A Proper Family Holiday (28 page)

‘Come on!’ Jack shouted from his place by the starting line. As she scrambled back out of her sack, Chelsea found a second to give him a high five. ‘You’re winning!’

One of the coordinators handed Chelsea her potato and spoon. As a child, Chelsea had taken part in plenty of egg and spoon races. Balancing an egg on a spoon was never as difficult as you expected. You just had to make sure that the wide part of the egg was in the wide part of the spoon. But balancing a potato?

‘The rules are, if you drop the potato, you have to return to the start,’ the coordinator reminded the frantic adult competitors.

Chelsea took a moment to centre herself and properly place her spud. Alas, it was no dinky new potato but an enormous baker that was covered in misshapen knobs. Meanwhile, the spoon was an ordinary dessert spoon. There was no way that it would fit. Chelsea glanced at the other competitors to make sure they had no potato-based advantage. All three of the dads were struggling to get enough balance to even consider stepping over the starting line. Adam was the first to attempt a step. He managed to cover about a metre before his potato dropped to the ground.

‘Back to the start!’ a coordinator shouted.

‘Shit,’ said Adam.

‘Language!’

Finally, Chelsea seemed to have achieved the perfect balance. If she just took it slowly, she would be fine. She stepped forward. One. Two. Three steps. The potato hit the ground.

‘Back to the start!’

‘Arse,’ Chelsea muttered.

‘Language!’ the coordinator screeched.

‘Come on, Auntie Chelsea, come on,’ Jack cried.

‘This is harder than it looks,’ Chelsea explained to her nephew.

‘I know, but you can do it, I know you can.’

Chelsea wasn’t sure she could. While watching the children compete in the potato races earlier, Chelsea had assumed they were all just too young to understand the principles of balance, too eager to get to the finish line. Now she knew that they’d been set a close-to-impossible task. At least the children hadn’t had to return to the start every time they dropped their potatoes.

‘OK,’ said Chelsea. ‘Here we go.’ She took another deep breath. Adam was six feet ahead of her by now. She couldn’t let him get too far in the lead. Chelsea stepped out again, spoon clutched in her hand, and soon she found herself passing Adam while he scrambled to retrieve his spud from the dirt for a third time.

At the other end of the track, Chelsea joyfully threw down her potato and spoon, and picked up her hula hoop. Here she definitely had the advantage. The hula hoops were all the same size, but Chelsea was three inches shorter than her nearest rival. She was the only contestant able to skip through the hoop without getting it caught on the top of her head. It was an unfair advantage, of course, but Chelsea made the most of it. The gap between her and Adam grew wider still.

Dumping her hoop, Chelsea stripped off her kaftan, threw it towards Jack for safe-keeping and ran over to the pool ready for the final stage of the race. She was grateful that she was wearing her sturdiest bikini that day. As a child, Chelsea had endured lessons at the local baths on a Tuesday afternoon, but she certainly couldn’t claim swimming as a favourite activity. Since leaving school, she’d avoided it as far as humanly possible, only venturing near a pool if the air temperature was hot enough that she would sizzle upon getting out. As a result, her style was far from Olympian, based as it was on keeping her face and hair completely dry, but there was no time to ease herself into the pool inch by inch now. Her super-expensive Japanese smoothing process was doomed. Now at the edge of the pool, Chelsea took a flying leap.

Splash!

Chelsea struggled to the surface and began the swim of her life, spitting chlorine as Adam followed her in with a dive-bomb. Chelsea did not look back. She just fixed her stinging eyes on the end of the pool. Most of the time, her feet touched the bottom and she was able to adapt her swimming style to a sort of pool jog. She had no idea whether or not that was allowed. The coordinators hadn’t said anything about it.

The Kidz Klub children were starting to get hysterical with excitement as the race entered its final stage. Even with the water in her ears, Chelsea thought she could hear Jack shouting her name. She pushed on and on, though her lungs were ready to burst with the effort. She thought, not for the first time, that those people who did triathlons for fun must be truly deranged.

‘Chelsea, Chelsea, Chelsea!’

It wasn’t only Jack who was chanting Chelsea’s name now. She reached the end of the pool and turned to start her final lap. She passed Adam on the way. One of the other dads was five strokes behind him. The fat dad who had almost been disqualified for his friend’s swearing hadn’t even bothered with the swimming part of the race. He was sitting in a plastic chair, fanning his face with a copy of the
Sun
. He’d done more than enough for the day.

‘Chelsea, Chelsea, Chelsea!’

The chants of the crowd spurred Chelsea on. She was in the lead. All she had to do was hold on to her advantage. She had to find that final burst of energy. Getting to the end of the pool at last, she almost forgot that the race didn’t end there.

‘Auntie Chelsea!’ Jack screamed. ‘You’ve got to ring the bell!’

The bell! Chelsea was panting so hard through exertion she felt as though the very fabric of her lungs was tearing each time she inhaled, but she managed, just, to haul herself from the pool like an elephant seal pulling itself onto a jetty. Groaning like an old woman, she got to her feet and ran, tripping with fatigue as she went, to find that bloody bell.

‘Ruuuuunnnn!’

As Chelsea stretched for the bell, Adam was reaching simultaneously. Somehow he had caught her up. For a moment, it seemed as though the two of them were frozen in time, arms outstretched towards the bell but never quite getting there. Then Chelsea’s hand slammed down on the dinger. Adam slammed his hand down at the same time, but Chelsea’s hand was firmly underneath his. She had definitely got there first. The stinging slap Adam accidentally delivered her was well worth it.

‘You did it! You did it! You did it!’ Jack sang.

Chelsea was over the finish line. She had actually won the race. She swept Jack into her arms and they did a victory jig.

‘You did it. I knew you would win it. You’re the very, very best,’ said Jack. ‘You’re the winner! You’re the winner!’

Chelsea punched the air.

She didn’t know when she had last felt so happy. Certainly, she had not felt quite so full of pure joy when she won an award for her journalism. This win was so unexpected and so sweet. Perhaps it was because she had made such an enormous effort. Chelsea sneakily glanced over her shoulder to where Adam was doubled over, winded by the hard work of that final sprint to ring the bell. Lily’s face was creased with disappointment. Adam put his hand on her shoulder, but Lily shook it off.

‘Loser,’ Jack mouthed as he made the ‘L’ sign. Chelsea quickly brought the offending hand down.

‘Jack, we have to be gracious in victory,’ she told him. ‘Though you’re absolutely right. What a loser, eh?’

Chelsea wrapped herself in a towel and busied herself with accepting the congratulations of the parents who had not taken part in the race. One of the dads offered to email her a series of extremely unflattering photographs he had taken during the contest, which he showed her now on the back of his camera. Recoiling at the sight of the exertion on her face, Chelsea told him that she would rather simply remember the moment.

‘I took some photos too,’ said Jack then, revealing that he had hacked into Chelsea’s iPhone and used it to capture the moment himself.

‘Great,’ said Chelsea. ‘I thought I told you not to mess with my phone.’

‘I wasn’t messing with it. I was taking photographs.’

Jack was especially proud of his picture of Chelsea carrying her potato and spoon. She was looking over her shoulder at one of the fat dads. His grimace reminded Chelsea of a cartoon character.

‘We can send this one to Grandma and Mummy.’

‘That’s a good idea. Shall I show you how?’

While all this was going on, Chelsea didn’t notice that the runner-up was deep in conversation with two of the Kidz Klub coordinators. Eventually, the chief coordinator gave a blast on the klaxon that he sometimes used to bring the children to order.

‘It’s time for the prizes,’ said Jack, clapping his hands with joy.

Now fully dried off, Chelsea pulled on her kaftan and sauntered across to the Kidz Klub podium, though given how flimsy it was, she very much doubted the adults would be expected to climb up on it. Adam was already there. He looked oddly smug for a loser, thought Chelsea. The KKC looked nervous.

‘Er, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, can I have your attention, please?’

Chelsea smiled at the crowd as everyone quietened down for her big moment. The coordinator continued, ‘I’m afraid there has been a disqualification.’

Chelsea turned to look at him in confusion.

‘Er, yes. I’m really sorry, but … it seems that one of the, er, audience saw the winner actually, er,
holding
her potato on her spoon.’

‘What?’ Chelsea spat.

‘I’m afraid we’ve got a witness who says you had your thumb placed so that you were actually holding your potato on your spoon to make sure it didn’t fall off. That’s not allowed. The rules of the race say there must be no “steadying” of the potato.’

‘This is ridiculous! Who said I was steadying the potato?’

The coordinator looked at his shoes. One of the laces was undone. He took the opportunity to duck down out of the line of fire while doing it back up.

‘Come on, who said I cheated?’ Chelsea asked again. ‘If you’re going to disqualify me on the basis of such slander, I want to know exactly who accused me.’

There was an eerie silence around the Kidz Klub pool. It was never quiet around the Kidz Klub pool. Everyone held their breath as Chelsea scanned the crowd, as though she might be able to tell just by looking at them who her accuser was.

‘If someone wants to call me a cheat, they can call me a cheat to my face. Come on, which one of you did it?’

‘I did,’ said Lily, suddenly stepping forward.

‘Right,’ said Chelsea. ‘Well—’ Her diatribe came to a sudden end. ‘If you say so, Lily.’

Jack glared at his pigtailed nemesis. Meanwhile, Chelsea ducked down to make herself level with the coordinator, who had retied his loose lace three times. ‘Could I have a word?’ she hissed.

Chelsea took the coordinator to one side. Jack followed them. ‘Don’t you think it’s strange that it’s the daughter of the contestant who came second who decided I cheated in the potato and spoon stage? Which I absolutely did not, FYI.’

‘She didn’t,’ Jack agreed. ‘She wouldn’t. My auntie Chelsea never lies.’

‘And neither does my daughter.’ It was Adam.

‘Of course not,’ said Chelsea, her voice heavy with sarcasm.

‘She wasn’t raised to lie. Or cheat.’

‘Neither was I,’ Chelsea retorted.

‘It’s a matter of your word against hers,’ said the coordinator.

Chelsea turned to Adam. ‘You put her up to this. Well, if it matters to you that badly to have the free beer vouchers, then you’re welcome to them. I don’t want to be in such an unfair competition. I’m disqualifying myself. Come on, Jack. Let’s go and have lunch.’

‘We’re not cheats!’ was Jack’s parting shot.

He was struggling not to cry.

Chapter Forty-Two

Chelsea

Even during lunch, Jack was still outraged that his aunt had been accused of cheating. Lily was such a liar.

‘We can’t let them get away with it,’ he said.

‘They have got away with it,’ said Chelsea. ‘He’s got the free beer vouchers, and my good name has been besmirched. Still, we know I was the winner. We know the truth.’

Jack speared a chip and regarded it thoughtfully. Chelsea could tell that something was on his mind.

‘What are you thinking?’ she asked him.

Jack shook his head.

‘Come on,’ Chelsea insisted. ‘You can tell me.’

Jack took a deep breath before he asked her, ‘Auntie Chelsea,
were
you cheating in the potato and spoon section?’

Chelsea looked away and pressed her lips together to contain a laugh.

‘Yes!’ she said at last. ‘Of course I was. For goodness’ sake, there is no other way to keep a potato on the end of a spoon. It’s impossible.’

‘Auntie Chelsea!’

‘But I was only cheating a little bit, and Lily is still a snitch.’

‘Yeah!’ Jack chimed in agreement. ‘Lily is a snitch.’

‘Plus, there’s still one more competition to go, and I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that you and I have got this one in the bag. No cheating required.’

Jack’s eyes lit up. ‘Are we going to do the fancy dress?’ It was the only competition left on the agenda for that week.

Chelsea nodded. ‘Darling, I work on a fashion magazine. I
am
fancy dress. We most certainly are going to enter the competition. Come on, finish your chips. We’ve got work to do.’

The theme of the Kidz Klub fancy-dress afternoon was
A Thousand and One Nights
. Jack, understandably, interpreted the theme as ‘a thousand and one
knights
’ and was disappointed when Chelsea told him that wasn’t the brief at all. There would be no cross of St George and no clanking armour (though she had no doubt there would be plenty of parents at the Klub who misunderstood the theme as well).

‘We’re talking about
The Arabian Nights
,’ Chelsea explained. She gave Jack the lowdown on the classical fairy stories. ‘So I’m thinking you need to go as Aladdin.’

Jack perked up again. He knew the story of Aladdin and his genie. He’d seen the Disney film.

‘I like Aladdin,’ he said.

‘Perfect. Now, what do you need to look like? Let’s Google.’

Chelsea got out her phone and together she and Jack pored over pictures of Aladdin for the best part of an hour. There was plenty of inspiration to be found online. The possibilities were endlessly exotic. The problem was how to translate that inspiration into a costume using only those items that could be found in the resort. While there was no official limit on how much you could spend, there was certainly a lack of variety to choose from. If only the theme had been ‘international football teams’: they’d have had no trouble whatsoever fitting Jack out in the colours of any team from Arsenal to Zenit St Petersburg. But a costume fit for a prince? That was going to be hard.