Chapter 19

19

The howling winds of early January did their best to rattle their way into the house through the windowpanes but the winter gloom couldn't dampen Gio's spirits. Not today.

His physiotherapist gave him a sideways glance when he was part way through a set of leg raises. ‘You're in a good mood.'

‘What's wrong with that?' His thigh muscles tightened as he lifted his leg off the floor.

‘Nothing.' But Aysha's suspicions lingered. ‘It's making me uneasy; I'm used to you being a bit sulky.'

He burst out laughing.

‘It's most disconcerting.' But he saw the glimpse of amusement behind her reprimand.

He'd managed to hobble around with just a stick rather than crutches this morning. Aysha had observed him to make sure he was ready and it had her seal of approval. It felt like another step in the right direction – no pun intended – and boosted his mood no end. But it wasn't just that. It was the dinner with his mum and Bess yesterday evening. It had gone so well. And he hadn't imagined it. He'd caught Bess watching him more than once.

The only uncomfortable part of the turkey dinner had come when Bess brandished the bottle of plonk. It had had him on tenterhooks and, he suspected, his mother too.

Seeing that bottle had reminded him of the sound of the popping cork on one of their worst Christmases as boys.

‘Oh, relax,' Marianne had told her teenage boys when she came into the lounge that particular Christmas. The boys had been clearing out the grate. ‘Haven't you heard of people having a Buck's Fizz on Christmas Day? It's tradition! I don't know who started it but I say bottoms up to whoever did.' And she proceeded to down the drink from her champagne flute that was likely to be 80 per cent alcohol, 20 per cent juice at best.

Marco whispered, ‘How many of those do you reckon she'll have before lunch?'

‘I'd say that bottle doesn't stand a chance.'

As they laid another fire and watched The Terminator , their mum insisted she didn't need help with the lunch; she was in total control. And so they left her to her singing, warbling the Christmas music at a volume the neighbours could probably hear without opening their windows.

On the dot of 2p.m., she hollered that lunch was ready and although she was slurring her words, given she'd polished off the champagne and was already on the wine, both boys sat down to what looked set to be their most civilised lunch since their dad had walked out on the three of them. She'd even remembered to buy Christmas crackers and that day, Gio had felt as though maybe their family was hanging together okay.

But when he cut into the second piece of turkey, it wasn't cooked. ‘Mum…' He showed her the piece and he hoped he hadn't polished off any that colour already. The thought made him feel like he was going to puke.

Marianne leaned over, speared the piece of offending turkey and dumped it on a napkin in the middle of the table before telling him, ‘The rest is fine.'

But his stomach churned at the thought of eating what could be a dinner teeming with bacteria. And the remaining turkey wasn't much better so instead, he focused on the less-than-crispy roast potatoes and the vegetables which were almost pureed, they'd been on so long. It was as though their mother had dropped the brussels sprouts into the boiling water as the same time as the potatoes had gone into the oven.

His mother had been happy in herself at the dinner table but the second she noticed her boys, particularly Marco, shifting pieces of food around their plates and avoiding the meat, she started to cry.

‘You both think I'm useless.'

‘Mum…' Gio tried to stop her rant in its tracks because past experience told him that once she got going, it would be next to impossible to come back from.

But she had already worked herself up.

‘You're both acting as though I've served you something poisonous.'

‘You have.' Marco forked a piece of the meat on his plate and lifted it up to show how pink it was inside. ‘I offered to cook.' His comment did nothing to defuse the situation.

She thumped her fist on the table. ‘Why do you never trust me, why do you always assume I can't do anything?' The wailing started again.

‘Because you can't,' Marco snapped before getting up from the table, the crackers unpulled, no paper hats to be seen nor a joke from the scraps of paper inside to be heard between them.

He was right; she was pretty bad when it came to cooking, because she was usually half-cut when she did it.

Gio cleared the rest of the table and left her to wallow .

‘Why can't you be a normal mum?' Marco raged as Gio scraped the remains of his dinner into the bin.

‘I am doing my best! Your father walked out, the bastard! Why is everything my sodding fault?' And with that, she came back into the kitchen, grabbed a fresh bottle of wine from the fridge, and retreated to her bedroom.

And Gio and Marco did what they usually did; they retreated too. And that was that. Both boys went to bed and wished for the whole thing to be over.

Last night at Bess's, when she'd got that bottle out, Gio's head had been right back there on his mother's worst days. But the evening had turned into one of the best and spending all that time with Bess was something he'd fallen asleep thinking about and woken up smiling about too.

‘Gio, are you listening?' Aysha prompted. ‘You're not, you're really not. Are you tired, is that it?'

‘Nope. Not too tired. Wall squats next?'

‘Right then, let's go. Whatever has put you in this mindset today, I like it. But?—'

‘Don't push it, I know.'

Over at the wall, he placed his feet hip-width apart and at the distance away Aysha had indicated before he slowly slid his back down the wall. His knees were almost at a 45-degree angle, he held for five seconds, his quads burned but it felt good to be strengthening his body again.

‘You've turned a corner, Gio.'

‘I've been progressing for ages.'

‘I'm not talking about physically,' she said when they were done with the squats. ‘I'm talking about mentally.'

Aysha called him her star pupil after they finished up another couple of exercises and he felt ridiculously happy with the praise. He felt like today, he was getting to see a glimpse of the man he'd been. And he liked what he saw.

On a high, Gio decided the exercises and the short walk earlier was enough for the day. He didn't want any setbacks and so he made some dinner and parked himself in front of a movie.

He was beginning to drift off when his phone rang beside him. He'd started to dream about Bess, not something he wanted to be disturbed from, but he reluctantly answered the call and mumbled a hello.

It was his mother. He put a finger in his opposite ear. ‘Mum, speak up, I can't hear you. Where are you? Is Bess having a party or something?' That or her television was on so loud, it sounded like they were.

He got fragmented pieces of speech – ‘Gio… with Bess… pub… no money… taxi.'

All he heard in that spiel was the word ‘pub' and he closed his eyes. This couldn't be happening.

‘Gio… sorry…'

And then came a crashing sound, an Oh my God! , followed by a lot of laughing.

She was off her face.

A male voice took the call and Gio realised it was the landlord. ‘Look, mate, she's wasted, needs to be picked up. Neither of them have any more money or cards on them.' He sounded unimpressed. It was one thing to drink in his pub, another thing entirely to cause trouble and hassle.

Gio thought about putting the phone down, washing his hands of it all. But he wouldn't be the man he was if he did that. ‘Get them a cab or whatever. Take them to Bess's place and I'll make my way there to pay the fare.' If he left now, he'd arrive around about the same time if they got a lift in the next ten minutes .

He felt like putting his fist through a wall. Why? Why had she done this to them again?

He pulled on his coat, picked up his walking stick, but immediately swapped it for the crutches. Funny how you got used to something you'd once resented. They'd get him there a lot quicker than the stick.

He couldn't bear the thought of Bess being angry at him, that this could interfere with their friendship or anything that might have had a chance to develop between them. She'd taken his mother in as a lodger, he'd assured Bess that she would make the rent. He hadn't thought he'd have to also explain her addiction and that it could cause no end of problems. Bess didn't deserve this.

Marco was going to say I told you so , and not only that, he wouldn't be bringing himself and his kids here to visit any time soon either.

The cold air whipped at his cheeks as he made his way to Bess's. He thought about the dinner they'd shared, his mother's face radiating joy, the pride practically bursting out of her.

But tonight, she'd ruined everything. Again.

And this time, Gio wasn't sure even he could manage to be so gracious as to give her another chance.