‘No doubt your mum will follow when she’s ready.’ Gran walked away towards the kitchen. ‘Cup of tea?’
‘I’m not a tea drinker. Do you have anything cold? Anything fizzy?’
‘I’m afraid not – all those bubbles don’t agree with me. But I can get some in,’ she added as an afterthought as though it might be enough for Audrey to want to stay here.
‘I’ll just have a water then, please.’ Audrey hoped they’d get into their groove soon, that they wouldn’t have to be quite this polite for the entire duration of her stay, or it was going to be the least fun summer ever.
Audrey took the glass of water as the front door opened and Sam finally came in.
‘Sam, lovely to see you,’ said Gran, although Audrey picked up on the undercurrent of tension, the same feeling she got the last time she’d seen them both within the same four walls. They didn’t hug either and Audrey wondered what it took to drive such a wedge between the pair. Although maybe she didn’t need to wonder – it was the way things were heading between her and her mum too; perhaps it was a family trait.
Sam accepted the cup of tea, Audrey busied herself bringing in all of the boxes, although by the time they’d all been taken up to the room that was to be hers until the end of August, the atmosphere was still just as stilted as before. Anyone would think they didn’t know each other at all. Her mum was rambling on about the storm last week, Gran told her about a magnificent rainbow she’d shown to one of the neighbours, and then talk moved to the vegetable curry Gran was making for dinner. Audrey was impressed; curry didn’t sound like a gran thing. Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad staying here after all.
Audrey grabbed a chocolate biscuit from the tin in the kitchen and headed back to her bedroom. She wanted to make it as homely as possible to survive this exile.
‘Audrey,’ came Gran’s voice, intercepting her. ‘Please eat that in the kitchen, it’s the place for food, nowhere else.’
Jeez, even her mum wasn’t this strict.
Audrey returned down the three stairs she’d progressed up, scoffed the biscuit and then charged up the stairs before anyone could stop her again. She opened up her boxes: onto the white table along one wall went a stack of books, all thrillers. She plugged her phone charger in and got that going, she put out her Hollywood make-up mirror with its lights up each side, she put her make-up bags beside it and her hair accessories on one of the shelves beneath. There was a second table in the room and onto that she dumped her schoolwork. She positioned her laptop there, too, in front of the little window that looked out over the playground opposite.
The bedding was at least a nice purple rather than the swirly browns or greens you’d expect in an old person’s house, and the bed was a double rather than the single she had at home. And so Audrey put in her earphones, lay back on her bed and blasted out her Billie Eilish album.
She could get used to this. Away from school, not sharing space with her mum – this was going to be like a holiday in comparison to being at home. Apart from not being allowed to even enjoy a biscuit in her bedroom, that was.
The next day Audrey had a completely different perspective. It seemed Sam had briefed Gran before she left to travel home, and so rather than Audrey schlepping off to a local shopping centre with the paltry allowance her mum had finally caved in to giving her so she wasn’t a burden to her gran, Audrey was to be at her desk by nine o’clock every morning. Gran checked on her too so she daren’t not abide by the rules. This was Gran’s home, after all, and she was doing her a favour by having her here. It was a pretty sad state of affairs though, that Gran had so much time on her hands that she could spend so long obsessing about where her granddaughter was at any given moment of the day. Didn’t she have her own life to deal with? Mind you, the saving grace in all of this was that Gran could cook and she kept Audrey topped up with delicious meals, cakes and treats. You name it, she made it. Her mum rarely cooked unless it was a necessary meal, so it was a novelty that Audrey was pretty sure wouldn’t wear off.
On day four of her stay, Audrey was faced with a new rule. Keeping her door open while she did her schoolwork. This came when Gran caught her sitting opposite her mirror experimenting with make-up when she was supposed to be studying. And it hadn’t gone down well.
‘You look like you’ve got war paint on,’ Veronica told her.
‘I haven’t finished yet. I’ve got to blend it all in.’ Even her mum never came into her room without knocking. She picked up her beauty blender sponge to go over the concealer she’d dotted on areas she wanted to contour.
‘Whatever are you trying to do?’
At least Gran was taking an interest, that was a positive. ‘I’m enhancing the structure of my face. I want to highlight the tops of my cheekbones; I want to shadow my jawline to give a better shape.’
Veronica shook her head. ‘Nothing wrong with the shape of your face – wait till you get to my age and then you’ll know all about losing shape.’
Audrey smiled, but her grin faded when Gran told her that from now on, she’d have to work with the door open. She didn’t come up here often, but when she did, she expected Audrey to be beavering away with school work, not doing her make-up.
Audrey
