8. An Extended Family

Peter's grandchildren finally meet him when he is wrapped in a towed!

STELLA‘S AUTUMN

8. An Extended Family

“You do know that I’m eighty-two, don’t you?” exclaimed Stella next morning as she smoothed her floral nightie with brisk sweeps of one hand and tried to look ss if what had happened had nothing to do with her.

“And I’m the best part of eighty. Birthday in a couple of months, and I thought that was a journey I’d never make again,” sighed Percival.

“And if you plan to make it again you’d best think of consigning your collar to the bottom drawer, and forgetting about it,” suggested Stella, knowing he wouldn’t be able to do anything of the kind. He had been a clergyman for half a century, give or take, and there was a great deal that she neither wanted to understand or believe could possibly have any bearing to the real world, the one she had lived in for eighty-two years, but that was ingrained in him by now.

“You do know what my life was, darling?” he said sadly, with Christ, in the church.

“Hey! You called me darling and not babe!” she exclaimed, “and we’ve only known each other for two days!”

“And the rest. The two years I sacrificed for my god,” he muttered.

“Your god, and not mine. What did the ancients believe in, then? The thousands of generations of human beings before someone in the middle east decided that a bearded bloke in the skies created Adam and Eve?”

“They were primitive and no way could they have understood the things I believe in,” he sighed, “but I can’t cast away what I’ve done for all those years, the good I’ve done for troubled people in times of need. And I won’t.”

“And sex outside marriage? What did you have to say about that from your pulpit? And has what you’ve just done changed your mind about it?”

He looked uncomfortable. “I’m sorry I’ve led you astray...” he murmured, “if that’s what you think I’ve done…”

“No, Percy,” she said, “you haven’t done anything of the kind. I believe that one of the main instincts, the survival of the species through reproduction, has evolved to become a necessary pleasure and that there can be no rational reason not to take advantage of it. Look, when we’re on holiday in France, will it be the holier than thou vicar I’m travelling with, or a real human being who accepts reality? I mean, are we likely to repeat this morning’s exercise in the Dordogne or not?”

“It just happened. I couldn’t help it,” he grumbled.

“Poor helpless Percival,” she said, “we’ll have to see what the French air does to you, I suppose. But promise me one thing. Put that darned collar of yours at the bottom of your suitcase!”

“And deny my faith?”

“No, Percy, don’t deny anything, just don’t advertise it either! Is that an agreement?”

He sighed. “I suppose so,” he murmured, “come on, it’s got to be time for breakfast and I need a cup of something hot and wet.”

They slowly climbed out of bed and he looked at her appreciatively.

“I reckon you must lie about your age,” he said quietly, “to look at you, I’d say you can’t be a day over twenty-one!”

“Cheeky!” she grinned, “when you know that I was twenty-two sixty years ago! But I wish you were right and the years hadn’t rolled by like they have. You know, what, when you’re young and innocent and think of the past it seems to go back for ever, and then when you’re old and crusty and do the same looking back, the perspective hasn’t changed much, it seems to go back for ever. It’s just the future that’s changed. You can’t see beyond a handful more birthdays.”

He nodded. “Then a heavenly eternity,” he whispered.

“I’ll let you off with that one, but I don’t believe a word of it,” she insisted, and they pulled their clothes on. He’d found clean underwear from somewhere, which she couldn’t help both wondering where from and admiring his attention to hygiene.

“Have a shower whenever you want,” she said suddenly, “I usually have one some time in the afternoon, when I feel I need to be refreshed.”

“Then I’ll pop in now, if you don’t mind,” he told her, “I was thinking of nipping back to my lodgings, for convenience.”

“We’ll talk about that soon enough,” she said, “I’m eighty-two and not even in my more optimistic moments can I see me lasting for ever. There are plenty of towels in the cupboard in there. Use whatever you need, though there’s no shaving stuff.”

“I’ve got a battery job, babe,” he grinned.

Stella went down the stairs, slowly because that was how she had to move when on stairs, and arrived at the bottom just in time to be next to the front door when it was knocked. She recognised the rhythm. It would be Peter, and it was. With him were his wife Miriam and twins, Mack and Bella.

“My, you keep growing,” she said to Mack, “you must be a foot taller than your dad!”

“I hear you’ve got a boyfriend, gran,” he said with a smile.

“He means, our granddad,” added Bella.

“He’s in the shower at the moment,” Stella told them, so how about coming into the front room while I make coffee. I’d have thought you would be at work today, Peter,”

“I’m on strike,” he informed her, “I don’t like it, but something’s got to be done to save this country. All the money’s in a few hands, and it’s getting worse. Even Miriam’s looking for a job, or we’ll be going to a food bank.”

“And you on a doctor’s wage,” muttered Stella, shaking her head. “Anyway, seeing as you’re not at work, I’ve got some news for you.”

They went into the front room and Stella attended to hot drinks “Will tea do instead of coffee?” she called though. “Anything, granny,” replied Mack on behalf of the four of them.

“I thought I heard voices,” came Percival’s voice from the top of the stairs, followed by a clump as he started the climb down.

“What was your news, gran?” asked Bella, “is it that your lover’s returned and you’ll spend the rest of your lives in harmonious bliss tpgether?”

“Not quite,” she said, “we are going abroad for a holiday in a couple of weeks. Together.”

“Crikey,” grinned Peter, “I never though you’d go flying again!”

“Because I’m not!” retorted Stella, “Wr’re going on a bus.”

“What? Over the seas on a bus?” asked Miriam.

“There are such things as ferries,” said Percival from the door, having battled his way down the stairs. “I think I’ll have a stair-lift put in if I’m to come very often,” he added.

“Let me introduce you to your grandfather,” put in Stella, “Minus his dog collar, thak goodness. This man is Percival and once upon a long time ago we were a couple.”

“And enclosed in a bath sheet,” noted Peter, “hello again; dad.”

© Peter Rogerson, 08.07.23

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