Was he pushing his grief that Ginny wasn’t here to protect him down into some deep, dark place? But protect him from whom? From me? With my get-out-of-jail-free card that I’d sported all my adult life? ‘My best friend is black.’ When push came to shove though, I’d left it to Patrick to call out other people when they’d gone, ‘Young black man, drugs, must be him.’ And I’d allowed my mother to pat his hair. Actually pat his hair. Like some prize poodle with a bow in its fur.
I heard some muffled sniggering in the hallway, then Phoebe appeared in the kitchen in a pair of jeans that had more holes than fabric. Victor followed her in, still wearing his hat.
I tried to make eye contact to warn Phoebe about the knitted tea-cosy that was also heading her way, but she ignored me completely. I hoped Mum wouldn’t notice the strained atmosphere between us and add fuel to the fire by deciding to investigate.
But she was a woman on a mission to distribute her bounty. ‘Hello darling.’ Her eyes dropped to Phoebe’s jeans, but she omitted to comment in her rush to hand over another lurid creation.
Phoebe giggled but not unkindly. ‘Thanks, Nan. See you’ve been busy.’ She turned to Victor. ‘Bet I look better in it than you.’
And with that she plonked it on her head, whipped out her phone, leant against Victor and took a selfie. Then she marched over to my mum. ‘Right, Nan. Honest opinion. Who looks best? Go on, it’s me, isn’t it? You don’t have to be tactful. Victor can take it. I am the one who bosses the orange woolly hat, yeah?’
I stood, waiting for her to say something horrible, something I’d have to repair afterwards, ashamed that I hadn’t done a better job and simultaneously furious with my mother for having an opinion on everything. That rage was sitting there, primed, ready to spill, before Mum even uttered a word, a bubbling cauldron of pre-emptive anger.
But Phoebe didn’t say anything mean. She made Mum’s day, who was all, ‘I knew you’d like it. As soon as I saw it in my magazine, I thought that’s the hat for those two.’ She grabbed Phoebe’s hand. ‘Your old nan knows you best.’
‘I’m actually going to sleep in this. It’s so cool.’ Phoebe was twirling round the kitchen. I couldn’t work out whether this was some kind of elaborate joke or whether I really did have no idea what Phoebe would like. The only thing I knew for sure was that Victor coming to live with us had magnified the cracks in everyone’s veneer. And if I wasn’t going to let him down, let Ginny down, I was going to have to stop being such a coward.
Chapter Fifteen
Over the next few days, Patrick and I danced around each other with our views about whether Victor was a ‘contributing factor’ to the problems with Phoebe or the main trigger. Or a red herring and, in fact, he was fine, it was our daughter who was out of control.
Patrick seemed a bit sparing with the details about what he’d uncovered from his chat with Victor, which led to me picking away at him. I didn’t want to fall into Andrea’s camp of blaming Victor for Phoebe’s shortcomings but I couldn’t deny that I was increasingly concerned that all the various stresses and strains of our domestic situation were only going to exacerbate Phoebe continuing to press the self-destruct button.
‘He doesn’t seem to do that much work, always seems so last minute, which probably leads to Phoebe doing a lot less,’ I suggested.
Patrick frowned. ‘He’s still getting better results than her though. Don’t you remember what Ginny was like with assignments? How many times did we get back from a night out to find her typing up a feature at 3 a.m.?’
I had to smile at the image that conjured up of Ginny in her pyjamas and fluffy bedsocks, swearing away in a shipwreck of coffee mugs and biscuit wrappers.
‘It’s not Victor’s fault, but inevitably we’re spreading ourselves more thinly and I think Phoebe’s suffering as a result.’
‘So what do you propose?’ Patrick asked.
I wasn’t sure I really wanted to suggest this, but I said it anyway. ‘Should we see about him going to live with her brother instead?’
Patrick dropped his head down. ‘Are you serious? You want to pack an eighteen-year-old off to Australia to someone he probably last saw when he was about ten? Her