Another Life Altogether: A Novel - By Elaine Beale Page 0,111
hard against each of her cheeks; Granddad, a bemused frown on his face as he held his knife and fork expectantly aloft; while I looked over at my mother, horrified, and she stared at the collapsed table, her face a picture of dazed bafflement. And, as I observed the scene, I wondered why I hadn’t been able to prevent this calamity. I’d known my mother shouldn’t drink, and I’d witnessed the precipitous decline of her mood. I’d even seen how the kitchen table hadn’t seemed as steady as it should have when she slammed her hand down on it earlier. If I’d been brought to witness this chaotic scene by the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come a couple of hours before, I would not have been surprised. Like Scrooge, I might have asked if this version of the future was inevitable or if I could make different choices that would change the outcome. But now it was too late. And, as the turkey, which had fallen off the table to balance precariously on Frank’s vacated seat, dropped to the floor with an enormous thud, that frozen moment was ended and I was no longer distant, observing, but fully occupying my horror.
Everyone began to move. Frank scrambled to his feet and half hopped, half ran over to the sink, where he began frantically dabbing at his trousers with a wet cloth. Mabel jumped up and dashed over to help Frank, Granddad loosed his grip on his knife and fork and let them clatter to the floor, and my father, speaking through clenched teeth, said, “Jesus bloody Christ, Evelyn, you’ve gone and done it now.”
“Are you all right, love?” Mabel said as she reached Frank.
“Oh, it’s nothing,” he said bitterly. “Of course, I may never have a normal sex life again.” He looked, incensed, over at my mother, who had backed away to the kitchen counter and slid down to the floor. She sat there, legs folded under her, shoulders sunken, as if she had crumpled.
“I’m sure you’ll be all right, love,” Mabel said, grabbing another wet cloth and starting to dab at Frank’s trousers herself. “Just a bit of gravy.”
“Gravy? More like frigging molten oil. It’s not right, Mabel. I come here for Christmas dinner and I end up losing my bloody manhood.”
After his first muttered comment, my father had remained silent. But now, as I looked at him, I realized it would not be for long. He stood up slowly, visibly shaking, the muscles in his face tensed. His hands were clenched, white knuckled, with one fist still wrapped around the remnants of the Christmas cracker we had pulled. He spoke softly at first, glaring down at my mother as if his eyes could burn right through her. “You have to spoil everything, don’t you?” he began. “Bloody everything. Can’t bloody well stop yourself, can you?” Gradually, his voice became louder, his words faster. I felt myself pressed against my chair, as if I had been slammed there by a wild and irresistible gale. “We can’t even have a bloody Christmas dinner without you causing chaos,” he continued, while my mother looked at him, her face pale and expressionless. “If it’s not one thing, then it’s another. I mean, what more do you want? I try my best. I bloody well do. I go out to work every day. I come home and I try to fix up this bloody house. I put up with your moods—your bloody ups and your bloody downs, your crying fits, your screaming bloody rages, your bloody weeks in bed. I take you to the doctor’s. I try to play the nice bloody husband. The caring bloody spouse. Hah!” He let out a short, sour laugh, shaking his head as if laughing at his own stupidity. “But nothing works, does it, Evelyn? Nothing ever does. And what I want to know is, what is wrong with you? What the bloody hell is wrong?” He was yelling now, but he stared at my mother imploringly, as if he really expected a response. His question hung in the air between them, the force of his words and his need for an answer filling the room. My mother dropped her gaze to the floor and began running an index finger along the zigzag pattern in the shiny linoleum my father had laid a couple of weeks before. My father sputtered and turned away. “I don’t know why I bother, I really don’t,” he said, closing his eyes