obviously given up on opening it, but he hasn’t emptied the bin. There’s a plastic bag hanging from one of the cupboards, with rubbish in it.

“What’s happened to the house?” says Hannah.

Dad doesn’t answer.

My room is a mess too, but that’s how I left it. Someone – Auntie Rose maybe – has washed all the dirty clothes, but the rest of my stuff they’ve just piled on my desk. Already it feels like someone else’s room. I take Humphrey out of my bag and put him on the bed, not for comfort, but just to have something that feels like it still belongs to me. It’s not until I go over to the bookcase, that I feel like this place is mine. My books! Tracy Beaker and my big old Winnie the Pooh! I want to take them all out and read them again. I wonder how many Dad will let me take back to Grandma’s.

I don’t think we’re going to move back here any more.

“Molly. Molly!”

Hannah’s leaning against the door frame.

“What?”

“He didn’t even tidy up for us. There’s all stuff in the fridge growing mould and things.”

Probably, we ought to clean it up for him. Probably, that’s part of the whole looking-after-your-parents thing those kids off Blue Peter do. Probably, we have to tidy everything up for Dad if we ever want to come back.

“Do you want to tidy up?” I say.

Hannah makes a snorting noise in the back of her throat.

“I want tea,” she says. “Come on.”

Dad’s sitting in front of the television. He doesn’t seem to notice the mess. He’s watching the cricket.

“Dad. Dad. Dad!”

“What?”

“Is there any food?”

Dad rubs his eyes.

“We could have chips, I suppose. Or there’s eggs, I think. . .”

We trail after him into the kitchen. No way would my dad let the house get like this normally. Normally, he’s way tidier than my mum; he’s the one who tells her off for leaving books lying around with their spines open, or stamping muddy footprints up the stairs, or bringing home pebbles and shells from the beach then dumping them on a pile on the hall table and forgetting about them.

“Do we really need any more clutter?” he’d say, holding up the mess of seaweed.

And Mum would say, “Oh, the girls were going to make a picture!” Or, “We got that bit of rock on that walk in Dorset – do you remember? You can’t throw that away!”

And Dad would pretend to be cross and say, “How am I supposed to remember? It’s exactly the same as all the other bits of rock! If we go on like this we’ll end up living in a beach hut!”

And Mum and I would say, “Let’s!” at exactly the same time.

There are shells and ammonites and bits of sea-smoothed glass still sitting on the kitchen windowsill, but a spider has made a web across them. Dad opens the fridge door and stares into it like it’s got a roast dinner hiding in the back. (It hasn’t.) There are things decaying at the bottom of the salad drawer and a pepper all covered in mould. It smells awful too.

“Why don’t you throw things out?” says Hannah.

“I’m sorry?”

“Like that. That horrible pepper with stuff growing on it. Why’s it still there?”

“Oh. . .” Dad picks up the pepper and pushes at the bin lid. The flappy bit doesn’t flap. He looks at the pepper for a moment, then puts it back in the fridge again.

“How about pizza?” he says.

I don’t say anything.

 

Hannah’s all excited about pizza. She bobs up and down, wanting garlic bread and chicken wings and Coke, and can she ring the pizza place?

“And strawberry Häagan-Dazs,” she says to the man on the phone. Dad opens his mouth to argue, then shuts it again. He looks too tired to complain.

“I ordered ice cream,” says Hannah. “Did you hear me?”

“I heard you,” says Dad. “Did they say how long it’s going to be?”

In What Katy Did, Katy runs a whole house on her own. She’d at least tidy. I wander back into the kitchen and pick up the pizza crusts off the plate. I try and squeeze them into the plastic bag hanging off the cupboard. The bag falls off, spilling bits of food on to the floor.

Dad appears in the doorway.

“What are you doing?”

“Nothing. The bin fell off the cupboard.”

Dad rubs his face.

“I thought you were doing a Hannah on me,” he says. “Come on, love, leave it alone. Pizza’ll be here soon.”

I trail after him. I bet Katy never had this problem.

In the living room, Hannah’s watching The Simpsons with her feet up on the table. I sit on the edge of my chair. If Mum was here, we wouldn’t be waiting for pizza and watching telly. We’d be doing proper family things.

“Dad,” I say.

He doesn’t look up.

“Dad. Can we play Monopoly?”

Hannah sits up.

“Yeah!” she says. “Can we? Can I be the banker? Can I be the dog?”

“No,” says Dad. He doesn’t stop looking at the television. He doesn’t even like The Simpsons.

“Awww,” says Hannah. “Why not?”

“Because the pizza will be here soon.”

“Can we play Cheat?” I say.

“No.”

“After tea?”

“No.”

I stick my fingers in the hole in the chair. I know it’s the wrong thing to say, but everything’s wrong.

“Mum would’ve let us.”

Hannah gasps. Dad doesn’t move. He carries on staring at the telly like he hasn’t heard me.

“Mum would’ve played Monopoly. And she would’ve cooked us a proper tea. You don’t even have anything for breakfast! Mum wouldn’t just have sat there—”

“Your mum’s dead,” says Dad.

“I know she’s dead! Do you think I don’t know that? But she would at least have been nice to us! She would at least have looked at us! She wouldn’t have just sat there!” I’m crying now, messy, gulpy tears. “I wish you were dead,” I say. “And Mum was alive. Mum would never have left us.”

Dad stands up, so abruptly that I think he’s going to hit me, my lovely dad is going to hit me.

“This is ridiculous,” he says.

I stop mid-gulp.

“I don’t know what your grandma thinks she’s doing,” he says. “I don’t know what you think you’re doing. Pretending you can come back and live here.”

Hannah tenses.

“Aren’t we going to?” I say.

“No.”

Time stops.

“I’m sorry I’m not dead,” says my dad. “If I was, maybe this whole mess would sort itself out.”

This is too scary to cry about. Dad isn’t crying either, but his face is moving under his skin.

“I’m phoning your grandma,” he says, and he strides out of the room, pushing past me like Hannah does.

The doorbell rings.

Hannah’s glaring at me.

“Thanks a lot,” she says. “For ruining everything!” and she runs out of the room after Dad.

The doorbell rings again.

It’s the pizza man.

“You ordered pizza?” he says.

I don’t answer. I’m crying too hard.

“Can you go and get your mum or dad for me?” he says. “Only someone needs to pay.”

 

Dad is on the computer upstairs. His eyes are open and he’s staring at the screen, but his hands aren’t moving.

“Dad,” I say. “Dad. We need money for the pizza.”

He doesn’t move. I can see the bulge in his pocket where his wallet is, but I don’t dare go and get it.

“Dad,” I say. “The pizza’s here. Dad.”

I come a little closer and I see that he’s crying.

 

On Saturday morning, Grandpa plays fourteen games of Cheat in a row with us.

It doesn’t help.