Summertime

by Raffaella Barker

  Vile, vile, vile. Revenge shall be mine.

  July 25th

  Revenge was indeed mine, and I am collecting it now from the trophy shop. Felix has won a cup for outstanding genius of some sort. None of us was listening when it was awarded, so we don’t know what it is for precisely, but it is his. He won it. All by himself. Giles has won one too. I think for cricket, but maybe music. Actually, I don’t care what they are for. I am brimming with ignoble triumph. My children have two cups. And Bronwyn Butterstone’s children have none. Ha ha. Must stop gloating now, or a mishap might befall me.

  July 26th

  Allow myself another quick gloat today when polishing Felix’s already gleaming cup. It is more or less an Oscar, being for drama. Am so pleased that I forget that I hate David, and try to ring him. A female answerphone says that David is away for the weekend. He has run away with the electronic voice simulator, I knew it.

  July 27th

  Horror. The children are on summer holiday now and do not go to school again for more than fifty days. They gleefully inform me of this during a pillow fight this morning. When the pillow fight is over, Giles slumps on the floor, still in his pyjamas, and groans, ‘Mum, I’m really bored, can we go to Norwich?’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘Oh, I dunno, just to look around at the shops and stuff. It’s just so dull here. There’s nothing to do.’

  Horrible little ingrate, how can he be so unspeakable? Exasperation flares and I have to leave the room to prevent myself from kicking him as he rolls about at the bottom of the bed, yanking sheets down over himself in a welter of boredom. Shut the door behind me, and take a series of deep, yogic breaths, trying to do the ones which bypass your nostrils and feel as though your throat itself is breathing (much easier than it sounds). In … and … out… in … and … out…

  Into my silent and tranquil space falls Felix’s voice, agreeing with Giles. ‘Yeah, it’s so boring. It’s totally chod. Let’s ask Mum if we can play Nintendo if we can’t go to Norwich.’

  Inner calm departs and temper rises to breaking point in seconds. Outside it is already hot. We have a garden, a cricket bat, streams and water meadows around us. We have bicycles and dogs, a tree house and those sodding Tarzan vines. It isn’t raining, in fact it’s hot enough to make ice creams an imperative. How can they be like this? Will I survive for fifty days? Must stop looking at it like this, it is reminding me of Noah in his ark, and he only had forty days with mad animals. Decide that most dignified course of action is to ignore the children, so depart to the garden to pick roses and sweet peas. Put on a straw hat and wafty shawl for this, as wish to become Vita S. W. for a while, as she was certainly unfazed by irritating children.

  Am fully in character and wondering if I should become a lesbian, when Hedley and Tamsin appear on bicycles. Abandon lesbian fantasies, as Tamsin’s brave little face reminds me that dumping children for love is not on. Suppose I could take mine with me to lesbian love nest, but doubt they would come.

  Am alarmed to have Hedley on my territory, as the children have not seen him since he and I became Dido and Aeneas, and I am not sure how, or indeed if, to break it to them. Hedley also seems alarmed, and keeps his eyes on the ground, mumbling in a fashion I find deeply irritating. We discuss the weather, and Hedley asks the boys if they are enjoying the holidays.

  ‘Yes thanks,’ lies Giles without looking up, then slides off with Tamsin and Felix, back into the darkened playroom to finish the next level of Peekaboo with Pikachu or whatever the frightful game is called. Realise that to them, Hedley’s behaviour is normal. They never look anyone in the eye unless forced to. Hedley and I are left alone. Finally he raises his head and we look at each other helplessly.

  ‘Tamsin’s mother has left to go to Ibiza for the summer with her girlfriend, and Tamsin has turned against her and elected to stay with me. She says she wants to be here with Giles and Felix,’ says Hedley finally, adding with what he must imagine to be a roguish grin, ‘I feel that the gods are conspiring in favour of our union, dear Venetia.’

  Union. Union. How can he say such toe-curling things? And not only do I let him, I positively encourage him. Here I go again.

  ‘We’re going camping next week at the sea. Would you and Tamsin like to come?’

  He looks absurdly pleased. Only when he has wobbled off on his bike to go and hunt out his tent from his schooldays do I remember that I have also invited Rose and Tristan.

  There is no way of making this seem less bad than it is.

  July 29th

  It is eight-thirty, and so far this morning I have received four telephone calls, three of them telling me I am mad, and one of them beeping and squeaking in an international fashion, which suggests either David or Martians are trying to make themselves heard.

  The mad calls are from my mother, my newly sensible brother Desmond, and Vivienne. All of them appear to think I am an imbecile and not fit to go camping. Surely camping cannot be so difficult?

  I flatly refuse to believe Desmond, who says, ‘You know you’ll have to boil all the water for washing-up or you’ll get dysentery.’

  ‘We won’t do washing-up,’ I reply loftily. ‘I’m getting paper cups and plates.’

  ‘What about saucepans?’ His new-found fascination with washing-up must have something to do with being married. Most odd. I do not remember our nuptial vows having this effect on Charles. Am losing interest in the argument, and am irritated that he has missed the point: we are to be rugged hunter-gatherers and will be cooking sausages on toasting forks and spearing fish and barbecuing. Saucepans are not on my list of things to take camping.

  My mother says, ‘I’m in a hurry, I just wanted to say remember to take a bladder of water, if you must go camping. But if I were you I’d take them all to CenterParcs instead – that way you’ll get a proper break yourself.’

  Feel like adding, ‘Yes, and a lobotomy,’ but she has rung off.

  Vivienne just sighs and says, ‘Well, if you really are set on this scheme, I suppose Simon and I will have to come and keep an eye on you. Now what about packing?’

  I pretend there is something wrong with the telephone and hang up, so incensed am I by her patronising tone. Still, huge relief to think of her and Simon with their peerless Boy Scout and Girl Guide skills, coming to help us rub sticks together and so forth.

  Take my list, and the children, to the tiny army surplus and outward-bound shop on the coast road as soon as I am off the telephone. The man in the shop gapes wordlessly when I show him the list, then pulls himself together and says, ‘And these are your fellow campers? Very bold, madam, very bold. I recommend you take these emergency flares, and I can rent you this battery-operated radio set, which is tuned straight into the emergency services.’

  Felix and Giles rush at a giant black box with aerials and dials. ‘Cool, they had one of these in the MASH video we watched at Simon and Vivienne’s,’ says Giles. ‘It’s for the Vietcong, I think.’

  ‘What I really want is camp beds,’ I wail, ‘and a bladder.’ May as well not bother speaking. All three children and the shop owner have vanished inside a purple tent almost as big as my house, with a card on the front announcing, Knock-down price for shop-soiled twelve-man tent, £699.

  Chart their progress by the bulges in the side as The Beauty hurls herself at the walls, testing and breaking the surface tension. After five minutes, it is clear that no one is coming out, so I must go in.

  July 31st

  A bunch of inflatable plastic bananas arrives in the post from David, and a penknife. Giles emerges looking anxious from my study, where he has been fiddling with the computer.

  ‘David sent an email saying does Mum know that storms are forecast here this weekend, and not to forget the drinking water,’ he reports, frown deepening as he adds, ‘and he’s given me the number of a friend of his who is a lifeboatman. I think he’s really worried about us. But he says Gertie will love it.’

  ‘Oh, no! We’re not taking that
sodding parrot, are we?’

  Giles looks pained. ‘Of course we are, unless you’re thinking of sending her back to the parrot hotel.’ There is undisguised menace in his tone, and I am far too guilty and keen to curry favour to stare him out. Instead groan at length and throw him a box. ‘Well, you’d better pack for her. And don’t forget her distilled water.’

  March on through the house, trying to be organised, thinking bitterly about David. He was the one who organised this summer holiday treat, ages ago before he went away. It is the kind of thing he is very good at, and I am extremely bad at, and this knowledge does not improve my mood one bit. However, there is no time for introspection, as I have to find four camp beds and a sleeping bag for me.

  Have purchased a very delightful cocoon for The Beauty in the shape of a pink mini-sleeping bag. She loves it and has not got out of it except for a bath since yesterday morning, and shuffles around the house looking like a snail without a shell, or, as Felix points out, ‘A raspberry slug.’

  August

  August 1st

  Still no camp beds. Am smitten with incompetence and spend the day loafing about in the garden instead of packing. Take dogs to kennels a day early to give myself a mini home holiday from their panting, eating and sagging about in the heat. Lovely without them, must remember to do it again, as really does feel like a proper holiday but costs only three pounds per dog with a discount if I leave them for ten days. In the peace of their absence I cook a chicken and leave it to cool on the kitchen table, something that can usually only be done after exhaustive chaining-up of dogs and closing of windows and all doors. Make some ice and feel smugly sure that I am on top of the pre-camping situation.

  August 2nd

  Yesterday’s sensation was misplaced. I am very behind, in fact, and not ready for anything. Simon has brought us camp beds and told me to take spare two-stroke petrol for the boat. Instead I pack the Scrabble board and several hundredweight of mini Mars bars.

  Midnight

  Torrential rain and thunderclaps like cannon fire wake me, and I have to rush downstairs and out into the gushing, streaming garden to shut the car sunroof and push the tent into the porch. Although it is raining hard, the night is hot. My nightie is soaked as if buckets of water have been poured over me; I grab a tea towel from the pile of unsorted laundry in the hall and begin to rub my hair dry. The rain continues, streaming from the guttering, bouncing mud-pie splatters of earth up from the flower beds and on to the step. The sky is soft black, with twists of silver glitter where the falling rain catches the light from the hall. Gaze out at the lawn, listening to the soft thump of raindrops landing on it, inhaling the leaf-and-water soft air. We will have to cancel our camping trip. Sudden claustrophobia and random naturist urge overcome me, and shedding my nightie and the wet tea towel, I run out into the storm again wearing only my yellow wellingtons.

  ‘Ladi-da-di-daaa,’ I warble, frisking about with my arms outstretched, warm rain drumming onto my shoulders and face as I twirl and prance on the lawn, dissolving tension and hysteria with every pirouette. Suddenly notice Giles and Felix at the open front door, gazing at me with their arms folded across their chests. Hooray, we can be a naturist family.

  ‘Come on boys, it’s lovely,’ I gasp. ‘Quickly, take your clothes off, you’ll feel so invigorated.’

  Both of them spring away as if I have rabies, alarm and consternation on their faces.

  ‘No thanks,’ says Giles politely. Felix has more to say.

  ‘Mum. Why aren’t you wearing any clothes? It’s the middle of the night, someone might see you.’

  Giles nudges him. ‘Silly, no one will see her because it’s the middle of the night.’ Felix looks relieved and wanders off into the kitchen.

  ‘Thank God,’ he says, reaching for the mini Mars bars.

  August 3rd

  What insane impulse has brought us to this spot? We have gone beyond the edge of Norfolk, off into the sea to a sandy peninsula inhabited only by seals, terns and the occasional lunatic birdwatcher. We are brushing our teeth in salt water and living according to the tides. We have no electricity and no running water, just some fishing nets, a tent and an open fire to cook on. The sun is blasting down in a most uncharacteristic fashion and I have forgotten my sunglasses, so will soon develop ancient person’s crow’s feet around my eyes from squinting. If I don’t get flu after my singing in the rain session, about which Giles said at breakfast, ‘Mum, please don’t talk about last night. I’m trying to eat and I don’t want you to put me off.’

  Rose and Tristan are meant to be here, but Tristan has managed to develop a migraine, so they won’t arrive until tomorrow. They will not like it, although they both pretend that they are longing to come. Rose was not born to camp. She likes to be able to wash her hair every day and to lounge around in steaming baths, inhaling attar of roses and so forth. Her silver-blonde hair and translucent skin were never intended for dirt, and all her clothes are made of silk or cashmere, and are as far removed from salty canvas and cotton ticking as it is possible to be. I take small solace in the fact that she won’t be able to observe the decline of her glamour, as there is no mirror here, unless you count the curious disc of wrinkled silver foil someone has hung on the wall of the corrugated iron hut we shall be inhabiting this week.

  Am actually quite amazed that we have made it here at all, as we left home this morning at sunrise in order to catch the tide, in such a welter of anxiety that I forgot the directions and the name and address of the woman with the key. I was half expecting not to be able to come, due to the freak weather conditions, and stayed up much too late with Giles and Felix, drinking cocoa by the Aga, drying my hair and searching for packs of cards to the unabated accompaniment of furious rain. However, I awoke at the first trill of The Beauty, who rises with the dawn chorus these days, and discovered a sparkling world with rose-flushed sunrise and the orderly drip, drip sound of things trying to dry out. Suddenly had to leap into action and pack the car, rouse the children, eat breakfast and get into the car by seven o’clock. Hence the forgetting of the key holder’s address, and who knows what else. Discovery of this disaster took place too far from home to go back, therefore had to bribe the children with sweets and Radio One in order to snatch a few moments in which to lie on the roadside next to the car in an attempt to meditate and therefore retrieve vital key information from my scrambled brain.

  It worked. In the background, Giles’s favourite song by Offspring snarled away with something about hating a bitch who’s got a job, and I lay on the warm, dew-damp verge with my eyes closed against the rosy morning and attempted to exhale a ribbon of breath. Like magic, after a few false starts in which hyperventilating began, the hypnotic big breaths took over, and the name and address of the keyholder pinged into my consciousness, emerging in a rush like change in a pay and display machine. Most gratifying.

  Onward to the coast, leaving verdant, heartbreaking summer country bursting with cows and flowering hedgerows behind us, in favour of glittering, Hemingway denim sea. We arrive at the coast at Felix’s favourite point, the place where the hairy mammoth was found buried in the chalk cliffs, having lain for centuries beneath layers of sandy soil. He adores this piece of local history, and never tires of each detail, seeing the mammoth rather in the role of Sleeping Beauty in her briary castle, awaiting rescue. The mammoth’s Prince Charming was a disobedient dog, a poodle, Felix insists. The dog was supposed to be playing catch with a ball on the beach with its owner, one winter morning three years ago. Tiring of the game, the poodle whisked away up the cliff in pursuit of a smell and disappeared into a crevice.

  Felix leans back in the passenger seat, eyes shining, gazing at the cliff’s edge, a serrated line cutting between the feathered golden cornfield and the sea.

  ‘Yes,’ he says, ‘and that poodle must have thought he was hallucinating when he found a giant dinosaur bone. He must have felt so lucky.’

  Giles interrupts without looking up. ‘Mammoths aren’t di
nosaurs, they’re Neolithic,’ and keeps his nose glued to the Nintendo magazine he has been reading non-stop since his father sent it to him three days ago. Felix wisely ignores him.

  ‘And he must have been really well trained to go and give it to his master and not just sit up on the cliff having a huge feast with it. And then it would have been really disappointing to see your bone going off to the museum. I hope they went to the butcher and bought him a good one. I wish I had a dog like that. Rags has never done anything exciting like discovering mammoths.’

  The Beauty’s radar has picked up the words ‘dog’ and ‘bone’, and from her seat in the back she suddenly bursts into appropriate song, in the manner of Olivia Newton John.

  ‘Nick nack paddy wack

  Give a dog a bone

  This old man goes rolling home.’

  Felix and I need little encouragement to join in, and we eclipse Giles’s radio station entirely.

  Such pleasures become a thing of the past on the quayside, where challenges to sanity and integrity pile up. Felix, Giles and I load the hired motor boat so full that the Plimsoll line vanishes beneath the water, while The Beauty assembles several buckets of stones and tries to put them on board as well, as ballast presumably.

  ‘Just go, you’ll be fine,’ urges the exasperated owner of the boat, having spent almost an hour helping us shift pillows, camp beds, food, water and finally The Beauty in a smart, if tight, orange life jacket, from the car on to the boat. Everything, including The Beauty, becomes instantly wet upon settling in the boat, and I feel both carsick and seasick due to the strong smell of petrol emanating from the outboard motor and the wobbly jelly sensation of being in a boat on water.

  ‘You know how to do it, don’t you?’ barks the boat owner, as an afterthought, having jumped clear of our craft, leaving us forlornly alone on the water. Nod determinedly and wiggle the handle about. Terrible strimmer-like whine starts and the boat veers, spins and heads straight for the bows of a larger, smarter sailing boat which is loading up with four middle-aged yacht-club types. Like a rabbit caught by a snake, I stare madly at the side of the boat we are approaching, so completely paralysed with terror that no messages at all are transmitting to my brain. To no avail does our boat owner shriek, ‘Turn to port. TO PORT, I SAID!’ It means nothing to me, my hand is locked full throttle on the handle and I can do nothing.