It almost kills me. The worst bit is when Dad takes the checked trousers off in the middle of the dining room. He has got shorts on underneath but how was I to know that?
At the end of the day, Dad gets on the school bus, whistling, and insists on chatting to everyone. The bus burbles around the town shedding passengers. Dad talks to them as they go.
‘Right, Dad,’ says Tilly when we finally get off the bus in a howling gale at the bottom of the model village. ‘We are going to have some rules.’
‘Yes,’ I say, for once in total agreement with her.
‘Number one,’ she says, struggling to put up her pink umbrella. ‘You are not allowed on the school bus.’
‘Number two,’ I say. ‘We do not eat lunch with you.’
‘Number three,’ says Dad. ‘You two don’t tell me what to do, so put up with it. I’ve got a job at your school and if you want to eat then that’s the way it’s going to be.’
‘OHHHWWW! Dad!’ shouts Tilly. ‘That’s so unfair!’
‘It is, isn’t it?’ he says, swinging off through the model village whistling.
I stand staring at his back, my heart sinking and sinking. I feel 1% good about this.
‘We’ve got to stop him,’ says Tilly. ‘This can’t go on. I’ll die if he asks me one more question about trestle tables. We’ll have to have a word with Mum. What are you doing now?’
‘Um …’ I say. ‘Going to the beach?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous, Tom. In this?’ She waves her hand through the torrential rain.
So I follow her up to the house.
But Mum’s drawing red circles on the newspaper too.
‘Shall I train as a plumber?’ she asks.
‘Very small spaces, dear,’ says Grandma, taking a large carving knife to some raisin shortcake and loading it onto inadequately small plates. ‘You won’t like it.’
‘Or an electrician?’
We all stare at Mum. Last time she did anything electrical it was to stick a screwdriver in the top of the washing machine and nearly blow up herself – and the house.
‘All right. What about welding? Could I do welding? Or I could be a yoga teacher or learn to make cheese. Or perhaps I should join the –’
‘Mum, can you just be quiet?’ says Tilly, grabbing a pencil off the table and using it to scratch her head.
Grandma frowns, but Mum turns to Tilly and beams.
‘Look,’ says Tilly, ‘it was bad enough when you and Dad were going to be magicians, but things are much, much worse now.’
‘Oh?’ says Mum.
‘Dad, at school. I’m serious, he is not coming into school again. Ever.’
‘Why?’ says Mum, reddening.
‘Because he’s awful – he behaves like … like … like a puppy!’ shouts Tilly. ‘He cannot, I repeat, cannot, come to school again.’
Grandma scowls. Mum folds the paper and opens it again. She doesn’t actually look Tilly in the eye. ‘NO,’ she says. ‘He will be going to school tomorrow, and the next day. It’s his job.’
Tilly looks as if she’s going to explode. ‘WHAT!!!???’
‘And we’d be very grateful if you were actually able to be supportive.’
Tilly doesn’t say anything this time but she turns red, then white, then a little green before racing from the room, screaming.