Happy Birthday and All That Read Online Free PDF Page B

tea.’
    Posy had no idea why she’d said that. Politeness shesupposed. She’d invite Flora and Kate round too; that would make things all right.
    Posy hated being a Virgo. It was so dull and brown and sensible. If only she’d been an interesting Gemini, or a beautiful Aquarius, or anything else. Not that she took any notice of any of it, of course. Also, how come, she thought, she’d been called Posy, not Flora? Well Flora had already been used up as Flora was older. But why Posy? If only she’d been called something a bit less ditsy and diminutive she might have amounted to something, she could have been somebody.
    She’d been up in the night with Isobel, but only twice. Now it was 7.14 and the children were awake, but Frank wasn’t. She had woken from a lovely dream that seemed like a birthday present in itself. She had found a whole set of orange Le Creuset saucepans, still boxed, in the Oxfam shop for £6.99. The shop had been about to close, and when she had offered a ten-pound note for them, the woman behind the counter had fiddled about, trying to find the right change. Posy had immediately said ‘Oh, keep the change’, and the woman had given her a Gift Aid form to fill out. Posy had woken delighted with her purchase, her beneficence, and the thought that the woman had taken her to be a taxpayer. She lay there smiling and pretending to be asleep.
    â€˜Dad,’ whispered James in a stage whisper loud enough to wake the neighbours, ‘Dad, wake up. It’s Mum’s birthday and we have to get her presents.’ Tom was doing his usual heavy breathing close to her ear.
    Posy made some impressive cartoony snoring noises. Perhaps, she thought, we could tour the world, and play in all the capital cities: ‘The Family Parouselli - Mouth-Breathing and Snoring Entertainers of Kings’. She kicked Frank to wake him up. He would sleep through anything - Isobel crying, the cat being sick on the floor on his side of the bed, a child having a coughing fit, the strange and sinister noises that came from the Common.
    â€˜Dad! We have to make her a cup of tea … Dad come on … I’m not allowed to do the kettle yet,’ James said. Poppy and Tom started to thump Frank on the legs, but still he slept on. Posy tried some more kicks, and then rolled over, deftly pulling the quilt off him and wrapping herself in it.
    â€˜Hell!’
    â€˜Come on, Dad. We’ve got to get Mum’s presents, and Mrs Fleance said that if you shout “Hell”, and you aren’t a vicar, then that’s swearing.’
    At last he was up; they’d be late for school at this rate. She could hear Isobel snuffling and kicking the bars of her cot. Frank pulled on the heavy, mustardy, velour dressing gown she’d given him for Christmas. It was meant to be luxurious, old gold, like a smoking jacket perhaps, but cat fur, Isobel’s Ready Brek and Frank’s morning aromas of Old Holborn and bacon sarnies had given it the character and appearance of an old yellow Labrador.
    Posy loved birthdays, especially the children’s, and doing all the stuff for them. She had a slight fear of her own birthday though, not a fear of getting old, but of what she might get.
    She hardly ever bought things for herself. She only ever had one or two lipsticks at a time. Even a £2.79 nail polish from Superdrug constituted self-indulgence. In her mind that equalled a pack of Ladybird socks for Isobel, around two days’ dinner money for James or Poppy, or a session of Tumble Tots for Tom. It was a pity that she didn’t reckon her allocation of treats in terms of the number of pints of beer consumed by Frank each week.
    If someone gave Posy a scarf, that would be her scarf until it fell into holes. She would use whatever the present was for ever even if she didn’t much like it. She was baffled by some of the things she saw in the shops - the plasticky flowers that