Exclusive Extract

 

When the Boys Are Away

By Sarah Webb

Chapter One

‘Mum, there’re here!’ Dan yells down from his bedroom window look-out. ‘Batten down the hatches.’

‘Dan, shush! They’ll hear you.’ I wipe my wet hands on the front of my jeans and walk out of the kitchen into the hall. I have about three minutes until Maureen and Joe, my sort of in-laws descend upon us, an hour earlier than expected. I scamper around the hall pushing Lily’s wonky wheeled buggy against one wall, picking stray crisps off the deeply scuffed wooden floor and kicking Dan’s runners towards the shoe rack under the stairs.

The doorbell shrills. I stand for a moment, take a deep breath and smooth back my hair, tucking any wispy ends behind my ears. I’ve been rushing around all day in preparation for the onslaught and I know my face is glowing like a lobster but there isn’t much I can do about that now.

As I open the door, Grasshopper, my brother’s idiot black puppy - half greyhound, half Labrador - flies out of the kitchen and throws herself against it with a thump, her tail thrashing around like an out of control garden hose. The doorbell rings again.

‘Just coming,’ I say loudly.

Grasshopper jumps against the door again, spraying the floor with the special pee she reserves for visitors. She has a weak bladder and excitement sends her over the edge. Of course my brother didn’t tell me this until he was well out of the country.

I put my legs on either side of the dog and grab her by the collar. Then I open the door a crack.

Maureen puts her twiggy fingers on the door jamb and pushes the door open wider.

‘What’s going on in there?’ she demands. ‘Are you going to let us in Meg? Fine welcome this is.’

‘Maureen.’ I hear Joe’s voice of reason in the background.

‘I’m just trying to deal with the dog and then I’ll be right back to you,’ I trill in my best stressed-out-but-trying-not-to-let-it-get-to-me voice. Don’t go away now.’ I close the door again, slowly so Maureen has a chance to extract her fingers.

‘Dan!’ I scream up the stairs. ‘Dan, I need you. Urgently!’

Dan appears at the top of the stairs and stares down at me. Grasshopper yelps with delight. She loves Dan.

‘Take this stupid mutt outside.’

‘Did she piss on the floor again?’

‘Dan, watch the language. You know what Maureen’s like.’

‘Sorry. Did she urinate on the floor again?’

I stifle a smile. ‘Just do it!’

Dan runs down the stairs, grabbing the newel post at the bottom and swinging himself half-way down the hall. The banisters shake ominously. Grasshopper barks loudly and tries to run towards Dan; but I have a firm grip on her collar, so instead her feet splay out like a cartoon dog as she skitters on the hard surface of the floor.

‘Dan would you stop doing that. How many times to I have to tell you? You’ll break the banisters and Simon won’t be pleased.’

‘It was Murphy who taught me how to do it,’ Dan replies with a grin.

‘And don’t call him that. Maureen hates it. Call him Simon, OK?’

‘Sure.’ Dan takes Grasshopper from me and drags her towards the kitchen. ‘Will I put her outside?’

‘Yes!’

I follow Dan into the kitchen, grab some disinfectant spray and a large handful of kitchen roll and then deal with Grasshopper’s mess in the hall.

Finally I open the door. Maureen is standing on the doorstep, her arms folded in front of her, tapping her smartly-loafered foot impatiently, with a face on her that would sour lemons.

‘What’s going on Meg?’ she says, bustling past, enveloping me in a cloud of expensive perfume and looking around the hall. ‘What’s that smell?’

‘Dog,’ I say, leaving it at that. She’ll find out about Grasshopper’s bladder soon enough, I hope rather wickedly. ‘Watch the floor,’ I add. ‘It’s wet.’

Joe steps forward and gives me a kiss on the cheek, his woolly salt and pepper beard tickling my cheek. He’s a jolly man, originally from Newcastle, with rosy cheeks and a shock of white hair. The complete opposite of his tall, stick insect wife, London born and bred Maureen.

‘Hello my dear, lovely to see you.’ Joe holds both my shoulders firmly and beams at me. ‘I hope we haven’t inconvenienced you by arriving so early. We were going to grab a coffee first, but Maureen was dying to see Lily - you know what she’s like.’

Maureen sniffs. ‘The afternoon ferry gets in at four. Always has, always will. You and Simon really should communicate better, Meg dear. Don’t you have some sort of wall planner or master diary for the house?’

‘No. Simon isn’t really the wall planner type of guy, Maureen, as well you know.’

She sniffs again. ‘I suppose not. But in my day the wife-’ She breaks off. ‘How silly of me. The wife indeed. What should I call you, Meg? The girlfriend, the partner?’

Spare me, I think, not already! ‘Just Meg is fine,’ I say through tight lips. She’s only been in the house two minutes but I know Maureen’s only getting started. She hates the fact that Simon and I aren’t married. I’d redeemed myself a little in her eyes after giving birth to Lily, her first ‘proper’ grandchild, but our marriage, or lack of, is a subject she never seems to tire of, unfortunately.

‘Thanks for having us to stay again,’ Joe says, ignoring Maureen’s barb. ‘We just can’t keep away.’ He throws a look at Maureen.

‘Yes, thanks for inviting us,’ she adds, distracted, her eyes wandering into the kitchen. She’s looking for Lily.

I bite my lip. I didn’t invite them. Simon didn’t invite them. Maureen invited herself and Joe largely does as he’s told. This is the third time they’ve been over since Christmas. As Joe says, Maureen just can’t stay away. It has very little to do with either me, Simon, or Dan; and everything to do with Lily. Maureen is completely obsessed with Lily, who, at two is largely oblivious to the attention. But if there was an adoration of Lily competition, my own parents or Joe wouldn’t get a look in: Maureen would win hands down. I’ve never seen anything like it.

‘Simon here yet?’ Joe asks as I lead them into the kitchen.

‘No. His flight’s delayed. He won’t be here until after seven. But don’t worry, he said to go ahead and eat without him. I know you like to eat before six, Maureen.’

‘Are you going to the airport to collect him?’ Maureen asks. ‘We can look after Lily.’

‘No, he’s getting a taxi.’

Maureen clicks her tongue against her bottom teeth.

I give her a forced smile. ‘If you’d like to drive to Dublin airport to collect him, be my guest. It’s about an hour’s drive there if the traffic’s good. And a good hour back again.’

Joe puts his hand on his wife’s arm. ‘Maureen, Simon spends his life in airports. He doesn’t expect to be collected anymore.’

‘I see.’ Maureen shrugs his hand away. Clearly she doesn’t. Then she spots Lily out the kitchen window. ‘What’s Lily doing?’

I look out the window. Lily is trying to sit on Grasshopper. She has a brown patch down one leg of her best denims. I sigh.

‘Dan!’

He looks up from his play station.

I smile at him. ‘Come over and say hello to Maureen and Joe. And then I have to wash Lily. She has dog poo on her leg.’

‘Yuck!’ Maureen wrinkles her nose. ‘How disgusting.’

‘Grasshopper’s always shitting,’ Dan says calmly. ‘Hi Joe, Hi Maureen.’

‘Nana Maureen,’ Maureen corrects him. ‘And I don’t think that’s fitting language for an eleven-year-old.’

‘Sorry. Pooing.’ Undeterred by the ticking off, Dan throws his arms around Joe’s waist. ‘Hello, Joe,’ he says with an upward lilt in his voice.

Joe gives him a warm hug and then ruffles his hair. ‘What have you been getting up to young man?’

Dan draws back. ‘Not much.’

‘How’s school?’

Dan scowls. ‘Horrible.’

‘I have something for you.’ Joe reaches into his pocket and hands Dan a twenty euro note. ‘Buy yourself a CD or something.’

‘Thanks, Joe.’ Dan gives him another hug.

‘Joe! That’s far too much. He’s only a boy,’ Maureen says.

‘You’ve been shopping for Lily all month,’ Joe reminds her. ‘And sewing like a maniac.’

My heart sinks. Not more of Maureen’s out of shape, one arm longer than the other cotton tunics. Why couldn’t she be a master knitter instead? I’d love a set of miniature jumpers or cardigans. I only put the damn tunics on Lily when Maureen is over, otherwise they’re to the back of the wardrobe with the weird Thanksgiving turkey suit the American cousins sent over last year and the tiny pink and white flowery wetsuit that Simon bought for Lily in the Caribbean and that I don’t have the heart to give to the charity shop, even if she has long grown out of it.

‘And I’ll bring you to town to get a new play station game tomorrow, if that’s all right with your mother,’ Joe adds.

I smile at him. ‘Of course. What do you say, Dan?’

‘Thanks! I know exactly what I want too.’ While Joe and Dan discuss games, I’m left with Maureen. She’s already out the back door on a rescue mission.

‘Let’s get Granny’s little angel out of those dirty, dirty clothes,’ she says to Lily. ‘And away from that filthy dog.’

Lily looks up at Maureen and then back at Grasshopper. She hangs onto the dog’s coat for dear life while Maureen tries to extract her.

‘Come on, Lily,’ Maureen coaxes. ‘Come to Nana Maureen.’

‘No Ganny,’ Lily says. ‘Doggie! Doggie!’

I should step in to help but I’m rooted to the spot, trying not to laugh.

‘Come on now,’ Maureen persists, ‘there’s a good little girl.’

‘No!’ Lily wails. ‘Doggie, doggie, doggie!’

‘Meg, for heaven’s sake don’t just stand there,’ Maureen says, ‘help me.’

I prise open Lily’s tiny hands and Grasshopper runs away. Lily is the only one of us she’s scared of and I don’t blame her.

‘Don’t pick Lily up-’ I begin, but it’s too late. Maureen is holding a soiled Lily to her bony chest.

‘Shit,’ Maureen says under her breath when she realises what she’s done.

‘Shit!’ Lily repeats. ‘Shit, shit, shit!’

 

When the Boys Are Away, published 2^nd March by Macmillan is available from all good bookshops or from www.amazon.co.uk or www.eason.ie