Free Soft in the Head by Marie-Sabine Roger

saying:
    “Think about it, Jacqueline, think carefully! If I walk out this door, you’ll never see me again!”
    “I’ve already thought about it. Two…”
    “I forgive you!”
    My mother lifted the pitchfork, aiming an inch or two higher. She said:
    “Three.”
    Gardini said Ow-fuck-shit-fuck! a couple more times—varying the order—then legged it down the garden.
    He climbed behind the wheel of his car, waved his fist, screaming, This isn’t the end of it! and took off at top speed leaving the caravan behind since, that particular morning, it was unhitched.
     
    A few days later, Monsieur Saunier—he was mayor at the time—came by to see my mother.
    “Listen, the reason I’ve come to see you is because we’ve had a call at the office from a man named Gardini about a caravan that is apparently parked on your property.”
    “That’s true.”
    “He wants it back.”
    “Let him come round,” my mother said, “I’ll give him a warm welcome.”
    “You sound hostile, Jackie,” said the mayor, “Do you have some grievance against this man?”
    My mother said:
    “He’s been beating my lad.”
    “Oh…” said the mayor.
    “And me.”
    “Really?”
    “What are you planning to do? Send the police round?”
    “And why would I do that?… You’ve assured me that, if he should show his face, the gentleman will get a warm welcome, haven’t you?”
    “That’s what I said.”
    “You have not made any threats against him in my presence, have you?”
    “No.”
    “In that case, it is a personal matter that does not concern the local police. You have every right to give a friend a warm welcome .”
    “Damn right,” my mother said, “It’s a free country!”
    “In that case, I believe we’re done. Oh, no, while I think of it… I don’t suppose you have a pitchfork by any chance?”
    “In the garage.”
    “Would you lend it to me for… let’s say two or three months?”
     
    The chicken-shit bastard phoned to threaten my mother every night for a few weeks. Then the calls became less frequent. Eventually they stopped.
    “But Jackie, what will you do if he comes back?” the neighbours would ask.
    And my mother would say:
    “A mischief.”
    She always was a woman of few words.

 
     
    I N THE BEGINNING , I used the caravan as a playhouse, later as a shag pad, and it was really practical. Eventually, one day, I decided to make it my primary residence.
    It has to be said that my mother was getting to be unbearable.
    She was getting to be completely batshit crazy, which was sad since she was only sixty-three. She’d got to where she only talked to the cat, and even then it was just repeating the same old things. She wasn’t interested in anything any more except her magazines; she would spend all day cutting out photos of American actors and pasting them over photos in the family albums. I don’t have much in the way of memories, and I don’t really give a toss, but it scared the crap out of me—to put it politely—seeing Tom Cruise or Robert De Niro pasted over my grandfather or my uncle Georges.
    When I asked her why she was doing it, she said:
    “I’m tired of looking at his ugly mug.”
    “Are you talking about Grandad or Uncle Georges?”
    “Both. They’re as bad as each other.”
     
    I came to the point where I thought that with parents, the only thing is to get out as early as you can. I hope the Good Lord can forgive such ingratitude, but He had it easy, His mother was a saint. So He can’t really compare the two.
    I’m talking about normal people, crazy people like my old lady.
    You don’t get this sort of problem with animals. When sparrows leave the nest, they don’t come back for lunch every Sunday as far as I know. And their parents don’t go round saying, What sort of time do you call this? Where have you been? Wipe your feet before you come in! Beasts are cleverer than us, even if they are dumb animals.
    Obviously, it was down to me to move out, to leave my mother.