by Sky Sommers
‘You’re twelve. I will take you to Mellie’s personally first thing tomorrow morning. For the whole weekend.’ I tell him as he shrugs, reaching for another apple.
Turning to Ella, I say, ‘If you tell your school friends that you do all the chores at the house, perhaps it is understandable, how your nicknames at school have come about?’ I suggest.
Purely self-inflicted.
Ella sniffs and snuggles closer to Peter, ‘It doesn’t make it hurt any less, you know.’
Probably not. Still…
‘The way that I see it, you can do two things now. First, maybe take a little responsibility that your own actions have brought about an undesirable consequence…’
One look at Ella’s mulish face and I know that number one is not going to happen any time soon.
‘…OR…’ I pause for effect, ‘you can just ignore them and they’ll stop doing it.’
Ella gapes, ‘You mean do nothing? DO nothing? Do NOTHING? I HAVE been a good girl and done nothing and where has that gotten me? Trust me, suffering in silence is not going to make them bully me less.’
‘You are bullied at school?’ I ask.
She looks at me like I’m dense.
Being called a few names equals bullying nowadays? Really?
‘Why don’t we know anything about it?’ Peter says.
Ella sniffles.
‘You could try saying ‘stupid is as stupid does’,’ Peter suggested.
Bless.
These kids wouldn’t even know what that means.
Ella looks blank.
A case in point.
‘It means that an intelligent person doing stupid things - like bullying someone - is still stupid. You are what you do,’ Peter explains.
Ella brightens, ‘That could work. It’s an insult, right?’ she looks at Peter again who slowly nods.
Well, technically, yes, but…
‘I would sound smarter than them, wouldn’t I?’ she lights up. ‘It’s almost as good as saying - I’m going to marry a prince someday, but you’ll always be the daughter of a pig farmer,’ she concluded, wiping the last of her tears.
I sigh.
This is how we deal with school bullying. By being pretentious back.
Although, offence is the best defence.
She’s got the makings of a fine princess, at least where the uppity spoilt brat measure is concerned.
Well, I guess it IS true. All our experiences shape us into who we are.
Ella stands up, looking almost happy.
I guess the family meeting is over.
Ella and Peter head up, as she loops her arm through his.
I guess I’m the one who’ll be doing the cleaning.
‘That name, it’s gonna stiiick.’
* * *
Peter comes down in ten minutes and I confront him. ‘Peter, are you having an affair?’
‘What?’
‘Don’t you ‘what’ me? Where were you tonight?’
The miller my arse.
‘Finishing up my article.’
‘You couldn’t do that tomorrow?’
‘The paper goes to print tomorrow and I still have to get the corrections in.’
‘Peter, you can start the press any time, you don’t have to do it tomorrow. Today, you could have helped out at the restaurant. With Grizelda we were short staffed and I had to do everything myself! I was so stressed I almost slapped Henry…’ I can feel the tears starting. ‘Ella got him away from me just in time.’
‘I’m sorry,’ he says and just stands there.
I wipe away the guilt and sniff. ‘You know I have a perfectly good reason to be suspicious. All those frequent absences, you not wanting to touch me when you’re home. Like last night, I was stark naked when I crawled into bed with you and you just ignored me!’
‘Those absences are research trips for articles that I’m writing. I usually come home from those and I’m dead meat from having to wheedle information out of people in 101 different ways.’
‘So we can expect a new issue of The Guardian soon?’ I ask and he nods.
It’s been a few months since the last one, which sold out quickly.
The news in this magic Kingdom of ours are a hot commodity, especially the exposés.
Unfortunately, Peter cannot write the biggest and baddest exposé of them all since Mellie is kin, even if we are not related by blood.
‘I apologise for last night and for tonight. I didn’t think. I’m sorry you had a tough night. I promise I’ll make it up to you.’
He looks like he means it.
‘Then why don’t I feel that you want me? Now that sex is not about conceiving a child, when I go to lengths to make myself presentable and desirable, despite being tons of tired, you ignore me. And when you ignore me, I get a feeling that any minute now I’m going to get the speech of ‘I found someone sexier, so long and thanks for all the fish and it’s not you, it’s me’?’ My hands go to my hips.
Peter smiles wide, ‘You did not just quote the Hitchhikers’ Guide to the Galaxy’ at me?’
‘Stop avoiding the subject!’
‘I’m not avoiding anything.’
‘So, what you’re saying is that you are not having an affair and you still want me.’
Peter nodded.
‘Really? Because you have a strange way of showing it.’
‘Look, I admit I have been absent a lot and neglecting you…a lot as well. That was not my intention, believe me. The whole reason we came here is so we could be together. I’m sorry, doll. I really am.’
Peter comes up to me and takes me in his arms.
I lean into him and breathe him in.
Even if he is spewing lies, I love the way he smells.
‘I’m not lying.’
Dang, did I say that out loud?
‘Grace. I love you. I know I don’t show it every day.’
‘Try hardly ever,’ I mumble into his shoulder.
He chuckles, ‘Fair enough. I hardly ever show it. How can I make amends?’
‘Leave your mistress and come back to me.’
He sighs, ‘For the last time, I don’t have a mistress.’
‘Prove it. Make love to me.’
‘What, now? I don’t know if I can perform on demand,’ Peter says, grinning.
‘You’d better. Because there is more demand where this came from,’ I say and smooch him full on the lips, getting tongue-action back.
‘Ewwww, get a room, you two,’ Ella says, shielding her eyes.
‘Buzz off, girl,’ I say and wave her off. ‘Go pester someone else. Anyone else.’
She hunhs and thankfully leaves.
‘Now I have you all to myself,’ I say, pulling on Peter’s lower lip with my teeth.
‘Yes, and what, pray tell, are you going to do with me?’ he asks.
I beckon with my finger and when he lowers his ear to the level of my mouth I tell him exactly what I’m going to do to him.
Next, I’m swept off my feet and carried the twenty or so steps up the stairs into our bedroom.
Chapter 5. The Toys
Grace
The next morning, mere hours after I had deposited Hans at Mellie’s, both twins shove two huge sacks through the kitchen door and plop down for late breakfast.
‘What’s this?’ I ask, trying to figure out if we have enough food to feed everyone.
‘The last of our clothes from Mellie’s,’ Hans says, reaching for my sandwich. ‘She said she is going on a trip and wasn’t counting on us being there.’
‘What do you mean the last of your clothes?’
I hope Grizelda is not back tonight.
Hans bites into the last banana as Greta takes a piece of yesterday’s bread to nibble on as she
skips upstairs with a few notebooks under her arm
‘Hans, what did I tell you about eating the last of anything?’ I ask sternly.
‘You said to ask if anyone wants to share it with me first, but I asked Greta and she didn’t want it,’ the boy says, pausing his devouring.
‘Yes, but you didn’t ask me or Henry, did you?’ I point out the obvious.
‘I thought you had already eaten,’ he mumbles, looking sheepish.
‘I have to go to the market, again,’ I sigh, thanking the heavens that there is still porridge cooking in the pot on the stove, which Hans hasn’t noticed. Yet.
Hans brightens, ‘Get some bananas! I want bananas! We never get to eat them at Godmothers…’ he starts.
‘Please would be nice,’ I suggest.
‘Where is your Godmother off to now that you are back? And why are these the last of your clothes?’
‘Nowhere,’ Greta says, appearing in the awning. ‘I’m going to make myself some tea. Would you like some?’
‘Yes, please.’ I sigh. ‘And what do you mean nowhere? I thought Hans said she’s going away on a trip. Did she say for how long?’ I ask.
The kids have been with us for four weeks straight, which is the longest that she has allowed them to stay here in the past two years.
I sigh. ‘What exactly did Mellie say?’
Hans shrugs, gobbling up the last of our stale bread. ‘She’s fixin’ brek’st for hesself when we arrived. Whe’ I men’sh’nd you cook bette’n her, she go’t mad’n said if we’re goin’ to be ungrateful brats, we can go and be ungrateful where someone feeds us bette’,’ Hans says in between chews.
I ruffle through their satchels.
Dirty clothes.
Dirty clothes.
More dirty clothes. For me to wash.
‘No toys?’
The silence stretches and I notice their long faces.
Greta shakes her head, ‘Godmother said that since Hans is going to school soon…’
I raise an eyebrow.
‘Soon? It’s not even spring yet. Next school-year doesn’t start until August…’ I argue. ‘And why only Hans, what about you? Provided we have the money.’
Greta continues as if I hadn’t spoken. ‘Godmother said next school-year will be soon. Anyway, she said Hans is a big boy now and big boys don’t play with toys. She had packed all of his toys up before we got there and said we might be allowed to sell them at the upcoming Beltane festival in May and earn some pocket money,’ Greta reports. ‘If she can find where she put them.’
Hans takes Henry’s wooden train set and starts building a railway. Henry joins him.
Yup, too old to play with toys. Poor kid. He can play with as many toys as he likes here. For as long as he wants. Childhood doesn’t end just because a grown up has decided it should.
‘If she has toys to spare, you don’t have to sell them, she can give some of Hans’ toys to Henry,’ I suggested. If she can find them.
Maybe if some of Hans’ favourite toys are spared, he’ll have a happier childhood. Or at least better memories of it.
‘I already asked,’ Greta says, ‘Godmother said no. She said Henry doesn’t need so many toys and he wouldn’t be interested in Hans’ anyway.’
From the corner of my eye I notice the toy train starting to emit smoke, which Hans quickly extinguishes.
‘Henry would definitely be interested in his brother’s toys. After all, his brother is interested in his, their tastes can’t be that different,’ I say.
Besides, before deciding what is good and what isn’t for someone else, it’s customary to ask.
Who am I kidding?
Mellie never asks.
Not when she sends the twins over with soiled clothes in their satchels instead of toys.
Not when she decides only the boy is going to school at our expense and takes away all his toys.
Why am I surprised? That woman has taken all of her decisions - sending Ella to live with us, sending Hans and Greta our way unannounced whenever she felt like it - without consulting anyone else.
Initially, the first few days Ella stayed with us she was a pure joy. She helped out with whatever I asked.
Then, a few weeks after we moved here, one Saturday evening, Ella just showed up on our doorstep, unannounced with a satchel full of clothes and said, ‘I’ve come to live with you. Didn’t Godmother tell you?’
Apparently, on that lovely Saturday Mellie started re-arranging her house, or rather rooms in it and made Ella’s room into a room for the twins and their former room into a playroom and…Ella was left without any room at all.
When Mellie essentially kicked her out, everything changed.
Goodbye, diligent girl.
Hello, stroppy teenager.
As for the twins, ‘Too young,’ Mellie had said. ‘You’re unexperienced as a mother,’ said the woman who had got her sister’s kids when they were 10 and 15 and managed to keep them for the whole of one month before Peter and I arrived.
‘It’ll be years before I’ll trust you with all of them. Years.’ she had said. Then she started sending them over every weekend, then during most of the week and then for weeks on end. From Greta I gather the twins are mostly cleaning and cooking when they are at Mellie’s and she is away lots. Now, two years later, she has finally sent them over permanently. But in a typical Mellie fashion, without asking or telling us.
Well, I guess the years of trust have been built. Or the twins eating her out of the house is outweighing the benefit of having a cook and a cleaner.
‘What’s for breakfast?’ Greta asks as Hans abandons the toys and peeks into the pot.
‘You just ate!’ I sigh.
‘I didn’t really. Just had some bread.’ Greta says. ‘I wasn’t hungry. Now I am. Seeing him wolf down everything,’ she points at Hans, ‘made me hungry.’
‘There isn’t enough for all six of us, if Grace is also going to eat...’ Hans says into the pot.
Well, of course there isn’t! I didn’t expect the two of you to be back!
‘Five,’ I correct him, ‘Ella has already left for school,’ I say as Greta shakes her head. ‘And what do you mean IF I’m going to eat? Of course I’m going to eat. It’s breakfast!’ I say.
Hans shrugs, ‘Godmother sometimes doesn’t eat with us. She says it’s not starving, it’s a diet. She said she should probably tell you that you should consider it as well. I just thought she already told you.’
I close my eyes as if slapped.
That’s just great!
What a lovely sneaky way to let me know she thinks I’m fat.
And because she has done it through the catty remark in front of the kids, she has total deniability. She can totally say she never said anything of the sort and blame it on the kids for misunderstanding.
The manipulative, selfish, cowardly…
I take a deep breath and exhale twice as long as I inhaled.
I am calm, I am calm, I am calm…
If I do this breathing exercise for two minutes, my heart will stop racing, my adrenaline will recede and my cortisone will be under control and I will feel sane again.
It’s the first time I regret not having my iPhone.
That witch would get an earful!
‘I’ll have a word with your Godmother later,’ I promise darkly, hoping this will get relayed to her.
I brighten at the thought.
Oh good, if Hans tattles on me, she’ll surely avoid our household for at least a few months.
‘Ella hasn’t left,’ Greta pipes up.
‘What do you mean?’ I ask.
‘She said she will stay in today, she’s too upset to go because of what happened last night,’ Greta reports.
‘Too upset to go? I can’t believe she is still fretting about wha
t kids at school might say!’ I fume. ‘Ella, come down here this minute!’ I yell, seeing Peter come down instead.
‘Please go and talk to Ella,’ I tell him. ‘She should go to school and not hide out home. It will make things worse.’
Peter nods and goes back up.
A man of few words.
Just the way I love them.
* * *
The mirrors are lying to me.
They are.
First, the bedroom golden mirror makes me see things, now the hallway mirror…
It glitched.
Either that or I am losing it.
Which is also a possibility.
Just now, I was passing the floor-to-ceiling mirror in our hallway and glimpsed a completely different person in it!
A rail-thin, green-eyed redhead with waist-long auburn hair.
And fangs.
When I back-tracked, it was bang old me again, framed in the silver oval.
About ten inches smaller in height with jet black hair and my lovely curves, courtesy of all the fertility treatments of the past ten years.
I sigh.
My sleep-deprived brain is playing tricks on me.
Again.
The mirrors are lying to me.
Ella
Friday, March 1st
Thank goodness for my Godmother!
After Hans and Greta blabbed about what happened yesterday at the restaurant, she swooped in, helped me skip school for a day and took me shopping! I love Mellie!
After some pampering at our only spa, Mellie got me two new pairs of shoes, a new dress and a new purse and a brand new leather-bound diary! Well, we were already in the town centre… Godmother even bought me jewellery to go with the dress. Well, not jewellery jewellery, but bijoux.
Grace makes me mend my own clothes until there are more patches than cloth. Only then do I get new ones. Godmother gets me new things as soon as she sees a hole or a patch. Why can’t Father? He always mumbles something unintelligible about four kids and the cost of living.
I caught Grace thinking she is the one who ends up paying for the things that Mellie buys me. But that can’t be right. Mellie has money. She just likes splurging some of it on me sometimes.