Bleak Spring

‘It just came up in conversation.’

‘Some conversation you must’ve had,’ said Mrs Carss, down-to-earth as usual. ‘Your tea all right, Sugar? I forgot to ask if you took sugar.’

Sugar gave her a big smile, peeled off her jacket; Jason wanted to laugh, seeing his step-grandmother peeling off her feathers or balloons or whatever she had worn in her stripper days. ‘No, I’ve never taken sugar, even though I come from Bundaberg. Up there in the sugarcane country, if you don’t take sugar they run you outa town.’

‘I often meant to ask,’ said Mrs Carss, ‘so your real name’s not Bundy? Short for Bundaberg?’

‘My real name’s Rockne,’ said Sugar. ‘Now.’

A goal to you, thought Jason, a two-handed slam-dunk right into the basket.

George looked back at Olive. ‘Are you gunna claim the money?’

‘Of course, if it’s legitimately Will’s. Otherwise, where would it go?’

‘I wouldn’t start spending it till you get it, Olive. It’ll probably have to go before the courts and you can never trust them.’

‘That’s because you’re a communist,’ said Mrs Carss.

George’s wrinkles increased; he had decided to humour the old bat. She was actually six years younger than he, but he knew an old bat when he met one. ‘I’m retired, Ruby. Didn’t you know communism is dead? It’s in the papers every day.’ His face was smiling, but his eyes were not. You couldn’t laugh at the end of the world. ‘Take my word, Olive. Don’t trust the courts. Wait till you’ve got your hands on the money before you spend it.’

When Jason had opened the front door to his grandfather he had experienced the sudden sad, mad hope that all the enmity and bitterness would be forgotten, though he had never been told or understood what had caused all the ill-feeling. He had just had the hope that as a family they would be together, as he had dreamed they might be. He had never confessed it to anyone, never could, never would, but he had always wanted the sort of extended family that he had read about in some books. He knew that family life on TV was all crap, but he had wished for something like it, to have a grandfather, even if he was a commo, who would tell him what life had been like when he