‘Play tug-o-war, more likely,’ Roisin muttered, going to retrieve the paper. She squatted down and pulled a few sheets of the newsprint loose; the title of a book that had been reviewed jumped out at her and falling back on to her bum she sat cross-legged scanning what the reviewer had to say about it. It was called, ‘When We Were Brave’ by Cliona Whelan. The author had swapped journalism for novel writing after a long career which had seen her at the forefront of women breaking into the male dominated newspaper world in Ireland back in the seventies. This was her first book, Roisin read, her attention well and truly caught. The actual review was all very high faluting and could have been summed up simply by saying this was a great book, I recommend you read it. They were a pretentious lot, those literary types. It did sound like a good story though, she thought, getting up. It would make a good Christmas present for Aisling; she was a reader. The thought of hitting the shops this time of year filled her with dread. It would be chaos but it had seemed silly to lug gifts over from London. She’d take Moira with her, she decided. Moira was good at getting people to move out of the way.
‘Mummy,’ Noah whined, growing ever more impatient, although she saw looking over, he had removed Mr Nibbles from the table. He’d set him down on the floor and was impatient to get on with the task at hand. For Pooh’s part he seemed totally uninterested in the little creature but then, Roisin supposed that was probably because Mr Nibbles was a boy gerbil. That didn’t mean she trusted him though.
‘Come on then, we’ll go in the bedroom to clean it all up.’
‘Oh, no you don’t. You can forget about cleaning that thing inside. Outside with the pair of you.’ Maureen appeared in the living room doorway and gestured to her little balcony. A Parisian style table and chair looked forlorn as they were lashed by the wind and intermittent drizzle.
Roisin could almost hear the wind whistling from where she was standing. ‘But, Mammy, it’s freezing, the cold would kill him and what if he escapes?’
‘Well you should have thought of that shouldn’t you when you decided to bring that thing with you.’
‘Nana, you’re hurting his feelings and you’re making me feel very sad.’
Another part of the Stop Bullying talk had been about how the children needed to express how they felt. Noah excelled at it and he wasn’t finished yet either.
‘I think you should say sorry to Mr Nibbles, Nana, or I’m going to cry. And, if he ran away or died because he was too cold, I’d be very, very, very, VERY sad.’
Maureen muttered a barely audible, ‘Mr Nibbles my arse.’
‘Mammy, don’t be so mean.’ Roisin added her pennies’ worth and got straight to the point. ‘And come on with you, let’s see the pants.’
Maureen brightened instantly, flashing a big smile as she did her version of a model strutting down the catwalk coming to a halt in the middle of the living room, hands on hips, looking pleased with herself as she struck a pose. ‘I got into them.’
‘I can see that, Mammy.’ Squeezed into them was more to the point. ‘They don’t leave much to the imagination.’
‘They’re grand, look...’ she swung forward bending from her middle, her hair a curtain over her face as she tried to touch her toes and her voice was muffled as she said, ‘I can even do the bendy yoga.’
Pooh tripped over himself in his excitement to get out of his basket.
‘I’d watch out if I were you, Mammy.’
She righted herself quick smart, her face red and mottled with the exertion of it all. ‘Don’t you go getting any ideas.’ She shook her finger at the poodle who skulked back to his basket.
‘I might need to wear one of those e-strings under them you girls get about in.’
Roisin must have looked horrified at the thought because Maureen puffed up, ‘Just because I’m a woman of certain years it doesn’t mean I can’t move with the times, Roisin.’
‘To be fair, Mammy. I’m surprised you can move in them at all and I think you mean G-string.’ She narrowed her eyes. She hadn’t counted how many pairs of smalls she’d packed. ‘You better not have—’
‘As if I would.’
Noah interrupted, ‘Nana, you still haven’t said sorry.’ He tapped his foot.
Maureen chewed her lip, her reluctance to grovel to a gerbil plain for all to see.
He raised an expectant eyebrow and Roisin choked back a laugh when he said, ‘I haven’t got all day you know.’ He was parodying her giving him a telling off without even realising it.
Maureen saw the funny side of things and decided to go with it. ‘I’m sorry I hurt your feelings, Mr Nibbles.’
‘Mr Nibbles accepts your apology. There now that wasn’t so bad was it. We’ll say no more about it.’
‘He’s been here before,’ Maureen said to Roisin. ‘I’m sure of it.’ She sighed. ‘Let me keep the pants and you can use the utility room to clean his cage out.’
Roisin pulled her son in the direction of the tiny laundry space before she could change her mind. She didn’t want the pants back now anyway. Not now that Mammy had stretched them.
THE AIR WAS BRACING enough to make Roisin’s eyes water and a battering of stout rain drops were stinging her face. They’d enjoyed a cup of tea and a biscuit and then Mammy had made them rug up like snowmen to take Pooh for his afternoon walk. She was still in the yoga pants. ‘Mammy, slow down,’ she called, but her voice was lost on the salty air. She was holding Noah’s hand tightly as they strode out along the pier. Maureen was grasping Pooh’s leash with a grim determination, the poodle having set off down the long expanse of concrete jutting out to sea at
