picked up the wrapper between his fingernails, dropped it quickly into the bin, then washed his hands more vigorously than he had ever washed them in his life.
Andrew spent a lot of time staring at Gaia's Facebook page on his laptop. It was almost more intimidating than she was in person. He spent hours poring over photographs of the people that she had left behind in the capital. She came from a different world: she had black friends, Asian friends, friends with names he could never have pronounced. There was a photograph of her in a swimsuit that was burnt into his brain, and another of her, leaning up against a filthily good-looking coffee-skinned boy. He had no spots, and actual stubble. By a process of careful examination of all her messages, Andrew had concluded that this was an eighteen-year-old called Marco de Luca. Andrew stared at Marco's and Gaia's communications with the concentration of a code-breaker, unable to decide whether they indicated a continuing relationship or not.
His Facebook browsing was often tinged with anxiety, because Simon, whose understanding of how the internet worked was limited, and who instinctively mistrusted it as the only area of his sons' life where they were freer and more at ease than he, would sometimes erupt unexpectedly into their bedrooms to check what they were viewing. Simon claimed that he was making sure that they were not running up huge bills, but Andrew knew it to be one more manifestation of his father's need to exert control, and the cursor hovered constantly over the box that would shut the page whenever he was perusing Gaia's details online.
Ruth was still rattling from topic to topic, in a fruitless attempt to make Simon produce more than surly monosyllables.
'Ooooh,' she said suddenly. 'I forgot: I spoke to Shirley today, Simon, about you maybe standing for the Parish Council.'
The words hit Andrew like a punch.
'You're standing for the council?' he blurted.
Simon slowly raised his eyebrows. One of the muscles in his jaw was twitching.
'Is that a problem?' he asked, in a voice that throbbed with aggression.
'No,' lied Andrew.
You've got to be fucking joking. You? Standing for election? Oh fuck, no.
'It sounds like you've got a problem with it,' said Simon, still staring straight into Andrew's eyes.
'No,' said Andrew again, dropping his gaze to his shepherd's pie.
'What's wrong with me standing for the council?' Simon continued. He was not about to let it go. He wanted to vent his tension in a cathartic outburst of rage.
'Nothing's wrong. I was surprised, that's all.'
'Should I have consulted you first?' said Simon.
'No.'
'Oh, thank you,' said Simon. His lower jaw was protruding, as it often did when he was working up to losing control. 'Have you found a job yet, you skiving, sponging little shit?'
'No.'
Simon glared at Andrew, not eating, but holding a cooling forkful of shepherd's pie in mid-air. Andrew switched his attention back to his food, determined not to offer further provocation. The air pressure within the kitchen seemed to have increased. Paul's knife rattled against his plate.
'Shirley says,' Ruth piped up again, her voice high-pitched, determined to pretend all was well until this became impossible, 'that it'll be on the council website, Simon. About how you put your name forward.'
Simon did not respond.
Her last, best attempt thwarted, Ruth fell silent too. She was afraid that she might know what was at the root of Simon's bad mood. Anxiety gnawed at her; she was a worrier, she always had been; she couldn't help it. She knew that it drove Simon mad when she begged him for reassurance. She must not say anything.
'Si?'
'What?'
'It's all right, isn't it? About the computer?'
She was a dreadful actress. She tried to make her voice casual and calm, but it was brittle and high-pitched.
This was not the first time stolen goods had entered their home. Simon had found a way of fiddling the electricity meter too, and did small jobs on the side, at the printworks, for cash. All of it gave her little pains in the stomach, kept her awake at night; but Simon was contemptuous of people who did not dare take the shortcuts (and part of what she had loved about him, from the beginning, was that this rough and wild boy, who was contemptuous, rude and aggressive to nearly everyone, had taken the trouble to attract her; that he, who was so difficult to please, had selected her, alone, as worthy).
'What are you talking about?' Simon asked quietly. The full focus of his