Ignited by his son’s good news, Arnold blazed with hope and purpose. He tingled with happiness. Trust Gabriel to give him a grandchild. A lifeline. He would never admit it but Gabriel was his favoured son, and never more so than now. With Vivian, he was constantly refocusing, trying to understand his youngest son, this quiet young man whose nose was perpetually in a book, a faraway land that held no interest for his father. Vivian, with his moods and silences, belonged to his mother.
Now was the time for all his ventures and collections to come to fruition. Time to cash in. He could hear the chink of coins, the rustle of notes. Surveying the wealth around him he chortled with glee. He would of course divide up the proceeds evenly, four ways, his two sons, Helen and himself. He would not leave Helen out. He bore her no malice. He knew things happened in a marriage to throw it off kilter.
He pranced in a jaunty walk around the kitchen. He stopped, and considering his bulk, managed a neat little dance. It wasn’t enough; he needed to broadcast his news. Unable to control his happiness he half ran, oblivious to the pelting rain, to Astrid’s, even though he had barely said two words to her in as many years. But he had to tell someone.
He banged away at the front door, and wondered, while he waited, why Gabriel had kept Ella such a secret.
A small thing. Silly detail. He suddenly realised Helen might be at Astrid’s. That would be awkward. He had sworn to himself not to follow her here. Still, this was an excuse if ever there was one.
Suddenly Astrid was at the door, peering at him suspiciously.
‘Helen’s not here,’ she said, straightaway.
‘No, no, no. Gabriel’s going to have a baby,’ he blurted out.
Astrid ushered him into the kitchen and onto a chair as if she had been preparing for this moment for a lifetime. ‘Who is the mother, and when is the baby due?’ Before Arnold could utter another word, Astrid’s fantasies unfolded into plans at lightning speed, as though they had been drawn up and approved years before by an architect of uncompromising precision.
‘They must all come and live here. These new mums are very modern, but they don’t know anything. Are her family close by?’ She gave Arnold no chance to reply, but raced on, ‘I don’t mind if it’s a home birth. I can help. Why, Arnold, I was born at home, before it was alternative, or mattered. I’m so happy. A baby! I will buy a brand new cot. And a bath. I love to have a baby here. Thank God you came to see me. You know once the baby is born you can visit as often as you like.’
Arnold felt his face tightening and his heart pounding. He stared at Astrid; she stared back. Words started to form in his mouth. They felt like gravel. He had no taste for fighting, but it had to be done.
‘Astrid, I think the baby will be better living with its grandfather.’
‘You?’
‘Yes. Me.’
‘You cannot have a young mother and a newborn baby living in your house.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because, Arnold, your house is a ghetto, a slum, not fit for anyone to live in, let alone a beautiful little baby.’ Astrid held back for a second as if deciding something. ‘It will catch diseases.’
Arnold went pale. ‘Diseases?’ His voice was trailing. He combed his beard with his fingers, uncertain of what to say next.
‘No, that’s not what I meant.’ Astrid caught herself, but it was too late, and she knew it. She held her arms open and flexed her fingers as a sign of apology. The gesture however was lost on Arnold.
He had had enough of fighting. Astrid had given him a mortal blow, a king hit. He couldn’t take another. One round and he was down for the count. He dare not ask for an elaboration about diseases. He knew what she was on about — Leif. Yet despite the bruising he raised his head and said, ‘You think my house is a ghetto, a slum?’
Astrid gave a heavy sigh. ‘Yes. Why, you think Home Beautiful wants to do a feature on your pigsty? What do you think I have been seeing out of my kitchen window all these years? The Taj Mahal?’
Arnold winced, too stunned to speak in the face of Astrid’s outburst. He had expected warm, hearty, congratulatory words.
She was relentless.
‘What do you think I have been looking at, Arnold?’ Astrid gestured towards the large window facing her neighbour’s house. The curtains were drawn back, held by lace bows. ‘A mountain of rubbish, that’s what. You should know all about it, you made it.’
Arnold sat, silent.
‘It’s for the best that Gabriel and his young family stay here in my house.’ She paused a moment. ‘With me.’
Arnold made his way back home slowly through the pouring rain like a man doomed. He had already lost Leif, Helen, Vivian. It would be too much to lose Gabriel and his girlfriend, but above all — his grandchild. His life was unravelling fast. Despite his best efforts to provide, to be a loving husband and father, he had failed.
Drenched to the bone he sat in the lounge room. Next to him was a box of old tennis balls. He lifted out a ball aged into a pale tufted brown and held it in his hands, deep in thought. There was plenty of money in all this, if he sold it. He began to do a mental list and started to feel overwhelmed, having little idea he’d accumulated so much. And what variety! His stash of ashtrays was worth a fortune by his reckoning. And his stockpile of religious artefacts and Bibles ought to give him a quid or two. And his assemblage of lampshades. He hesitated; who’d buy those? A smart person, he reasoned. Half a roomful of lampshades was an excellent investment.
If making the place like a dental surgery guaranteed that Gabriel, Ella and the baby all lived here, then so be it. Maybe Helen would return too. Or was that asking for too much?
He would prove Astrid wrong. His home was not a ghetto or slum where diseases lurked, ready to pounce on an innocent grandchild. He threw the tennis ball against a box, and then lifted another from its cardboard nest and threw it hard, sending it ricocheting around the room. He sent another tennis ball flying, and another, until the room was a swarm of rubber bullets. He intended serving Astrid more than a couple of aces. Show his neighbour with her empty house and vacant head that he was well capable of keeping his family together.
‘Forty love,’ he yelled. ‘Game to me! I’ll keep that woman’s mitts off my family.’
The tennis balls bounced back and pooled around him as if telling him he was right.