Zac is behaving very oddly.
He keeps taking showers. He has joined the gym to deal with his hump and goes with Edward the judge’s son who plays rugby and is going to Sandhurst. Zac is cross when we run out of deoderant and he minds if he has no clean socks.
He works very hard for his GCSEs and worries that he cannot get to grips with his Spanish. I ask Zac if he has a girlfriend.
‘No!’ he says ‘Why should I have a girl friend?’
‘Well, have you got your eye on anyone?’ I ask. ‘Apart from Victoria obviously.’
‘There isn’t anyone called Victoria. Why do you think there is someone called Victoria? No one is called Victoria EVER!’ says Zac.
He’s right of course Victoria is not a common name amongst his friends but I thought if I feigned a little knowledge he might cave in and confess all.
‘Why do you keep washing then?’ I ask.
‘For God’s sake!’ says Zac and leaves the room.
Then My Very Attractive Brother rings me.
‘I really can’t cope with this.’ he says. He is crying.
‘Is it Olivia?’ I ask ‘Has she phoned you?’
‘I’m in love with her.’ he says. ‘I miss my family, the girls, I miss them all. And I’m going to hurt Katie and Kitty and Jay will nevr talk to me again.
‘Blood is thicker than water.’ I say. You are part of our family and Kitty has nailed her colours to our mast. Of course she will forgive you. Anyway, that’s not the point. What are you going to do? Does Olivia want you to get back together?’
‘What?’ says my Very Attractive Brother. ‘What mast?’
‘Mast?’ I say.
‘Yes.’ says my Very Attractive Brother. ‘You said something about a mast and nails.’
‘It doesn’t matter.’ I say.
‘I can’t go through this again.’ says my Very Attractive Brother. ‘Literally.’
‘Never see Olivia again.’ I say. ‘Change your phone number. Move house. Leave Cornwall. It will take you a year to get over her.’
‘ I’m going to see her tonight.’ says my Very Attractive Brother ‘I love her. She is the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. She’s more myself than I am.’ he says.
I didn’t know he had read Wuthering Heights.
I quite like Olivia.
John rings me from Nashville. ‘Guess who I had dinner with?’ he says.
‘Ummm.. Robert De Niro?’ I say.
‘No,’ says John. ‘Is Abigail there? You must tell her. It’s so funny...Daniel Bloomberg from Cajun Dance Party!’
Daniel Bloomberg has just chucked his photography A level at Camden School and is releasing a solo album. I think he’s about 17.
‘I’ll tell her.’ I say.
Friday 18th April 2008
Ellis phones me.
‘I am so worried about Hannah.’ he says.
‘Why don’t you come over?’ I say.‘
‘I am in Brighton doing a course in Medical Anthropology. It’s so easy, ‘The course is so boring.’ says Ellis ‘Anthropology is a doddle. Why didn’t I become an anthropologist instead of someone who has to try to stop teenagers killing themselves? The trouble is, I am only using about half my brain and the other half is worrying like mad.’ says Ellis.
‘What are you worried about? She’ll definitely get into that Hogwarts school.’ I say ‘And she’ll be offered a scholarship.’
Hannah only has to poke her nose round the corner of any educational establishment to be offered a scholarship.
‘I’m worried because if Hannah gets in, I’ll lose my daughter and she’ll become all weirdly left wing. She’ll marry a Canadian who won’t approve of me, Canadians are terribly conservative you know. And there’s no way I can afford the fees, so if she isn’t offered a scholarship she will hate me for not being able to pay and her mother’s no help at all. She’ll never get that book published it’s all about Texan rapists and who on earth wants to read that?’
‘She’ll get a scholarship.’ I say. ‘She always gets offered one. Now go back to nice restful anthropology and stop worrying.’
John comes back from Nashville and goes straight to work. The paper is planning a Madeleine McCann pull out on the anniversary of her disappearance and he has to write up his Jack White interview. Is it really nearly a year since that little girl was taken?
Saturday 19th April 2008. Broken Heart.More Food Moths. Jan’s Birthday. John’s mother. Squid.
‘And neither ever found another,
To stop the hollow heart from paining,
They stood apart the scars remaining,
Like cliffs that had been rent asunder,
And neither rain nor snow nor thunder,
Shall wholly do away, I wean,
The marks of that which once hath been.’
I almost quoted that to Giles but decided it would be tactless.
This morning, at breakfast time, Zac said this: ‘It crawled, out of my Weetabix and looked at me. It was disgusting, I nearly ate it. I am never eating Weetabix again.’
Food moths! How? Why? Wheretofore? And stuff like that.
I threw away the Weetabix. I chucked the organic, rough rolled oats. I binned the Puy lentils and squirted a whole bottle of Detox on everything else. It says on the back of the Detox that it is tasteless and odourless so no-one will notice.
After that I remembered it is Jan’s birthday today so I texted him ‘Happy Birthday! I am going to be 45 on Tuesday. It’s horrible !’.
I must introduce Jan to Ellis. Jan seems to have a much better time as a gay man in London than Ellis does. Ellis still thinks Old Compton Street is the hub of Gay Culture but Jan told me that everyone moved on to Vauxhall ages ago and that only old poofs and foreigners hang out in Soho.
No wonder Ellis says London’s gay scene is shy-making. I told him about Vauxhall but he said it was probably full of agressive clubbers wearing chaps and that the very thought filled him with horror.
Jan texted me back, ‘You are only as young as you feel and last night I was feeling a twenty one year old ! Happy Birthday for Tues!’
I really must introduce him to Ellis. Perhaps I’ll invite them for supper together. Jan does wear chaps but I’ll tell him not to, to begin with, or at least not to wear the black leather ones.
I am becoming a fag hag.
John’s mother comes for the day. We take her to Spitalfields to pick up my computer. My computer has crashed and I am afraid I will have lost my book as I never back it up.
It tuns out that although my computer is dead my book is still alive and is saved onto a CD by a Pole. I love Polish people and I feel very happy.
The Polish person tells me that it is ridiculous to write a book and not back it up and she tells me that she will install a Time Machine on my new computer when I buy it.
This sounds very exciting and I am very pleased.
‘I want a new computer for my birthday.’ I tell John.
Later we take John’s mother out to lunch. We go to a Spanish restaurant and John and his mother order paella. I can’t eat paella on account of the squid.
John’s mother says she never eats anything with a face so she supposes it’s OK to eat squid.
I am dumbfounded, but not for long.
I say ‘Do you realise that squid have a distinct head and bilateral symmetry?? Do you not inderstand that they have eyes similar to those of vertebrates and that the giant squid has the largest eyes in the animal kingdom?’ I say ‘There are well documented cases of squid forming emotional attachments, and having complex social structures in wild squid groups.’
John’s mother decides to eat her squid anyway.
I see that I may have cast a pall over the meal and I change the subject.
‘What do you think of John’s interviews?’ I ask. ‘His column is very good isn’t it? His Dolly Parton interview was so excellent, don’t you think?’
‘I don’t know.’ says John’s mother. ‘I’ve never read any of it.’
‘What none?’ says John.
No, none at all.’ says his mother.
‘In 5 years?’ says John.
‘No.’ says his mother. ‘It never occurred to me to read it.’
Later, I phone Ellis and tell him about John’s mother.
‘She can’t help it.’ says Ellis ‘She’s definitely on the spectrum.’
No comments:
Post a Comment