Free Marrying the Mistress by Joanna Trollope Page A

said it was cool.’
    Jack said carelessly, removing the sausage, ‘What would she know?’
    ‘Nothing,’ Emma said, slurping strawberry yoghurt straight from the pot, ‘because it’s crap anyway.’
    ‘Trudy heard her,’ Rachel said. ‘Trudy was trying to get Mr Finlay to let her do extra art instead of home economics. Moll was in there.’
    Emma put the plastic pot on the table. She had a smear of yoghurt across the bridge of her nose.
    ‘Mr Finlay’s crap too.’
    ‘Only because he told you you couldn’t paint until you’d learned to draw.’
    ‘I don’t want to paint,’ Emma said.
    ‘OK,’ Jack said, regarding his Coca-Cola can with great intensity. ‘So this girl I don’t know liked my painting?’
    Rachel looked at him. She let a tiny pause fall.
    ‘You know her,’ she said. She bent into the fridge and retrieved the last sausage, a carton of apple juice and a mini Mars bar.
    ‘You’re not allowed chocolate till after supper,’ Emma said.
    Rachel put her bounty into the crook of one arm and added a bag of crisps.
    ‘I’m going to talk to Trudy. Before Mum gets back. I’ll probably ask her to tell me what Moll really said about your painting.’
    Jack shrugged.
    ‘Suit yourself.’
    Emma darted a hand into the fridge and snatched a couple of Mars bars.
    ‘Nobody’s going to look at
you
, Jack,’ she said. ‘Not in a million years.’
    The trouble was, Jack could now hear Rachel’s voice, but not what she was actually saying. There was a lot of laughing and every so often, Rachel said, ‘Wow!’ and, ‘Wow-ee!’ but he couldn’t tell if the subject of Moll and her admiration of Jack’s painting was ongoing or over. What, he wondered, had she actually
said
anyway?‘Cool,’ or, ‘Great,’ or, ‘Who painted that?’ or, ‘Who painted that, I’d really like to meet them?’ Downstairs, the front door slammed. Carrie always slammed it in order to give her children fair warning to stop doing the forbidden things they were doing and revert to the things they were supposed to be doing. Jack sat up and banged with his fist on the floor to warn Rachel. He heard her scream, ‘Bye-eee!’ and then silence, and knew she’d be scrambling round the bed trying to get the crisp and chocolate crumbs out, and the pillows back in, before Carrie came upstairs.
    He stood up. In view of the day’s developments, he decided he’d give Rachel a break. He opened his bedroom door and shouted, ‘Hi, Mum!’
    From two floors below Carrie called, ‘Hi,’ and then, ‘Can you give me a hand with the shopping?’
    Jack loped downstairs. The hall floor was covered with supermarket bags, bulging with depressing things like giant bottles of clothes-washing liquid and jumbo packs of dustbin liners.
    ‘This is what every girl should see,’ Carrie said, gesturing at the floor, ‘before she orders that white dress and books a beach in Bali. Can you put it all on the kitchen table?’
    Jack looped his fingers through three bags for each hand.
    ‘You love it, Ma.’
    ‘Do I?’
    ‘Yeah. You love being in charge. What’ll you do when you’ve only got Dad to make life hell for?’
    Carrie began unpacking a bag of vegetables.
    ‘Poor Dad.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘He went to see Gran today. With Alan.’
    ‘Oh.’
    ‘Yes. Oh.’ She looked at the pack in her hand. ‘Why did I get more sprouts? I am sick of sprouts and they’re horrible at this time of year. All rank.’
    ‘Is Gran OK?’
    ‘No.’
    Jack dumped four more bags on the table.
    ‘Are you pissed off with Grando?’
    Carrie gave him a quick glance.
    ‘Not particularly.’
    ‘Dad is.’
    ‘It’s different for Dad.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘He feels – well, he feels it’s tough on Gran.’
    ‘Yeah,’ Jack said, ‘tough all round.’
    The telephone rang.
    ‘Oh,’ Carrie said, her arms full of vegetables, ‘you get it—’
    Jack picked up the receiver.
    ‘Hi,’ he said. Then his expression changed. He made an embarrassed face at Carrie.