Changing Speed

CHAPTER SIX: SISTERS

The plane touched down with a thud. We were back to our normality. It was cold and wet and the place we had left behind seemed like a different world from a distant memory. It was incredulous that only five hours ago I had been wiping the sweat from my brow. Still I had reason enough to feel pleased with myself. If there had been a Greek god, bronzed and balding with a portly belly then I could have called myself such. My suntan had given me more confidence in my appearance than I'd had for some time. There had been some ups and some downs but the holiday had in general been a success.

There was time now only to sleep. My wife and the children had retired to bed being work and school respectively the following morning, whilst I unloaded the suitcases from the car. The packed suitcases remained in the living room for much of the next day. In truth I hadn't wanted the holiday to end. The talk of emigrating, even if talk is all it was, made my adrenaline waken. I realised that the suitcases had to be unpacked but it made things so final. Instead I called to my parents. My mother looked better than the last time I'd seen her, somehow more at peace with herself. She smiled at me with her eyes and held my hand as I sat cross-legged on the floor facing her. Never before do I recall her holding my hand. She had readied herself for what is inevitable for us all. My father spoke openly in front of my mother, for the first time as far as I knew, about the cancer. My mother was without expression. They had both accepted what was to be. I didn't want my mother to accept what was to be. I wanted her to fight the cancer for me. I was being selfish. I knew it but I couldn't change the way I felt. I didn't say anything.

I was just about to leave when there was a knock at the door. It was a priest from the parish in which my parents belonged. He had known my parents since long before I was born and had become as much a friend to them as he was their mentor. He was much older than I remembered and his mobility was severely impaired from unsuccessful hip replacement operations. His black suit and white dog collar failed to mask his years. The only thing about him that had remained constant was his thick Irish accent. I invited him in, holding out my hand as a greeting. Instead of shaking my hand, he grabbed hold of it to pull himself in over the threshold.

The atmosphere in the house changed instantaneously. My father stood respectfully upright and as bold as if he were back in the army where he had so long served as a sergeant major. My mother preened her hair upward with her fingers in the absence of a comb. The letter 'h' began to be dropped from where it should have belonged and be inserted into words where it shouldn't. I began to make my excuses to leave but the priest kept a tight hold of my hand as if it were a child's comfort blanket. He wanted to know how I was, making it obvious that I had been the subject of numerous discussions and quite likely that they had prayed together for me. I answered him curtly. He wanted something from me more than the support of my hand. I guessed it was probably the ego trip of me asking for his blessing. He represented God and God had allowed my mother to develop cancer. I had little time for him and, but for my mother being there, I would have told him so. I left the house and headed for home, my disdain having grown into anger by the time I arrived.

My wife's sister was sat in her car parked on the drive. Never before had she called to the house without my wife being there. Around her I was never in a positive mood at the very best of times. This wasn't the very best of times. Right now I was feeling nasty. I wanted to inflict pain verbally on somebody and she presented herself as the perfect subject. As I stopped the car next to hers, she jumped out asking how my mother was. It was none of her concern and I told her so. She was taken aback at my being so rude but not sufficiently to curtail her movement forwards. She somehow interpreted my attitude towards her as a cry for help. I was looking for sympathy and understanding and she was there to give it to me she thought. She thought wrongly.

I unlocked the door and walked into the house without asking her to follow and without closing the door on her. She followed me in anyway and, without taking her coat off, put a kettle of water on to boil. She asked if I wanted a drink. I didn't. I wanted her to leave but still she interpreted my attitude as a cry for help. She wanted me to ask for her help I surmised. The two people I had least time for, the priest and my wife's sister, both wanted something from me and neither were going to get it. She said she would call again when I was feeling better and left. This was good news to me seeing as how I'd been feeling pretty much like this for the last couple of years or so.