Weekend reading

Lucy is fed up with her summer job in the supermarket and Ma is acting strangely in the latest episode of Family Lines. Read on!

29 August 1980

I haven’t forgotten you. It’s just that working in the supermarket really knackers me. By the time I get home in the evening all I want to do is sprawl on the sofa in my pjs and watch TV. I give Ma half my wages which doesn’t leave much to play with. Sometimes I get to bring home food that’s past its sell-by date, so we’re in preservative injury time! She loves the grub though!

So until last night there wasn’t much to write about in my humdrum existence, except how many boxes of cornflakes or soap flakes I counted in the stock take or how many packs of razor blades went walkies, or who dropped a bottle of ketchup today. The manager thinks we do it for the craic. Shows how much imagination he has! If only I was working in a video rental place, I could watch movies all day long.

The other girls in the supermarket sunbathe on the roof in their bras and knickers during their lunch breaks but I won’t give them the pleasure of laughing at my flab. I usually sit in the store room with my book and a sandwich. I’m reading The Hollow Hills, all about King Arthur – before he becomes the king that is. He’s hidden away cos he’s illegitimate and Merlin teaches him magic. Pretty cool. Better than the real world.

  School starts again on Tuesday. Boring! I’ll probably keep on the job a couple of evenings a week and on Saturdays. Da says that’s okay as long as it doesn’t interfere with my school work. No problemo I said. The truth is I want to save a bit of money and go away somewhere, anywhere, next summer. I couldn’t stick another three months hanging around here. I know there’ll be a row but I’ll hold my ground or stick to my guns or put my foot down, or whatever is needed. Just to get out of here for a while at least. What’s it like out there? Are you living it up in Berlin or London or Paris or New York?

Anyway back to last night. I think Ma might be losing her marbles. That’s what I wanted to tell you. Everything was fine, well, situation abnormal which is our new normal if you get me, until the day the Leaving results came out. Then she locked herself in the bedroom and cried all day. Yeah, yeah, I know it was because you should have been in that group and we should have been celebrating your great results and getting a grant for art college and all that. She was still there when weeping and wailing when I came home from work. I knocked on her door but she told me to go away. I made the tea for me and Da. Luckily I had got a pack of frozen burgers and some half-melted ice cream from work. He brought a plate of food up to her. They had a long powwow and when he came down he said, She’s better now, she’s resting.

  I said Maybe she needs some pills, you know, the blue ones, Roche tens, like Mrs. Twomey has. She swears by them.

Da looked offended. Your mother doesn’t need pills. She’s just upset is all.

  Yous never go out any more, I said. You never go bowling like you used to and I don’t see Ma reading any scripts for the Christmas play.

  It’s early days to be thinking of Christmas, Da said. And I don’t have the heart for the bowling. We’ll go out when we feel like it.  

  Sitting here moping won’t bring Deb back. Suddenly I was beginning to feel like the parent here, telling the kids to get out from under my feet. That’s a laugh when you think about it.

  Da shook his head. I know it won’t. I’ve tried, believe me, I’ve tried to get your Ma interested in going out. I even suggested going away for the weekend. She doesn’t want to budge from here until we get some definite news. That’s what she says and there’s nothing more I can do. You don’t need to be worrying about us, Lucy. You’re a good daughter to us but don’t think I’m not aware that you’re missing out on your life too.

  Well I think it’s morbid. It doesn’t feel much like life. More like being a shadow. And Ma makes a song and dance every time I do go out. Only not a real song and dance. I could put up with that now, if she’d leave me be.

  That night I heard Ma roaming around the house opening and closing drawers and cupboards. The next morning she looked wojus. I said nothing and skedaddled as fast as I could. For once I was glad to get into work and start mopping the floors.

Photo by Nathália Rosa on Unsplash

Everything went back to the way it had been until last night. I was reading until about three a.m. I finished the book and switched off the light. Just as I was going to sleep I heard a weird cry from outside. A loud wailing sound. It wasn’t a siren. I thought it might be mating cats or a lost kitten. It was such a human sounding note that I looked out the window wondering had someone left a baby on our doorstep! But there was Ma, wandering around the garden in her nightie, halting now and then, bending double and letting out a roar of pain. I went rigid with fear watching her. I was afraid to call to her through the window because they say you shouldn’t wake a sleep walker or they’ll die. I went into their room and shook Da awake. When he opened his eyes he stared up at me and said Where is she?

  I didn’t know who he was talking about but I said, It’s my Ma, she’s wandering round the garden like a ghost.

  He sat up and pulled on his dressing gown then ran down the stairs and out the back. By the time he got out there lights had come on in some of the neighbours’ houses. They must have enjoyed the show. Mrs. Byrne stuck her head out the window and asked Da was everything all right. What did she think with the pair of them parading around in the middle of the night in their pyjamases? But as Ma would say, I’m sure she meant well. Meanwhile, I put on the kettle and waited for them to come inside.   

  A few minutes Da led her in by the arm, soothing her as if she was a child. There’s a good girl, Fran. Sit down now and Lucy’ll bring you a cup of tea. He left the room then.

  Ma’s eyes looked at me but I didn’t think she recognised me.

  I handed her the tea. Two sugars, the way you like it, I said to her.

  She looked at the cup as if she scarcely knew what that was, then back to me. I wasn’t a bad girl, she said. I truly loved him. Or I thought I did. I don’t know anything anymore.

  Who Ma? My Da? I know you love him. At least I suppose that’s what it is.

  Da returned then with a towel and Ma’s dressing gown. He draped the gown over her shoulders then knelt to dry her feet which were all grassy.

  She bent her head to look at him but she didn’t seem to recognise him either.

  It’s funny isn’t it, how you never really think about your parents as romantic lovers? I mean they’re just so old and so worried about the bills and the shopping and cutting the grass that there doesn’t seem to be much left over. Except when they want to give out to us.

  She sipped the tea and I waited for her to tell me it was too weak or too milky or too sweet the way she usually does when I make it but she never said a word. Then Da brought her back upstairs. They looked sad, and pathetic, the two of them. Now I feel lost.

Ma didn’t show for breakfast this morning but this evening she was at her post, clouded in steam from the murdered cauliflower. When she said You’re late I wanted to hug her. Instead I gave her the day’s catch of frozen peas, fishfingers, strawberry yoghurts (no one buys them!) and a bottle of cider I bought on a discount in hopes of cheering them up.

  Thanks, Lucy, she said. We’d be lost without you.

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Now Family Lines has gone weekly I’m hoping you’ll enjoy the new momentum! Let my know your thoughts on the story so far or where you think it might be going.