Skinny Melon and Me

by Jean Ure

  Actually, the reason I would like to be a judge is so that I could say to children when their parents are trying to get divorced, “Do you want them to get divorced?” and if the children said no, then the parents wouldn’t be able to do it.

  I’d have said no. I didn’t like Mum and Dad quarrelling but I hate having to live with Slimey Roland and Dad having another wife. What I’d have said is you’ve got to turn the house into flats, one upstairs and one downstairs, and Mum can live in one and Dad can live in the other and I could live in both of them and go upstairs or downstairs as I liked. That, I think, would be perfect.

  Or else they could have sold the house and bought two littler ones next door to each other and knocked a hole through the middle. They could be in Southampton so that Dad could still do his new job. They could be in cottages with chimneys and little gardens.

  And Dad could go off to work and Mum could stay at home and read her books and they wouldn’t ever have to see each other if they didn’t want, they could even go out with other people, I wouldn’t mind, just so long as they came home at night and were always there.

  I said all this to Skinny once and she said that if she had a dad she’d want him to live in the same house as her and her mum and her brother and sister and for them all to be together all of the time. This would be her idea of heaven.

  I agree it would be mine if Dad could come back and he and Mum didn’t quarrel.

  There’s a boy at school called Timothy Dunbar who lives with his mum during the week and his dad at weekends. He reckons it’s brilliant as his dad spoils him rotten, giving him presents and taking him to places of interest, which he never did when he was at home. But it’s all right for Timothy Dunbar. His dad only lives just a few streets away and his mum hasn’t gone and got married again.

  Slimey came back tonight. Worse luck. I was hoping he might have fallen through a crack in the paving stones.

  Wednesday

  Mouse droppings and jellied eyeballs. Or maybe it was frogspawn. Either way it was disgusting.

  Now that Mum has told me about the baby she seems to think it’s OK for her to keep on talking about it. She said to me at teatime, while Slime was upstairs with his elves, “What do you think we should call it? Think of some names!” I said, “There aren’t many names that go with Butter.” I said, “Barbara Butter, Brenda Butter, Belinda Butter,” very heavily sarcastic, but that was the wrong thing as Mum immediately thought it meant that I was interested. She said, “Would you like it to be a girl?” Very quickly, and just as sarcastic, I said, “Bertram Butter, Bruce Butter, Bernard Butter.” All Mum said was, “Bernard’s nice! I like Bernard.”

  Bernard Butter? She has to be joking!

  Slimey Roland brought me back a china figure from Newcastle. It is a Victorian lady with a crinoline and the crinoline is made of real lace.

  Mum says it is valuable and that I must be careful not to break it. It is quite nice, I suppose. I have put it on the top shelf near my bed.

  I would much rather have had a dog.

  Thursday

  I have found something new to worry about. Suppose Mum dies while she is having this baby? People do die. In olden times they were always dying in childbirth. Even today it could still happen. I couldn’t sleep last night for thinking about it. It would be all Slimey’s fault! Why couldn’t he keep out of our lives? Why couldn’t he leave Mum alone? We were perfectly happy without him!

  Friday

  I asked Mum two things when I got in from school and to both of them she said no.

  First of all I asked her yet again if I could take sandwiches instead of having school dinner because today it was something quite unspeakable, I mean it looked as if it had been scraped up off the pavement. It is only a question of time before I get terminally poisoned. Mum said, “You can take sandwiches so long as you’re prepared for them to be vegetarian” which as far as I’m concerned is the same as saying no because I am not going to change my eating habits just to please Slime. What’s being veggie ever done for him? Made him look like a fungus. And anyway, it would mean he’d won and then he’d get all unbearable and triumphant.

  So we had a bit of a dispute about it, with me saying why couldn’t I have ham or chicken and Mum saying because it upsets Slime to see dead things in the fridge (and me thinking but not saying that it upsets me to see Slime in the house) and that if I choose to eat meat at school that’s up to me but we’re not going to have it at home, which means we shall all end up looking like fungus. Except by then I shall probably be dead of food poisoning so I suppose it really doesn’t matter.

  Anyhow, we then had tea and I said, “Oh, by the way, Gemma Parker has invited me to her sleep-over tomorrow. Is that OK?” and Mum tightened her lips and said, “Well, no, as a matter of fact I’m afraid I don’t think it is. I think I’d rather that you stayed away from Gemma Parker.”

  I knew she’d say that. She has taken it into her head that Gemma is a bad influence all because last term she heard her say a four-letter word that she doesn’t even know the meaning of. Gemma, that is. It was just something she’d heard her brother say. All the boys say it; all the older ones. Even Skinny’s brother, who Mum thinks is such a “nice young man”. They go round shouting it at each other. It doesn’t mean anything. They think it makes them sound butch and grown-up.

  I said to Mum, “Everybody else is going. I’ll feel left out.” She said, “Not everybody can be. There wouldn’t be room for them.” “Well, everyone who is anyone,” I said. “The Melon, for instance. Her mum doesn’t mind.”

  Mum likes the Melon. I thought it would sway her, but it didn’t. After about ten minutes of arguing she said, “Look, I’m sorry. Cherry, but that is that. I do not want you going to the sleep-over.” I shrieked “Why not? When the Melon is allowed to?” Mum said, “You don’t have to shout at me. What Melanie’s mother allows her to do is neither here nor there. She probably doesn’t know that family as I do. I just don’t trust them.”

  The only reason she says this is because Gemma’s mum smokes cigarettes and she and Slimey think that anyone who smokes cigarettes is some kind of criminal and ought to be locked up, and also because Gemma’s dad happens to work in a place called Franco’s that once got raided by the police, which is hardly Gemma’s dad’s fault. He can’t help where he works. What Mum doesn’t understand is that Gemma is totally naive. She’s like a six year old. Her mum won’t even let her watch television without supervision in case she sees something she shouldn’t.

  I tried explaining this to Mum but she plainly didn’t believe me. She said. “If you ask me, Gemma’s mother is rather flighty.”

  What does she mean, flighty? Does she think she’s a witch, or something?

  Mum told me not to sulk. She said that to make up for not letting me go to the sleep-over, we’d all have a meal in the pizza place tomorrow night and then we’d go to the video shop and I could choose whatever video I wanted. That cheered me up a bit as I thought that I would get something really gross that they normally wouldn’t let me have. But honestly, what does she think we do at sleep-overs? We don’t do anything! Just sit and talk and try on each other’s clothes and then tell scary stories in the dark. Gemma’s such a baby she usually falls asleep.

  I am going to get a really gross DVD.

  Saturday

  I am seriously annoyed. They wouldn’t let me have any of the videos I wanted. Mum said I was just picking them to be awkward, because of her not letting me go to the sleep-over. She said if I couldn’t choose something sensible, then she would have to choose for me. When I pointed out that she had promised me, she said, “Oh, now, Cherry, act your age! You know perfectly well there are limits.”

  She never said anything about limits. She said I could choose whatever I wanted.

  “Anything sensible,” she said.

  They cheat all the time, grown-ups do.

  So while I’m mooching about looking for something sensible, and doing my best to find one they’
d loathe, she and Slimey are wandering over to the kids’ section and mooning about amongst the Walt Disneys. Suddenly I hear Slimey cry, “Oh, look, Butterpat!” (I nearly died. The girl behind the counter had to put her hand over her mouth to stop from sniggering.) “Look, Butterpat! Look at this … Snow White!”

  And Mum squeaks, “Ohh! Snow White!” in a silly little girly voice, and claps her hands. “I haven’t seen that since I was younger than Cherry!”

  Slimey says, “Me neither. It used to be my favourite film when I was five years old.” And Mum says, “Oh, we’ve got to have it! Cherry, it’s all right, we’ve found One … we’re going to watch Snow White!”

  Which we did, whether I liked it or not. Which for the most part I did not. I mean, it’s kids’ stuff. Mum and Slimey sat there on the sofa together going oooh and aaah and “Oh, I remember this bit!” “That bit always terrified me!” Having a right nostalgia binge.

  Afterwards I rang Gemma’s number and spoke to Skinny. I asked her how the sleep-over was going and she said they were watching When Harry Met Sally, which actually I have already seen, though I wouldn’t have minded seeing it again. At least it would have been better than Snow Soppy White. I said, “I’m surprised Gemma’s mum lets her watch that,” remembering certain bits which I felt sure she wouldn’t think suitable. Gemma’s mum is really strict, in spite of being flighty and going round on broomsticks. Skinny said, “She’s sitting there with her finger on the fast forward button in case of dirty bits, but she can’t always get there in time!” and we both giggled.

  When I went back in the lounge Mum said, “It’s good to hear you sounding so cheerful.” I just frowned and didn’t say anything. That is the second time Mum has broken her promise.

  Sunday

  Dad rang this morning. He said he and Rosemary are really looking forward to having me at half-term although it is unfortunate that I won’t be able to stay with them for the whole week as they are both working and cannot get more than a few days off. He said they are very disappointed about this but they are not free agents like Mum and Slimey. They can’t just take time off whenever they feel like it.

  I said that I understood and that it would be lovely to get away even just for a few days. Dad said, “Why? Are you fed up? You’re sounding a bit fed up.” So I told him about Mum breaking her promises, not letting me have a dog or choose a video, and Dad said, “Breaking a promise to a child is one of the worst things you can do,” which I must say I heartily agree with.

  He said, “I can’t offer you a dog, but when you come to us you can watch whatever video you like, and that is a PROMISE.” I said, “You mean it? Any video I like?” and he said, “Any video except Snow White and those dratted Dwarves.” And I hadn’t even told him that that was what Mum and Slimey made me watch! He said they kept pushing it at him in his local video shop, trying to make him take it.

  “Don’t,” I said. “It’s really yucky.”

  Dad said, “I won’t, don’t worry! I was taken to see it as a kid and had nightmares for months afterwards.”

  Nightmares? What on earth could he have had nightmares about? Dad must have been an extremely sensitive little boy.

  When I told Mum about him and Rosemary not being able to get time off she gave this sort of sneer, with her lip hooped up, and said, “You amaze me!”

  “It’s because they both go out and do proper work,” I said. “They can’t just go taking days off whenever they want, like you can.”

  “Of course they can’t,” said Mum, all sarky and snide.

  “Well, they can’t,” I said. “They do very important jobs.”

  “I don’t call being a computer programmer all that important,” said Mum. “Nor being an office manager,” she added.

  It’s Rosemary who’s the office manager, Dad who’s the computer programmer. They both work in the same office, which is probably quite nice for them.

  I said, “If it wasn’t important, nobody would care if they took time off,” and to my surprise old Slimey jumped in and agreed with me. He said, “She’s absolutely right!” and I saw him give Mum this funny little frown. I don’t know what he did that for, but anyhow it stopped her trying to tell me that Dad isn’t important, which I really resent. He said, “The way I see it, everyone is important in his own way.” To which Mum snapped, “Her!” being a bit of a feminist which actually I am as well. So then old Slime says, “His or her. I stand corrected,” and goes on to say that he personally doesn’t see why a person that sweeps the road, for instance, should be considered any less important than a prime minister, which is just stupid. Anybody could sweep the road. Not anybody could be prime minister. And not anybody could be a computer programmer, either, so sucks to Mum! She certainly couldn’t be.

  141 Arethusa Road

  London W5

  18 October

  My dear Carol,

  Well, I’ve done it! My secret is out. On the whole she has taken it very well; far better than I’d dared to hope. To begin with I could see she was a bit stunned – as she had every right to be – and a bit put out that I hadn’t told her sooner, but I apologised for that and admitted that I was a coward, and I think she understood.

  I was dreading that she would feel resentful and that we’d be in for an attack of the sulks, but the other day she was even suggesting names to me and was starting to sound enthusiastic! I realise now that I was wrong to keep it from her – Roly said all along that I was – but I’m hoping no real harm has been done. I am making sure that we spend some part of every day talking about the baby together, even if it’s just five minutes, so that she will be made to feel a part of it and not left out in the cold.

  I’m glad you’ve had a good week (meeting handsome Texans! You just watch it!) because after a bumpy start so have we. Roly went away to Newcastle for just one night and I missed him more than I could have thought possible, but it gave me the opportunity I needed to talk to Cherry and make my confession, and when he came back the next day he’d brought her the most truly beautiful china ornament that he found in an antique shop. I told him that it’s far too valuable to give to a child, especially one as clumsy as Cherry, but he insisted that he had bought it for her and that she must have it. She mumbled her thanks – not quite as ungraciously as usual – and seemed reasonably pleased with it. She has put it away very carefully on a high shelf, but it’s only a matter of time before it gets smashed to smithereens.

  I sometimes wonder whether Roly is trying too hard. Might it not be better if he gave her tit for tat and treated her with the same contempt as she treats him? Unfortunately – or fortunately – it’s just not in his nature. He is a very gentle, caring person and I’m afraid that a child like Cherry rides rough-shod over him. I’m hoping that the baby may bring out the softer side of her nature. If she has one!

  No, that’s not fair. She has on the whole a very sunny personality, very bright and bubbly, and can be quite warm and loving when she chooses. I remember after Gregg and I first split up she was incredibly supportive. I couldn’t have asked for a better daughter! It’s just that at the moment events are rather conspiring to bring out the worst.

  On Saturday she wanted to go to something she calls a sleep-over at a friend’s house and we had a bit of a scene when I wouldn’t let her. Roly says I should have taken the chance, but he hasn’t seen the parents!!! The father works in a gambling den and the mother – well! The mother is something else. Huge peroxide beehive, mascara ten inches thick, mock leopardskin coat. Roly says what does it matter, but I don’t want Cherry being led into bad ways and coming back here using foul language, which she is likely to do. The child swears like a trooper. Anyway, to make up for not letting her go we all went up the road for a pizza and then came back to watch a video. Guess what we saw? SNOW WHITE! Did you ever see it when you were a kid? I adored it – and still do! Cherry was inclined to be rather sniffy at first but afterwards she went out into the hall to telephone one of her friends and I heard her laughing, so she w
as obviously happy, which is something she hasn’t always been just lately.

  She’s desperately looking forward to staying with Gregg for a few days at half-term. I just hope he doesn’t let her down. Originally she was going to go for the whole week, but surprise, surprise! He can’t get the time off. Funny he could spend a whole fortnight in Florida back in July and is going off skiing for another fortnight at Christmas, but can’t spare just one week to be with his own daughter.

  I know I mustn’t run her dad down in front of her, but the temptation is sometimes very strong! Happily on this occasion, bless him, Roly stepped in before I could open my big mouth and say something which I might afterwards have regretted. I wouldn’t want to poison Cherry’s mind against her dad. I won’t say she regards him as a god, exactly, but he is certainly far higher in the popularity stakes than my poor Roly. On the other hand, I do believe I have detected a slight softening in her attitude just recently. I am keeping my fingers crossed!

  Please report on handsome Texans.

  Love from

  Chapter 5

  Monday

  He’s still shoving these stupid cards under my door. I really hate the thought of him creeping about doing that while I’m asleep. I just keep chucking them in the waste-paper basket. I’m still on strike and so the basket is practically overflowing and everything is thick dust except for the crinoline lady on her shelf. I am too scared to dust her because she is so fragile and so I blow on her, ever so gently. Maybe if she gets too dirty I can give her a bubble bath and use the hair dryer.

  Terrible row with Mum this morning when I arrived downstairs in T-shirt and leggings and my Doc Marten’s. She screamed, “You can’t wear that gear to school! You go back upstairs and change immediately!” I said, “Into what?” I said, “It may have escaped your memory, but we don’t happen to have any school uniform at this school, we can wear whatever we like, and right now everybody is wearing T-shirt and tights and Doc Marten’s.”