The thing about family is nothing is quite what it seems. Like when the minster comes round for a cup of tea of a Friday and our mam she throws the newspapers into a cupboard and she sweeps the dirt under the carpet and she opens the window to let in the air adding a little freshener from a spray can so the air smells of flowers but not of any flowers that grows in our garden. And the minister smiles and says what a lovely home we have. And we children have been warned to be on our best behavior – which is a little odd to be doing in our own front room.
And our mam is all smiles when the minster calls and she has the tea made and a madeira sponge cut into neat fingers and arranged like a yellow sun on a plate. And there’s a lace-paper doily on the plate, too, as if a sun wasn’t pretty enough, and cloth napkins on the table, pressed neat and sharp into triangles. And the minister nods his approval at everything.
And we sit at the table like good children ought to – not speaking unless we’re spoken to. And minding our p’s and q’s and saying please and thank you when our mam offers us milk and a biscuit. And the minister asks if Mr Thomas will be joining us, and by Mr Thomas he means our da and we don’t dare look at one another and we try not to laugh, holding it in our mouths with a hand cupped over it.
Our mam makes an apology for our da. She says he is working late now and he’ll be sorry to have missed tea with the minister. What she don’t say is that our da is sulking in the shed at the bottom of the garden. They’ve had words, see, our mam and our da. Again they have. And our mam smiling is just like papering over the cracks in a wall and the paper is just so no one will see.
And what our mam don’t know – and only me and God knows – is that our da is probably looking at pictures of women in the noddy in his shed, mucky magazines he keeps there under the potato sacks, magazines with their corners all god-eared and pinched and girls in full colour with their legs open across two pages and touching themselves. And maybe our da’s got his cock out and pulling on it slow and then fast and blowing like a dog what’s run after a pretty rabbit and not ever catching it.
And the minister thinks we is a happy family and a family under God and he blesses us. He thanks our mam for his tea – no, two cups is quite sufficient, Mrs Thomas – and the bit cake he thanks our mam for, too, and does not make a fuss against our mam wrapping up the rest of the cake for him to take home with him, makes not a fuss though I am praying to God, making any bargain God cares for just so the minister will say ‘no thankyou, Mrs Thomas, that is too kind,’ and we children might then have cake with our tea just this once.
And the minister folds his napkin back into triangles and sets it neat by his plate, and he gets up to go. Our mam sees him out and at the front door the minister takes our mam’s hand in his and he kisses her cheek and she blushes and she says he’s welcome anytime and no, it’s no trouble, really, no trouble at all. And we watch from the window, watch the minster walking away with out cake.
May 21, 2012: The thing about family…
The thing about family is nothing is quite what it seems. Like when the minster comes round for a cup of tea of a Friday and our mam she throws the newspapers into a cupboard and she sweeps the dirt under the carpet and she opens the window to let in the air adding a little freshener from a spray can so the air smells of flowers but not of any flowers that grows in our garden. And the minister smiles and says what a lovely home we have. And we children have been warned to be on our best behavior – which is a little odd to be doing in our own front room.
And our mam is all smiles when the minster calls and she has the tea made and a madeira sponge cut into neat fingers and arranged like a yellow sun on a plate. And there’s a lace-paper doily on the plate, too, as if a sun wasn’t pretty enough, and cloth napkins on the table, pressed neat and sharp into triangles. And the minister nods his approval at everything.
And we sit at the table like good children ought to – not speaking unless we’re spoken to. And minding our p’s and q’s and saying please and thank you when our mam offers us milk and a biscuit. And the minister asks if Mr Thomas will be joining us, and by Mr Thomas he means our da and we don’t dare look at one another and we try not to laugh, holding it in our mouths with a hand cupped over it.
Our mam makes an apology for our da. She says he is working late now and he’ll be sorry to have missed tea with the minister. What she don’t say is that our da is sulking in the shed at the bottom of the garden. They’ve had words, see, our mam and our da. Again they have. And our mam smiling is just like papering over the cracks in a wall and the paper is just so no one will see.
And what our mam don’t know – and only me and God knows – is that our da is probably looking at pictures of women in the noddy in his shed, mucky magazines he keeps there under the potato sacks, magazines with their corners all god-eared and pinched and girls in full colour with their legs open across two pages and touching themselves. And maybe our da’s got his cock out and pulling on it slow and then fast and blowing like a dog what’s run after a pretty rabbit and not ever catching it.
And the minister thinks we is a happy family and a family under God and he blesses us. He thanks our mam for his tea – no, two cups is quite sufficient, Mrs Thomas – and the bit cake he thanks our mam for, too, and does not make a fuss against our mam wrapping up the rest of the cake for him to take home with him, makes not a fuss though I am praying to God, making any bargain God cares for just so the minister will say ‘no thankyou, Mrs Thomas, that is too kind,’ and we children might then have cake with our tea just this once.
And the minister folds his napkin back into triangles and sets it neat by his plate, and he gets up to go. Our mam sees him out and at the front door the minister takes our mam’s hand in his and he kisses her cheek and she blushes and she says he’s welcome anytime and no, it’s no trouble, really, no trouble at all. And we watch from the window, watch the minster walking away with out cake.