‘Half my rent. And I never asked you to pay it,’ I say. ‘You did it to make me move out, remember? And it’s Dad’s money, anyway.’
‘You are so ungrateful. It’s like you were born ungrateful.’ She snarls it at me. Like I was born just to spite her. And she goes on to talk about the expensive Barbie whose hair I coloured red, the wrong-coloured bike I screamed about on Christmas day when I was ten, and the time I told her to fuck off in Tammy Girl when I was twelve, because she was trying to make me get a thong to wear with these jeans I allegedly had a ‘VPL’ in when I put them on. She tells me that I’d always pour salt in the wound by crying to Dad, and that I was an angel for him. Which isn’t true. I used to bite him, like, all the time. He just forgave me, and she never did.
I get up from the table while she stews.
‘Where are you going?’
‘I’m getting you a glass of wine,’ I say. And I go to the fridge. Suddenly relaxed, she tells me to make sure I get the Riesling and not the Chardonnay, because the Chardonnay they’ve got is bloody awful.
‘I want red,’ I say.
‘We don’t have any.’
I pour us both a glass of the Chardonnay. She makes a face, and I tell her it’s best to get rid of it – she slides her glass over to me with her eyes narrowed. ‘You drink it,’ she says. ‘I know you like a drink.’
She gets herself a glass of the Riesling, and there’s something petty in how little wine she pours for herself. She puts her glass beside mine to compare it, telling me that she only likes a splash of wine on a weeknight.
I ask her about her cancer friend – the annoying one, on Facebook.
‘She’s gone into hospital now, not long left,’ says Mam. ‘And you think she’d be spending a bit less time on Facebook, wouldn’t you? But no.’
That keeps her busy, till Dad gets back. He drops the bag of fish and chips on the dining table and begins dishing it out. He runs back and forth with cutlery, and condiments, and kitchen roll, while Mam and I sit and watch him. Mam points out there’s three portions of chips.
‘I got Rini a portion of chips as well,’ he says. I whine. ‘You don’t have to eat them, love; they’re just there if you want a treat.’ He smiles at me. ‘A few chips won’t kill you, you little skinny-mini.’ He kisses the top of my head.
‘Thank you, Daddy,’ I say. He lovingly moves a large cod from its sweaty box to my plate.
‘Thank you, Daddy,’ repeats Mam, in a high-pitched voice. Her splash of wine disappeared rather quickly. ‘Are you going to cut that up for her, as well, Nigel?’ she asks. He cut up a steak for me when we went out for his birthday one year, and she’s never let it drop. ‘What did you do on your date, Irina? Did you have that short lad cut your food up for you?’
‘Oh.’ Dad smiles at me. ‘Is this the bloke you’re seeing? The one you told me about?’
‘Of course you told him,’ snarls Mam. ‘I had to hear it from Susan.’
‘Oh, you’re seeing the little feller?’ Dad says. ‘I didn’t think he was in a grooming gang, love. I said he was probably just your friend.’
‘He is sort of just my friend,’ I say, shrugging, beginning to extract the cod from its batter. ‘Just.’ I shrug again. ‘It’s like a pity thing, basically. I feel bad for him.’
‘Ah, well,’ he says. ‘You always used to say you only went out with me ’cause you felt sorry for me, didn’t you, Yvonne?’ says Dad. Mam grunts. ‘I remember asking her out at the disco. Have we told you this story, love?’
‘No,’ I say, as Mam says she’s heard it a thousand times. I have; it just winds her up. I think it’s the equivalent of someone who had a terrible car accident being told the story of how they nearly turned left, but turned right instead, and drove straight into a truck.
‘Well, I saw her across the dance floor, sitting, face like a smacked arse – beautiful smacked arse, mind you. And I went over, and asked her if she wanted to dance, and you know what she said?’ Dad purses his lips like Mam does. ‘Erm… I’m minding my friends’ coats.’ He laughs, I laugh. Mam forces a smile. ‘’Course, she did dance with me, in the end – didn’t you, Yvonne? ’Cause you felt sorry for me. That’s what you say.’
‘Mmhmm,’ she says. ‘Well you kept asking, didn’t you?’
Dad’s a plumber, and at some point, plumbing started to go very well for him, and he started buying nice cars, and looking at big houses. And that’s when skinny, angry Yvonne from the disco developed a proper interest in him. There’s this photo of the two of them, when they first moved in together in the mid-1980s, and Dad’s wearing this awful big suit where he looks like an uglier, ginger David Byrne. Mam is tucked under his arm, with her big blond perm, and she’s got this skintight, metallic-gold dress on – it’s framed, and it sits in the living room, and Dad always points it out to guests. Me and Yvonne, back when she was just my trophy girlfriend! And Mam will usually say that she stopped wearing that dress so Dad would stop making that joke.
Aside from their wedding photo, all the other pictures hanging in this house are of me. Me as a baby, me at nursery, all my school photos. There’s a gap between the ages of twelve and sixteen （when I did not photograph well）， then the photos start again, in earnest. Dad even had me print out a couple of my selfies for him to hang. I stare at myself on the wall as I pick at my fish. A little girl with freckles and orange pigtails. She is missing her front teeth. I run my tongue over my veneers.
Mam sulks over dinner and has a go at Dad for telling the same stories over and over again. She really lays into him and doesn’t stop till she runs out of breath.
‘Irina has some news about her job,’ says Dad. He blurts it out while Mam is between sentences, then curls down into his chair, avoiding my eye.
‘Oh?’ she says.
‘I quit.’ And then it’s my turn. She doesn’t believe I’m making enough money from photography to pay my half of my rent, that if I want to do stupid things, like quitting my job, she’ll cut me off, completely. That was the condition: I work part-time, at least, or she cuts me off. I pay my half, or she cuts me off. ‘It’s Dad’s money, though!’ I shout. And when Dad doesn’t argue with me, or back her up, Mam stomps out of the kitchen in tears. Dad follows her.
I eat my entire portion of chips. I eat them with my hands.
I hear my mam screaming and crying upstairs. I can’t hear my dad. When he comes back, I tell him I need to go because I need to meet Flo.
He drives me to the pub. He says Mam is having a hard time at the moment. She rings and rings and rings the both of us, as soon as she realises we’re gone.
Flo is there when I get to the pub. Flo is there, and so is Michael. I could kill her. She sees my face drop, and grabs my arm, leading me to the toilets where we bicker. She just wants me and Michael to get along. She wants us to be normal with each other. She hopes that a little alcohol and quality time will lubricate things between us. She goes back to the bar, and I piss, and scowl, and check my phone.