35. Socks Full of Food

Socks full of food

It took many hours to retrieve the Range Rover and it was pretty late when Jimmy got home, but Monica was stil awake.

‘I only just got Lil ie down,’ she said. ‘I was about to clear up.’

‘Sod that,’ said Jimmy, heading for the fridge. ‘I need a drink.’

e family room was something of a tip but Jimmy didn’t care any more. If anyone had ever told him in his previous life that he would be virtual y indifferent to treading on soggy rusk in his socks he would have laughed at them, but now he didn’t even notice. Just as he didn’t notice the crunch of toys and fal en fridge magnets under his feet either. And when he opened the fridge he didn’t notice the vast array of bowls containing bits of half-eaten kiddie meals, diced carrots and mashed potatoes, al careful y preserved under cling lm until the time when they would be deemed mouldy enough to be legitimately chucked away. Or the half-squeezed Frube Tubes and half-chewed, spit-soaked lol ipops lying on saucers because Cressida insisted that such precious items be preserved at al costs.

He ignored al this, which in a previous life he would have deemed unacceptable to a civilized standard of living, and simply pul ed the wine from where it nestled in the fridge door.

What Jimmy could not avoid noticing was the upturned plug-socket protector. Even a brain-dead dysfunctional like him could not ignore that when treading on it. He screamed in agony and staggered backwards, dropping a third-ful bottle of wine in the process and going for six over a plastic re engine.

‘Are you OK, Jimmy?’ Monica asked, fetching a mop and a dustpan and brush.

‘I hate those plug protectors,’ he gasped from the oor.

‘We need them. Cressida’s rushing about al over the place now.’

‘I know, but I stil hate them. And what’s more, when you want to get one out of the socket, you can’t.’

‘Wel , that’s the point, isn’t it? If we can’t, then she can’t.’

‘Yes, but what about when you want to plug something in?’

‘Like what? We have sockets for the toaster and the kettle.’

‘I don’t know. Something new? Like that breadmaker my mother gave us for Christmas.’

‘Yes, you’re right, Jimmy,’ Monica said sarcastical y, ‘because bread is so difficult to nd in London, it would be wel worth risking our daughter’s electrocution to bake some at home.’

ere was silence for a while. Jimmy wasn’t real y interested in plug sockets; he was just putting off the awful moment when he would have to tel Monica about Toby being chucked out of Abbey Hal .

en a tiny piece of emotional good fortune came his way. It turned out that Toby had made the decision for them.

‘Jimmy,’ Monica said, ‘Toby’s been talking to me and he wants to leave Abbey Hal .’

‘Real y? Why?’

‘He’s not stupid. He knows he doesn’t belong there any more.’

‘Is he being bul ied?’

‘I don’t think so, not terribly. Teased, certainly, but he’s tough enough for that, I think. No. He just knows that he’s at a posh school but that his dad isn’t rich any more. We’ve already pul ed him out of the ski ng trip and there was a note today about a trip to the theatre which wil cost sixty pounds in al . He’s worked out for himself that we can’t afford that sort of thing any more.’

‘at’s pretty sad, isn’t it? I mean if he’s feeling guilty about how much he’s costing us. Makes me feel a complete failure.’

‘He isn’t feeling guilty and this isn’t about you, Jim. It’s about him. I think the penny’s dropped for him in a way that it stil hasn’t for us. He doesn’t feel like a rich kid any more. Maybe it’s because we used to bang on so much about how lucky we were and how we should never take it for granted. I honestly think he took us at our word and never did. Take it for granted, I mean. And now he can see that everything’s changed and he’s accepted it.’

‘Wow,’ said Jimmy. ‘He’s a good kid, isn’t he?’

‘Yes.’

‘As it happens, Mr Lombard was chucking him out anyway.’

‘No! e bastard! I can’t believe it. He’s an Abbey Hal boy.’

‘at’s what I said.’

‘Fuck him.’

‘Yes, fuck him.’

‘Toby’s a good kid,’ Monica said as Jimmy went back to the fridge.

‘Better than us, I reckon,’ Jimmy replied over his shoulder.

‘Yes, but he’s got our DNA. So we take some of the credit.’

‘Oh certainly. We get the credit for nature and I suppose Jodie gets the credit for nurture. A lot of it anyway.’

‘at’s a bit sad, isn’t it?’

‘Yes. I suppose it is.’

‘Funny it took us losing everything to work that out.’

Jimmy brought another bottle of wine and put it on the oor in front of them. en he sat down beside Monica and for a while they just held each other.

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