Vintage Babes Read Online Free PDF Page A

fun. Wicked sense of humour, a snappy dresser and game for anything. Lives on the third floor, has one of the larger balconies. She’s recently had the place painted and decorated throughout. She –’
    ‘Which is what you should do here,’ I interrupted.
    For at least a year before she died, my mother had been eager to have their flat freshly painted, but my father had insisted there was no urgency. In other words, he could not bring himself to spend the money.
    ‘I’ll get round to it, in due course. Dilys has a son, William, who’s same as you,’ he continued. ‘Divorced and at a loose end.’
    I gritted my teeth. Maybe I should procure a blow-up Bertie and drive with him past the retirement flats at night. Whatever time I arrived, the twitch of at least one curtain indicated a perpetual look-out and a glimpse of me plus male passenger would provoke gossip which would be certain to reach my father. Gillian refers to the residents of the thirty-six flats as ‘one big family’ and they are, in so much as everyone is zealously interested in everyone else – their state of health, financial situation, the activities of their offspring. And if the news contains a whiff of scandal, so much the better. Bridgemont residents are also united in their hatred of noise after eleven p.m. and dogs which wander in off the road and relieve themselves in the landscaped gardens.
    ‘I am not at a loose end,’ I protested, but he wasn’t listening.
    ‘Which reminds me, I won’t be with you on Sunday. I’m taking Dilys out for a pub lunch. And although it’s kind of you to call round twice a week, pet, I realise it must be a nuisance and from now on once a week will be sufficient.’
    I felt a spurt of anger. My mother’s death had left my dad lost and forlorn, and, initially, I had made a point of visiting every day – to try to cheer him, to see if he needed any washing or shopping done, to let him know he wasn’t alone. Again Eric had been aware of my visits and had not minded. I had also suggested my father should come and stay with me at my house for a while, but he had refused. To my secret relief, for he expects to be waited on hand and foot, turns the television sound up high and then talks over it. But I had visited out of love and willingly, though I had always come round often. As their only child who lived near – my brother has been up in Scotland for years – my parents’ welfare as they had grown older had seemed like my responsibility.
    ‘They’re very lucky, having you dashing around like a blue-arsed fly dancing attendance,’ Gillian had said. ‘There’re several in here who only get to see their kids on rare occasions. And some who don’t have kids and no visitors.’
    Gradually, the visits to my father had settled into sometime on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, with him coming for lunch at my house every Sunday. It was not always easy to find the time – and the regular Sundays meant me turning down invitations and were tying – but I had made the effort. And my dad, who frequently claimed that my visits were ‘life-savers’, had seemed so grateful.
    ‘You want me to come on any special day?’ I asked a touch tartly, for regardless of the fact that I worked, the Tuesdays and Thursdays had been chosen because they did not clash with his other pursuits, such as short mat bowls, ballroom dancing lessons – he had never set foot on a dance floor when my mother was alive – and whist. Thanks to Gillian’s oft-stated desire to ‘keep her old folks happy’, there is a leisure pastime perpetually on tap at Bridgemont.
    ‘Let’s leave it open for now, but it would help if you could ring first, pet. In case Dilys and I have plans. Though I should be at home this Thursday.’ The clock was eyed and his tea was being drunk with noticeable speed. Today I had not been offered a piece of the Battenburg cake of which he is so fond, not even a biscuit. ‘There was a bit in one of the papers at