I'M labouring up the steepest section of the hill above the promenade when the twins run ahead. At least we're past the main road by the railway station. 'Don't cross — ' I shout or rather gasp.
Perhaps each of them thinks or pretends to think I'm addressing the other, because they don't slow down until they reach the first side street and dodge around the corner.
'Stay there,' I pant. They're already out of sight, having crouched below the garden wall. I wonder if they're angry with me by association with their parents, since Geraldine wasn't bought a kite to replace the one she trampled to bits when yesterday's weather let her down. They did appear to relish watching teenage drivers speed along the promenade for at least a few minutes, which may mean they aren't punishing me for their boredom. In any case I ought to join in the game. 'Where are those children?' I wonder as loudly as my climb leaves breath for. 'Where can they be?'
I seem to glimpse an answering movement beyond a bush at the far end of the wall. No doubt a bird is hiding in the foliage, since the twins pop their heads up much closer. Their small plump eight-year-old faces are gleeful, but there's no need for me to feel they're sharing a joke only with each other. Then Geraldine cries 'Peep.'
Like a chick coming out of its shell, as Auntie Beryl used to say. I can do without remembering what else she said, but where has Geraldine learned this trick? Despite the August sunshine, a wind across the bay traces my backbone with a shiver. Before questioning Geraldine I should usher the children across the junction, and as I plod to the corner I wheeze, 'Hold my —»
There's no traffic up here. Nevertheless I'm dismayed that the twins dash across the side street and the next one to the road that begins on the summit, opposite the Catholic church with its green skullcap and giant hatpin of a cross. They stop outside my house, where they could be enjoying the view of the bay planted with turbines to farm the wind. Though I follow as fast as I'm able, Gerald is dealing the marble bellpush a series of pokes by the time I step onto the mossy path. Catching my breath makes me sound harsh as I ask 'Geraldine, who taught you that game?'
She giggles, and so does Gerald. 'The old woman,' he says.
I'm about to pursue this when Paula opens my front door. 'Don't say that,' she rebukes him.
Her face reddens, emphasizing how her cropped hair has done the reverse. It's even paler by comparison with the twins' mops, so that I wonder if they're to blame. Before I can put my reluctant question, Gerald greets the aromas from the kitchen by demanding, 'What's for dinner?'
'We've made you lots of good things while you've been looking after grandpa.'
The twins don't think much of at least some of this, although I presume the reference to me was intended to make them feel grownup. They push past their mother and race into the lounge, jangling all the ornaments. 'Careful,' Paula calls less forcefully than I would prefer. 'Share,' she adds as I follow her to the kitchen, where she murmurs, 'What game were you quizzing them about?'
'You used to play it with babies. I'm not saying you. People did.' I have a sudden image of Beryl thrusting her white face over the side of my cot, though if that ever happened, surely I wouldn't remember. 'Peep,' I explain and demonstrate by covering my eyes before raising my face above my hand.
Paula's husband Bertie glances up from vigorously stirring vegetables in the wok he and Paula brought with them. 'And what was your issue with that?'
Surely I misunderstood Gerald, which can be cleared up later. 'Your two were playing it,' I say. 'A bit babyish at their age, do you think?'
'Good Lord, they're only children. Let them have their fun till they have to get serious like the rest of us,' he says and cocks his head towards a squabble over television channels. 'Any chance you could restore some balance in there? Everything's under control in here.'
I'm perfectly capable of cooking a decent meal. I've had to be since Jo died. I feel as if I'm being told where to go and how to act in my own house. Still, I should help my remaining family, and so I bustle to the lounge, where the instant disappearance of a channel leaves the impression that a face dropped out of sight as I entered. Gerald has captured the remote control and is riffling through broadcasts. 'Stop that now,' I urge. 'Settle on something.'
They haven't even sat on the furniture. They're bouncing from chair to chair by way of the equally venerable sofa in their fight over the control. 'I think someone older had better take charge,' I say and hold out my hand until Gerald flings the control beside me on the sofa. The disagreement appears to be over two indistinguishably similar programmes in which vaguely Oriental cartoon animals batter one another with multicoloured explosions and other garish displays of power. I propose watching real animals and offer a show set in a zoo for endangered species, but the response makes me feel like a member of one. My suggestion of alternating scenes from each chosen programme brings agreement, though only on dismissing the idea, and Geraldine capitulates to watching her brother's choice.
The onscreen clamour gives me no chance to repeat my question. When I try to sneak the volume down, the objections are deafening. I don't want Paula and her husband to conclude I'm useless — I mustn't give them any excuse to visit even less often — and so I hold my peace, if there can be said to be any in the room. The cartoon is still going off when we're summoned to dinner.
I do my best to act as I feel expected to behave. I consume every grain and shoot and chunk of my meal, however much it reminds me of the cartoon. When my example falls short of the twins I'm compelled to encourage them aloud — 'Have a bit more or you won't get any bigger' and 'That's lovely, just try it' and in some desperation 'Eat up, it's good for you.' Perhaps they're sick of hearing about healthy food at home. I feel clownishly false and even more observed than I did over the television. I'm quite relieved when the plates are scraped clean and consigned to the dishwasher.
I'd hoped the twins might have grown up sufficiently since Christmas to be prepared to go to bed before the adults, but apparently holidays rule, and the table is cleared for one of the games Gerald has insisted on bringing. Players take turns to insert plastic sticks in the base of a casket, and the loser is the one whose stick releases the lid and the contents, a wagging head that I suppose is meant to be a clown's, given its whiteness and shock of red hair and enlarged eyes and wide grin just as fixed. I almost knock the game to the floor when one of my shaky attempts to take care lets out the gleeful head, and then I have to feign amusement for the children's sake. At first I'm glad when Gerald is prevailed upon to let his sister choose a game.
It's Monopoly. I think only its potential length daunts me until the children's behaviour reminds me how my aunt would play. They sulk whenever a move goes against them and crow if one fails to benefit their twin, whereas Beryl would change any move she didn't like and say 'Oh, let me have it' or simply watch to see whether anyone noticed. 'Peep,' she would say and lower her hand in front of her eyes if she caught us watching. My parents pretended that she didn't cheat, and so I kept quiet, even though she was more than alert to anyone else's mistakes.
Eventually I try conceding tonight's game in the hope the other adults will, but it seems Paula's husband is too much of a stockbroker to relinquish even toy money. The late hour enlivens the twins or at any rate makes them more active, celebrating favourable moves by bouncing on the chairs. 'Careful of my poor old furniture,' I say, though I'm more dismayed by the reflection of their antics in the mirror that backs the dresser, just the top of one tousled red head or the other springing up among the doubled plates. I'm tired enough to fancy that an unkempt scalp rendered dusty by the glass keeps straying into view even while the twins are still or at least seated. Its owner would be at my back, but since nobody else looks, I won't. Somewhat earlier than midnight Bertie wins the game and sits back satisfied as the twins start sweeping hotels off the board in vexation. 'I think someone's ready for bed,' I remark.
'You go, then,' says Gerald, and his sister giggles in agreement.
'Let grandpa have the bathroom first,' says their mother.
Does she honestly believe I was referring to myself? 'I won't be long,' I promise, not least because I've had enough of mirrors. Having found my toothbrush amid the visiting clutter, I close my eyes while wielding it. 'Empty now,' I announce on the way to my room. In due course a squabble migrates from the bathroom to the bunks next door and eventually trails into silence. Once I've heard Paula and her husband share the bathroom, which is more than her mother and I ever did, there are just my thoughts to keep me awake.
I don't want to think about the last time I saw Beryl, but I can't help remembering when her playfulness turned unpleasant. It was Christmas Eve, and she'd helped or overseen my mother in making dozens of mince
