Welcome to the Real World (8 page)

H
alf an hour later, I burst into the packed waiting room at the doctor's surgery. My dad is sitting on one of the plastic chairs, looking the picture of rude health. All the images I had of him with an oxygen mask on his face or possibly a limb missing, evaporate into the air.

He smiles when he sees me. 'Fuck off!'

There's an audible gasp in the waiting room. Mothers clamp their hands over their children's ears. Two women with blue rinses tut loudly. A toddler who is knocking seven bells out of a brightly-coloured play centre stops mid-hammer.

'We won't have that, Mr Kendal,' the receptionist shouts. 'I've told you.'

'Arse. Bum. Widdle,' my dad responds.

I edge in, hardly daring to admit that this flushed-faced, foaming man is my relative. If the woman behind the appointments desk hadn't already clocked me, I might have turned and run. I note that the receptionist sags with relief. 'I'll buzz through and tell Doctor you're here, Ms Kendal.'

'Dad?'

'You're a bagful of shite,' he tells me cheerfully.

'What?' I feel myself recoil. 'I'm your daughter. What's going on? Why are you saying that?'

He turns to the woman on the chair nearest to him. She's trying to put as much distance between them as possible, edging into the corner. 'Do you like big willies?' he asks her.

There's another gasp. The poor woman is about to pass out. She is an ageing spinster and looks, quite possibly, as if she's never seen a willy in her life, let alone a big one.

'We can't have this, Mr Kendal,' the receptionist says sharply. 'Apologise at once.'

'Poo. Fart.' My dad pauses while he chooses his next word. 'Testicles.'

'What's going on?' I spread my hands. 'What on earth is going on?'

Not a moment too soon, Doctor Parry opens his door, ushering out an elderly lady with a bandaged hand. 'Ah, Ms Kendal,' he says. 'Come straight in. And you.' He gestures towards my dad, who stands up and makes a very lewd gesture involving his hips to his audience in the waiting room.

Grabbing him by the arm, I snatch him into the doctor's office. Dad sits down on one of the chairs and grins happily.

'Have you lost your mind?' I shout.

For once he is silent. I flop in the chair next to him while our GP runs a hand through his hair in a weary manner.

I don't know whether to address the doctor or my dad. I try both, but reserve my fierce look for my deranged parent. 'Do you want to give us an explanation for this?'

My dad folds his arms.

Doctor Parry huffs. 'Your father insists he has Tourette's syndrome,' he tells me.

I start to laugh.

'Fuck off,' my dad says again.

'And you shut up,' I tell him.

'He says he caught it at the King's Head.'

'You can't
catch
Tourette's syndrome.' At least I don't think you can. I look to Doctor Parry for confirmation. 'Can you?'

'No,' he assures me.

'Bog off.'

I think Doctor Parry is being patient beyond the call of duty. If I were him, I'd have strong-armed Dad out of the surgery within minutes. Or I'd have given him an armful of some powerful sedative reserved for violent lunatics or horses. 'He has
not
got Tourette's syndrome,' I hiss. I have to say that Doctor Parry doesn't look surprised.

'I bloody well have,' Dad insists.

'He's attention seeking,' I say to the GP. 'This is all because my mum has thrown him out.'

'Kiss my arse.'

'Shut
up!
' Is punching your own dad a criminal offence? I might be tempted to risk it. 'You never swear.' Well, only if he hits his thumb with a hammer or something. 'Stop it. Stop it at once.'

'I called your mother, Fern. Before I tried your phone.' Doctor Parry looks at his notes. 'She wouldn't come down here, I'm afraid.'

'He thinks if he's ill, she'll take him back.'

'Well, it doesn't seem to be working.'

'Stop pissing talking about me as if I'm not here!'

'Then stop
"pissing"
acting like a spoiled child!'

'I'm ill,' Dad insists.

'You are not. You have the constitution of an ox. The only time you're ever under the weather is if you've had too much beer.'

'Nellies. Knackers. Knockers,' is my dad's lovely rejoinder.

I feel like banging my head against the peeling paint on the wall in Doctor's Parry's jaded office. Why didn't I just hang up and face the musicor questions
about
the musicwith Evan David?

'What can I do?' I make my plea to the GP.

'I'm very busy,' he says apologetically. 'I'll write him a prescription for some antidepressants.'

'He's not depressed.' This is ludicrous. 'He's as right as rain. Acting like this will only make my mum more determined to divorce him.' I turn to my Dad. 'Can't you see that?'

'Big dangly bollocks.'

He might be fit and well now, but he won't be if he carries this on for much longer. 'This is not funny, Dad. It's an insult to Mum, to me and to Doctor Parry.' Not to mention all the people who do genuinely have Tourette's syndrome. 'This sort of behaviour is ridiculous. Nathan is the only one who's ill in our family. Don't you think we have enough to worry about with him?'

'Your father clearly has some mental problems, Fern.'

'He hasn't. He's making this all up.'

'Are you happy to take him home?' Doctor Parry asks me. 'I can have him hospitalised.'

At the thought of this, Dad perks up even more.

'He's not going to hospital,' I tell Doctor Parry as I scowl at my dad. I won't have him taking up a bed, denying treatment to someone who really is ill. 'He's coming home with me.'

Dad's smile fades. Yes, I'll sort him out. Just wait until he gets a taste of my medicine.

O
n the Tube on the way home from Doctor Parry's surgery my dad said, 'Bottom,' in a lascivious manner to the woman seated next to him. She whacked him over the head with her copy of the
Guardian
newspaper three times and so he spent the rest of the journey in morose silence. Which just proved to me, as if there was ever any doubt, that he's simply making all this up. Now he's sitting at the kitchen table, chin on his hands, sulking.

Squeaky pops his head out of the skirting board. Rummaging in my bread bin, I find a crumb of cake for him and put it on the floor. I wish someone would give me the same sort of unconditional love that I lavish on this mouse, and then I remember that Carl does. Carl adores me and yet gets little more than a few crumbs of cake in return.

My dad sighs theatrically.

'Don't. I'm not in the mood. I have just walked out on my new job for you,' I snap at him. 'For no good reason. A job that was very important to me.'

He opens his mouth.

'And don't even think about saying arse or bugger!'

He closes his mouth again.

'I don't know where you got this stupid idea from.'

Without realising it, my dad's eyes slide furtively towards the lounge and the site of my ancient computer. I stomp into the front room and log on. This is yet another gift from Carl; his sister's company was throwing them out to make space for whizzy replacements with flat LCD screens and more megabytes or gigabytes or whatever sort of bytes are important for computers, so he rescued one for me and one for himself. Ali, my landlord, lets me use his broadband line for free, so that I don't even have a bill for my e-mailnot that I ever get any. All I ever get is spam offering me dodgy American medications, a Russian bride or begging letters from African princes who have fallen on hard times. The theory behind the computer acquisition is that it will be easier for Carl and me to compose music together, although we've never quite worked out how this will benefit us in practice, and still sit on my sofa strumming away until the wee small hours, fuelled by cheap vodka.

When the computer has finished whirring, I check out the history of places that Dad has visited on the Internet and gnash my teeth at a government that provides free computer tuition for the over-55s. The government should have better things to do with the money, like putting more research into child asthma and affordable housing, so that Nathan doesn't have to spend every day wheezing in a damp flat. And the over-55s should have better things to do with their time, like gardening and playing bowls. The first thing they do when they get hold of a computer is buy Viagra and get themselves into all sorts of trouble in chat rooms. My dear parent hasn't been buying medication to enhance his sexual prowess, but sure enough, he's been onto a dozen different sites all discussing the symptoms of Tourette's syndrome. No wonder he now considers himself to be such an expert on it. I could kill him. Really I could. And guess what? You can't catch it in pubs. One vital flaw in his completely cock-and-bull story.

Back in the kitchen, I fold my arms and put on my most disappointed voice. 'I know what this is all about, Dad, but it won't help. It just won't help.'

'Go and see your mother,' he whines. 'Tell her I'm ill. Tell her your old dad needs her.'

'All this will do is make her more determined to keep you out of her life,' I tell him earnestly. 'Can't you see that? She needs you to be strong. She needs you to give up the booze and the gambling. She needs you to stop seeing diamond-patterned jumpers as a style item. And, most of all, she needs you to put her at the top of your list for once.'

Somehow, my dunderheaded dad still manages to look sceptical.

'No wonder she's had enough of you,' I say in exasperation. Two days and I've had
my
fill. Snatching up my handbag, I head for the door. 'I'm going to see Mum.'

My dad brightens.

'But not to plead your case.' Though, of course, in reality I'm going to beg her on bended knee to take him back so that I don't have to put up with him for a moment longer. 'I'm going to see how she's managing.'

'Tell her I love her,' Dad says.

'You should tell her yourself.'

'She won't listen to me.'

'Well, pretending that you've got Tourette's syndrome certainly isn't going to do anything to improve the situation.'

My dad hangs his head. 'Bloody bastard bugger,' he says with feeling.

M
um is working at the newsagent's shop today, so I head off there to speak to her. I decide to walk in the hope that not only will I get a bit of fresh air and exercise, but that it will give me time to calm down and put some distance between me and my darling daddy and all his foibles. I love my father dearly, but that doesn't mean that I like him all the time.

Also, I need to decide what I'm going to do about Evan David. I suppose I should phone to explain what has happened after my hasty departure this morning, but what can I say? 'My father has gone completely doolally, but other than that it was all a big hoaxsorry I skipped out unnecessarily.' I'm not sure that he'll want me back anyway. I've hardly proved myself to be the most efficient personal assistant. I've turned down the possibility of a dinner date with him. I've forgotten to tell him about a meeting with the most important man in Britain. And I've muscled in on his singing lesson. Not what you'd call a great start. Plus, there seems hardly any point in ringing up to grovel and then ask for tomorrow off to attend the
Fame Game
auditions. I'd have to explain about my singing aspirations, and that would be too, too embarrassing for words. It's a shame because I think I really would have enjoyed myself working there. If nothing else the view was greatand I'm not talking about the one out of the windows. Oh well.

This newsagent's shop has been here for as long as I can remember, and my mum, Mrs Amy Kendal, has been one of the fixtures for just as long. It's a tiny place, every spare inch crammed with sweets, birthday cards and magazines. The shop has a long history of loyal customers even though it has looked like it needed a good clear-out for the last twenty years. When I round the corner, I'm astonished to see that a man in overalls is painting the facade an attractive shade of blue. I'm astonished not because it isn't long overdue, but because someone is actually
doing
it. The man is whistling as he works and wishes me a good morning.

My mum is behind the counter when I swing into the shop, and something about her demeanour stops me in my tracks. Usually, she wears a work-weary expression, there's a permanent slump to her shoulders and a frown comes easier to her than a smile. Today, by contrast, she is looking positively sprightly. She's wearing make-upsomething she saves for high days and holidaysand for some reason, this appears to be a blue eye shadow day. It looks as if she's been to the hairdresser's, too, as there are unnaturally tight curls in her freshly dyed hair. A red jumper that normally languishes at the back of her wardrobe'for best'has also been pressed into service on a weekday. All of this is very strangenearly as strange as my father shouting obscenities every five seconds.

As I approach, my mum pats her hair self-consciously. 'Hello, darlin'.'

'Mum?' I can't help but blink in surprise. 'What's got into you?'

She looks around shiftily. 'I don't know what you mean.'

'You look great...not that you don't always look great,' I blunder on, 'but you don't normally look this great to go to work.'

'That's because I've got more time to spend on myself now that I'm not having to look after your lazy, good-for-nothing father.'

This is not a good set-up for me pleading a case for him to return to the marital bed.

'I thought I might even take myself off and have one of those facials,' she tells me with a rather defiant nod.

This is my mother who eschews all types of face creameven Niveaas a profligate waste of money. Then I look round the shop. Someone has definitely tidied it up. Dust no longer lurks in every corner. The magazines lining the racks somehow look more perky. The ancient birthday cards that rotated forlornly in a wire carousel have been swept away, and brightly coloured ones in protective plastic wrappings have taken their place. Gone is the cracked lino, giving way to that wood-effect laminate stuff.

'We've got new owners,' my mum says in answer to my questioning look. 'They're doing the place up. Mr PatelTariqhas big ideas.'

'Tariq?'

'My new boss.' Mum's face takes on a girly flush.

Oh, no. Oh, very no. My heart drops to my shoes and there's a bad, bad feeling in my bones. Tell me this is all a terrible dream. Not only has my dad developed an imaginary illness, but my mum now has a fancy man.

'Mum,' I say pointedly. 'I've come to talk to you about Dad.'

'I've nothing to say, darlin'.'

'He's in a terrible state.'

'That's his own fault,' she tells me with a startling lack of sympathy. My mum is one of life's carersthe Florence Nightingale of Frodsham Court flats. When did she get this sudden personality transplant?

'I'm sure he's having some sort of mental breakdown.'

Mum shakes her head, unmoved by my plight. 'All this rubbish about him being ill is just another one of his silly scams. I've given him enough chances over the years. He's used them all up.'

'I just wish you'd see him.'

'No,' she says in a voice that would be difficult to argue with. 'Look, darlin', I'm sorry that you've been landed with him. But me and your father, we're over. He's not coming home no matter what he does.'

At that moment, a stately Asian man comes out of the back room and stands next to my mother in a proprietorial manner. He has a look of Omar Sharif about himeyes that are limpid brown pools, skin the colour of caffe latte, strong wavy hair flecked with silverand even I, a good thirty years younger than him, can see the attraction.

'This is my daughter, Mr Patel.' My mum's voice has suddenly gone all breathy.

'Ah,' he says. 'Fern. I have heard a lot about you.' I wish I could say the same about him. My mum has been extraordinarily quiet about the subject of her new boss until now. This is the first I've heard about it, and yet normally she's so keen to share all the gossip from the shop.

He takes my hand and brushes it against his lips, but not in a smarmy way. Hmm. Charm personified. My mum giggles alarmingly. If only my dad could see this, he would let out a stream of blood-curdling expletives that he wouldn't have to put on.