Passion Flower

To be honest, I was never quite sure what work Dad actually did. When people at school asked me, like my best friend Vix Stephenson, I couldn’t think what to say. Once when we were about ten Vix told me she had heard her mum saying that “What Stephanie’s dad does is a total mystery.” Vix asked me what it meant. Very quickly, I said, “It means that what he does is top secret.” Vix’s eyes grew wide.

“You mean, like … he’s a spy, or something?”

I said, “Sort of.”

“You mean he works for MI5?”

“I can’t tell you,” I said. “It’s confidential.”

It was so confidential I’m not sure that even Mum knew. ‘Cos one time when I asked her she said, in this weary voice, that my guess was as good as hers. I said, “Mum, he’s not a … a criminal, is he?”

It was something that had been worrying me. I had these visions of Dad climbing up drainpipes and going through windows and helping himself to stuff from people’s houses. Tellies and videos and jewellery, and stuff. I didn’t imagine him holding up petrol stations or anything like that; I didn’t think he would ever be violent. Mum was the violent one, if anyone was! She was the one who threw things. But I was really scared that he might be a thief. I was quite relieved when Mum gave this short laugh and said, “Nothing so energetic! You have to have staying power for that … you have to be organised. That’s the last thing you could accuse your dad of!” She said that Dad was an “opportunist”.

“He just goes along for the ride.”

I said, “You mean, he gets on trains without a ticket?”

“Something like that,” said Mum.

“Oh, well! That’s not so bad,” I said.

“It’s not so good, either,” said Mum.

She sounded very bitter. I didn’t like it when Mum sounded bitter. This was my dad she was talking about! My dad, who bought us trampolines and camcorders. Mum never bought us anything like that. I was still only little when we had this conversation, when I got worried in case Dad was a criminal; I mean, I was still at Juniors. I was in Year 8 by the time Mum threw the frying pan. I still loved Dad, I still hated it when Mum got bitter, but I was beginning to understand why she did. There were moments when I felt really sorry for Mum. She tried so hard! And just as she thought she’d got everything back on track, like paying off the arrears on the gas bill, or saving up for a new cooker, Dad would go and blow it all. He didn’t mean to! It was like he just couldn’t stop himself.

The day after Mum threw the frying pan, Dad left home. The Afterthought said that Mum got rid of him, and I think for once she may have been right. Mum was certainly very fed up. She said that Dad spending her cooker money was the last straw.

I don’t think that she and Dad had a row; at any rate, I never heard any sounds of shouting. I think she simply told him to go, and he went. He was there when we left for school in the morning – and gone by the time we got back. Mum sat us down at the kitchen table and broke the news to us.

“Your dad and I have decided to live apart. You’ll still see him – he’s still your dad – but we’re just not going to be living together any more. It’s best for all of us.”

Well! Mum may have thought it was best, but me and the Afterthought were stunned. How could Dad leave us, just like that? Without any warning? Without even saying goodbye?

“It was Mum,” sobbed the Afterthought. “She threw him out!”

That was what Dad said, too, when he rang us later that same evening. He said, “Well, kids —” we were both listening in, me on the extension “ —it looks like this is it for your poor old dad. Given my marching orders! Seems I’ve upset her Royal Highness just once too often. Now she won’t have me in the house any more.”

Dad was trying to make light of it, ‘cos that was Dad. He was always joking and fooling around, he never took anything seriously. But I could tell he was quite shaken. I don’t think he ever dreamt that Mum would really throw him out. Always, in the past, he’d managed to get round her. They’d kiss and make up, and Mum would end up laughing, in spite of herself, and saying that Dad was shameless. But not this time! This time, he’d really blown it.

“She’s had enough of me,” said Dad. “She doesn’t love me any more.”

“Dad, I’m sure she does!” I said.

“She doesn’t, Steph. She told me … Daniel Rose, I’ve had it with you. You get out of my life once and for all. Those were her words. That’s what she said to me. I’ve had it with you.”

Oh, Dad, I thought, stop! I can’t bear it!

“She’s a cow!” shrieked the Afterthought, all shrill.

“No, Sam. Never say that about your mum. She’s had a lot to put up with.”

“So have you!” shrieked the Afterthought.

“Ah, well … I’ve probably deserved it,” said Dad. He was being ever so meek about it all. Taking the blame, not letting us say anything bad about Mum. Meek wasn’t like my dad! But that, somehow, just made it all the worse, what she’d done to him.

“Dad, what are you going to do?” I said.

“I don’t know, Steph, and that’s a fact. I’m a bit shaken up just at the moment. Got to get my act together.”

“Shall I try asking Mum if she’ll let you come back?”

“Better hadn’t. Only set her off again.”

“But you don’t want to go, do you, Dad?”

“Want to? What do you think?” said Dad. “Go and leave my two girls? It’s breaking my heart, Pusskin!”

He had me crying, in the end. If he’d been spitting blood, like Mum, I wouldn’t have felt quite so bad about it. I mean, I’d still have felt utterly miserable at the thought of him not being with us, but at least I’d have understood that he and Mum just couldn’t go on living together any more. But Dad still thought Mum was the bee’s knees! It’s what he’d always called her: the bee’s knees. He wasn’t the one that wanted to break up. It was Mum who was ruining everything.

“Couldn’t you just give him one last chance?” I begged.

“Stephanie, I have lost count of all the last chances I’ve given that man,” said Mum. “I’m sorry, but enough is enough. He has turned my life into turmoil!”

It is very upsetting, when one of your parents suddenly isn’t there any more; it’s like a big black hole. The poor old Afterthought took it very hard. She went into a crying fit that lasted for days, and when she couldn’t cry any more she started on the sulks. No one can sulk like the Afterthought! Mum tried everything she knew. She coaxed and cajoled, she cuddled and kissed – as best she could, with the Afterthought fighting her off – until in the end she lost patience and snapped, “It hasn’t been easy for me, you know, all these years!” The Afterthought just went on sulking.

Mum said, “Stephanie, for goodness’ sake talk to her! We can’t carry on like this.”

I tried, but the Afterthought said she wasn’t going to forgive Mum, ever. She said if she couldn’t be with Dad, her life wasn’t worth living.

“Why couldn’t I go with him?”

I suggested this to Mum, but Mum tightened her lips and said, “No way! Your father wouldn’t even be capable of looking after a pot plant.”

“It’s not up to her!” screamed the Afterthought. “It’s up to me! I’m old enough! I can choose who I want to be with!”

But when she asked Dad, the next time he rang us, Dad said that much as he would love to have the Afterthought with him – “and your sister, too!” – it just wasn’t possible right at this moment.

“He’s got to get settled,” said the Afterthought. “As soon as he’s settled, I can go and live with him!”

“Over my dead body,” said Mum.

“I can!” screeched the Afterthought. “I’m old enough! You can’t stop me! As soon as he’s settled!”

Even I knew that the chances of Dad getting settled were about zilch; Dad just wasn’t a settling kind of person. But it seemed to make the Afterthought happy. She seemed to think she’d scored over Mum. Whenever Mum did anything to annoy her she’d shriek, “It won’t be like this when I go and live with Dad!” Or if Mum wouldn’t let her have something she wanted, it was, “Dad would let me!” There was, like, this permanent feud between the Afterthought and Mum.

Her name isn’t really the Afterthought, by the way. Not that I expect anyone ever thought it was. Even flaky people like Dad don’t christen their children with names like Afterthought, and anyway, Mum would never have let him. Her name is actually Samantha; but I once asked Mum and Dad why they’d waited four years between us, instead of having us quickly, one after the other, so that we’d be nearer the same age and could be friends and do things together and talk the same language (instead of one of us being almost grown up and the other a child, and quite a tiresome one, at that). Mum said it was because they hadn’t really been going to have any more kids. She said, “Sam was an afterthought.” Dad at once added, “But a very nice afterthought! We wouldn’t want to be without her.”

Oh, no? Well, I suppose we wouldn’t. She’s all right, really; just a bit young. Hopefully she’ll grow out of it. Anyway, that was when me and Dad started calling her the Afterthought. Just as a joke, to begin with, but then it sort of stuck. Mum never called her that. The Afterthought said she wouldn’t want her to.