says in this tiny voice, 'Will you stay for dinner?' I mean! I am so sure. So I go, all narky, 'He can't, there aren't enough plates.' Then I tell him, all accusing, 'She broke most of them yesterday because she was so upset.'
But not a bother on him. He just said, 'I can't stay anyway.' Then he gives the front door a furtive look and something clicked into place and I yelled, 'She's outside! You've brought her with you.'
'Gemma,' he shouts, but I was already at the front door and yes, there was a woman sitting outside in the Nissan Sunny I thought I was going to gawk. There really was another woman and Dad wasn't in an overworked state of delusion.
You know how in books they always say that women who steal other people's men look 'hard', just so we'll have no sympathy with them. Well, Colette did, she really did look hard. She spotted me and gave a kind of don't-mess-with-me stare. Like a complete looper I ran over, pressed my face against the window on her side, pulled my bottom lip over my top one and bulged my eyes at her, then I called her the C word and, all creditto her, she didn't retreat even an inch, she just gazed coolly at me with roundy blue eyes.
Dad shows up behind me and goes, 'Gemma, let her alone, it's not her fault. Then he murmurs, 'Sorry, love,' and it wasn't me he was talking to. Deflated to fuck, I went back inside, and Susan, do you know what I was thinking? I was thinking. She has highlights, her hair is nicer than mine.
Dad stayed only about five more minutes, then just as he was leaving, he produced four of the prototype tiramisu bars from the pocket of his (I can hardly type this) brown suede jacket. For a minute I was almost touched - at least he was planning to keep us in chocolate - then he says, 'Let me know your impressions, especially if you think the coffee flavour is too strong.'
I threw a bar at him, which caught him on the sideburn and said, 'Do your own fucking market research,' but Mam held on to hers with a death-grip.
And next thing you know it's just me and Mam again, sitting in silence, our mouths agape.
It was then that shock really got a grip of me, none of it seemed real. I couldn't get anything hardwired into my system.
How had it all happened? But do you know what? In amongst all the other feelings I've still enough room to feel embarrassed. That's bad, isn't it? But, Christ, the thought of my father cavorting, cavorting with a woman my age. It's bad enough to think of your parents having sex with each other. But with different people.
Remember when your dad married Carol? And how the thought of them 'doing it' was too horrific so we decided they were just together for the companionship? If only I could convince myself that this is the case here!
And what's in it for hard-faced, highlighted Colette? My dad wears a vest. A vest , for God's sake.
Aaargh! Just had an image there of them 'at it.'
'After all I did for him,' Mam said 'And to leave me in my twilight years. What did I do wrong?'
You know what, I've always worried about having children because I felt I couldn't watch them endure their teenage heartbreak.s Not in my worst nightmares did I think I'd have to do it for my mother.
You know what she's like - the perfect wife, always cooking wonderful meals, keeping the house perfect, never braining Dad when he was narky about bars of chocolate not selling as well as they should have. She kept her figure right into the menopause. Even her menopause was carried off with aplomb, not once was she stopped leaving a supermarket with an unpaid-for can of sardines in her handbag. (Why is it always cans of sardines?)
I'll tell you something, this has made me very bitter about men. What's the point? You give them your life, cook yourself blue in the face, starve yourself into osteoporosis and for what? For them to leave you just when you're commencing your final descent into old age, for a vest-loving woman who has highlights.
'He didn't deserve you,' I said.
But she
But not a bother on him. He just said, 'I can't stay anyway.' Then he gives the front door a furtive look and something clicked into place and I yelled, 'She's outside! You've brought her with you.'
'Gemma,' he shouts, but I was already at the front door and yes, there was a woman sitting outside in the Nissan Sunny I thought I was going to gawk. There really was another woman and Dad wasn't in an overworked state of delusion.
You know how in books they always say that women who steal other people's men look 'hard', just so we'll have no sympathy with them. Well, Colette did, she really did look hard. She spotted me and gave a kind of don't-mess-with-me stare. Like a complete looper I ran over, pressed my face against the window on her side, pulled my bottom lip over my top one and bulged my eyes at her, then I called her the C word and, all creditto her, she didn't retreat even an inch, she just gazed coolly at me with roundy blue eyes.
Dad shows up behind me and goes, 'Gemma, let her alone, it's not her fault. Then he murmurs, 'Sorry, love,' and it wasn't me he was talking to. Deflated to fuck, I went back inside, and Susan, do you know what I was thinking? I was thinking. She has highlights, her hair is nicer than mine.
Dad stayed only about five more minutes, then just as he was leaving, he produced four of the prototype tiramisu bars from the pocket of his (I can hardly type this) brown suede jacket. For a minute I was almost touched - at least he was planning to keep us in chocolate - then he says, 'Let me know your impressions, especially if you think the coffee flavour is too strong.'
I threw a bar at him, which caught him on the sideburn and said, 'Do your own fucking market research,' but Mam held on to hers with a death-grip.
And next thing you know it's just me and Mam again, sitting in silence, our mouths agape.
It was then that shock really got a grip of me, none of it seemed real. I couldn't get anything hardwired into my system.
How had it all happened? But do you know what? In amongst all the other feelings I've still enough room to feel embarrassed. That's bad, isn't it? But, Christ, the thought of my father cavorting, cavorting with a woman my age. It's bad enough to think of your parents having sex with each other. But with different people.
Remember when your dad married Carol? And how the thought of them 'doing it' was too horrific so we decided they were just together for the companionship? If only I could convince myself that this is the case here!
And what's in it for hard-faced, highlighted Colette? My dad wears a vest. A vest , for God's sake.
Aaargh! Just had an image there of them 'at it.'
'After all I did for him,' Mam said 'And to leave me in my twilight years. What did I do wrong?'
You know what, I've always worried about having children because I felt I couldn't watch them endure their teenage heartbreak.s Not in my worst nightmares did I think I'd have to do it for my mother.
You know what she's like - the perfect wife, always cooking wonderful meals, keeping the house perfect, never braining Dad when he was narky about bars of chocolate not selling as well as they should have. She kept her figure right into the menopause. Even her menopause was carried off with aplomb, not once was she stopped leaving a supermarket with an unpaid-for can of sardines in her handbag. (Why is it always cans of sardines?)
I'll tell you something, this has made me very bitter about men. What's the point? You give them your life, cook yourself blue in the face, starve yourself into osteoporosis and for what? For them to leave you just when you're commencing your final descent into old age, for a vest-loving woman who has highlights.
'He didn't deserve you,' I said.
But she
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